Get tested

Last February, I ventured up to FitWerx in Vermont and underwent VO2 max testing with Joey Adams. When you only have a few days a week to train, you have no choice but to train as efficiently as you possibly can. And to train efficiently (and moreover, to race efficiently), you need to know your heart rate zones, which I never did before the test. I'll be back again this Winter for another test, just to see how things have adjusted since the last trip up there. The test is about 12 minutes, and when you start, you feel like a monster. Inside of the last minute, you feel very, very different. I'll just leave it there.

If I were to guess, I probably train the least of anyone who has aspirations for being a competitive hillclimber; at least, in the winter months. I have very little tolerance for sitting on a trainer or a spin bike. 45 minutes is about all I have in me before my boredom starts to transform directly into hate. And I usually can devote 3 days a week (sometimes 4) to training, but by no means could I ever do it every day. I have to many other interests and things I'd just much rather do than sit in a hamster wheel. If it becomes mechanical and mandatory, all of the fun in this will disappear. These are bikes after all. Kids ride bikes. You can't take them too seriously.

So that's where the efficiency comes in. I need to make the most of every single minute I can devote to getting better. Using that efficiency, I went from a 1:45 on Washington the year prior to a 1:35 this year. Now, who knows how low it will go. Eventually, my progress will level off as I reach my physiological potential. Who knows where that is though. 2006 was my first year riding, so hopefully there's a (warning: impending horrible pun) long road ahead.

Here we go

For 2008, I began training for Mt. Wash in February. After two months of purely aerobic base work, I did a lot of high intensity riding, but very little if any strength work. Cardio-wise I felt very good all year, but never felt very strong at all. And since I was constantly wrapped up in really hard rides, I never had enough energy on the off-days to do any strength work.

A two month fight with insomnia didn't really help either. It made base training orders of magnitude more difficult than it should have been.

This year, I'm starting early. Two weeks ago I started two months of aerobic base, which will leave me all of February and March to do work on getting stronger. It would be good to feel a little more powerful when the early April riding begins.

Tough to tell from the picture above, but at that point in the race I was a complete zombie. Even still, I managed a 1:40 that day, and a 1:35 a month prior. I'm aiming for the 1:20s in '09, but as we see every year, you never know what the mountain is going to throw at you. I give it my best, and so does the rockpile.

A month off

I haven't done anything in a month. Nothing. Haven't been on a bike, haven't been to the gym, obviously haven't run, zero. I've been eating and drinking like it's my full time job and I'm being paid by the pound.

Speaking of pound, I weigh more. In the past month I've gained about 5 pounds of pure crap. And I don't really care. For the first time all year I actually don't feel hungry all the time, I eat what I feel like eating when I feel like eating it, and the repercussions are seemingly minimal. I know that if this were riding season, I would be keeping the weight off without a problem. I also know that come riding season, I probably won't be drinking 19 beers a week. So I don't intend to stop really. For 2009, instead of pretending I'm a sprightly climber who needs to watch his weight, I plan on being a climber who will just weigh whatever I happen to weigh. That's it. I'm giving up on the fantasy that I could weigh 165 pounds, because it doesn't make any sense. What makes sense is improving power-to-weight by getting stronger, not by getting lighter. What a mess I must have made of myself this season. I probably ran on empty every day, and the tank dried up in August on Mt. Wash.

No more starving or undereating. I don't see the point. Hell, the best ride of my entire life was this year's Prouty, and the night before I ate a fried chicken sandwich and a pile of fries. Maybe Phelps is onto something after all. I guess I'll find out. Honestly, it just doesn't matter. If you're riding regularly like I do during the season, burning thousands upon thousands of calories every week, get over it. You need to eat. I've been told this many times before. I was too dumb to take it to heart. It's probably brain damage.

Trying to put together my base training plan now, which will start after another V02 test sometime after Christmas. Have a good one. And watch out for this guy: