Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Tuesday, December 02, 2003

Getting Ready to be Schooled

Yesterday was the beginning of the new cycling season. I put in 52 slow, cold and windy miles on the road bike. I can hear you think, "But wait, you just finished the last one!" Yes, that is true and I took my well deserved three weeks off but now it's back to the pedals for what should prove to be an interesting year. I'm moving up catagories this next year; to Cat IV and maybe Cat III on the road and to Sport class on dirt. While I was pretty dominant at the end of the year, things will change a bunch now. At this new level, everybody has good fitness and some experience. What makes a difference now are tactics and that little bit extra. I have a lot to learn so it's time to get ready for school.

December is base miles month. That's like learning your multiplication tables and such. I do lots and lots of miles at really low intensity. This will cause my body to replumb itself for the third year running. Every time this happens my body gets a bit more efficient at transporting oxygen and getting rid of lactic acid. In Cat V road and Beginner's MTB races, victory was decided by less than 1% in many cases. Even a 5% improvement in oxygen handling is a huge gain at this point. The problem is that, just like multiplication tables, base miles training is boring. It's a lot more exciting to attack a big hill and suffer through the climb than to plod endlessly through low, rolling hills never letting your heartrate get above 140. The other thing I'll be doing is teaching my body to use fat as on-the-bike fuel. Now that my races will all be 50 miles or longer this will be an important thing to have. I'll be able to save glycogen for the last 15-20 miles when I can use it to time trial on a break.

The other area I'll work on is skills. I need to improve my pack handling confidence and cornering on the road and my descending on the MTB side. I need to find a place to practice cornering at high speed and, once I get to intervals in January or February, how to sprint out of them. That'll happen once finals are finished and I've got a lot of time to spin. Right now it's pedal, pedal, pedal without much excitement. On the trail, I can't descend unless I climb and I can't climb a bunch until January so that'll have to wait some. Right now I'll practice cornering and bike balance and how to lose less energy braking through corners.

The Goals for the year are modest in some ways and daring in others. I want to win the state time trialing championship. I think I have a good shot at it if I can peak at the right time. I also want to win a medal at the Georgia State Games. The biggest thing is that I want to move up to Catt III in time to go to the U.S. Masters National Championships in Salt Lake City this August. That's where my family lives and to compete at that level in front of them would mean a lot to me and to them, I think. To get there I have to finish top ten ten times with 25 races. Right now I'm one for two so I'm off to a good start. If I can find hilly races early in the season I have a pretty good shot at it. Too bad I can't count time trails as it would be a shoo-in. On the MTB side I'm looking for a top ten finish in the state GAP series. The competition really steps up and my fitness level isn't going to carry me like it did last year. So I expect to have a lot of 10th and 11th place finishes while I learn how to ride better. The races will be longer distance so that will be to my advantage as a roadie, assuming I can get my upper body in better shape. Late in races last year I found that I would get sloppy in terms of my handling halfway through the second lap and we'll be adding a third lap in this year. Instead of going for a high standing in the series, I'm going to target wins at one or two events in the area I live in so as to impress my team's sponsors. A medal at the Georgia Games in X-County MTBing would be good too, but the competition will be intense. I may also try to race in a couple of regional level events just to get a feel for the level of competition there. Once I get past January, my MTB training will shift from the friendlier environs of Dauset Trails to Camp Thunder and the killer environment there. I hate to ride there but if I want to get better technically, I'll need to ride more challenging courses.

With those in mind, I'll endure the boredom and low-end riding and build a foundation that will take me to greater heights. Watch for me on the roads and trails of north-central Georgia.

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