Okay, I am declaring my off-season to be officially over. I have increased my cycling workouts, keeping the time under 75 minutes each so far, but making each workout count. That is the key to avoiding early season burnout and overuse injuries: make it short and intense. Thursday and Friday I did three back-to-back workouts, this is when there is 12 hours or less between workouts, giving you the benefits of a longer workout but without the strain. Thursday evening I did a 70 minute high cadence spin. Friday morning I did a 45 minute tabata workout, 1 minute hard, 1 minute easy, with ascending and descending gearing. Friday evening I did a 60 minute high cadence spin followed by a 75 minute core workout.
I am reintroducing my body to running. I got hit with a weird, dry cough in early December that was exacerbated by heavy breathing, especially in cold air, so I had to take a break from running until I knew the cough was gone. This cough was brutal. It was keeping me up all night, and I was coughing so hard it made me retch, and would come and go randomly. Totally gnarly. Anyhoo, Thursday I headed up into the foothills with my best bud Hugo (my big, red dog), and did a run/walk for about 90 minutes. When I say "walk" that is an understatement. We were on a gravel Forest Service road that was mostly steep, rolling hills. I climbed the hills at a hard walk, and ran the more level areas. It was probably harder on my knees than a regular run, but damn, it was great to be out in the woods. I am going to enter running at a slow-ish pace, I don't want to overdo it early in the season. That being said, my running felt good, my breathing was easy, and my legs felt powerful. There is a lot to be said about offseason strength training. I am going to start with 3 runs a week, allowing my body a few days for recovery between runs, and see how that goes. I want to get back to the run drills I was doing up until the cough sidelined me. I also have a great hill about 1/2 mile away for hill repeats.
Tonight I had the best, and longest, swim I've had since my event in December. I went into the water with "fresh" arms tonight, which I haven't done in several months. That is one downside of arduous strength training, your muscles always feel in some state of fatigue. I have been doing hard upperbody strength routines nearly every other day for several months now. Yes, my shoulders are rock hard, and I have some nice deltoid definition, but it has made me mildly fatigued in the water. Last week I was actually feeling a bit of burnout, so slacked off on my swims a bit, dialing them down to just swimming a simple mile without any strenuous drills. Tonight I was aiming for 1-1/2 miles, with some intensity thrown in for kicks and giggles. I ended up swimming 2 miles, with a lot of intensity. I started with 20 laps with hand paddles. 5 laps of kick drills (remember, describing my kick as "weak" is an understatement, so kick drills are asskicking). 5 laps at race pace. 10 laps freestyle sprint. 5 laps race pace. 5 laps kick drills. 20 laps race pace. It was a good workout. The 10 sprint laps were right at my asthma threshold, and my shoulders were burning well before I was finished. The hard part about sprint drills is pushing through the last lap or two, keeping the pace hard and steady, and not letting myself slack at all. I had only planned on swimming about 45 laps, but I was feeling so damned good that I kept thinking, "Maybe just 5 more laps." The last 20 I swam at just above race pace, i.e. my I-can-do-this-for-miles pace, and felt really good. Honestly, I felt a bit stilted for a good part of the first mile, but just like running, "the first mile is a liar."
I spent a lot of time on the bike this week, and am eager to start rebuilding my cycling base. I am really seeing gains from my months of strength training. I feel like my cycling power is up, as well as my cadence, and the smoothness of my pedal stroke. I have a small bike computer coming with a cadence meter and speedometer so I can really work on maintaining high cadence especially while I'm indoors on the trainer. And once I get back on the road I can really work to get my average mph up to where I need it to be for the Epic 250K come September. Today was a total leg rest day, which was one reason I swam so hard, but my legs recover quickly so tomorrow is run and cycle day, with a nice upperbody workout tossed in for good measure.
Now is when it is all about intensity, whether that is speedwork or strength. Now it the time to up the intensity.
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