The Annual "Come to Jesus" Workout
Every year I have some watershed workout, the one that's just the hardest thing I can remember doing...like ever. It's the workout that reminds me that what we choose to do isn't easy, at all.
It's the workout that is so hard that doing an Ironman itself just seems impossible.
It's the workout that reminds me that, no matter how badass I thought I was, or how fit I felt, that I have a long way to go to get to where I want to be.
It's the workout that reminds me why I love our sport. There's no coasting. No easy street. Nothing is free.
This isn't "a" specific workout. Often it's the one that hits you when you least expect it.
For 2015, my CTJ WKO was a plain old three-hour trainer ride. Some intervals early on, followed by steady state.
Seems simple enough...but man did I ever try to find a million ways to stop. As it was, it still took me 3:45 to ride the 3 hours...the battle of wills, of voices in my head was THAT epic.
This experience -- for me -- is the line between training to train and getting ready to race. The numbers aren't that different, but the experience says otherwise.
When was your last such session?
It's the workout that is so hard that doing an Ironman itself just seems impossible.
It's the workout that reminds me that, no matter how badass I thought I was, or how fit I felt, that I have a long way to go to get to where I want to be.
It's the workout that reminds me why I love our sport. There's no coasting. No easy street. Nothing is free.
This isn't "a" specific workout. Often it's the one that hits you when you least expect it.
For 2015, my CTJ WKO was a plain old three-hour trainer ride. Some intervals early on, followed by steady state.
Seems simple enough...but man did I ever try to find a million ways to stop. As it was, it still took me 3:45 to ride the 3 hours...the battle of wills, of voices in my head was THAT epic.
This experience -- for me -- is the line between training to train and getting ready to race. The numbers aren't that different, but the experience says otherwise.
When was your last such session?
0
Comments
I'll get back to ya.
Not sure this qualifies as epic but I had a difficult 90' bike this weekend. My plan going in to the Saturday rides is to start getting the 90' in with as much .85 work as possible. Recently I've been having some difficulty holding the longer FTP intervals so after fighting through 2X15 with 5' breaks I plunged in to some zn3 work.
First though was 2X15 @.85 but I stopped at 1X10 then headed up stairs for some chamois butt'r that I forgot to bring down. My wife was eating chili and I just wanted to shut it down and eat. I headed down quickly so that I would not lose the battle with myself.
As I started the second interval, thoughts were of 3X10 now instead of 2X15'. At the end of the second 10' I realized if I take a 3' break now I might shut it down so 10' became, 12, then 15 to 18 and eventually 20'. At each segment I needed to coax the legs to keep turning over, just 2 more minutes, just 3' more. Once I got to 18 it was tough.
So I go in my 30' of .85 woke and won a mental battle. The last 5' was hard but the biggest hurdle was walking back down stairs and then getting over the 10' barrier in that second .85 interval.
Not ready to jump of the ledge or anything, plenty of time yet to go -- but its just a reminder that despite a good build into the 12 weeks -- Lots of work to do. Time to refocus efforts and make sure next week is better.
I'm quite sure that later on this summer I will try to ride 5 hours between .85 - .90, (because again, for some reason I will think that I can do anything i want) make it to 2.5 hours and limp 5 or 10 miles back to the car. I will start asking myself all the questions, why am I doing this, it would be so much easier to be at home watching a game on tv or hanging at a beach drinking a beer firing up the grill. Then a few days later i'll be over it and fired up for the weekend to come so I can prove to myself that I can do it.
Just remember that indescribable feeling of crossing the finish line. That makes it all worth it to me.
It is my first long ride for my IM build. I have just completed a 12 week HIM build and race, and am in great bike shape.
I got a bit carried away on the 5 hour Race Pace Plus ride — the first 4 hours were an IF of 0.763 for TSS of 230.
But after that, I was really suffering. I had a 10 mins lying under a tree, then rode for 30 mins and had another 10 mins lying under an overpass. Then staggered home with the last hour had an IF of 0.51 and TSS of only 26.
I really wanted to ring my wife and come and save me, and the voices in my head were screaming at me to stop.
But I thought at the minimum, I would get some additional positional fitness from the last hour, if nothing else. Afterwards, I was happy that I HTFU. The APB ride the next day had an IF of only 0.73, and I cut it short at 2 hours.
If my memory serves me, an IM is easier than that!
2.5 hour run, with the last 2-3 miles @ HMP. "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger" is how I always feel when that one comes up - more often than not, the former, not the latter.