Wow can’t believe its been two months since I last blogged.
Between the frivolities of the festive period and training
as much as I can, I have no idea where the time has gone. Nearly 10% of 2016
has already passed.
What’s been happening? Sleep, work, eat, train repeat pretty
much sums things up.
I had two weeks off work for Christmas and had a blast. It
involved a lot of alcohol and time spent enjoying myself with friends and
family. Happy times.
Unfortunately the weight loss stagnated (well to be honest
it went backwards). That is one of the downsides of me consuming alcohol but as
Vinnie Tortorich says “It doesn’t matter what happens between Christmas and New
Year, it’s what happens between New Year and Christmas that counts” Amen to
that. So now we are out of January (which included a divorce party, a wedding
and more nights out with friends) it’s time to go back to basics with my diet.
I have 16 weeks to go until the qualification races and the
most important part of my season. If I manage to shift 1 lb of weight every 2
weeks, I will be a minimum of 4kg lighter come my important races. I’d have to
spend £8k on a bike to get one that is 4kg lighter than my race bikes. I may as
well save that money and instead invest in myself and my future health. Plus
weighing less will have benefits across all three disiplines and not just a
lighter bike.
The other week I got struck down with my yearly bout of
lurgy. I thought I’d avoided it but the germs finally tracked me down. As usual
I immediately stopped training until I was better. I really don’t understand
people who train and don’t let their bodies recover. Your body needs to use its
energy to get better in my eyes.
Have the 10 days hurt off my training. Probably not but it
was only 10 days as opposed to the 3 weeks I know some people have been ill
for. I know I am swimming as quick as I was pre illness going from last nights threshold
set.
I also had a niggle in my knee over Christmas which I
finally managed to ascertain was caused by my cleat on my new bike shoes being
slightly off. After correcting this, my niggle disappeared.
I have also found a new love in my training. Kettlebells. I
came across the Strength Matters podcast in early December and after binge-listening to all 66 episodes on my commute to work, I decided to see what
benefits they could have for my training.
I have dabbled with kettlebells as part of my Functional
Movement Training with Blizard Physiotherapy.
Now having never been interested in the gym in all my life,
the fact I am enjoying lifting (increasingly) heavy things is a nice change for
me.
I have started working with Susie (a PT friend who coaches
us at Doncaster Triathlon Club) on a one to one basis to ensure that I am using
correct technique as I don’t want to end up injured but I love the fact I can
swing my kettlebell round while watching telly with the wife and have started
to notice the benefits.
My glutes are starting to fire from all the kettlebell
swings I have been doing; I also believe they are having a benefit with my swimming.
Before my bout of lurgy, I found holding my threshold pace easy which is a
first. The only thing that has changed is the introduction of kettlebell work
on top of my existing training schedule. Another benefit of swinging iron is
that it helps me deal with work stress and I can fit this in no matter how time
crunched I am.
Since Christmas my commute with work has increased so my
sense of being time crunched has also increased.
The next 16 weeks will all be about quality of training, I
will be limiting my junk training and concentrating on getting the most from
each session.
Last week I was also mentioned on the Strength Matters
podcast which is a really bizzare thing to happen when you are just driving
around listening to it. It was completely unexpected but I was really thankful
for the mention. One of the things they mentioned was starting a blog. Woohoo I
am ahead of the curve with that one.
http://www.realstrengthmatters.com/smp-67-how-to-make-your-fitness-website-work-for-you/ Listen at about 29 mins for my mention.
This past week also saw my #blogbirthday, I can’t believe my
blog is now 4 years old. I don’t even want to know the total word count of it.
I bet there are smaller books.
On the subject of books, one of my friends (initially from
social media but now in real life) has just released her book. Hollie Cradduck
first contacted me in October 2013 to promote her blog detailing her awful
likfe changing trip to Tenby to complete Ironman Wales. Her book charts her
journey from their to Kona and she very kindly mentiones me in her book with
some very kind words. If you want to read her book it can be found here.
I was pleased to be mentioned in her book including a
hyperlink to my Twitter profile in the ebook. Thanks Hollie. Hope I’ll see you
on a start line soon.
The next 9 days will consist of me taking part in the
#TourOfSufferlandria. The tour is a stage race taking place in the fictional
land of Sufferlandria. Sufferlandria is the place where the Sufferfest videos
are set.
Sufferfest videos are cycling training videos which use real
race footage and link them to intervals and you have to suffer at differing
intensities according to what the suffer level is meant to be.
I have been selected to be part of #TeamWattbike for the
tour.
The tours main aim is to raise money for an American Charity
called the Davis Phinney Foundation which is for people with Parkinson’
disease. Davis was a professional cyclist who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s.
Each entrant to the tour pays $10 to compete in the tour and for each entry
they are put in a raffle for some AWESOME prizes.
As part of #TeamWattbike I have to complete the tour on my
Wattbike.
I am using the 9 days riding totalling 12 hours in the
saddle as a way to build my endurance ahead of my training camp in Mallorca in
April.
Having only completed one Sufferfest video I am slightly worried
by some of the stages. There is one which incorporates 32 one minute all-out
efforts into a 90 minute workout which I am dreading. This takes place this
Sunday and joy of joys I will probably be hungover after a night out with
friends.
 |
| Here is the profile for the suffering I will have to endure. The redder the profile, the harder it is. |
The 9 days should really pay dividends in Mallorca.
Since my last blogpost I've also been officially announced as a brand ambassador with Generation UCAN in the UK.
This will be my fuel of choice (along with cheese) for the training camp in Mallorca.
With retrospect, I know I said at the start of this post that I haven't been up to much but reading through all this, it appears I have.
Thanks for reading,
I'll try not to leave it so long next time.
Michael
No comments:
Post a Comment