Tired!

Last week's training was focused on "Top End Power" and this week is labeled "Transition to Race Season" with many of the workouts similar to last week. Time in the saddle is reduced to 9 hours, but the time is what a prior Team sponsor called "quality" time. That sponsor was Tim Cusick, and he and his side-kick and female athlete extraordinaire, Kathy Watts, are now both coaches (and hosting a training camp for Peaks Coaching this year in California) and I now totally understand what he meant by quality time. Quality time, in Tim's world, is intervals, sprints, tracking power output in watts, etc. All that "stuff" that serious competitors always, always use in their training. If I'm not mistaken, road racers and time trialers are constantly doing this type of training and not as much endurance. Mountain bikers, in my opinion, don't need quite as many sprints built into their training plans and thank god the Eatough plans don't have too many intervals -- except for last week and this. There's one interval session that I've grown to like because of the convenience of doing it next to my house and getting a really good workout. I call it "good" because the next day I'm whooped and beat. If the training pushes you and you feel it the next day, something's working, and I label it a good workout. Tuesday's plan said "If you trained properly on the weekend, you still need this day for full recovery." We did and I did. Last Friday Donna and I did a little 12-minute ditty going at race pace inside our 2.5 hour road ride on mountain bikes. Ouch. Saturday was the hill interval thingy, and Sunday I just kinda lazed up and down the side of a mountain 2 times. Monday was off, and I was tired yet on Tuesday and did the Alternative option of an easy spin on the trainer for 45 minutes. Last night was the 10 x 2 (I do three minutes just cause I need a minute to get my HR in the range) at 85% heart rate with 1 minute at 60% in between. They seem easy enough while doing them, but damn do they tucker me out the next day. Yes, today my arse is dragging. I'll push through tonight's "exploding" workout (Standing starts: 4 x 1 minute "getting all the power you can out of your body.") Tonight's workout is painful and I'll be screaming. But the reward will be a nice, warm piece of vegan chocolate cake. Yummmmmm...