Sweet Victory

The past two days, I've been in the basement on the trainer. Last weekend, I was in the basement on the trainer. My last run was last Friday. I can't take it anymore -- I'm going out over lunch. The weather's been 75% to blame. 10% of it has been the fact that my plan calls for me to ride more this month and the other 15% of it was that I had an ugly cold that made the 5 degree weather seem that much worse. But in twenty minutes, me, my tights, my pants, my shirt, my sweatshirt vest and assorted accessories are hitting the roads, for better or for worse. Interesting - I ride my bike on my trainer in the basement, which is different than a spinning class. But I never realized how it was different until I read this article . A sampling: So in conclusion, there is a high degree of muscular and physiological specificity between the two modes of cycling. The best of both worlds would be to teach your legs to achieve a high cadence without the use of the flywheel.

Just by writing that title, it's obvious I'm tired, isn't it? After all, there are six (6!) full days of potential workouts left this month but it kind of sounds like I'm phoning it in... I didn't realize how much I worked out this month until I took a quick look at my logs this morning... So far in January, I've run 74 miles - my second longest month so far (and the first longest had a half-marathon in it) and *if* I run 3 more days this month, it'll be my longest month ever. Including bike, swimming and elliptical workouts, I've worked out twenty of the 26 days so far. My next greatest month was 18! So, all in all, January was a month of really turning up the activity (for a guy who just started working out last July). Things will get a bit interesting as today marks 90 days until my first triathlon. Given that it's a sprint distance, I have zero fear about completing it -- truth is, I could do that today. However, I'm going to need mor...

So now that I have a tri-worthy bicycle, I think it's ok to layout my tentative plan for end of '06 and beginning of '07. Though I'd always hoped to do a few triathlons next year, planning one without a bike is kind of like planning a trip to the shore without suntan lotion. In a nutshell, I like to do 1 race per month... it keeps me motivated without cutting severely into family time. It's interesting reading over triathlete blogs and seeing how many people are trying to train for Ironman competitions while their family is being left behind. Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me. I know I can do a good job in an Olympic length triathlon while keeping my house in order. I think the *potential* exists to do a half-Ironman without my wife and kids forgetting who I am. But a full Ironman? No way, so I'm putting that idea on the back burner for a few years. (And if you've had a better or worse experience, feel free to comment -- this isn't a training issue...

So today I finally was able to take the Cannondale out on the road.... After buying it a week ago and taking a few days to get it road-worthy, I was treated to four days of solid rain. Not funny. Add to that a sore knee from the race on Saturday and I was going out of my mind. While it's still pretty much a rainy today today, it was dry enough to hit the pavement for a lunch-time jaunt. Cycling is always such an interesting contrast to running. Generally speaking, running seems to have a fairly constant amount of pain (depending on the workout). Your run is either easy or hard or somewhere in between and while hills have a nominal effect on the amount, it's all relatively constant. Cycling, however, is as easy or as hard as the road beneath you. A rip-roaring twenty-five mph downhill can give way to a hard-charging level stretch followed by a quad-numbing ten mph uphill - and all of this can (and does) happen within two or three minutes. All in all, it was a lot of fun. :) Acco...