I just climbed off the trainer. I brought down the DVD/VCR combo and started playing a bunch of DVDs I made off of my bike tapes. I've realized just how much of a pain the VCR is, especially since watching a tape basically erodes it just a bit (not to mention that VCRs erode too). Problem was that I recorded the DVDs in such a way that I can't play them in any DVD player except the combo unit.
Hence the combo unit migrated into the bike room. So it's now the Dungeon V 3.1.0.0. The increase in functionality? Being able to watch all my old bike tapes and skip forward through the commercials (they're off of TV).
The DVD player opened up a whole world of available tapes to watch because I've been loath to watch 10 or 15 or 20 year old tapes - they may spontaneously break or jam or do something bad like that, so I pull them out only on special occasions (like making a copy of it). Suddenly I had all these cool tapes from back in the day.
So, properly motivated, with good music cranking from my laptop (through ear buds), I decided to do a 20 minute effort. I started out "easy", 300 watts, my goal for the 20 minutes. With a prior best of 255 watts, I figured I could handle 300, and if I failed and hit only 275, that would be fine.
I exploded after 5 minutes.
So much for "just" 275w. I struggled and pushed and spun and stood and sat and finally, at about 14 minutes, started seeing the possibilty of making it for 20 minutes.
249 watts.
Well, I don't have a season of training behind me. When I did my 255 watts I did. And I did much better than 225w or so, last winter's best 20 minute effort. But part of that low number was because I sat up for a few minutes, soft pedaled, and started up again. I basically did a 10 minute effort and an 8 minute effort, with 2 minutes of easy pedaling in the middle.
With my ego properly deflated, I figured my legs would be fine for a 60 second effort.
35 seconds later I exploded. I stopped pedaling for a good 10 seconds (or pedaled at about 40 watts anyway), then started spinning a bit at 150-170 watts for 10 or 15 seconds. My minute average?
424 watts.
100 watts or so below a race effort. This is more indicative of what I can do in a race, since a race like Bethel (one with a short hill) is a minute on, a minute off.
My average for the ride was a normalized 202 watts. That's about right for me.
So for now, I'm slightly heavy and in average shape.
I hope I can improve dramatically in California.
Time to sleep.
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2 comments:
Hey, I gotta be honest, I kind of feel like there's going to be a sorting out this year when it comes to amateur racers in new england--of course I'm in New Hampshire, not Connecticut so I'm not familiar with your local all-stars, but:
It seems to me that, maybe it's the economy, I don't know, but people are either finding much MORE time to train, or they are finding much LESS time to train. There are only two camps in this matter. When you're low on work, it's either a boon or a blow to your training schedule.
Hm. I think you're right. And I think it'll be more of the "more time to train" than not, at least down here. Racing will be hard.
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