So, January is over and had things gone to plan I would have been taking part in a 24 hour MTB race over the weekend1. Instead, my Ayups are out on loan and I will be secretly relieved as the Saturday forecast is hot and steamy with a helping of thunderstorms.

That change has not however derailed The Plan, and on yesterdays ride I rolled over 300 miles (500km) for the month. Not huge by real riders standards, but still a decent start to the year. I would estimate around 220 of the miles to be ‘good’3 miles so there is a reasonable balance of work and recovery, but with plenty of scope to up the workload.

Since I use a Garmin Edge 305 (which records the gps track as well as heartrate and cadence), I have been recording the data to Ascent for analysis, but since it is currently falling behind in features I have also been using the windows based SportTracks, which supports the training load plugin, allowing me to keep track of my fitness more accurately.

Sporttracks_sm

The vertical bars are the activities (taller indicates harder and/ or longer sessions), the blue is fitness (Chronic Training Load or CTL) and red is fatigue (Acute Training Load or ATL). The two gaps in the chart represent three weeks of fieldwork in the Queensland bush (November) and two weeks holiday in the UK (December), where I was without bike. From the graph is seems that my ten days hard work just before the Christmas break payed off in giving me some fitness to lose without going backwards.

Since the beginning of 2010, CTL has risen from around 25 to 40 and I see the change in my lap times at my normal training location (Centennial Park). This is one of few areas of Sydney where you can ride for more than 10 minutes without having to stop for a junction or traffic lights. It’s boring, but handy for short pre-work rides and speed sessions. After an easier week this week, I am hoping to ramp up CTL to around 50 and see how things go from there.

The weights are going ok too, though I am doing maybe three sessions a week whereas I feel four would be more advantageous. Rather than fancy machines at the gym or barbells, I am using kettlebells. I am currently using the ‘beginners’ weight of 16kg (35lbs) which doesn’t sound so much, but which is good enough to give me a good kicking in a session lasting about 20 minutes. I do have a 24kg (53lbs) under the table but I think that will be a while before I can work with it safely and comfortably.

  1. Stymied due to an 11th hour ‘we are not allowed to ship brand X outside the US’2 ↑
  2. But I have a cunning plan ↑
  3. I.e. non-recovery, making-an-effort intensity ↑

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