Computrainer and Ford Road

Yesterday it was raining, so coach supplied an alternate Computrainer workout. Nothing special, just a 15 minute warm up moving from 100 - 200 watts, then 7 repeats of 3 minutes at 200, then 3 minute ramp of 200 to 290..., finishing with 15 minutes at 150. But boy that hurt... and only 55 TSS points :-)

Computrainer workouts, especially the ERG based ones (the trainer makes you do the required watts regardless of the RPM you are pedaling at) are hard. Similar to track workouts, no coasting to let your legs get a little rest, shed some lactic acid, get your breath for the next climb etc... You go at exactly the pace the workout specifies (or stop completely...) so unless the workout left some slack at a very low wattage (like under 100) you work continuously for the length of the workout. I find that doing the high (290 watts !!???) sections at a high cadence (>90) helps...

Today the sun was shining again, so back to Ford Road for my standard tempo workout. Although I had to pickup the pace at the end when I realized that I was running out of daylight and had forgotten to put the blinky lights back on my P2c... So it was a bit of a race back home before it got too dark to be safe on the road.

Change of plans for next weekend. John Sullivan and Michel Pelltier decided to go over to Vancouver Island and do the BCMCA Mt Washington Hill Climb. Over 1000m of climbing over 19km... Apparently with some sections at the end close to 18% grade. Run as a mass start race.

So how can I resist... even though I'm a little to heavy to be competitive in hill climbs. Especially since the popular local Mt. Seymour Hill Climb didn't take place this year (900m over 12km). Should be fun.

Won't get the same bump in CTL as the 200km event but should still be fairly good. I'll have to try and get out and do another Mission ride over the next week or two. But CTL is at least back over 80.. Which is (in my mind) the minimum I want. So as long as I keep it at that level, I know that I can bump it up another 5-8 TSS points with another good weekend. Our weather turns wet now, but it's reasonable to assume I'll get at least one good weekend in October to put in a couple of long rides.

Track racing starts on either Oct 12 or Oct 19. It will be interesting to see how popular it is this year. We went from 10-12 in A and B groups two years ago to 12-14 in A, B and C last year.. double the riders. If we double again this year there will be too many people on the track even if they add a D (novice) group. I race the B group and it gets a bit hectic on our 200m track with more than about 12-14 people racing.