Last weekend the team headed down to Austin Texas to do a little testing at Pedal Hard in the dungeon of Mellow Johnny's with Kevin Livingston. We had a great time and, I at least, learned a ton. I have always been skeptical about training with wattage or heart rate, mainly because I've never taken the time to learn anything about it. We did a Lactic Threshold test. The test itself is pretty simple, you warm up for 15 mins, then the real test begins and you start out at 120 watts and ride for 3 minutes, then it jumps up 20 watts every 3 mins following that. It was pretty interesting that the test went just like Kevin said it would. Basically you don't feel bad at all, and then it hits you like a truck. I was pretty nervous because my training had started a little later than most of my teammates and I had missed a few days due to a weird sickness and another few to some big projects. I was feeling pretty disappointed comparing my numbers to everyone elses, but then I realized that they were pretty much non comparable. We're all different sized etc. The only thing that is really worth looking at from a strictly statistical standpoint is the watt/kilogram number which I was pretty satisfied with. Needless to say, this weekend convinced me in improving my training methods so much that I went out and bought a Garmin with heartrate and cadence. Time to get serious. I haven't had a computer on my bike since I crashed at Webster last summer, and I had that one on for about a month. I considered getting some kind of power meter, but I'll give it a year, anyways the Garmin works with any ANT+ power meter so it should be an easy upgrade. I am also really happy to say that our Director, Jim Schneider, will be writing my training plans for the year. I'm excited to combine these with the Garmin.
Thanks so much to Kevin, Chris and Jim for everything this past weekend. I had a blast and learned more than I anticipated. My schedule has also changed quite a bit since the last one I posted, so that's not super accurate anymore. Like anyone reading this cares.
bump this track.
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