Mining for Coal

I finally decided to just go ahead and call this week a bust.

I haven't felt all that bad all week. But I haven't felt all that great either.

The cold, dry air on an extended commute to work Friday morning had my lungs screaming and me in a coughing fit when I got to work.

As the day wore on I felt worse and worse so I just called it at

Friday, 2/1/08

1 x 60', Force work on some minor hills with the Single speed.

1 x 90', Gorging myself on all you can eat sushi in hopes that the pain would stop. I think I had somewhere in the vicinity of 8-10 rolls, 2 pieces of nigiri, 1 bowl of soup, and roughly 2.75 bowls of ice cream.

I was a little bummed as this was supposed to be my highest volume week for the month. So it goes. Better to take a couple of days off than to get pneumonia and have to sit out through May.

Saturday, 2/2/08

I again felt 'okay' Saturday. Though the coughing fit of Friday had subsided in the relatively more humid air of my apartment, I still found myself with some pretty severe chest congestion. Again, nixed any aerobic exercise.

Having pretty much 3 years of continuous base miles on a road bike under my belt at this point along with decent pedaling technique--riding single speeds for a couple of years has taught me to spin high cadence--yet struggling to hang onto the pack in a race, I have come to the conclusion that my greatest limiter is likely strength and the ability to generate power.

I can sustain the outputs I'm capable of fairly well. They just aren't all that high.

To that end, I decided to make the best of calling off additional bike time for the week to head to the gym and boost my leg strength.

When I left the house, I was feeling okay and, as far as I could tell, didn't have a cough to speak of. I thought I had put the bulk of the previous week's cold behind me.

But the Shell is hardly even insulated and the dry air soon had my lungs inflamed and begging for mercy.

I made it through my workout, which was actually quite good, bummed some lasagna off of my roommates, and went to sleep.

Warmup:

1 x 15 Back squats @ 45#, focusing on going through the full range of motion
1 x 12 Straight leg Deads @ 45#
1 x 12 Lateral Lunges (24 total, one on each side)
1 x 12 Back Squats @ 45#, again hitting full range
1 x 12 Back Squats @ 115# with good range of motion.

I felt pretty good, pretty loose through the warmup so I just figured I'd see what happened. This was my first time going back to free squats after a couple of weeks of box squats, and I definitely felt more mobile and more stable under the load.

Work:

Back Squats--I was hoping to get 6-8 sets of 5 reps, increasing the weight by 10-20 lbs every set. Didn't happen.

1 x 5 @ 135
1 x 5 @ 155
1 x 5 @ 175
1 x 3 @ 195
1 x 2 @ 205

These, I was able to get through with pretty good depth, keeping my hips back, my back straight, and my thighs finishing at just about parallel to the ground. I'm guessing that as I got more toward the 205 side, I wasn't quite dropping to paralell, but at that point I was just trying to keep my back tight and not lose form.

I hadn't pushed it on weight in awhile so I thought I'd go a little higher and see what I could handle.

1 x 1 @ 225
1 x 0.75 @ 245

I definitely didn't get the full squat at 245--probably getting it down to about a 3/4 squat--but I didn't balk at it as I have in attempts past. And I was definitely looking smoother than the guy doing about a 1/8 squat with 490 lbs on the Smith Machine next to me.

Rest was at 60" for initial 3 and all of warm up, 90" for next 2, and 120" for the two singles.

Seeing as the gym was empty and no one was waiting for the rack, I added:

RDL's

1 x 5 @ 135
1 x 5 @ 165
1 x 5 @ 175
1 x 4 @ 195
1 x 3 @ 205
1 x 1 @ 225

Initial 4 were on 60" rest. Final 2 were at 90" and 120" respectively. Grip failed at 225 and I called it.

Then:

3 x 5 Pull Ups, 20 Pushups, 15 Crunches with Rope/Cable, Rest 90"

Usually I add 5 more pull ups at the end of the set, but I just didn't have it yesterday. The initial 5 were hard enough. I could tell I have been neglecting the pull ups lately. I like these because they require minimal equipment and floor space (assuming your gym has a pull up bar and set of cables near each other). If you're hardcore and/or like the taste of vomit, you'd do burpees instead of pushups.

Sunday, 2/3/08

I called it over and done with today. I was shooting for 18 hours this week, mostly base aerobic development function with some strength development and a long (45 min - 1 hour) tempo session. I missed that by a long shot despite setting a good pace for it early on in the week. I got about 9 hours with very little aerobic development. I did manage most of my strength, technique, and flexibility work, though the intensity of the tempo workout was beyond what I could muster. Hopefully my hypothesis is correct that I can stand to add a little more strength work at the expense of my base fitness work.

Next week is a scheduled "rest and recovery week." I feel pretty rested and recovered already. But I guess just getting over a cold is probably the best time to have an easy week scheduled. Well maybe 2nd best behind actually having a cold.

I'm still not sure how I feel about the first road races being 3 weeks from now. It's a road trip with the UW team to Ohio State for a road race and a criterium. My nerves are crazy, and I just don't feel mentally ready for road racing yet. I was also planning an upgrade from Men's C to Men's B, which in years past would not have scared me too much. But the USCF just tightened down the criteria for collegiate racing categories. The men's B field is now being described as borderline Cat 3/4. I guess that's probably always been the strength level of the Men's B field, but seeing it on paper scared me a little. I'm not sure if I'm there yet.

This year the breakdown looks like this:

Men's A = USCF Cat 1/2/3
Men's B = USCF Cat 3/4
Men's C = USCF Cat 4/5
Men's D = USCF Cat 5

My impression of the breakdown (which was much more word of mouth last year) in years' past was more like

Men's A = USCF Cat 1/2/3
Men's B = USCF Cat 4
Men's C = USCF Cat 4/5/Strong Citizen
Mens' D = USCF Citizen/I just bought a bike yesterday

Though I have to say the C races felt much faster than "citizen" races last year. I guess there's always sandbagging...

I do meet the minimum requirements for the upgrade, but I don't know if I have the legs for the upgrade.

Eh. I'll probably just upgrade and we'll see if I can muster the stones to back it up.