Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Wrap-Up
So having looked at the absolute disaster that was the 2011 Northshore Inline Marathon and subsequently survived my final hour bike ride at UT Austin, it’s time to put the 2011 season to rest with a year-end wrap up, look back, and post season analysis along with some general plans going forwards.
Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Northshore Inline Marathon
I was seriously tempted to title this in the Why the US Sucks at Olympic lifting nomenclature to make people think that that series wasn’t over but it is (I might do a short addendum, not sure yet). But among all of the other reasons I wanted to finish the mega-series on Friday one was that it was time to move back to self-indulgent prattling about my inline racing, primarily my final race of the season along with an end of season wrap up. Today I’ll talk in overview of what I did following the Tour of Chicago leading into my final race (I was actually travelling the day I posted the final part of the OL’ing series) the Northshore Inline Marathon along with a race report.
Tour of Chicago: 2011 Race Report Part 2
I slept well enough Saturday night, fatigue will do that too you. It hadn’t rained although there was more ominous lightening during the night. Alarm went off at an all too early 6:45am (it takes me about 3 hours to get generally warmed up and race time was at 9:45am). I cleaned up and ate a small breakfast (protein bar + banana) since blood glucose/glycogen could be an issue for a race this long and had a bunch of water so I’d be hydrated but have time to pee out any extra. Legs were definitely a touch heavy and I was feeling the two races from yesterday.
Tour of Chicago: 2011 Race Report Part 1
Ok, picking up from Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 14, it’s time for the first part of the race report. There will actually be a bit of overlap with the previous article just in terms of the days. And if it seems a bit more stream of consciousness than usual, it’s because I’m doing it on the fly to kill time in the hotel.
Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 14
Today I’ll look at how the block actually progressed week by week (or didn’t), note anything of interest and talk about my final taper to the Chicagoland Inline Marathon.. More specifically, I was doing the Tour of Chicago, 3 races across two days consisting of a 10k pack race Saturday morning, a 2 mile individual time trial Saturday afternoon and the full Marathon pack race on Sunday. It was going to be a hell of a weekend that was for sure and it required that I develop pretty much every physiological system as well as I could.
Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 13
Ok, time to prattle again. Previously, in Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 11 and Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 12, I looked in some detail at my post-race analysis of my performance at the Texas Road Rash, what I had determined and how I had set up my training to address the problems leading into the next major event, the Chicagoland Inline Tour an omnium type event consisting of three races across two days. If nothing else, this would make travelling worthwhile since I’d get to do a lot of racing (and be flat exhausted afterwards).
Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 12
Fixing top speed meant focusing on two primary issues: sheer top end power output along with the neuromuscular skills needed to go fast. The power outputs could be developed on the bike, the skill work would have to be done skating. Today I want to look at the plan I set up based on these goals along with details about why I did things the way I did.
Methods of Endurance Training: 2011 Season Part 11
Ok, time to get back to self-indulgent prattling mode, hopefully this won’t screw up my training again. Previously, in Texas Road Rash 2011: Race Report Part 1 and Texas Road Rash 2011: Race Report Part 2 I gave a detailed description of my performance in the elite marathon division of the race (my first time racing elite or at the marathon distance).
The Bearing Story: Part 2
Today I’ll actually get to the real part of the story, as I mentioned in The Bearing Story: Part 1 only Caleb and I were at summer training consistently for the most part. Other skaters came and went but they were usually so much further behind he and I that, for all practical purposes, he and I skated together.
The Bearing Story: Part 1
And while I still feel that, for the most part, equipment is secondary to other things relevant to performance, there are places where it matters. One of those places is when your equipment is just horrible. In general, cheap stuff is just cheap; it doesn’t work well, falls apart, whatever. And it will hold you back if it sucks too hard. But once you surpass some price threshold, rarely does throwing more money at the problem generate massive improvement benefits. Sure, it matters for the top 1%. If you’re reading this, you’re not one of them.
