Week of December 1

Monday – After last week I was totally blitzed. My TSS going into Monday was –34. I was in no mood to ride, so I didn’t.

Tuesday – Still tired but I got out on the bike and managed 66 minutes of L2/L3 riding on the PCs. Legs just didn’t want to go. Last week’s volume really took it’s toll, particularly Saturday and Sunday.

Wednesday – Got home early but I had no motivation to ride. Great week, eh? Seems to be turning into a rest week. It’s my body telling me something – take it EASY!!!

Thursday – Got home late so I threw the bike on the Computrainer with the intent of doing a VO2 workout. Man did I forget how much I hate riding a trainer. I did the workout in the garage where the temperature was in the mid 50s. I was still sweating like a pig. I managed 2 whole VO2 intervals of 3 minutes each before I just had enough. 50 minutes of PC riding on the Computrainer was all I could take.

Friday – No riding.

Saturday – Usual blitz fest. I was apprehensive in how I’d ride. I know that with so much rest this week I often come in flat. On some of the harder efforts the lack of intensity this week certainly got the better of me. My stomach was cramping from intensity and I had to throttle back. Still, it was a good hard ride. Didn’t break any significant records today, and the intensity of the ride was down a few percent for me, but overall it was fun.

Sunday – I started the day thinking I’d do 5+ hours on the PCs. When we hit the road I was feeling pretty fresh despite the Saturday slugfest. I figured I’d try some VO2 efforts and see how that went. To my surprise they went really well. I was pulling off 5 minute VO2 efforts with relative ease, so I just kept up with that. First true VO2 workout on the PCs and it was a good one. Had a yearly best 5 minute power on one of the intervals (OK, by 1 watt) despite not really getting a recovery interval (a teammate was doing threshold intervals at the same time, so it’s hard to really recover at that tempo). I didn’t reach my 5 hour goal (indeed, only half of that at 2:30), but from a workout perspective, today’s ride was better than a long endurance ride.

Overall a pretty light week. My body appreciates it.

PC time this week – 4 hours 25 minutes
PC time to date – 127 hours 55 minutes

Weekly status of power progression – Some new highs to report this week. 280 W normalized for 30 minutes this week is my best yet with PCs and is the best 30 minute power I’ve had since June 2007 (well, by only a couple of watts). Bumped up 40 minute power a watt, and 50 minute went up 4 watts.

Still no significant improvements as a result of Powercranks. If we look at the two plots below, my power since using Powercranks is within the accuracy of the Powertap (around 2.5%) for all but the longest durations (and even then within 3-4%). In general I’m seeing better numbers than I was for the same time period as last year, but if we look at the second plot I’m running a high average TSS. It makes sense that my longer term power is better because of the higher average TSS. It’s not like I’ve been slacking. I’ve been busting my arse each week trying to bump up my power. The big test is December, which is a month focused on VO2 work.