NO LOVE HANDLES ALLOWED!

'It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.' Theodore Roosevelt 23 April 1910

Tuesday, 25 August 2009

The BIG Fortnight - Tuesday Week 2

As planned, Monday was a recovery day so just an easy 30 minute spin.

Today, though, was the 6 x 6 minute session. With the improvements I've been showing of late I thought I would up the ante and decided that 340 watts would be a good figure. Bearing in mind that last week I only completed 5 x 330 watts (and that the 5th of these intervals was completed as 3 mins effort 1 min rest, 2 mins effort 1 min rest, 1 min effort) then today's session was going to be a challenge. So, ipod on, progressive warm-up, calibrate turbo, and then I was off.

Let's face it, this is a tough session, both mentally and physically. It is above FTP so you are working hard physically, and 6 minutes is long enough to tax you mentally as well. But I was in the zone and there was no way on earth I was going to be defeated today. By the 5th interval I was hurting a lot and after just one minute of the 6th interval my legs and lungs were begging for mercy, but today there would be none. HTFU was definitely NOT required!

The session was completed and as I cooled down I felt great. The BIG Fortnight has been a massive overload session for me but my body has responded brilliantly and I am astonished at how quickly the power figures are showing significant improvements. I now understand how Sags has been able to drastically cut his TT times following a period of bike specific training.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a 75km road ride but my Litespeed is off the road waiting for new gear cables so it will be an early morning turbo session and probably only for an hour or so.

Train smart folks.

6 comments:

Sags said...

Impressive work dude! I know your history of these 6 min sessions so completing at 340W means that you are in tip top dhape for your Spanish sub-5! Get a 25 mile TT in mate and crack the hour. . . mmmmmmm 50 something sounds nice eh!!

Mark "Frank" Whittle said...

Good work young Mick, sub 4:50 here we come! ;-)

Sags said...

The pressure builds! I can feel the weight of expectation from here!

Turbo Man said...

Frank - That's your Vit time, not my Barca time!

Sags - Yes the pressure is building, although it is all self-induced. I will try and get some TTs in over the next month but have alternative plans as well.

jc said...

So what are the mileage stats so far mate?

Turbo Man said...

I managed 440km last week and was hoping for 350 or so this week. Unfortunately my road bike has had to go for some TLC (I sheared off the downtube adjuster whilst fitting new gear cables) so it will be a lot of turbo work this week which doesn't lend itself to big mileage.