A New PB!

How do you test your progress?

As regular readers will know I test myself by doing a 40km turbo TT; my reasoning is that this test is within a controlled environment and is repeatable. The time is immaterial in itself as it doesn't correlate to a road TT time, but if I get quicker in this test then I know I am improving.

A quick recap; in Jan 10 I set the benchmark for the year with an unremarkable 61.34 mins for the test, but just a week later this came down to 57.46. Better, but still some way short of my overall PB of 50.33. Things progressed and on 13 May I recorded a 50.48 that I was very pleased with; almost at my PB level and nearly 5 months still to go to my 2010 A race. But I knew that the gains would now become harder to come by, and my move to a Primal Blueprint way of training meant I was heading into the unknown as far as improvements were concerned. Would the Primal way deliver the results?

With 2 weeks to go to The Outlaw I decided I needed to test myself, to give me the confidence that I was progressing and could head to The Outlaw assured that my legs were in good shape. To be honest, I didn't feel that fresh this morning, and as I started my warm up I wasn't sure I would be able to sustain the required effort for some 50 minutes. But I pressed on regardless.

I could bore you with the details, but I'll cut straight to the chase. Today I SMASHED my 40km turbo TT PB, and set the new level at 49.24 - that's 48.58kmh if you're wondering - beating my previous best by a whopping 1 minute and 9 seconds and showing an increase in average power of 6 watts. Pleased doesn't come close to expressing how I feel about this result; I am totally over the moon chuffed. Now add in the fact that I am now sub 70kg and I think it's fair to say that I am in the best shape of my life.

All I need to do now is get my nutrition and pacing strategies right - and how hard can that be?

All the best folks. Race hard, train smart and rest easy.