"Train For Life" "Race For Fun"

I have always struggled with the pressures, anxiety, and stress that racing can produce. Over the years I have been able to overcome a great many of my short comings when it comes to controlling my anxiety/expectations associated with racing which has allowed me to continue to enjoy racing even when I am not placing well. I have always enjoyed that increadible natural high I get at the end of every race I am able to finish. However, I have also equally enjoyed training for every race. I enjoy the challenge and discipline it requires, the peace and solitude I find, and the ideas that always visit me on a long run, bike, or swim. It makes me feel alive and young and I learn a little something new about myself after each workout,,,, and even more so after each race. I make new friends and rivals and get to know them at a level few others can. Why do you train? Why do you race? Finding the answers to these questions will provide you with the motivation you may be lacking. So often I have read stories of professional athletes who quite their sport because they have lost sight of things. I am sure the average age grouper is no different here. We all train and race for different reasons. Some of them may sound silly or trite but it doesn't matter. If you race for yourself and can understand what really drives you and why you do what you do, you will be able to wake up at 4 am on a cold damp morning and complete that workout with a smile on your face no matter what place you happen to find yourself in come race day.

Balance Training In Your Dynamic Warm-Up

We commonly lift weights in order to over load our muscular system in order to create muscular strength gains that carry over into your specific sport being trained. We do squats to increase speed and power on the bike, core strength to increase run and swim economy, and we practice our speed/form/technique skills to improve our efficiency in sport (running, biking, swimming, golf, you name it.) It is often a given that our strength training will transfer over to functional strength in our desired sport. And it does... or else we wouldn't do it. The same goes for flexibility training as well as technique training. However, there is one component that is neglected. Balance Training. Have you ever noticed that when you first began bench pressing your "strength" increased dramatically in those first few months of training. Of course your "strength" was increasing but your balance and ability to "handle" the bar with weight may have really been what was increasing. Getting the movement down first when bench pressing is vital to throwing-up larger amounts of weight in the future. The same holds true to all the olympic lifts as well. Why don't we see more athletes balance training in addition to flexibility training, strength training, and technique training? Incorporating balance training into your workout is easy. Actually balance training, if done correctly, can be all three forms of training rolled up into one. Balance training incorporates more muscles which leads to greater strength. It also requires improved flexibility in order to perform the various movements and it ultimately will allow greater gains during technique/speed skill work due to a greater sense of body awareness in the various planes of movement. If this were not enough, balance training has been proven to significantly reduce sports related injury. Plus, 10-15 minutes of balance training can be done as your dynamic warm-up prior to more intense exercise or strength training. So get on the ball.

Applying Equal Force Throughout Your Pedal Stroke.

The above photo of "spinscan" found on computrainer is meant to illustrate why you might find yourself doing the one legged spin drill once a week for a speed skill workout on the bike. Until I finally got computrainer I never realized how much I was still mashing down on my downward pedal stroke. I actually took pride in having a powerful downstroke. Little did I know that as I mashed I also crashed...so to speak because I was wasting so much energy. I was not applying an even amount of force throughout the pedal stroke and this became very apparent once I finally found myself on the computrainer. After analyzing my own pedal stroke with spin scan. I found a whole new meaning to the one legged pedalling workout and now find myself focusing on my upstroke constantly. Once you begin to focus on eliminating your dead spots within your pedal stroke you will start to realize how much easier it is to maintain a higher power output with less energy. You really don't need a computrainer to work on your pedal stroke but it is quite beneficial to get on one for a workout or two just to see what it means to be applying equal force to the pedals.

Goal Setting & Coaching

If you want to add rocket fuel to your dreams then start focusing on goal setting. Setting goals, no matter what aspect of your life, has been proven to get you there faster and more efficiently. The same holds true in athletics. However, setting goals is not quite as easy as it may appear at first glance. There are different types of goals. Outcome Goals? Performance Goals? Weekly Goals? Three Month Goals? where do they fit in and how does one make sense of it all. Getting to the real essence of why you do what you do and defining that in your own personal terms is the seed of lasting motivation and peace of mind. Then, deciding on what it is that you really want to accomplish is the sunshine that makes the seed grow. Then you have to do the work of watering the seed every day and analyzing and measuring progress. As with any development, change is part of the process and as one grows towards a better understanding of their dreams, goals, and aspirations things become more clear. Distractions lessen. Focus becomes a normal state of being. Success happens as you define it to be. Just as a coach can help you with your training plan to reach your athletic/fitness goals, a coach must also listen and allow the athlete to define what those goals are and mean to you. In this case the sum of the parts (Training Plan & Goal Setting) are greater than the whole. Setting goals as they pertain to you (not the coach) is where real progress develops. Click here for an illustration of "how goal-setting works"

Taking those small steps towards a better diet, more rest, consistant training, less stress, and better overall life functioning will not only make you a better endurance athlete...it will also make you a happier one.

WKO + Analysis

Please click to enlarge the above photo. This is meant to illustrate the usefulness of WKO+ analysis for your critical workouts and all races. The above picture is an example of the type of file you would receive if you were to request a workout or race anaylsis as a Balanced Training Solutions coached athlete. In order to create a file such as the one above, it is necessary for the athlete to have a device that measures power on the bike (ie. Power Tap) and/or a device that measures pace and heart rate on the run (ie. Garmin Edge 305). The above illustration is a track workout file I completed on myself to demonstrate the difference WKO+ can make in guiding training development. When looking at the above photo you will see a series of 5 intervals of 9 minutes in length with a one minute rest interval between each to be run at 1/2 marathon race pace. What is important to look at is how the subject's heart rate responds to pace and duration. In this case, it is evident that the first interval is a bit fast, which is typical of most first intervals. The subject was unable to maintain this pace on the subsequent intervals, however, heart rate was below lactate threshold for interval #1. The next interval's pace drops off by 20 +or- seconds which indicates pace is regressing to a more realistic level. Then on the next three intervals the pace stabilizes at 7 min. 24 seconds which is the pace this subject should shoot for in future interval training sessions of this type. Notice that heart rate stabilizes as well at around 161 beats per minute which also indicates that this pace is appropriate up to the 5th interval. However, if heart rate were to continue to increase it would indicate that the pace may still be too fast if this subject's goal was to remain below lactate threshold. The usefulness that this information provides is that it allows the coach to not just prescribe workouts but actually see minute by minute how those workouts are executed and the subjects response to the workouts. In this case it would be advised for the subject to stick to a pace of 7 min 30 seconds on this workout in the future. If in the future heart rate drops then the pace may be increased, indicating the subject has been adapting quite well to training stress.