A Knight To Be

Last week I completed another 12-week cycling training plan with The Sufferfest. The grand-finale, yet again, is the excruciating Full Frontal 4DP test session. As a brief reminder, since most who endure this go deep into denial, you undergo a series of 4 maximal power output tests to get a complete and comprehensive profile of your abilities. And these are: Neuromuscular Power (NM): 5-second max power Anaerobic Capacity (AC): 1 minute Maximal Aerobic Power (MAP): 5 minutes Functional Threshold Power (FTP): 20 minutes It looks like this: 4DP Full Frontal Power Output Graph (on a bad day) More info: https://thesufferfest.com/blogs/training-resources/4dp-full-frontal-fitness-test-faq Completing the test creates and applies a "4DP Profile" to your training plan and subsequent workouts. Right. Moving on. So last week I completed the third instance of the test . The first was upon my arrival at Sufferlandria, part of the immigration process. I then fol...

Violated. Quite simply. That's what Violator will do to you, for two primary reasons: 64 sprints. What Rest? The complicated thing about Violator - the 5th ToS stage, is that a sprint is a sprint. Meaning, you go all out. Sure, The Sufferfest app gives power targets, but this session is done in Slope/Level mode because the timings are too fast for my Tacx Neo to respond, so yeah, the target might be one thing or another, but I'm eating stem anyway so whatever. I did reduce the slope for each set to match the reducing slope of the power curve, but it hurt nonetheless. The last set has just 5sec recoveries, so it gets silly. So that was ToS Stage 5... Then came Wednesday. Because of domestic obligations, I can only ride in the late evening after the kids are asleep on Wednesdays. Today though, I fell asleep before the kids :D So while I had the Torture Chamber ready to go for Stage 6, I involuntarily took a rest day. I earned this rest day earlier by riding multip...

Funny how I wrote about wanting to increase training volume... careful what you ask for... Stage 1 kicked off with It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time (ISLAGIATT). While I haven't ridden this as a standalone too many times, I've done ISTLA (the extended mashup with Thin Air) many times, so I'm very familiar with it. Mostly, I'm doing these workouts on the "Focused" mode, so they are slightly reduced in their power targets not to derail the training plan by too much. I'm not looking to utterly destroy myself during the stages, considering that I plan on riding into Knighthood on the last day and have a 4DP test coming up in two weeks. So ISLAGIATT was solid tempo fun at ~3.1 w/kg weighted average for the 2 hours. ToS Stage 1: ISLAGIATT Then, stage 2... I was looking forward to The Bat. The new workout that replaced the NoVid "Batman Intervals" with this Mental Toughness themed workouts. Good marketing! There are 6 intervals with ...

More Volume, that's what I want. One of the many joys of being relatively unemployed is that I can "afford" to spend more time on the bike (but not much more than that). Coupled with my overeating tendencies (don't get the wrong idea, I'm ~12% body fat, ~67kg), I still want more training volume to polish off those extra snacks, another serving of pasta and yes, please, I would like to see the dessert menu. At the moment, I'm working on The Sufferfest's all-purpose plan that has me riding about 6-7 hours a week (plus 1-1.5 hours strength and same for Yoga). As such, my longest ride in a block is around 2.5 hours (ISLTA longest session on the plan). So sometimes, I find myself, well, longing for longer. I want to hit off on those 3-6 hour rides, good old quality time with myself, off-limits to the world, off the grid, not to be interrupted. Sometimes, I just go on. I'll finish ISLTA and keep going for another hour. Other times, I might push on ...

Eight weeks to go. 2019 had just ended. Here are some stats: 94% of those kilometers were indoors. It was my most active year in a decade. My oldest child (of 3) is ten, so it kind of matches. 2015 was strong, and I also had a few podium finishes, including one on the National Championships (for CAT, Masters B). Still, there's a direct correlation between the occurrence of an offspring and a reduction in cycling volume. A brief history of time: In May 2018, I decided that I'm going to ride the Alpen Brevet in Switzerland, only three months or so away. This followed 2.5 years of practical inactivity: 2015: 400 hours / 10,000 km 2016: 116 hours / 3200 km 2017: 40 hours / 790 km 2018 (through May): 12 hours / 270 km Then in June 2018, I started to get things in motion with Zwift's Fondo plan. I managed to ride about 40hrs/1000km in training before the August event, which was pivotal. I knew I was light years away from my podium form, yet rode on in t...