I Feel the Need for Speed

Christian Van Velde on his time trial bike.

Ah the Cervelo P5. Beautiful bike. I love riding it. The only catch is nothing looks worse than someone who flashes a lot of $ on a bike but then can't back it up. It's like buying a Ferrari but not knowing how to drive stick. Some things just shouldn't be done.

Writing down what I've learned to help bring the thunder.

Slow Ramp.

Ramping up too quickly leads to injury and burn out. It's about the long game. Sure, it feels great to go from zero to hero. But if you need a week to recover from a hero session, you've missed out on valuable training. Training that would get you faster more quickly. Most workouts should be aimed at developing an aerobic base you can stand on so you can reach up and hammer hard, intense work outs periodically. You need it all, aerobic training and intense workouts, but the aerobic stuff where you aren't killing yourself is the largest portion of training. The 80/20 rule is based on 80 percent of training is done at a sub-threshold pace and 20 percent is done above threshold.

The easiest way to fall into this trap is to base your expectations on where you were a few months or years ago. You have to be realistic with where you are now and patient.

I swam ~30 hours/week for about 65,000 - 70,000 yards growing up. Sometimes when I miss the feel of the water, I'll drop in the pool and do 4000 yards even though I haven't swam for months or even years. I don't feel it at the time, but the result is overwork and injury to my shoulders. It is much smarter to end the first few sessions early even though I feel I can do more.

Grab a training buddy.

Study with those smarter than you in school, work out with those who are faster, work professionally with those who are more skilled. In each scenario, you know where the bar is and you'll work harder to get there. Even if you enjoy working out on your own, having a buddy will motivate you and you'll be surprised by what you learn about yourself. You don't know what you don't know and a buddy will push you to find out.

Your buddy must also take the long-view for their training and for their relationship with you. A training buddy is a buddy first and then the training comes after.

Warm up and cool down.

The older you become the more time you need to warm up and cool down. This is critical. I find myself skimping cool down the most often, but that just hurts the next workout. A great way to warm up is to get on a foam roller for 5 minutes. It's a way to self-massage and increase your internal heat.

Rest.

The pros train more volume than amateurs and they honor their rest. Down time is sleeping, laying down, and letting your body soak up all the hard work it has done for you.