Work Works

I got to ride with a couple of friends/training partners today. Last time I rode with them was ~6 weeks ago and I got dropped repeatedly through the ride. Today was much better! We cruised easy on the way out, until we got to a point where they pretty much always do an interval that's ~7min long. 6 weeks ago I was impressed with myself b/c I could avg 200w for that 7min. Today my goal was to shoot for 215w. So I started off at what felt pretty hard and after maybe a minute glanced down at my garmin... saw 210 and thought UGH I'm in trouble b/c this feels WAY harder than what 210 should feel like... I glanced again... oh not 210... it's 270. Whoops! Ok that makes more sense but yikes back that shit off! I ended w avg 243 which was obviously well above what I thought I could do today. How's that for improvement? I'll take 40watts in 6 weeks!

Coming home we were cruising again and then somehow (after getting stopped at a light) I found myself in front so I just started pedaling and well look at that... 200 watts... so I just kept doing that because it felt good... 10min later still avg 200 so I decided to see if I could hold it for 20min... based on the effort it was requiring I figured I could... upped it even and finished that 20min avg 205w and thought YES these are the legs I remember having a few years back.

It's rides like these that confirm to me that yes, work works. I've had conversations with several athletes over the years and they were convinced that training doesn't work for them... saying that they train but don't get faster. My question is always how much are you actually training? Thinking about training doesn't count as training. It's often the case that those athletes think about training a lot, which leads them to believe they are training a lot. But let's look at log books and actually see? Ride 200+ miles/week for a few months in a row and let's see if improvement happens? My money says it will.

Anyway, my motivation to keep up the riding consistency and volume is high. It was still pretty windy today but after several days in a row of that it didn't bother me today, which is again a sign that we adapt to whatever stress we routinely put ourselves under.

I got home and took Maia out for a jog. I told Scott I'd either be back in 10 min or 20 min, depending on how my hip felt. I'm cautiously optimistic at this point that my hip is finally healing from whatever strain I must have had. Can't say it feels perfect, but I've run that college loop 3x this week and hip feels 90% fine. Maybe next week I'll try a 3 mile run and see. :)

And because blogs are more fun with pictures, here's one of 5 (wild) baby pigs Moana and I saw in the park this afternoon! Dogs aren't allowed in this park, which is probably a good thing for those pigs. Maia would have been a dog possessed had she smelled these babies.