Got up and went to the coaching session at the track this morning which was really fun and we worked on a bunch of stuff especially jumping and gates which is what I need to work on a lot.
I was on flats still as I am going to mostly ride flats over the winter anyway and it went really well although I didn’t feel very comfortable on them which proves that I need to use them more. I am using my Pedalling Innovations pedals so they are way more grippy than normal pedals so they are not quite as hard to get used to and I also found that I wasn’t lifting my feet as much as I usually do out of the gate which is good.
Unfortunately there weren’t any really fast people in the training so it was harder to gauge if I was gating well or not but I felt good out of the gate and was ahead of everyone every gate so I think that I will be OK going forwards.
I am still debating what pedals to use for sprints over the winter but just for ease of not having to take extra shoes I may stick to flats for now. It would also be interesting to see how my times compare between flats and clips and if I can get my flat pedal times faster than my clip pedal times from the last few weeks.
I am also conscious that I have only been doing one sprints session a week so far instead of the 3 sessions planned a week. I am now thinking that it may be better to work on my flat skills more now and build up the sprints sessions slowly after I have got used to the gym sessions that I will start next week once I get paid.
I was thinking of buying new wheels for my 20″ and riding that over the winter but I think that I would be better off using the wheel money to pay for a years gym membership instead. I have been watching a Global Bike Network video with Sir Cris Hoy and he was saying that sprinters are built in the gym not on the bike so I feel that getting in the gym may be the most imports part of my training for the Worlds. So I am going back to the idea of adding the gym to my training so that my training will be:
Monday
AM – Gym(Legs) / Stretching
PM Rest
Tuesday
AM – Flat Skills / Stretching
PM – Sprints
Wednesday
AM – / Stretching
PM – Basketball or Racing Bristol
Thursday
AM – Gym (Legs) / Stretching
PM – Flat Skills
Friday
AM – Flat Skills / Stretching
PM – Rest
Saturday
AM – Coaching
PM – Rest
Sunday
AM – Road Ride
PM – Rest
As I stated before I want to focus on my flat skills this month and as my manuals and pedal manuals are way weaker than my bunny hops I have decided to concentrate on them first. As my manuals are my weakest flat skill I will work on them first and then when they are better I will start working on the pedal manuals as well. As a short term goal I have decided to se a target of 10 meters is a realistic target to set as a goal until the end of the year. 10m is just over 30feet which is about as big as any jump that I will come up against on any track so it is a really good first goal. Once I have achieved that I will try and build up my pedal manuals to the same distance then try and build up to 50 meters for both as it is basically the furthest we can go in a straight line at our undercover sprint/ flat skills spot and it is also way further than you would need to manual on any track!
Once I can easily manual 50m I will stop doing the specific training sessions in the mornings and swap them out for upper body weight training to help drop weight and also improve my conditioning ready to start racing in March!
I also know that I am severely limited at the moment with my Range of Motion (ROM) so I urgently need to start stretching in the mornings to rectify this. Doing the first flat skills session on Thursday night highlighted the fact that my limited ROM is affecting my ability to manual as I am not able to get far enough back over the back wheel or low enough due to lack of flexibility. Practicing manuals will help with this but it can be sped up by specifically stretching every day. I am going to try and get up early enough in the morning that I can get my workout done and get home and stretch before having to get ready and starting work at 7:30 am. The flat skills will be easy to fit everything in as I will only be able to cope with 30-60 minutes before I am too tired to carry on (and I am going to practice just outside of my house so there is no travel time needed!) so I will be home by 7am at the latest so I will have 30 minutes to stretch and have a shower before starting work.
I have decided to practice manuals on the two tunnels as it has no traffic at that time in the morning and it is literally behind my house! There is also a flat bridge on there that is about 10m long so I will not need markers to practice. There is also a slight slope to get onto the bridge which will make it a bit easier to get the front wheel in the air to start with. Also once I am a bit better I can move to manualing down the hill after the bridge to make it easier to manual a long way. I will get up in the morning and pop out with the measuring wheel and see exactly how long the bridge is and then start practicing tomorrow morning to get a head start on it. I have another full week of work and then and 3 days the next week and it is the xmas break so I will be able to spend more time practicing manuals and hopefully get to a point where I have reached my 50m goals for manual’s and pedal manuals so that I can start doing 4 gym days a week by the new year. I also have the first week in January off as annual leave so I can use that week as extra practice. Thinking about it it will be my 49th birthday on the 8th of January so I may as well challenge myself to manual 49m by 49! So that gives me just under 1 month (28 Days) to learn to manual!