Last Tuesday I went on my first tempo bike ride in months. The plan was to ride two miles to warm-up, then ride 10-12 miles at a 3:00/mile pace (fast for me!), then cool-down for a few miles. I popped a caffeine pill and a gel pack, filled up my water bottle, and hit the road. Here's how it went:
11 miles of intervals (about 33 minutes total), with a 7 mile cool-down.
The wind was awful (20 mph gusts) on the front end of the neighborhood loop, and that kept me above a 3:00/mile pace on several of the miles. I made up for it on the back end and averaged 2:59/mile over the course of the 11 miles, and still felt pretty good at the end. So good, in fact, that I did a longer cool-down than originally planned, rounding it out to an even 20 miles.
On Saturday I went out with a goal of biking 40 miles, with a short run afterwards. The weather was perfect: 70 degrees and sunny, with minimal wind. 40 miles seemed to easy, so I ended up doing 50. 3 hours of biking is exhausting. I got home and napped for an hour, and my quads were achy the rest of the night. But I can confidently say that my knee is at 100%.
I'm noticing a significant difference using the caffeine during my hard workouts; my muscles get tired at times, but instead of staying tired the rest of the workout they bounce back pretty quick. I'll have to integrate it into my races.
11 miles of intervals (about 33 minutes total), with a 7 mile cool-down.
The wind was awful (20 mph gusts) on the front end of the neighborhood loop, and that kept me above a 3:00/mile pace on several of the miles. I made up for it on the back end and averaged 2:59/mile over the course of the 11 miles, and still felt pretty good at the end. So good, in fact, that I did a longer cool-down than originally planned, rounding it out to an even 20 miles.
On Saturday I went out with a goal of biking 40 miles, with a short run afterwards. The weather was perfect: 70 degrees and sunny, with minimal wind. 40 miles seemed to easy, so I ended up doing 50. 3 hours of biking is exhausting. I got home and napped for an hour, and my quads were achy the rest of the night. But I can confidently say that my knee is at 100%.
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| Hills! |
I'm noticing a significant difference using the caffeine during my hard workouts; my muscles get tired at times, but instead of staying tired the rest of the workout they bounce back pretty quick. I'll have to integrate it into my races.
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