VENT is located on Rte. 2 in Latham in the KMart plaza. Please come prepared to ride with a hand towel, water bottle, stiff soled sneakers or cycling shoes with SPD clips, moisture wicking clothing or athletic attire, and a heart rate monitor if you have one.
This Friday will conclude the Base Phase of our training. Hopefully you have worked on staying in your endurance zone (65-80% MHR) for the past 4 weeks building yourself a solid base for the rest of the season.
This Saturday, Julie Gauer will be leading our group ride and will introduce the Build Phase of our training program. The ride will be 1 hour and 30 min long. We will be in the Build Phase for the next 4 weeks. While in this phase, we will build on the fitness gained while in the base phase by introducing interval/speed and hill training to push ourselves a little harder (increase intensity) and start to make the strength and power gains needed to compliment our base aerobic fitness.
The Build Phase increases overall training stress on the body by increasing the amount of time you train for, and the intensity you train at. However, we don’t just make a ‘step change’ from base to build: there must be a gradual increase in intensity and volume of training. You still should be doing about half, or more, of your training as aerobic training (65-80%). This continues to maintain your aerobic base, and gives you time to recover from the harder sessions.
We will start to introduce speed training into the equation, which teaches the body pace and technique using faster movements. Interval training (increased exercise intensity for a set period or distance followed by a rest period or distance) increases strength, speed, and raises our lactic threshold. We start to get an idea of what our key physical limiters are, in terms of speed, speed-endurance, strength, etc.
We can also start to tailor our training to improve specific areas; for example, if strength and hills are your main limiter, introduce a hill session into your training every week or so. Vary the gradient, length of hill and speed to give your body a more rounded experience!
MISSION MOMENT VOLUNTEERS NEEDED! Please let me know if you would like to do next weeks mission moment before 5 pm on Thursday, March 14.
WELCOME BACK LEN!
Len is one of your cycling coaches who has just returned from a nice, long vacation in Florida. Len has been with TNT as a cycling coach for many years, so please feel free to ask him questions as the season progresses. We are glad to have you back Len! Len's bio is located on the coaches tab on our website.
