Went on a group ride...finally...

There's me!

I finally went on one of the group rides with other people in the race team(Mad Dog Cycles). I had to go on one to support the team so I just went, it was hard because they are all in Utah Valley and here I am in Sanpete Valley, also the rides are always on a weekday(usually Thursday nights). This one I went was in Mapleton which was 45 min. from my work which was in Mt. Pleasant so I thought I could head off there from my work and make it on time. So I did and I was the first one at the trailhead and waited 45 minutes for everybody else. We went on the Whiting Trail near Whiting Campground in Mapleton Canyon. I thought it was a good trail and we rode for an hour, about 40 minutes uphill and 15 minutes downhill. There were a lot of people that came and we all had a blast. Good climbing with some awfully steep sections and water bars in some places, mostly singletrack and the last 2 miles of the climb was doubletrack. I do remember hiking some of the trail while I was living in Provo but never biked on it though. I thought it was a fun ride and I got to know everybody. I should go on more group rides if I can besides racing which can get me to work harder because I would really like to ride with guys that are faster and can make me a better rider.

Great Riding At Black Hill

B-E-A-UTIFUL day today! Finally, spring has sprung and wouldn't miss this day for a ride. The temperature got to 71 and I headed off to Black Hill and took Duke my dog with me. He really ran and kept up with me the whole time. For a dog like him, he can pass me and get in front on the singletrack trails but doesn't really keep up on the roads when I go a little faster, and boy he was really tired though. After 11 miles of riding and dog runnin', Duke jumped in the giant water puddle from an irrigation ditch at the bottom and drank and drank and cooled off. He ran for an hour without stopping trying to keep up with me.

Black Hill Trails are getting better and better every year. Today, I saw a lot more mountain bike tracks on them than motor bike tracks but it is getting packed down really good. I am so glad they are not closing down the trails, great riding there, just for the spring and fall though(hot and lot's of mosquitos in the summer) but a lot of people like to go there when there is still snow in the mountains. Ephraim's got some great mountain biking trails right in my backyard so I am not moving away, I like it here.

My bike worked great on these trails and I had some great riding today and enjoyed the warm temperatures.

Just like the olden days...

I am going to start a training program that I did back when I was in high school but there may be a few changes. In high school I did this:

Monday-rest
Tuesday-sprints
Wednesday-endurance
Thursday-intervals at lactate threshold
Friday-rest
Saturday-race
Sunday-recovery ride

The training I have been doing right now is similiar but I don't do a sprint workout anymore so it looks like this:

Monday-rest
Tuesday-intervals
Wednesday-rest
Thursday-Endurance
Friday-rest
Saturday-race
Sunday-recovery ride

.....I have been thinking in the last few months that I NEED to add a sprint workout! Because it really helps with your training when you are racing. In the past few years, I have just been too lazy to do so. And back in high school I was doing sprints and I saw a major fitness gain and I need to do these again to see what happens now. Doing a sprint workout in my opinion is harder than doing a race, especially when it's in the first of the week.

This is the schedule I want to start doing right now:

Monday-rest
Tuesday-sprints
Wednesday-intervals at lactate threshold
Thursday-endurance
Friday-rest
Saturday-race
Sunday-recovery ride

The kind of sprints I do will be on an gradual climb at about 8% grade. So doing on that kind of grade would really kill you, doing a sprint like that should last 30 seconds and do about 4-6 of them. On a flat road, I can do it for a minute but I think I can get a better sprint workout on a hill.
On lactate threshold intervals, they should last 10 -30 minutes then recover then do it again. Depends how long my intervals are. If they are short, I do a bunch of them, and if they are long, I do only a few. It's just the kind of ride I do out there that I get adjusted to. Somtimes when I go up the canyon road, I do a long interval at 45 minutes to an hour and that's the longest my body will do. If I was doing shorter ones, I could crank up the intensity. It depends what I want to do that day. I always do these intervals on climbs.
On the endurance miles, I like just go for 2 hours at low intensity. I have some perfect rides around here on both dirt roads or pavement. Some people go for 3-4 hours but I have to work a lot and I don't have the time to go that long so 1-2 hours sounds more reasonable to me.
One mistake I did in high school was that I didn't do my training in blocks. So I was overtrained. In order do the right kind of training, I need to do building for 3 weeks then use the 4th week for a recovery or rest week. Then build again, then recover. Then again. Then race and peak.

There are 5 different training phases throughout the year which are:

Base training
Build
Race/Peak
Transition
Crosstraining

So this season the only difference I am making is adding a sprint workout each week during the build weeks and lets see what happens. Hopefully it'll turn out!

Hardware Ranch Road Ride

For a long time I wanted to try this ride, from Hyrum, UT to Hardware Ranch, then back to Hyrum. It was shorter than I thought, I logged in 32 miles on this ride so it was a quick one. So it took me a good old two hours and I thought this ride would have a lot of hill climbing but it was relatively flat with easy to moderate climbs which lasted only a minute or two. The weather was fairly decent(around 45 degrees) so I really enjoyed a moderate intensity ride. I ran into a stomach problem though, I guess a big salad won't work before a ride, too much dietary fiber. Also too much ranch. I should have ate something more digestive, more like a sandwich or something. Something low fat and foods that contain carbohydrates. Like fruit, lean meat, bread, pasta, etc, but no vegetables! I should have did some thinking though. I knew vegetables take a long time to digest and only eat it at night but I guess I didn't think, all well, I still had a fun ride. So, I took it easy during the whole time. I only saw maybe 10 cars, 4 runners, and 1 biker during the whole ride. I'd do this ride again but I rather go up Richards Hollow mountain bike trail when the snow melts, that one's funner.

Good way to start on the first day of Spring...Antelope Island

Today I went on a ride on Antelope Island. Antelope Island is the biggest island on the Great Salt Lake. It actually is a State Park so it has great mountain biking trails. I went today which is the first day of Spring and it was packed. Mostly a lot of horseback riders along the trail. Quite a lot of bikers too. But I got around all right. It wasn't too bad though, just had to stop and slow down every time there was a horse. But the riding was fantastic! I did both the Split Rock Bay and White Rock Bay loops which was the total of 15 miles and about an hour and 40 minutes of riding. Saw some buffalo and it was dry everywhere for March. Where I live, there is still a lot of snow and it was great to get out of town and ride someplace I can actually get some mountain bike riding in. I am guessing my riding buddies went road riding in Sanpete today....losers. I am the kind of person that know how to have a real adventure and do some real riding! Road riding is booooring, hands down. I am glad I went and it was a perfect day weatherwise.

Race Schedule:

March 6 St. George, Ut Red Rock Desert Rampage
April 3 Hurricane, Ut Cholla Challenge
May 1 Lehi, Ut Showdown at 5-Mile Pass
May 15 Sundance Resort, Ut Sundance Spin
May 22 Soldier Hollow/Heber, Ut Hammerfest at the Hollow
May 31 Draper, Ut Stan Crane Memorial XC Race
June 12 Deer Valley Resort, Ut Pedalfest
June 19 Sherwood Hills/Logan, Ut Wimmer's XC Race @ Sherwood
June 26 Jackson Hole, Wyoming Taming the Tetons
July 3 Snowbird Resort, Ut Mountain Bout
July 10 Solitude Resort, Ut Chris Allaire Memorial/Utah Open State Championship
July 31 Snowbasin Resort, Ut Basin Bash XC
August 7 The Canyons Resort, Ut Rock the Canyons! XC

My Race Reward...

After a grueling race season this year, I deserve a fun bike vacation. My plans are to go to the Southern Utah Mountains near Brian Head Summer Resort and Bryce Canyon. I want to go sometime in August and use up my paid vacation days for it. At first I want to go to Brian Head and do the Scout Camp Loop, I have done this trail a couple times before, this used to be a race course as part of the ICUP races years ago. If I remember it right, there were a lot of singletrack with 1,000 feet of climbing and have lot's of shade. It is up high though, at the 10,000-11,000 feet elevation. It should be nice and cool for the hot summer months. Also at Brian Head, on a another day, I want to do Lowder Ponds Loop which is up higher and has a lot of singletrack with a 2 mile dirt road climb included. I never did this trail and I will have to see what it is like! It is a 11 mile loop. Then on the way back home, I would like to stop at Bryce Canyon and do the Thunder Mountain Trail. The trail is all downhill but I am going to go up the 5 mile paved trail to get to the top of the Thunder Mountain trail head. I heard that it's a blast going down it. I don't know when the exact days are but hopefully it turns out!

Scout Camp Loop

Lowder Ponds Loop:

Thunder Mountain Trail: