Between Races
It's been nearly 5 weeks since the hectic North West Tour, throw in the NSW State TT as well for good measure, family things and back to uni.
After using the NRS Tours of Toowoomba and North West as a litmus test to see where I stand in the domestic racing scheme of things, my coach, Mark Fenner www.ftptraining.com and I sat down to see where my next step as a rider is, and as a result got my training programme overhauled... significantly. After an initial FTP Test up Camberwarra Mountain down near Nowra to set appropiate training zones it was, excuse the phrases, "Balls to the Wall" and "Training my Ring off" time. Days with split sessions, plenty of turbo work, but thankfully (between uni lectures) enough legs in the air recovery time, coupling it with post workout TORQ Recovery drinks and constantly being absolutely spaced out just because I am shattered from my last session.
Thankfully it hasn't been in vain with some rather impressive power gains over the last 4 weeks.
Now it's time to look forward to the next block of racing, with the Tour of Gippsland starting next week, I am looking forward to catching up with the boys and a farewell tour for our man Robbie Hucker who is moving on to bigger and better things in the near future.
During all this I got my new team issue wheels, a lovely set of ENVE Smart 3.4 carbon tubular wheels. So I am looking forward to using these light, stiff and aero wheels around the rolling roads of rural Gippsland. Did I mention they are AWESOME. After years using other brands of wheels which I thought were pretty good, these are stiff to boot. No break rub, accelerate straight away, no lag or wind up. Just brilliant.
A special mention must go to my lovely girlfriend who has put up with me in my constantly dazed state lately. I think I scared her one day when I took her along while I was doing some VO2 hill efforts and started coughing up a lobe of a lung or two.