100km ride and Swim

Well this afternoon I had to make up for the lack of training in the morning. I knew I wouldn’t be able to do a run due to my knee so had to make sure I really blasted my legs to make up for it.

The aim was 100km, before the knee troubles of the morning that’s what I had planned to do. This afternoon was a planned "big gear" day so unfortunately that meant 100km in big ring only. I was surprised with the pace I could hold, remembering when I started out a big gear ratio was virtually impossible for me to push. I had come a long way.

I did a lot of short sprints and standing up work to really stress my quads. I kept a consistent pace the whole time and would intermittently do sets of 1min standing, 1min sprint in the big chain ring. I was amazed during the "easy" bit when I was in the aero position the amount of stress it placed on my hamstrings. I had never noticed this before and knew I would have to train a lot more in aero to strengthen them.

In comparison to yesterdays ride the 100km went by a lot faster, and mentally I was able to push the whole way. However it took a far greater toll, probably carry over from the 180 I did yesterday but when I got off the bike I could barely bend down without cramping.

I found today standing up sprint reps in big ring so far are the best strength builder. I love climbing mountains works the quads a lot, but I think along a straight standing in big ring, 100% sprint would pretty my ruin my legs very quickly.

The swim set was a relatively short one for me. As I discussed before I really only need to do maintenance work in my swimming as I have developed such a base with my 25km open water swimming. 100km weeks in the pool will do that too you.

3 x 500 free on 7.00 descend 1 - 3
6 x 50 25easy/25hard on 60

I didn’t push the 500s out all that much, 6.40, 6.30, 6.10 that’s 1.20pace, 1.18pace and 1.14 pace respectively. Nice little sharp set just to keep me in shape. Tomorrow morning was a planned group ride, but had some members cancel on me, so looks like I am flying solo. Hopefully knee permitting, followed by a run. That’s all for now.