Changes Coming???

First off, my plans and goals for the year remain the same. Apart from dropping the second round of Snake off the schedule there have been no changes to the races I want to complete this year apart from adding the Dirty Spokes 6 Hour race on May 9th. The changes I speak of are of the scheduling workouts variety. Back in September/October when this whole idea started forming, I wasn’t anticipating meeting someone who I’d be willing to adjust my schedule for. But when lightning strikes sometimes you have to make changes in the fly. So what changes are coming? I don’t exactly know yet.

Since early December my training has been of the “shoot from the hip” variety. Getting sick, going over the bars, meeting my girlfriend, traveling to see family, the holidays, and two races in the first few weeks of January have thrown my finely tuned plan into chaos. With The Gobbler coming up this weekend and only one race (The Flow, Feb 29th) between now and Big Frog on April 25th; I’m looking forward to establishing a new routine for my workouts. Dedicating time to a relationship means that if I want to commit the same amount of time towards training as before then I need to sacrifice time elsewhere. So where does my time currently go? I’m glad you asked. See below in no particular order.

  • Work

  • Bike/Working out

  • Sleep

  • Jordan

  • Chicago Bulls games

  • Other TV

  • Adulting

  • Friends

  • Reading

  • Social Media

Of the items listed above, the things that are most likely to get cut out or at least dialed back are the Bulls, TV, and social media browsing. The Bulls are a dumpster fire at the moment and I have little interest in dedicating several hours a week watching them continue to flounder. Other TV can also be cut back as well. I can still watch some TV, but I don’t really need to watch Season 3 of Supernatural for the 14th time on Netflix when I can be doing something productive. Finally, I spend way too much time browsing social media. I’m going to cut back on that since its basically the opposite of productive.

Additionally, I’ve been reflecting on Snake all week and on how I felt through much of it. Usually Snake is a crampfest for me once I hit the Rock Garden. The combination of all the hard miles and the various hike a bike sections often send my legs into “we quit” mode. That didn’t happen this time. I could feel fatigue in my legs climbing up to the tower, but I wasn’t cramping. Why not? Much of the 2019 was spent running in addition to riding my bikes. I suspect that all the running helped prepare me for all the hike a bike sections. In previous years the closest thing I did to running was walking to the fridge for more beer. Apparently the running has been of some benefit to my mountain biking after all.

So now here I am wanting to introduce running into my already busy schedule, while also trying to work around the rain and find time for my girlfriend. How? Good news is that Jordan likes to run, so we can run together sometimes. She also goes to the gym and does yoga, so maybe there’s a way to combine some of those together as well? Dunno. Lots to think about.

I’ve got about a week to sauté on it and come up with a new plan. I’m not interested in making drastic changes the week of a race, so next Monday I’ll return to an actual training plan. Look for a new breakdown post come January 27th. It’ll be nice if I can stick to the new plan, but we’ll see.