What tricks have you learned that help you get ready for the new season?
This year I want to give myself a longer break with no structured workouts. I enjoy running the Honolulu Marathon and my first A race of the season will be the first weekend in June. The '23 Marathon was on December 10th and my Prep period began December 25th. This time I will make that break at least twice as long. The nice thing about Hawaii is I don’t need to move indoors. I hope to do more hiking and for that, rain up on the mountains can be a factor.
I mostly liked the content in this episode, but there are three key things I would add to the discussion:
- Get a physical. As athletes we are often over confident in our ability to manage our own health. Get a physical, get blood work done, for some us paler folks also get a skin check – we spend a lot of time in the sun. Things pop up that are unexpected. As mentioned in 343, even fit athletes can be pre-diabetic, but you won’t know it unless you get the blood work done.
- Check Your helmet. The protective foam in helmets doesn’t last forever. Check that your helmets aren’t more than 3-5 years old.
- Bike Handling Skills. I coach mostly mountain biking where skills are very important. I’ve seen athletes with remarkable fitness not perform at their best because they were constantly burning matches to keep up with riders with better skills. But mountain biking isn’t the only discipline that can benefit from skills training in the off-season. Crit racers can benefit from bumping and cornering drills, track racers from foot speed work, track transitions, pace lines and more. We’ve now seen in the Tour that a racer with poor descending skills can cost them serious time, or worse, serious injury. Good skills give riders confidence and speed on their bike, while reducing risk and effort to maintain momentum.
Great suggestions! Chris Case and I were actually out filming some bike handling videos to help cyclists with their skills. Hoping we’ll get those out in the winter.