Wednesday 021313

Finally caught up on the latest Endurance Planet episode with Tawnee and Lucho.  I have a question that wraps up the episode that asks about folks that don’t seem to periodize.  As I expected, Lucho’s take is that the folks that don’t periodize would most likely be better if they did. 

But I know at least some of those guys don’t believe that.  In fact, they seem to believe that if they taper, or look to periodize they go flat, or lose fitness. 

Probably the first guy that I saw that seemed to really not periodize was Bernie B.  For something like five years, Bernie just seemed to race, week after week and was hugely successful (he was third overall at Pikes a few years in a row, and won something like 80 percent or more of the races he was in).  I asked him once if he thought that he would perform better if he did not do this but instead focused on a few key races.  He admitted that sometimes the back to back races – in a weekend – left him a bit tapped on the second day, but he 100 percent thought that he was better for consistently racing. 

I have met others that think and feel the same thing:  their races are their weekly workouts and how they get after it.  There are some guys that are younger that do this (JJ out east), but most of the guys I know are a bit older (Andy A comes to mind, Dave D).

Maybe you just need a name that has the first and last name start with the same letter to be successful with a strategy like that.
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Afternoon, Green on the front side (up and back) with JV.  I felt thrashed both ways and felt like I was slogging, but it was my quickest time on this route up this year (this is my least favorite ascent which probably speaks to how it is more a weakness).  Still 42 and change.  If I actually RUN the thing I will be back in the 30s. 

Tacked on, getting 10 and 3500 of vertical on the day in just over 2 hours.

January stats: 313 miles, 44.37 hours, 12,530 feet climbed, 2 days off, 5 treadmill runs, 2 20 milers, 9 days of quality, 1 summit of a 8k peak (Bear) (which accounted for almost 20% of my climbing for this flat month!) and zero days at high altitude.  Zilcho racing.