Many people that I know tend to chose a New Years Resolution that they want to stick to.  No matter what it is many people don’t make it past the first week with these resolutions and the feelings tend to make them more demoralized than they were before.  Personally I do not set a New Years resolution.  “Why?” you might ask.  I personally feel that setting one goal that is often an obscure far reaching goal that you fantasize of obtaining is only setting yourself up for failure and let down.  I personally set goals, now maybe this is my sport background or my competitive nature but I feel that this is a better way for me.  I do not set goals that are “low hanging fruit” so to speak but I set some that I know are achievable in the year’s time frame and then some that will be a challenge for me.  I have found this to be very beneficial for me for three main reasons:

1. There are multiple things that I would like to achieve so if I don’t meet one it is not a complete failure for the entire because I didn’t make it.
2. Some of them seem to be long shots when I am planning them and I might not make them but it makes me continue to strive to be my absolute best.
3. I make them defined so I know what success is.  Much like a sport and training you can leave your goals vague and then success is up to your decision where if you have a quantitative aspect to it you will be able to gauge the level of success.

So you might be wondering “What sort of thing should I do as a goal for the year?”  Here is my recommendation.  Make more than one goal, I personally chose 10, this allows for many things to strive for but gives you stepping stones to success.  Make your goals something you desperately want or desire, but more importantly be sure it is your goal and not someone else’s.  The drive must be from within, otherwise you will dread the task of getting to your goal and drastically reduce your rate of success.  So to give you an idea of what I mean here are 5 of my 2012 goals:

1. Be a better father and husband for my family: Put down the cell phone, put away the laptop and enjoy the time that I have available with them by giving them my undivided attention.
2. Win RAAM 4 man team: This is very high hanging fruit but if I am going to do something I am going to do my best to win.
3. Increase power at Threshold by 20 Watts by June: Consistent training and hard work is the only way too get there.
4. Get more consistent sleep:  Sleep no less than 6hrs and no more than 8hrs/night unless I am sick.  Bed time consistent w/in 30min of 10:30pm
5. Stay Positive: Stop negative talk and thoughts, Positive self talk and surround yourself with positive people.  Strive for a “get to” attitude versus a “have to” attitude.

So, as you look at a lot of my list you may notice that they are all fairly simple in terms of what to do but a lot of them are related around RAAM.  This is a large event for me and my teammates and I do not want to let them down so 2012 up until June is almost solely centered around the race.  After June I have other goals as well but they are on a different level.  If you have someone who can hold you accountable that you are willing to share your goals with do so.  Be sure it is someone that won’t nag you but someone to support, encourage and keep you honest.  I have set my goals as a recurring meeting in my phone for Monday mornings and I hope that I will start each week with a positive reminder of what I am striving for.  I do not know how this reminder will work but I will let you know!  Do it because you want to, not because you have to, and love every minute of it!

With so many things going on during the holiday season the first thing that always tends to go, after diet at least, is exercise.  Between all of the hustle and bustle of buying gifts, traveling, meals with family and food induced comas the exercise routine is put by the way side. Over the years I have found several things that have really helped me out and I hope will help you to keep a more normal exercise routine. 1. Set up a schedule- Yes the training schedule is import but I am talking about the schedule with your family in this instance.  This is how you will stay out of the dog house with your significant other as well as not miss out on any/many of the family activities.  It is important to have your family supporting you in this and setting it up ahead makes that easier. 2. Travel Days- Take the travel days off or easy.  These always tend to be the most stressful.  Whether you are driving with kids screaming in the back seat or dealing with the re-circulated air of an airplane take the rest of the time easy and relax.  The stress of travel always takes a toll and be sure to remember to recover! 3. Intensity over time- Trade off overall intensity for time if things are busy.  This is a good way to get a legitimate workout in and not add any stress in the family. I was able to get my first ride in this morning and it was a nice 32degrees in the dreary Kansas winter.  I can not thank my wife enough for letting me get in the saddle time today and even though it was cold and damp it was nice to get out after a long drive.  The one, and most important thing, to remember is that you aren’t getting paid to be an athlete.  So… if it comes down to it and you miss a workout or two it doesn’t result in you losing your career.  Happy Holidays and safe travels!

After chatting with many of you the number one question that was posed turned out to be, “How can this(lactate threshold testing) help me with my training and race performance?”  For many of you out there who might be asking the same question let me answer that for you as well: The lactate threshold testing is designed for two different reasons.  The first reason is to provide you with customized training ranges for your workouts.  The training ranges that are created based off of your test allow you to train more consistently and more accurately.  This increased accuracy in your training allows you to get more benefit from your structured workouts and more importantly make the most out of the limited time you have available.  Secondly testing adds consistency to your results.  Field tests can be performed to help out with training ranges, however, lab testing does one thing that field testing can not do and that is take out many of the variables.  The controlled environment of the lab allows for much more consistency between testing and gives you a more realistic measure of where your fitness actually is.  The testing also helps to reduce the overall affect that fatigue or mental fortitude (depending on the day) can have on your results by utilizing the blood samples that are taken.

Alright so several weeks ago I did 6 Gap Century in Dahlonega, GA.  It was a fun event and really eye opening at how much fitness I have lost in the last 5 months or so.  The riding has slipped a bit since our move, and a little before that for that matter, the guys I did Phantom canyon with can attest to that! 🙂  But hopefully really long days of work are going to become fewer and farther between and a little more consistency will come back in my training which is necessary in preparation for RAAM next year. Anyways…enough about that and on to my real reason for writing.  At 6 Gap I was surprised by the audacity of one individual who stated, “Dumb racers go to fast to even enjoy the scenery,” as I was riding through a little slower moving traffic (missed the start by 10-15min…oops!).  This really bothered me because I felt I was being as courteous as possible in going by.  Either way I think there is something that the “racers” need to understand as well as the more recreational crowd and everyone in between.  Everyone gets their enjoyment from riding in different ways, some enjoy the scenery, others like to push their limits.  The most important thing is that we all have a mutual respect for everyone that is out on the road.  Love what you do and just be glad that someone is out on the road and riding in a respectable manner to continue to give cyclists a good name.  

Well, I got my first road race in 4 years done 2 weekends ago at the Mead Roubaix.  For those of you unfamiliar with a roubaix style course it is not only pavement but dirt and gravel roads.  This race happened to be 68 miles in total and 20 miles of that was Gravel.  Let me clarify that a bit more.  It was gravel, hard packed dirt and the worst of all was sand that was 2+inches deep.  The race started and we have several miles before we reached the first of 3 dirt sections.  This was the longest section each lap and was the smoothest and fastest (minus the the headwind) it wasn’t more than 150meters onto the dirt and the first crash happened near the front of the field taking down 5 guys right in front of me and thankfully there was enough room that I was able to steer clear and catch up to the guys who had already created a gap.  The cross winds played their toll and those who were not able too find shelter suffered.  The race turned south and the tailwind kept the group compact.  Because of a recommendation from another racer in the morning wave I moved to the very front in this stretch for the next section of dirt.  It was a great tip because when we hit that stretch I was second wheel and the 2+ inches of sand had clearly played havoc on the fields.  There were police cars already on scene from groups that went off in front of us and broken and battered bodies laying in the ditch.  A deep section of sand grabbed my front wheel and put me into the left lane and almost onto the hood of the cop car that was sitting there.  Through the descent and up the sandy climb and a field of 65+ was now a break of 10 riders. A couple miles of pavement and we were on the final dirt stretch.  This was two shorter steeper climbs with what looked more like a cyclocross sand pit to me than a road race and we reached the top with four of us together and nearly 50miles to go still.  We turned back north after the start/finish line and within miles it was 3 of us. The final 2 laps we continued to push and pass the shattered remains of many of the fields that headed out before us.  On the final lap one of our 3 men was struggling and in the second dirt section we dropped him and then there were two.  I worked as little as possible and tried to conserve as much as possible.  A valuable lesson was learned in the final 1000 meters and that is be sure that you pay very close attention to what the finish looks like.  I attacked thinking I had 400 meters to the finish and it turned out there was a orange fencing up at the turn prior to the finish and I went with closer to 750 meters.  OOPS!  So giving it my all and realizing that the distance was nearly double what I expected the other rider caught my wheel with 200 meters to go and then went around me and I was unable to muster up any additional strength.  Second place on the day and a big lesson learned.  Either way it was fun and a great challenge. Final lap and hurting a little   Blog taken from Scalybirdlegs