Winter Training

Welcome to Winter! Well I guess technically that welcome should come on Tuesday but close enough. It is cold out there! Winter has come early to the Baltimore - Washington corridor and well yuck. Its one thing if it just cold but we have the wind too! Usually the wind doesn't come into play until about February or March but this year it has made an early appearance. What does that mean to an outdoor athlete who likes to stay warm? It means indoor training. Well that isn't too much of an issue for swimming as the majority of my swimming has been inside anyway. For cycling and running that's a bit different. We will continue to go to spin class but nothing beats riding your own bike so today we set up the trainers.

After some previous races I decided I needed to practice my cycling more and get some aerobars. Most would think the aerobars are to go faster.

Mine...are for reading.

I did find at a previous race I needed my hands to open my gels and really wanted some bars then to free up my hands. Other than that I don't quite think I have the balace for this aero thing but we'll see.

So my bike when on our old magnetic trainer and Jeff's bike went on the fancy new fluid trainer we bought today. My hope is that since they are easily accessible to us we will ride often. By easily accessible I mean they are in our main tv watching, dinner eating, room. Without finishing our basement (and we hope to move in the next year or two) it's our only place to bike and watch tv.

Our first indoor ride was an hour long and it did feel long. It was a very different riding experience. With outdoor riding you can coast not indoors. The tension is very uneven which was unsettling at first and was a bit rough on the knee and shins but once they warmed up it was ok.

So how's your marathon training going you ask...yea about that....basically all the people we were going to run with have decided not to do the race. Since the primary reason to do the race was to support our friends to do their first marathon. Since that is no longer happening we didn't have much motivation to run long each weekend in the cold and wind. Additionally cycling is where we needed to focus our attention as that is weak for each of us. That is what brings us to today. So our indoor gym is set up, hopefully this proves to be the right decision for us. I don't like that I don't know how many miles I went since my bike computer is attached to the front tire and only the back tire turns on the trainer. Oh well!

Happy Holidays and Happy Training!