Laatste Ronde

Now that cross season is over, it’s time to start planning for next year. Since each season builds on the previous, it’s important to start planning as soon as possible.  Here are a bevy of helpful tips that will insure that you are stronger and more successful next season.

• Take some time off. You might have wicked good fitness right now but it’s important to let your body and mind have some down time to recover. Some say a week or two is good and others say six weeks. I’ve found that two months off the bike is best. Then another three to four months should be dedicated to unstructured riding — limit yourself to light commuting or riding around town. I recommend riding a cruiser bike so as to not tempt undue strain on your system.
• Refuel properly. Lots of serious racers watch their diets very carefully during the season so that they can maximize their performance. These limited diets, while fine for competition season, can lead to serious deficiencies if followed year round. Of course I’m talking about beer deficiency. And desert deficiency too. And the very serious Cheetos deficiency. Also, it’s unhealthy to stay really skinny for entire 12 month periods at a time. The off season is the perfect time to put on those healthy 20 pounds. Once your serious training begins, there will be plenty of time to lose that weight. Plus, the extra pounds are an excellent training tool. Imagine how fast you’ll feel once you drop them.
• Don’t over train. Too many cross racers will race other disciplines in the off season. That’s just a recipe for over training. It’s much better to come into cross season with fresh legs and a hungry attitude. If you must compete, I suggest cross training with another sport like golf, darts, or bowling.
• Increase lung capacity: The deep inhalations associated with smoking are excellent for increasing lung capacity. The tobacco companies have a large library detailing the health benefits of smoking. Plus, all the old school Tour winners smoked like chimneys. Who can argue against success?
• Renovate your bathroom. I recommend that you do this project yourself and that you start a month before the season begins since that should be plenty of time to finish. Don’t worry that your wife will likely hound you every weekend, telling you that the bathroom better be done before her mom visits in October.

For a limited time, I’m offering free coaching and training plans to any local racers planning on competing in the 35+A category next year.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 6th, 2007 at 12:55 pm and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.