"Cardio"

When I'm doing a doubles routine a skip a lot of the more aerobic-oriented workouts in X because I'm generally getting heaps of this type of training on my bike. Yesterday my legs weren't recovered from the race so I opted for Kenpo instead of Plyo. It felt better than it ever has. My kicks (which suck due to lack of flexibility) were stronger and had a lot more snap than usual. It also seemed to really help loosen up my leg muscles. So even though it was a random substitution it ended up being the perfect workout.

The X doesn't have any traditional cardio work. Each of the cardio-oriented workouts focus on performing something. There is no idle bopping around. This throws a lot of people who've been taught by the media to think that cardio training is nothing but low-level movement. In fact, "cardio" isn't a type of training at all. We just use those titles because people are taught that they "need cardio".

You need to train your cardiovascular system. It's vital. But you never need to do a "cardio" workout because every type of exercise trains it in one way or another. In fact, the most effect training for this system--if you had to just choose one way--would be doing anaerobic training sets in an interval format, which is what we call circuit training. That is because is puts the most stress on your heart during the actual sets, which then beats fast in order to recover for the next one. This is why the "cardio" workouts in X always have some sort of human performance element. They are meant to stress different muscles and connective tissues in different ways. They are not meant to give you low-level aerobic training.

What we're generally taught to be "cardio" training is actually low-level aerobic training, or more intense interval training that targets your lactate threshold. Both have a place in an exercise program but neither is as time efficient as circuit training.

In relation to X, traditional aerobics are what we'd call a aerobic workout and would mainly be used for either recovery or foundation work. It trains your aerobic system to function well but does very little musclular breakdown. Xers should have done this type of training during their foundation, when they were building up the fitness to tackle X.

Higher level interval training, similar to what Chalene does in Turbo Jam, causes more breakdown and trains your VO2 max and lactate threshold. While highly effective this style training leads quickly towards a plateau if not interspersed with other things targeting different energy systems. Chalene mixes variations in to keep this from occuring but, at some point, you need to create more breakdown using resistance to keep your results curve going up. This is why she's created ChaLEAN, which is weight training program.

The X cardio workouts would be catagorized as the above but vary in intensity so much that some are more like circuit training. Plyo, for sure, creates very high level breakdown but even Kenpo and Cardio X will max your heart rate during segments. Essentially, there are no easy workouts in X (except X Stretch), which is why you should recover between rounds doing something else, like long easy bike rides or dusting off those old Richard Simmons tapes.

Block III

My legs were pretty cooked from yesterday's adventure so I began the third 90x block with Back & Biceps and now I'm so pumped that my arms are swollen up like a tick. I've been preferring lately to switch things up by doing Legs & Back on Monday to have the legs more recovered by the weekend. This weekend should be interesting after doing legs on Friday.

This block will be a short three weeks as we're heading off to Tahoe during the middle of that week. Tahoe will be catagorized as a recovery week but I'm thinking that a lot of riding will be happening that may be anything but recovery. Romney and I (well, at least the I part) are excited to tackle Ebbets Pass and its 24 percent grades on our tandem and I'm looking forward to some good hippie bike riding with the lads. With Speedgoat still on the schedule, a couple of peaks are going to need to be bagged as well.

The summer is shaping up and I'm tentatively targeting two good endurance challenges. One is a 170 mile road race, the Tour of Park City. The other is my newer version of the old E100 course. This should set me up to start thinking about next fall's birthday challenge.

This will be the last block of traditional X. With mainly cycling and running on the agenda all of this upper body muscle is mainly for fitness. Of course, who knows when I'll get psyched to do some climbing as well and might use it? I do plan to do a forth block in July that features more specific sports training along with a lot of P90X Plus.

First things first. The next two-point-five weeks will focus on finishing strong in traditional X and streamling the diet. I plan to drop a few pounds between now and July, so I'll axe the junk, eat as I should, and maybe suffer a little bit.

Here's the schedule:

Week 1,2

M - Back & Biceps, ARX
T - Plyometrics & hard ride
W - Chest, Shoulders, Arms, ARX & hilly run
T - Yoga X & hard ride
F - Legs & Back
S,S - outside stuff

Week 3

M - Legs & Back, ARX
T - Yoga X, hard ride
W - Chest, Shoulders, Arms, ARX, hard run
Off to Tahoe...

Diet Rules: nothing is off just yet except binging and complete junk food. I'll keep my calories just under what I'm buring. So instead of bowls of cereal I'll have a bowl. Instead of a smothered burrito it'll be plain. Instead of beers I'll have a beer. That should be about all it'll take to take me to the next level. Fitness is not far off right now. I think Bob, Josh, and Reed are all in, too, which is an odd serendipity. Maybe even Romney. It'll be easier this way, since we'll all have Tahoe as the focus.

pic: workin' on the Burt Reynolds look. I may need to dye that chest hair before the next photo shoot. And grow a moustache, which goes without saying.

BAM - A Race Report

Since Tony likes to say "bam", it seems fitting that it would be the name of my first event during this round of 90X. My friend Mike told me recently that he needed "an eye opener" to motivate him to train so he had signed up for something that would destroy him. Last weekend I heard about an off-road duathlon called the BAM (for Battle at Midway). Since I hadn't been able to run and had not done a single run this year--since hurting my ankle in India--it didn't seem feasible but I had been getting better and decided to peruse the race web site anyway. As soon as I saw there was a dog division I was sold. If I could run at all, this would be my eye opener.

Not only hadn't I run but I hadn't mountain biked but once, and this hurt as my now 6 week old surgery has me in a state sensitive to jarring movements). Furthermore, I was swapping out my Anasazi frame to turn my "silly" 69er into an actually usable 29" squishy geared bike. Beyond that, I'd never run with Beata. Tuco's beyond his racing years but B would be psyched, for sure. But since I hadn't been running, and Romney doesn't run, well than neither had she--at least over distance with a leash. So my first race of the year would include three milestones: first run of the year, first run with Beata, first ride on my new hippie bike. I think this qualifies it as an eye opener.

Sunday morning we lined up with a small field of dogs behind the main pack of competitors and waited for that cannon to go off. If you're thinking that a cannon might not be the best device to start a race with dogs you'd be right. One dog got away from the owner, who had to chase it down and then run back to the start. Beata was clearly confused but happy. We were running with a pack of dogs and chasing a bunch of people. Woof.

Soon we'd moved ahead of all the dogs and were passing most of the people. B looked a little uncomfortable and kept looking back for other dogs. Around a mile in a couple of dogs pulling their owner made a move and passed us. Beata seemed a little more at ease racing from behind.

By mile two they were a ways out in front and she began to sense what we were doing. Instead of running at my heels she moved up, looked at me, then up the trail. "Want to get 'em?" She looked enthused. We picked up the pace. We were about to catch them when one of the dogs stopped for her morning dump, which thrust us into the lead. B seemed pretty pleased about this and we headed towards the transition near the front of the entire race.

I handed her to Romney and took off on the new hippie ride. With 1,200' of climbing in 12 miles I figured this would make or break the race. By the summit I'd created a gap, which I held all the way to the second transition. Our race was still up in the air, however, since Beata had never run this fast over this much ground. I had no idea how she'd be dealing.

"How's she doing?" I asked entering the transition.

"She's can't wait to run," replied Romney.

Apparently, as the other dogs came in B's eyes where glued out to the course awaiting my return. Romney was stellar as our team's director sportiff. She hydrated B, let Ratso intimidate the competition, and made sure B had taken care of her business so we wouldn't have to stop during the race. As I approached she was fired up to get back out there.

We began the final run slowly. This is always the case in du's as you need to get your "sea legs" back after being on the bike. in spite of her protesting to go faster, I walked B on a couple of steep paved sections because pavement can be hard on paws and I was tired. Well before mile one, however, I noticed her look back with a sense of urgency. Some dogs were gaining on us. And quickly.

I'd hoped for a cruise home but it was not to be the case. I was hurting but we weren't going to let this one go. How many chances do you get in life to stand on a podium with your dog, anyway? We picked it up and B did fine. We increased our lead a bit so I stopped at an aid station to see if she wanted anything. She looked at me, then back down the trail, then up the road again and accelerated. She knew we were racing and didn't want anyone getting back in it. At the next one approached I pulled us near the "doggie pool" just in case.

"Need a drink?" A glance at the pool, then eyes fixed straight ahead and another acceleration. By the finish we'd put an extra two minutes into our completion. Beata then ignored a dog who ran up to us on the finishing straight. She was like a race horse running for the wire and nothing was going to interfere with her concentration.

She seemed really pleased when I placed the medal over her neck and revelled in all the attention. She like the medal ceremony, too, but I think her favorite part was when Tuco found the pizza delivery guy before it was announced and brought her over so they could score a bunch of pizza before anyone else.

We were a pretty happy family. Romney was like a proud parent and wrote this race report. Tuco may have lost his physical dominance but can still work a crowd. And I think I've found my new sport. I wonder if it has a world championship event?

Diet

I haven't been too strict with diet over the course of the program. But since I always eat decently my results are progressing just fine. For the next two weeks, however, I'm going to get a bit stricter and force the next set of results.

The P90X is a performance diet, not a weight loss diet. While you are likely to lose weight on it that is not its priimary function. This is in contrast to every other diet we offer with our programs. It's also why if you run the calorie calculations for X compared to with our other tools you'll end up with more calories. Because X is advanced we assume that anyone going into it has a higher fitness level and percentage of fat to muscle. We have a fit test, that if you can pass, means this is true. So the average person beginning X will consume at least 500 more calories a day than someone beginning our of our regular programs because their BMR should be much higher.

When I advise people beginning X I don't emphasize a weight loss plan, even if their aim is to lose weight. Paramout in X is recovery and you must eat enough to recover if you want your performance to increase. In a more de-conditioned state, as you're more likely to begin one of our entry programs, we suggest you begin with weight loss because you're not yet fit enough to incure serious breakdown from your workouts. So we severely limit calorie consumption as your fitness builds its base.

In a beginner program as your body composition changes you need to eat more to keep results coming because you have to feed your new muscle mass, even in order to keep fat loss happening. For this reason the number one piece of advise we give our longterm members is to eat more calories once they've hit that initial plateau. In X, if you undereat you'll simply never recover and your results will stagnate from the start.

The phased diet plan in X was designed for our average X customer but isn't meant to be set in stone. Here is my post on periodizational dieting. I like this plan for most people, but I ammend it for my friends, especially athletic friends who've gotten a little our of shape, like me during this round of X.

For these types I generally recommend eating anything you want during the initial stages of X. The reason is that we need to recover above all else. The chances are, also, that we'll be doing at least some other exercise. Most of us are training for sports as well the X will always have a double element, even in its initial block. We don't recommend this in our program guide--and wouldn't even necessarily recommend it for athletes. But the reality is that athletes like playing their games and are probably going to, at least to some degree, all of the time. Btw, I'm going to post on sports-specific X routines later on.

I'll always show some restraint with my diet when training but, essentially, if I am desperately hungry I'll pig out. I'm not really a habitual eater. When I'm hungry it's usually due to body breakdown. However, I don't always fuel myself properly. During the initial stages of an exercise program (unless I'm on a very tight schedule) I'll generally fuel myself with whatever I feel like eating, even if it's junk-ish. If I want pizza and beer; that's what I have. And I don't care if this causes me to gain weight initially as long as I'm recovering well enough that I can continually improve the intensity of my training.

At some point, however, bad eating becomes simply bad eating. This is when it's time to streamline. I think I'm at that point. I feel good. My training is beginning to make big leaps along with my fitness. Yesterday I did a group ride and beat my time up Emigration canyon by about 25% from a month ago. I'm recovering with what I eat but I can tell I'm eating a little more than I need. So it's time to start ditching those extra calories. To borrow a broken English term from Arnold back in his Pumping Iron days, it's time to get my diet "to a point."

When the fitness is there it's important to note the cutting calories will have a dramatic effect, and that it could be bad. You need to feed your body and over the next two weeks I'm going to border on not feeding it enough. This helps improve fat metabolism--really important for endurance events--but can lead to chronic overtraining quickly if it's pushed too far. But as far as visible results go, this is when they happen rapidly.

Reed, you gettin' this? 'Cause you're in too.

pic: i like to enjoy a martini. two at the very most. three is off the diet. and four...

Thanks Tony

Actually it's thanks Beachbody, which you'll find here on our wedding site, but since this thread is about P90X I thought I'd throw some extra love Tony's way for contributing to the tandem fund. We have our bike, and there will be pics to follow. But, for now, here is the card that Jude (at the office) concocted for us. Click on it to read the caption, which is perfect.

That was above and beyond the call of duty for all of you, and we greatly appreciate it.

Dilemmas Of A Weekend Warrior

The main problem with being an advanced weekend warrior is that even when you’re in shape for one sport you’re out of shape for another. Since I cycle my sports throughout the year I seem to always find myself in early season dues paying season for one sport or another. This year, since I got out of shape for all of my sports, I’m concurrently searching for form at cycling, climbing, and running (even though I can’t yet actually run). What this means is that I just had a recovery week and I’m more sore than during my 90X training weeks. This week, therefore, will be a transition week.

Friday I did an easy bouldering circuit with Ben in Little Cottonwood. Got really sore. Sat rode the fixie down to the races and back a couple of times, then Romney and I took the tandem out and chased Dustin around. One crit doesn’t really do much except warm him up and this ride was a bit tiring. Sunday, joined Sam and Dustin on a “recovery” ride for around 4 hours. This all went well until they decided to air it out a little near the end of Emigration and put over a minute into me over the last quarter of the climb. Ouch can’t really describe how hard the rest of the ride was. Numb described how I feel this morning.

One of the interesting dilemmas I face is that my main two sports have exactly the opposite physical requirements. In both climbing and riding strength to weight ratio is paramount. However, the perfect physique for climbing is a large strong upper body and spindly legs. In cycling, it’s reversed. Living in a compromised state is something I’m used to. I try and peak at different times of year. But since I skipped an entire season of training I’m now trying to build concurrent fitness in sports requiring completely different training regimes. While it’s fun sorting out what you can put your body through I’m also wandering around in a constant “I’ll never be fit again” state. Of course, by definition having a dilemma means that I need to try and solve it. And as long as I’m leaning something it’s all okay with me. I’m my favorite lab rat.

So this week is a transition towards my final block of 90X (this is going to incorporate X Plus). Along with daily riding, running, climbing (not all each day), my X schedule will be targeted toward both recovery, preparing me for the next round of resistance training, and my sports.

M – Yoga X
T – Legs & Back
W – X Plus Core & Slim Series Express Cool It Off
T – Core Synergistics
F – Yoga X

Photo: The wrong kind of bike: getting un-fit in Nepal.

How Long Should Recovery Cycles Be?

This morning Romney and I got up at 5:30 to do yoga. She had a class. I joined Tony. I got out of bed as stiff and sore as I was last week when I was actually training hard and thinking that I should be closer to being recovered by now.

P90X has recovery weeks that, as I said before, are really more like transition weeks. Recovery cycles during hard training can't always be mapped out. They generally consist of low-level training until the body is healed up and ready to go again and it's impossible to estimate how long this will take. While there are some obvious signs when your body is recovered that will surface eventually it can be tricky to get the timing right on exactly when you should begin hard training again.

Early in a training programs when recovery periods are transition periods you've often just shifted the work load. During this time other breakdown is occuring and you may not feel recovered during a recovery cycle. It's generally best to stick to a per-determined schedule during these periods. However, when you jump back into your training if performance hasn't improved you'll be best served to go back to your recovery phase.

During very hard training, like doubles in X or when your competing or performing it's best to continue recovery until your sure you're ready. The obvious indicator is feeling restless and bored and jonzing for more. But this isn't always the case because your body can trick you and feel creaky or sluggish when it's over rested. Checking your resting heart rate is a good way to tell when you're rested. It's not always correct but if your morning heart rate is slow it probably means it's time to load up the training again. If, after a couple of sessions you aren't feeling strong, transition back to recovery workouts and try again later.

A key component to recovery is nutrition. There's a saying that goes along the lines of "there's no such thing as overtraining. There's just undereating, undersleeping, and failure of will," and it's accurate to the point that overtraining is defined by your ability to recover, which is a function of rest and nutrition. This brings me to a little point I've been thinking about concerning doping for sports, because its aim is to enhance the body's ability to repair itself.

Sports doping enhances recovery through un-natural means. Using science we can speed up recovery, meaning you can train harder sooner. No sport has been rocked by doping as much as cycling over the last few years. This year's Giro is an indication that doping may actually not be going on in the peloton.

The reason that almost every grand tour champion in the last 15 years has been busted for drugs is that in a stage race doping is vital if you're competing against other dopers. In a one day race you can train, then rest and recover and peak. A stage races requires that you race daily. Over the last 15 years the speed of the grand tours has increased nearly every year. You would see the favorites win every key stage, even towards the end of the race. They were even getting stronger. Some of the fastest time trials in Tour history have been ridden at the end of the race, which seems unlikely using natural means after 20 days of continuous competition.

This year's Giro was different. The leaders--even though they were the best time trialists in the race--got creamed in the final stage. This makes sense because they'd been battling in the mountains during the previous stages while those not competing for the general classification were "resting" in the autobus, just trying to make the time cut. In the last stage the overall leaders were very competitive with each other but were beaten badly by those who'd rested while they were racing. This is a far cry from the last couple of decades (since EPO surfaced in the peloton) where the favorites would be dropping everyone in the mountains and then take more minutes in a time trail for following day. Clean cycling may be a reality again.

I'm not sure if I am creaky and sluggish or still overtrained, but yoga was hard this morning. I'll take it slow and steady this weekend, plan the next block of training, but Monday will only be a test as to whether I move ahead or do some more recovery.

pic: Giro podium: first and second in the first tt, this group finished 11th, 28th, and 68th on the race's final day.

Things Are Startin' To Stretch

Bagged Yoga today after the first few sun salutations and popped in X Stretch instead. I'm still tired and what I really needed today was a thorough stretching session. It occured to me that I haven't ever done this workout in its final form. I did the test version, of course, but this was a little different. During the X each time I stretched I'd done Debbie's Slim in 6 Express Cool It Off dvd, just because it's shorter. X Stretch was just what I needed.

I stretch daily but almost never long enough, which is a chronic problem. Stretching is boring. Thing is, whenever I do it I feel so good I say to myself that I'll stretch more. Rarely happens. Whenever it does my performance goes up and my injuries abate. Today's session was prompted because while climbing last Sat my knee locked up doing the above move. I have a problem in my knee that's been there for years. When I'm stretching enough and warm-up properly I don't notice it. But whenever I neglect it for too long I have something bad happen. This is generally during a climb when all of my weight is sitting on it, or when it's twisted as I'm starting to do in this pic. It usually siezes up, locks, causes me to fall off and then swells up. Luckily, it's never happened in a dire situation--actually, it did once and I was luckily able to hold it together for one more move to a big hold where I could both get protection and shake out my leg. This weekend it was a minor problem only as I was able to clip a bolt, hang, and shake it out. But it was enough to get me stretching again.

A cycling coach once said "if you don't have time to stretch you don't have time to train." Very few of us pay attention to this. Those that do, I'm certain, out perform everyone else.

Core Synergistics

I generally find this to be one of the more fun workouts in the 90x arsenal but yesterday it destroyed me. This is the sign of a good workout. One that is challenging and fun but still requires you to be on your game. I'm very tired from the events of the preceding weeks, which is why this is recovery week in the first place. The next time this workout pops up on the schedule it's going to be different.

Core Syn is a hybrid workout that targets all the muscles of the core region. You'd guess this from the title but many of the movements confuse people that have been conditioned to think that the core region is trained with nothing but crunches and sit-ups. In reality, its attached to everything so practically any full body movement trains your core. This is why this workout is full of variations of squats, lunges, and push-ups. Since it's your core, not your legs, that are essentially the trunk of the human tree core training is single most important body region to keep in condition.

Isabelle, wife of our CEO Carl, is a core training expert. She works will a lot of world class athletes on balance and core synergy to try and even out their training. She developed a program years back that never made it to market. It was outstanding, in my mind, and a completely new concept for not just home training but training in general. But Carl nixed it because we couldn't find a home for it. It was just too conceptual for us to sell to the masses. I fought to keep it, even if just a piece of our arsenal, because in my world the more fitness solutions we offer the easier it is to get results with our clients. But Carl didn't want to "half ass" its release, which is what we'd have to do if we couldn't sell it on TV. We're still hoping to find a way to sell it to the masses. In the mean time, we've added more core and balance oriented movements to all of our programs. So we're essentially building our own base for this program. The X Plus workouts have taken another step in this direction. We'll get to those later.

Tony's line of the day is when he's discussing some people's tendency to do a move with poor form. He corrects this with "I want you to start a new tendency..." I love this. It'll work for anything. Why blame bad habits? Just change them into good habits and you'll be fine. Life doesn't have to be as difficult as we like to make it.

pic: climbing requires a lot of core strength.

Recovery Week

My second block of P90X has ended with our marriage/housewarming party this weekend. I think just hosting the party was enough to cause overtraining. It's time for a recovery week.

In 90X, the "recovery week" is really more of a transition week because it's not really easier than actual blocks themselves. In fact, many people find P90X recovery week to be the hardest weeks of all. And though they may feel like harder weeks they aren't on most of the systems being targeted. They feel hard because they include a lot of synergistic movements that are just plain difficult to do. But the overall breakdown that occurs is much less.

It's a little difficult to understand growth curves, recovery, and how or when to actually peak while doing 90X (or any program). We're getting so many questions about it that I'll be writing an article on it soon for the Beachbody newsletter. I'll explain, in brief, what's going on. It's in the X guide (I know, since I wrote it) but here is some further explanation. The concept is simple but understanding it in relation to your own training is more subtle. Many people feel like they won't make progress unless they're training hard all the time, but that's not how the body works.

A block of training generally targets something specific. You may target muscle growth (hypertrophy), muscle strength, pure power, endurance, increased VO2 max, etc. A block generally assumes that a foundation has been laid, or a "Foundation Phase" can also be a block. Each phase goes through an adaptive period followed by a growth period (also called mastery). Once your body masters the said curriculum it tapers off. This tapering is referred to as a plateau because the ascending curve associated with the fitness gains levels off because your body has gotten used to the training.

A recovery period allows the microtrauma of the above training to heal. If done correctly other aspects of fitness can be gained as the main elements are healing. When the recovery period ends you should be stronger and ready to begin the next phase (or block) or training or to do an event you've been training for. Recovery periods don't necessarily have to be easy but they do have to rest whatever was targeted during the preceding block. Harder recovery weeks, such as in P90X, are often referred to as transition phases because they are designed more to aid transition than simply speed recovery. Essentially, as you are resting the targeted areas of your latest block you are targeting new areas. In this case, stabilizer muscles, flexibility, and coordination. If you were recovering for an event in which you wanted to peak, you would choose an easier recovery period that focuses more on resting and less on improving other areas.

The length of a recovery period varies as do the length of training blocks. The 3 weeks "on", 1 week "off" 90X plan is an advanced scenario. Training blocks are often set up differently. 6 weeks on and 2 off is common. An effect block will almost never exceed 10 or so weeks. The perfect scenario is variable, meaning that you would graph off of your training and begin recover once your gains declined. Then you would begin your next round as soon as you were recovered.

In my example, I have overtrained slightly on the bike over the last few weeks but my abridged workouts in X mean that my growth curve there is still accelerating. So my week on the bike will target full recovery while my week of X will target improvement. My X training is going to begin to incorporate some climbing. My bike/cardio stuff will begin adding more runs/hikes (still can't run yet, hmmm).

Progress update: My strength has improved a lot. I’m doing more push-ups during sets of workouts than I could do as a max in April. Almost ditto for pull-ups. My shoulder, which felt awful at the start of the program is moving with much less impingement. I’m tired on the bike but with the virtual Giro that was to be expected. I think my time trial this week will show that I’m fitter. Given the stress level of my life over the past few months I feel pretty damn good. I think the next block is going to be great.

Recovery Week – I plan to bike most days and run/hike the others. All biking will be easy except for a time trial up Emigration and one up Mill Creek. I will try and begin climbing a little, but no hard days at all.

X Sched:

M – Core Syn
T – Yoga
W – Stretch
T- Core Syn
F – Yoga
S, S – play outside

Overtraining

"This is the most blantant case of overtraining I've ever seen. God, I love it!"
- David Brainard, to me, climbing Old San Marcos Pass during '98 Tour simulation

Yesterday I woke up with my heart racing. I was overtrained. This was expected, at least to a point. If you never overtrain than you're never pushing yourself hard enough. Sure, being 1% overtrained is worse than being 25% undertrained but you've got to walk that line, and step over it, if you ever want your training to get close to its potential.

During the '98 Tour de France simulation I hadn't ridden a bike in 8 years as I'd basically been climbing full time. I dusted off an old bike and began riding daily. During the two mountain stages in week 3 I was riding most of the peloton's mileage and destroying myself. Sometimes the aim is break mental barriers and let the physical stuff catch up. That was my plan then. This time, not so much.

This time I'm far more calculated. The aim is to improve a lot more than to finish my simulated Giro goal. My hope was/is that I could do both. After 2 weeks of the Giro and P90X (while recovering from a surgery) I've been right on the edge. This weekend I knew I'd be pushing it, as I was upping my riding from pedestrian mileage to racer mileage. Could I handle real training with X? I'd find out.

Sat: Big Cottonwood and Mill Creek

This isn't an easy day even in shape but daunting when you're not. I chose it for its panache—a perfect simulation for with they were riding in Italy. I rolled out under threatening skies. It had been raining on and off and the top of the peaks were cloud covered. Since they were racing in the rain in Italy it seemed fitting, but not particularly fun. I warmed up into a headwind out towards Big. If it meant a tailwind later things would be perfect.

I begin up Big spinning my smallest gear. I suck, but didn't I just see Contador riding a 34X27? Forget tradition; I’m breaking down and getting a compact crank.

The first steep section. There's a rider up ahead. Don't look. Don't chase. It's way too early to blow. I stand and watch the road ahead. Zone out. Don't chase. Long day ahead.

I glance ahead. Sure enough, I'm gaining. I don't want anyone pushing my pace. Should I slow down? Look down. Ignore it. Could I be fitter than I think?

She’s right up ahead. That’s right; I’m not fit. But wait, climbs equalize gender, since it's all strength to weight ratio. Maybe I’m going okay. Maybe it’s Kim Anderson.

Getting closer. She’s old. Well, not old, but in her 40s. Probably my age. Jeannie Longo? No? I’d better pass her quickly; act as though I’m on a recovery ride. But my breathing is too hard. She’ll know. I suck.

I give my best nonchalant “bon journo”. No response. Her eyes are glued to the road; in full concentration. She’s suffering. Maybe I don’t suck after all.

In the false flat, mid climb, I’m cruising. Maybe I’m ready to ride with the team. No, can’t be. It’s too soon. But I’m flying, right? I glance back. Two riders, steadily moving up. Ride smart. Don’t accelerate.

A casual hello. They spin past smoothly. It looks so easy. Must be Louder and Zabriskie to be passing me so easily. Gotta be. But where’s the moustache? Must have shaved it.

Now I’m gaining. Maybe they weren’t going easy after all. Getting closer. Wait; I’m not gaining. They’ve hit the steep section. I’m on it to. They quickly disappear.

I’m standing and using my weight to turn the pedals. Mashing. Old school. I feel like Greg LeMond. I look like him, too. Except that I’m turning a 39X24 instead of a 42X15.

Near the summit someone passes me descending. Wearing a moustache. Zabriske, for sure. No one else would be up here on such a day. But isn’t he injured in Europe? Never mind. It’s gotta be him. That must have been Swindlehurst riding with Louder earlier.

At the summit I see the two guys who passed me, looking decidedly recreational except for their team kit. Will I ever be fit again? But those sure are nice bikes. And one guy’s sporting a $2,000 wheelset. Maybe they can ride a little. They’re waiting for some friends. I think about waiting to get some help on the descent but think 4” rims will be squirrelly in the wind—reason enough not to let this guy pull me. I head down alone.

Spin over to Mill Creek with a tailwind. Nice. A guy passes me as I’m eating and speeds off. I see him turn into my canyon. Another arbitrary rabbit. But who’s racing?

I catch him at the first steep section. “Hello.” “Hi again.” Good spirits all around.

I’m feeling good. Really good. Could I actually have some fitness? I can’t believe I’m this strong. What’s that sound? A guy flies past. “Beautiful day, eh?”

Surviving now. Just a few steep ramps, then it’s over. Up ahead, could it be?

He’s coming back. For sure. I get close. He stands and pulls away. At the next steep section I’m gaining again. Damn. Legs are way too sore to get into it. I slow. He’s still coming back.

I stand, shift, accelerate past. “Hi again.” Jesus that hurt.

It flattens out. I’m alone. A bathroom. Cool. I slow to pull over. The guy flies past. Head down. No hello. Must be going for the time bonus up ahead.

Sun: East Canyon, Little and Big Mountain

Dustin calls and cancels. He’s overtrained, too, and suffered in his race on Sat. He’s needs some time off—a mid-season break while I’m still hairy-legged and getting ready for any season.

Last night I slept like I was dead. Haven’t been so tired in a while. I was surprised how strong I’d finished the day. No bonk. Solid all the way home. Until that night when I was light’s out about 5 minutes into a movie—a boring husband on a Saturday night.

A late afternoon start means I’ve once again missed the rain. Cool. The first pedal stroke singes my thighs. Not so cool.

I nearly turn around on the warm-up. I’d eaten plenty but the tank is empty. At least get to the first real climb. This doesn’t help. I want to turn around. I tell myself how easy this climb is. I still want to turn around. Just turn the cranks a few more times. When can I go home? It’s a stunningly beautiful afternoon; just do some sightseeing. My legs are on fire. Romney’s fasting. For sure she’s suffering worse then I am. I keep going.

Halfway up Big Mountain I cash it in. I’m struggling. This can’t be doing my fitness any good. I’m only still here to get my percentage of the Giro’s climbing in. With under 5,000’ I’m about a third of today but I’ve got plenty in the bank from the last few days. Now to survive the ride home. I do. Barely.

Mon: Mill Creek Time Trial

My heart rate won’t drop; a clear sign of overtraining. Maybe the Giro simulation is too much too soon. Keep a cool head. I don’t need to finish if it’s worsening my fitness. I wake up slowly. Drink water. More water. Plenty of coffee. Feeling better.

It’s pissing down rain. Ugh. That’s okay; plenty of work to do today. Romney gets called into a training session at the last minute. This means she needs to break her fast so we hit the coffee shop. Still raining. It’s getting late. It’s snowing on the top of Mill Creek, for sure.

P90X is on the agenda. Chest & Back would be an interesting “warm up”. Romney heads to Gym Jones. Tony starts yappin’ at me. Still raining. Doing P90X in full kit, waiting on the weather. That’s it, folks. The mother of all P90X workouts. Yeah, great warm-up. I’m about to puke on my first pedal stroke. The rain has stopped.

I can’t believe how well my home stages have mimicked the Giro. Mill Creek is ridiculously similar to today’s time trial. The upper part of the road is even closed, so it hasn’t been cleaned, which makes it more like the gravel section.

I’m dying but at least the weather is nice. Gorgeous, in fact. Still super wet but I can’t complain. Except for that burning in my thighs. Wish I had some dope. Or at least a compact crank. I can’t wait to get home to my wife.

I think about Contador but I can’t spin. I think about Levi. The Giro’s been too much. That’s more like it. Just surviving. Now I’m Bosisio; in the pink jersey on day one of the Dolomites and now missing the time cut and getting kicked out of the race. Sad. That’s me. It sure is beautiful out.

Somehow I’m feeling okay. Must be the nature. I’m 2 minutes faster than I was last week. Astonishing. I run out of ride-able road. Plant my bike in the snow and take a picture. Three “rest days” ahead. Bliss.

Weekend Plans

When I planned the virtual Giro I had no idea that the weather would cooperate so well. It's gone back and forth from hot to cold just like we're on the continent. I've been pretty lucky. It's rained the last three days and I've hardly gotten wet. Today I even began in the rain and it cleared. Now it's looking bad again. With my two biggest rides of the year planned this weekend I'm hoping for some virtual luck

Dustin sent a link today:

www.mapitpronto.com

Though one of the major roads around here isn't working for some reason (perhaps I've not got it sorted yet), it's a generally great tool for concocting rides, especially if you're trying to mirror something that's going on elsewhere. Tomorrow, for example, my ride is very similar to what they're doing in Italy. Albeit much slower and shorter, I'll being doing a similar amount of climbing. Sunday I'll mimick as well but I'm not going to attempt to come anywhere close to all that elevation gain. That, at this state, could be asking for some knee trouble. Sunday's stage is an absolute monster ride. I wish I could mimick their scenery. Check it out:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/road/2008//giro08/?id=stages/giro0815

Today's "flat" ride banked some elevation. Flat is difficult since I live above the flat area of town. According to the above site I did 1,300' of climbing over just under 30 miles. Tomorrow I'm riding Big Cottonwood and then Mill Creek. According to the site, it's 8,200' of climbing in 65 miles. Sunday I'll tag along with Dustin out East Canyon, so we'll do those climbs in both directions. Two longest days in the saddly, back to back. Should be fun, especially if it doesn't rain.

Legs & Back

I think this is my new favorite X workout. I switched my schedule this week so that I could work my legs today and rest them before my big rides this weekend. It's an odd combo from a traditional training standpoint but, to paraphrase Tony, I climb rocks and I ski (and I ride bikes and I run). So what do I need to train? Legs and back.

My legs are mega sore from the Giro/X double. This week could be horribly painful. But having just finished L&B I'm feeling better than I did before the workout. Giro rest day might have helped but so did the slow balancy movements of L&B. The first few legs sets were hard. I did worse on them than ever. Then I began to loosen up and finished feeling good. I did, however, also benefit from a rest day over in Italy.

Tony had a great line that's cut out because, well, it's not all that PC. Halfway through he's fired up and says, "This is not #$%(. This is something serious." Unfortunately, I'm not at liberty to disclose what it was but it was classic Tony. I hear, though I've never actually asked him, that he came to LA to do stand up. The guy is funny; no doubt about that. But, as is the case with many comdeians, his material is far more suited to a comedy club than family home video. Rehearsals with Tony are a non-stop stream of politically incorrect observations. One of our crew members, Stef, kept saying "wow" at the audacity of some of these. Finally, he made a cue card that just said "wow" whenever Tony was walking the line with a joke. He even used it during the real shoot. I think the only place you might get hear some lines like this are in his "One on One" workouts, if they get released.

No Pain No Gain

This morning I'm extremely sore. It's a good sore--the kind of blissful all over soreness that comes from a big day out. The problem; I had no big day out. The old no pain no gain adage is a misnomer for most aspects of training. But the adaptive phase always causes soreness. Working through this phase is the hardest thing for people trying to change their body composition. They hear that exercise will make them feel better. During adaptation you feel worse, which often forces the uninitiated to quit. Unfortunately I'm not adapting as quickly as I'd hoped. Fortunately, I've been through it so much that I actually like it.

Looking ahead at the race and other summer projects seemed absurd yesterday as I struggled on the friggin' approach trail. Then I did three routes in the sun and pretty much melted (nothing melts you like granite cracks off the couch in the direct sun). The skin on both my hands and feet were so bad that I could barely stand. They recovered enough for an easy spin later and a couple of dog walks but it was a slap in the face on how far I've slipped. Hopefully, my years of experience will make this adjustment happen quickly. But as has been my war cry all this year goes, it's going to get worse before it gets better.

Week one of the virtual Giro was "easy". Not a single hard ride. Yet each day I'm sore from my one hour or so spin around town. 90X has still been abridged. I'm back to about 3/4 workouts. Certainly not recovered from my surgery--and this certainly is why I'm not recovering as well as I should--but it's making progress daily so I don't think I'm overdoing it. Therefore, I'm ramping up on all fronts. Yesterday's issue were certainly exacerbated by the hot weather. It was my first day in the heat this year and my first time climbing since I got married. All providing myself with a fine array of excuses for this morning's pathetic hobbling. But still...

Week two I move to 25% of the Giro stages and 50% of the climbing. This means big days on the bike next weekend. 90X will get back to 100%. And after yesterday's "successful" climbing trial I can now throw a little of that back into the mix. It's a lot of stuff but I badly need the latter if for no other reason than to condition my hands and feet. Skin training should not be underestimated. In long mountain adventures it's often the key to success or failure.

pic: The Giro is the most beautiful bike race. Star of the first week, Riccardo "Il Cobra" Ricco, shadows last year's winner Danilo "The Killer" Di Luca. The Killer's form was suspect coming in but he's looking the best of all the favorites, save Ricco. But Il Cobra is untested and young and all the big time trials and mountains loom. Astana's big three, Contador, Kloden, Leipheimer are all quitely gaining form and biding their time until the first TT. Look for a huge shake up on Tuesday.

Doubles

While I was concocting the doubles routine for the 90X book Tony asked, somewhat rhetorically, "does it really do you any good to train longer than an hour or so?" He was hesitant about adding a doubles segment to something so intense and it was a good question. For most situations you can't benefit much from training more than an hour a day at all out intensity. In almost every case you can come up doing one workout well is far more effective than compromising two workouts. And if workout one is hard enough than compromising workout two is inevitable. So why did we do it?

There are, basically, two scenarios where adding a second workout can be beneficial. Both have caveats attached to them. One is to improve your body's ability to utilize stored fat for fuel. The second is to train for specifically for an endurance sport. Since 90x is designed to train for endurance sports (it's better used as an off-season conditioning program) we added it for the former.

While we were designing 90X I was running groups of our members through various programs using our existing workout programs: Power 90, Pour Half Hour, Slim in 6, Slim Series, and a few other odds and ends. During these "test groups" we found a scenario where most of our members, at one point or another, could benefit from a phase of training designed around improving fat mobilization. But keep in mind that they earned it by maxing the regular program the first time. For most people, adding doubles to the X won't be beneficial until you've gotten so good at it that you adapt very quickly. So most people don't need doubles. They should be earned by plateauing on a program first.

It's the type of training a lot of highly trained athletes will try when they need to lose weight. It's done by, essentially, adding an aerobic workout (low intensity consistant output that's always under one's AT) to a training program. This session is best done after a period of fasting (such as in the morning) when the body is low on stored glycogen. There are other ways to accomplish this as well. Cyclists will often do intense sessions sans nutrition to force the issue. While effective it's a bit more dangerous. Our version is easier and safer. The only danger is that some muscle mass will be compromised unless the diet is perfect. Doing doulbles one must always be willing to lose a little size for a trade off of building a better engine for more intense training later.

For myself, I'm doing it for sports specific training. All of my objectives are in the endurance realm. If I don't ride, run, or climb than I won't have the specific strength to do these things no matter how strong my engine is. In theory, I should only do X in the off-season. But my seasons are weird, and different each year. Right now I need build some aerobic base and I can't run, hence the virtual Giro. And while I'll certainly compromise some strength gains by adding this I need some long days to get ready for long days. One thing about training an hour intensely is that it doesn't get you ready for doing 12-24 or more straight hours of intensity. And that's what I'm ultimately training for.

pic: Romney learning the art of drafting on stage 2 of our "giro".

Virtual Giro

In spite of my precarious situation I began my virtual Giro yesterday. What this includes is riding each day of the Giro that the riders ride. This means I'll be on my bike each day but two over the next three weeks. Romney and Reed have both joined in and I imagine will put their own spin on it. My rules are as follows:

Each day I must ride a minimum of 10% of the race distance or time.
I do a time trial on TT days.
I climb on climbing days.
I ride each of my bikes at least one day per week (road, CX, fixie, SS, 69er).

If I can finish this and make progress through it will build some base for my objectives during the latter half of the year. 10% doesn't sound like much but given I can barely ride at all I'll be happy with it. Plus, this is my "second" workout of the day. Plus, as soon as I can run I have to start doing some preparation. I wanted to make it harder but after day one I'm going to be happy to just finish this.

Day One - rode a time trial up Emigration from the zoo. 36 minutes. Pathetic, yes, but I'm also super sore today and was too tired last night to ride to bike film festival. Regardless, it felt nice to be out on my bike. I'm very much looking forward to the rest of it.

The Giro course is brutal this year. I wish I had more time to do a better mimick. There are no big climbs until stage 7 so I've got a few days to get my legs going. The last week is absurd. I'm psyched to concoct some big circuits here in the mountains. Since I've never timed myself up Emigration I have no idea how much time I'll shave off but I'm thinking it will be a lot. We'll see. Right now I've just got to stay healthy and get on my bike.

Of course the US doesn't cover the Giro too well anymore. This is a shame since it, for sure, has the best field of this year's grand tours. It's going to be an epic race. Cycling TV on the web has daily live coverage for $30. Rai sport has free daily coverage on the web in Italian. The race seems more appropriate this way anyway. Check out:

http://www.cyclingfans.com/

for daily live streaming coverage and cyclingnews.com and velonews.com for more in depth info.

Now off to ride my bike.

Abridged Workouts

While my recovery is going a little slower than I'd hoped the design of the P90X workouts has made it easy to continue with my program. I won't be making the same progress but I'm not sliding backwards either. I'd never done abridged X worouts (except yoga) and hadn't even really thought about it since we have so many shorter workouts to choose from. But every workout in the X rotate is set up so that it works well if you can only do it in parts.

This is particularly true with the focused body part resistance workouts. I've been warming up, doing half of the sets, then doing the cool down. It's plenty of training. It ain't X, but no one is wasting away doing this many sets on the given body part. Since the more cario intensive workouts have an intensity over time component they are less effective when abridged--more like maintenance work.

All in all, my two week off period has me in a similar fitness state to where I left off. I'd be exstatic about this if I could jump back in full bore but I don't think I've recovered enough yet. Hey, wasn't I supposed to start doubles tomorrow?

pic: bikes clean and ready for simulated Giro. Am I?

Good Pain vs Bad Pain

With new clients it's generally a challenge teaching them to sort out good pain from bad. Good pain is the type associated with "no pain, no gain," while bad pain is more associated with "no pain, no brain." The former is the type that exercise induces that is your muscles and cardiovascular system working against the forces of your workout. The latter is bone, joint, connective tissue or other signs your body is giving you that you're doing something harmful to it. It's often not easy to sort out the difference. To max your body's potential you need the ability to fight through pain, but if you fight through the wrong kind of pain you'll never be able to reach your potential.

New clients often think that the standard soreness from a hard session is the sign of an injury. Conversly, seasoned athletes tend to feel that they can ignore and fight through anything with enough willpower. This often leads beginners to give up training altogether and athletes to be chronically injured or, only slightly better--to spend most of their careers in a state of being overtrained.

How hard is it to get right? Well, I've been around this block a bit and I often can't tell. Part of it is from sheer manicness. If I can't exercise I'm a bad person to be around. My doctor recognized this straight away, telling me "you're going to f@$% this recovery up, aren't you?" And in spite of his warning and my own knowledge, I'm probably bordering on pushing too far. I've regressed a bit in the last two days. It may be a normal part of the recovery but I had just inceased my exercise level as well, so I'll blame myself. Today I'm back to icing and sitting in front of a computer.

There's a saying amongst the endurance athletes that goes "it's better to be 25% undertrained than 1% overtrained." This is because 1% overtrained means injured, or at least a state of cumulative microtrauma. It means that you can't train or can't compete, productively. It means that racing someone 25% undertrained will be frustrating because they will have their emergency fibers ready for use while yours are extinguished. And then you'll be racing someone that you know damn well hasn't put the work in that you have, and they will beat you. This is a horrible feeling. It happens all the time.

I always tell myself that if I don't feel like training then I shouldn't. I try my best to stick to this rule; I still often fail. I just had a surgery. I hurt. But it's beautiful out. My bikes are all clean and beggin me to ride them. And I want to. I want to bad. But I'm not going to. I'm going to sit here and ice and work and read and maybe watch a movie. I'm not going to ride. And making myself do that hurts a lot more than any pain I'd face on the bike.

pic: good pain: the only thing more painful than time trialing is not time trialing.

Block II

After a recovery week of dog hikes and a few sun salutations I'm moving well enough to begin my second block of training. Today I'll ride--not for too long--for the first time in a while, which will hopefully allow me to line up virtually with the start of the Giro on May 10th. In prep for Speedgoat, some big rides and climbs I've got planned for the summer/fall, block II begins with some extra focus. In spite of the forced time off block I was successful in that my overall body condition has improved a lot. I've gained some size (probably more than I want)--enough that some of my shirts are much tighter--and evert aspect of my fitness has improved. On to block II.

This block will have a lot of double days as riding, running, and climbing will get into the mix. But the main focus will still be on the X workouts. Since block three will be even more sports specific, II will look more like a traditional block III. It's four weeks long, which is mainly because week one is going to be abridged. Rather than using different workouts to ease back in, I'll stay with X workouts and abridge them each day and only do enough as my body allows. Since most of these are repetitive circuits it's pretty simple to do this.

Here's the plan for the next for weeks. X only--sports training will vary and I'll list this plan later as I'm actually able to do some running, which I still can't.

Week 5

M - Chest, Shoulders, Tris & ARX
T - Cardio X
W - Back & Bis, ARX
T - Yoga X
F - Legs & Back
S,S - outside stuff--begin Giro simulation (more on this later but Sat begins virtual Giro--fun fun)

Week 6

M - Chest & Back, ARX
T - Plyo
W - Shoulders & Arms, ARX
T - Yoga X
F - Legs & Back, ARX
S,S - outside stuff--begin Giro simulation (more on this later)

Week 7

M - Chest, Shoulders, Tris & ARX
T - Plyo
W - Back & Bis, ARX
T - Yoga X
F - Legs & Back
S,S - outside stuff--begin Giro simulation (more on this later)

Week 8

M - Chest & Back, ARX
T - Plyo
W - Shoulders & Arms, ARX
T - Yoga X
F - Legs & Back, ARX
S,S - outside stuff--begin Giro simulation (more on this later)

Week 9

M - Core Syn
T - Yoga X
W - X Stretch
T - Core Syn
F - Yoga X
S,S - outside stuff--begin Giro simulation (more on this later)

Periodizational Dieting

Answering a question on the boards this morning I realized that I haven't talked about the P90X diet yet. This is because I haven't addressed my own diet yet at all either. I eat okay most of the time but my diet varies drastically over the year as I train for different sports and events. The bottom line is that you should always eat for what you are doing. Since most of us don't do the same things every day it doesn't make sense to eat the same foods every day.

Periodizational training has been around for a long time and most people are sold on the fact that it's the most effective way to train. You can periodize different ways but the objective is the same: to train one energy system at a time until it plateaus and then move to the next one in a way the reduces the plateau and keeps the perfromance curve moving skyward. The schedule generaly depends upon your goals. A periodized training program can be a few weeks or an entire year. Most fall somewhere in between.

"Training" your diet works the same way. The most famous phase-oriented dieters are bodybuilders but most athletes do some form of it, either planned or serendipitious. The 90X diet is just one plan that was written with our clients and this program in mind. It's not perfect for everyone but every one can use its aspects to suit their needs. Because we don't all have the same level of fitness, goals, or agenda it's impossible to write one diet that works for every single person. With X we used the most generally effective system that had worked for the largest group of our client population. There is leaniency written in, especially in regards to how long to stay in each phase.

A periodized diet, like an training program, targets different areas in each phase. With new clients I generally follow the same path. First reduce carbs until your energy stalls out, then add carbs back in until your energy peaks, and then adjust the amounts of carbs you eat based on exercise. Within the simple plans there are many variables, from obvious ones like reducing junk foods and ensuring you are getting enough nutrients from proper foods to the more subtle, like balancing weight gain/loss with performance goals. No matter what the end goal the phases attempt to work towards that goal an efficient manner. The general path is to establish a good nutrient base, target this towards a desired weight, then get the most performance out of the body at the given weight for the desired goal.

I'll talk more specifically about the X diet, and about my own diet for my upcoming goals, as the program moves along. It will all follow the above principles.