Century Training Series: Days 44, 45 and 46

Day 44 – 4×6 Intervals at RPE9 All my interval sessions up to this point had been 4×8 (four intervals at 8 minute duration) so I was looking forward to something new and to see just how hard I could push for 6 minutes. It was hot when I started the ride with a stiff wind out of the Northeast which made the second and fourth intervals particularly difficult. After my warm up I waited until I had a...

Century Training Series: Days 40, 41, 42 & 43 (Week 6 Re-Cap)

Today marks the end of six weeks of training for my first century. Last week was a somewhat lighter load as far as mileage goes but I still managed over 100 miles for the week thanks to the 63 mile ride on Saturday. Here’s the breakdown and re-cap. Day 40 – Off Day Day 41 – 4 Hour Endurance Pace Ride I was a little nervous going into this ride because I had not ridden this long at one time in a...

Century Training Series: Days 37, 38 and 39

This week in the Century Training Plan is basically a recovery week so in addition to having Monday as a normal rest day I also had Tuesday off with Wednesday as an easy spin day. I believe this week was positioned this way to give riders a chance to recover some after having put in three hard weeks prior to this week. I can tell you that I needed it. Here’s the daily breakdown: Day 37 – Rest Day...

Century Training Series: Day 22 (Week 3 Re-cap)

Yesterday marked the completion of my first three weeks of training for my first century and since Mondays are a rest day it’s weekly re-cap time. For those that are new to this series I’m following the Century Training Plan from the June 2009 issue of Bicycling Magazine to train for my first century ride the last Saturday of September. Along the way I thought I would document the effort to see what...

Century Training Series: Day 21

Before I could ride today I had to replace my cut tire. I picked up a new yesterday at a local bike shop. The one I picked it up at wasn’t my first choice but the first one I went to didn’t have a single road tire hanging up so you could browse through them. I wasn’t going to play a 1000 question game with an employee to find what I was looking for. So I left there and headed to a shop where I...