I’m five and a half weeks away from Haute Route Alps and feeling pretty okay, except for this persistent cough that was given to me after La Marmotte. I’ve got precious few days to train right now because of ‘work’ (again, the irony…), but I have put together a few ‘crash blocks‘ to hopefully put me a few watts stronger and a few kg lighter before the end of August.
- This week: 4 days of ramped-up distance and intensity.
- Next week: Nearly nothing because I’ll be in the Alps doing a tour, then in Paris saying goodbye to my wife.
- July 25-30: This is going to make up for all the slacking in the previous two weeks. I’m going to Cuneo, Italy, to hit some big, big cols, followed by some big, big bowls of pasta.
- August 6-10: A ‘research’ trip to Majorca that will work wonderfully for the climbing legs and getting used to the stinking heat, too, I imagine.
Then it’s recover, taper and try not to gain back all the weight that I lost the previous two weeks.
In 2013 I think I did too many miles with too little intensity running up to the event and I felt a little ‘blah’ right from the beginning of Haute Route. I’m hoping to at least feel fresh for the first climb of this year’s; even that’d be an improvement.
In other news, that attack by Froome today was unbelievable, wasn’t it?
The Vicious Cycle 
It certainly was and what was just as impressive was that Porte and Thomas kept going after leading him out. Good luck with the training.
Indeed. If I were the skeptical type I might be wondering out loud how that’s possible…
Unbelievable is the operative word. Either Brailsford + Team Sky are geniuses at training, not out of the question, or ???
For the love of the sport I hope that Mr Charisma (not) and co really are that good, though I also hope they share their knowledge as otherwise we’re going to have a few years of boring tours. “The race for second” doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Mr Charisma and his team are bringing us a good portion of our clients, so I’m sort of hoping it’s all on the level! That said, it doesn’t smell right.
I am very willing to believe that Chris Froome is that freak of nature that can do what he does naturally, albeit with the best science money can buy. And it makes sense – Sky have the money to both find and support the best cyclist there is, and the knowledge available now should mean that that person will be the best cyclist of all time, which Froome arguably is (or is becoming).
So yeah, until convinced otherwise I’ll believe it’s all above board, and sympathize with Sky’s “we can’t prove a negative” dilemma.
Maybe you should ping Sir Dave for training advice? After all, if it works for Chris … 😀
My training (for HRD) is currently along the lines of advice from Jan V.M. To paraphrase: “ride a big hill as hard as you can, recover, rinse and repeat”. Unfortunately for me that means a lot of time on my virtual trainer since it’s so flat around here (MA, USA). 😢 He also said to make sure to get a lot of rest before the event, so take that taper period seriously 😀
Jan knows what he’s talking about. You’ve picked a good guru! Yes, hill training is very important, no question. But if you don’t have them, you don’t have them. If you’re doing HRD, by the way, get yourself a granny gear. You’ll be glad you did!