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?