Pre-UTCT training update

After CCC I travelled to South Africa for two weeks. When I was there I got food poisoning and felt terrible for almost the entire two weeks. The stress of the race at CCC and then immediate travel left me vulnerable and my body wasn't ready for all the demands I put on it. I knew it was time to rest and recover so I took a week off in October and then started a block of work to prepare for UTCT beginning at the end of the month. This provided me with six weeks to build back some fitness and get into race shape.

Focus for the block
  • use the same weekly route as pre-CCC to prepare for UTCT
  • increase weekly vertical with climbs similar to Platteklip Gorge
  • prepare with a single race in mind rather than building for a season

Training statistics
  • Time: 88hrs 46min
  • Distance: 673km
  • Vertical gain: 30,700m

Training log

Green bubbles = normal training
Yellow bubbles = workout
Red bubbles = race
XT = cross training

Review of the block
This block of work went very well. I felt good, I was motivated and I picked up the routine and structure quickly. I would have liked to do longer long runs, but the snow and poor trail conditions meant my long runs were more slogs against the conditions rather than efficient runs for long distances. The volume of work was good for this block, but I definitely need to build that more if I want to race with the top competitors.

Overall, I felt well prepared and excited going into UTCT.





No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)