January 17th was the Frozen Otter Ultra-Trek. For me, a long hike. I attempted the half: 32 miles. I completed half of the half: 16 miles. Single-digit temps, and it snowed the whole goddamn time. It was a trudgefest of a good proportion. One of the more difficult things I've done to date.
I trekked with the guys from team POLeR, Chad Hannon and John "Code" Morris. Chad made a video.
I think this will be excellent training for the Bataan Death March.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
CTS Performance Testing Camp
January. Subzero. I have been going so crazy riding the trainer that I started to move my whole workout room upstairs into the empty spare bedroom. I half-assed it, so now the house is an mess of weights, stability balls (yes, plural), bosu, mats, etc, etc, all over the house.
I decided to mix things up a bit and go to the Carmichael Training Systems Performance Testing Camp in Colorado Springs.
All in all, a rockin’ experience. I hadn’t been to CO in a while, and never to CO Springs. It’s a great little town, with cute local restaurants with good food within walking distance of the major hotel.
CTS headquarters is a surprisingly low-key building. I had this illusion of some intimidating structure, full of coaches buzzing around being important and impersonal. The exact opposite is true. A one-level repurposed brick building in an art district, CTS headquarters is totally unassuming. And there were maybe a dozen people in the office, every single one of them friendly and approachable, even Dean Golich (though he seems to have an unnatural lust for Porsches). Chris Carmichael’s office is also unassuming. Many coaches were out with their athletes.
Only two other athletes were at this particular Testing Camp, which is understandable. Only the truly masochistic want to know their performance levels in the off-season, especially that soon after the holidays. One was a pro triathlete. The other was an elite road racer. Truly out of my league… but you would never know it. Everyone treated me exactly the same as the other two campers, and all test results were confidential, given directly to me by my coach.
I’ll spare the lackluster details. The results are: I’m not a pro, I have a lot of work to do, I need to eat better, and I bought a Powertap the second I got home.
I decided to mix things up a bit and go to the Carmichael Training Systems Performance Testing Camp in Colorado Springs.
All in all, a rockin’ experience. I hadn’t been to CO in a while, and never to CO Springs. It’s a great little town, with cute local restaurants with good food within walking distance of the major hotel.
CTS headquarters is a surprisingly low-key building. I had this illusion of some intimidating structure, full of coaches buzzing around being important and impersonal. The exact opposite is true. A one-level repurposed brick building in an art district, CTS headquarters is totally unassuming. And there were maybe a dozen people in the office, every single one of them friendly and approachable, even Dean Golich (though he seems to have an unnatural lust for Porsches). Chris Carmichael’s office is also unassuming. Many coaches were out with their athletes.
Only two other athletes were at this particular Testing Camp, which is understandable. Only the truly masochistic want to know their performance levels in the off-season, especially that soon after the holidays. One was a pro triathlete. The other was an elite road racer. Truly out of my league… but you would never know it. Everyone treated me exactly the same as the other two campers, and all test results were confidential, given directly to me by my coach.
I’ll spare the lackluster details. The results are: I’m not a pro, I have a lot of work to do, I need to eat better, and I bought a Powertap the second I got home.
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