WEEK 1 TRAINING SUMMARY

Top of the small and challenging mountain bike trail by the Nedereindse Plas: cold,
muddy and no place to hide when is out of shape.

Finally the first full week of real training. Finished today with a short and hard 1 hour 45 minutes mix of road and mountain bike. This week felt like a proper one with two sessions on the Tacx on Tuesday and Thursday and this one "longer ride" on a real bike outside. I didn't feel particular strong in any of the sessions with clearly low power output especially today in the climbs. I really felt out of shape and high heart rate and sucking air like a vacuum cleaner. But let's consider this is just the beginning and take this as motivation to get down to business for go. No more "kidding" about it.

The ride today is a short mountain bike trail 20 minutes from my home. That is great because with 40 minutes of travel time back and forth there, which leaves me with 1 hour or pure mountain bike training. The place is a single trail route of 6.5 kms that goes up and down a kind of man-made hill. It is the type of dikes / sound barriers the Dutch build alongside their highways. The good thing is when you are going up the inclination is up to 15% in a narrow single track. And this being the end of fall season, was really muddy and slippery. Adding more difficulty to just clear the climb to the top with the back wheel going everywhere under you. It was cold around 5 degrees celsius but at least it wasn't raining

After every climb and one is on the top, it doesn't get easier. The ride on the very narrow single track requires constant attention or else you will be on the ground in a heartbeat, with the front wheel locking in. And the downhills were really nasty with all the mud and dead leaves. No time to really rest before one is down and start climbing again. I think that is good to train technical skills and start getting confidence with the handling of the new bike, which I'm still getting used to the big 29 inches wheel.

I did 3 loops today and decided to call it a day. In a good day I could do 4 or 5 loops but that will be later in better conditions and when I'm back in shape. For now good enough for a winter training.

Top to bottom: heart rate, speed, profile, inclination.