London TWC - vol.3 - The aftermath

To my family and friends: Thanks for the support!

Life and training goes on anyway. Now, couple days after things are set into context and I'm very much coming to my senses about it all. I've gone the 1k performance through and my training leading to it. I've lost my standing start understandably, but it is not easy to remember when I have the bib in my back. Naturally though, other attributes are going the other way, I mean upwards, which is good when considering the set targets. Sometimes it is ”good” to fail, just to realize where you are going – not to say that failing is nice by any means. Today though, the process is fully on again and after some testing I see myself comfortably in the schedule, but I just gotta remember to let the kilo go as big part as it has been for me earlier on.

The things to learn; Live the journey. Also keep eyes on the target, and don't get distracted from that. Accept the fact that I can't be in top form in all the races I do, and accept the fact that if you don't train something – you will lose it. I'm studying coaching, you see. Ha ha.

Now I'm back on my two wheels with great joy and motivation. We have tested a bit of new things and settings in my riding position and made some findings as well. It looks good, and it starts to feel good. As I will get my upper body flexibility to appropriate levels – that will bloody work.

Learn from the past,

Live in the present,

Dream of the future.

(Petteri Nykky)

London TWC - vol.2

I don't know what to say. I have no words.

I'm disappointed. I'm devastated.

Believe me, I'm am the first one to admit the failure and to take it on myself. I knew it was a gamble to take up the kilo with my current focus of endurance training. It just didn't work at all. However, I was confident as in the training sessions the flying efforts were rather alright, but the issue was the start. I never reached the speed and faded from there. The moment I saw my time was crushing, a moment, I hope, no one would ever experience, but I had to take it. To be honest, I think everyone should, but that is not the point. And believe me – that was one of the hardest split moments ever. No explanations needed, I know what went wrong or what was missing. Still, for me, it is hard to take this at the moment. I know that I haven't trained for the kilo at all, but I never ever would have thought that all the starting power is so gone, but that's how it is. There are things on the background, such as the current training phase and and non existing track time, that had their toll on the ride, but I'm not very much willing to talk about them.

It is a crisis just now. But tomorrow, I believe, that I can start figuring out how to come up stronger. Some one has said that the character is tested when one is put against it. And now it is my job to show some character, and come the longer spring races, I'll be stronger than ever before.

As you can imagine, I'm not keen on talking about this. I'll go this through, with the people close to me, but this is something I just don't want to go through again and again. That's why I'm writing this now here – not trying to hide anything, but to say it and put it behind.

There is no starting or stopping - only doing.

Everything has a purpose, even this, and it's up to you to find it.

A warrior does not give up what he loves, he finds the love in what he does

(Quotes from Peaceful Warrior)

London TWC - vol.1

TWC means Track World Cup.

First and foremost – the traffic in London is nothing but ridiculous! Three miles in an hour, that's not too bad, is it?
But anyway, here we are now, the bikes are in the container and official training ahead. And on Friday it is time to open the season with my second world cup start!

It's been loads of this lately....



….but tomorrow it is time for some real track action at the Olympic arena!

The beauty of a rest day.

On Wednesday I had a horrible session consisting of four 72 second intense efforts with 180 second rest intervals simulating the upcoming kilo, and as a bonus some max wattage efforts. On thursday, I had an active recovery. And yesterday pyramid effort from consisting of two, three, four, three and at last another two mins efforts just give a bit of depth for the kilo. The main sessions have been like these two intense ones during last two weeks or so. It's been quite a killer, but yet I've managed to complete them alright. But today is a day off from training.

Another point is uniwork. When I train, I train. When I do uniwork, I think when I'd have time to rest. And when I rest, I feel pressure to do uniwork. Kind of a mind fuck, but in truth, uniwork has lately proved to be a rather nice escape from the training regime. And my dissertation project has taken many steps forward. It is just a major balancing act to get it all suitably fitted in the program, but it can be done effectively.

But back to the header. What's the most beautiful thing on a rest day? The waking up to the fact that there is no training might be one. The thought, that I can just lay and do nothing is another. And the most peaceful morning coffee is just something purely amazing. That might be it, the beauty of the day. I don't know, but somehow at the end of the day, I really start to look forward to get back on the bike and going again, but that ain't a bad thing either.

Today is a rest day, and I've now had my perfect morning coffee. It is time to take care of some practicalities first, draw some graphs for uni and then ultimately it is time for Six Nations rugby action. I'm not gonna move from the sofa this afternoon! Proper rest, isn't proper rest if you do something all the time. And the beauty of rest days ultimately lays within the art of being lazy for one chosen day.

Just another week.

I would have had seriously lots to write about, but I didn't have computer and then I forgot all I was about to share. Just kidding... Although, I don't think that my daily life really has been so inspiring lately. Quite straight forward stuff to say the least: train, rest, eat and study; train, rest, eat and study and so on. That is just how it is at the moment, but only until next week.

Maybe, I'm just exaggerating the boredom of this all, because there certainly has been some breathtaking moments. Firstly, I had to take my laptop to service. Not the nicest thing with the dissertation project going on, but I was relieved to hear that it is just one or two days to get it fixed. And I just want to say, that this happened on Tuesday 31st. Only today, after calling the company every day I got this thing back unfixed – yes, unfixed. But, eventually my old man got it fixed. Apparently, they had successfully changed the broken part, but whilst doing that caused other damage, which they didn't bother to check or fix. It could happen to anyone anyday.

Isn't it normal to get asked for ID if you buy some wine from the supermarket? Yes, I think it should be. That happened to me the other day and I handed my driver's license to the cashier lady. She looked at it for long and asked if that was a driver's license at all. I told that it was and it was an EU one. Apparently, she asked for my age and where it says that in the card, but also called a supervisor in. That time I thought: Oh my... Only then I realized that the supervisor lady either didn't recognize the card, and started asking the same questions and I kindly answered. Then she asked what did this note of year '09 mean in the card and I responded that by asking if looked like if I was three years old and then told that it is the date I got my license. My response, somehow, was considered as inappropriate, but I passed and got my wines. I just don't think that EU license should cause this much trouble or that I'm a toddler. For a toddler, my taste for wines seems pretty developed.

That's about the unexpected. Expectedly I've trained and studied hard. It all seems to come together nicely and I'm well in the schedule with my uniwork as the first results have also been pleasing. In terms of training I've been killing myself on the Wattbike for next weeks test. And yesterday I saw some progress and boosted confidence out of that.

The test, next Tuesday I'll head to London to ride my second Track World Cup, but this time I'll ride the kilo. The Kilo will be on Friday evening. I have no real expectations as it is only February and I haven't really done as much track work as earlier. Although, I have to admit that my form has been building up quite nicely, otherwise I wouldn't go there. I'm looking forward to take another babystep or -steps forwards, enjoy the brand new Olympic arena and ride to my best. On the bonus side is also that I'm not the only Finn competing.

Stay tuned!