Rest and get better?

After the second trip to Sweden I took couple days of recovery to get somehow set for the racing weekend at Kauhajoki consisting of 20km time trial and 142 road race. I had a pretty decent feeling, but it didn't quite transfer to my riding and it was disappointing at first hand.

In the time trial my power was down, or maybe I should say not on the level I expected or presumed. Now the magical word here is 'expected'. What did I actually expect and why? There is absolutely no reason to expect anything before, there should only be a plan to be completed. Learning point number one.

Still, the power was down to normal and there symptoms that I didn't perform at my level. The next day I rode a decent road race being active the whole way and then missing the break. I guess that happens more often than finding the right break. However, this time I had no expectations whatsoever. There might just be something in there. For it being only psychological, I dared to disagree. We (or more my father) did analyse the rides and loads of other data to find out, actually, what is going on. The data told us things that I would count as learning points from number two to number x. There were some things directly related to my riding or how I should ride.

The main point still was in my training regime. We take HRV-samples every morning to follow my recovery and ultimately avoid overtraining. One measure is the relationship of LF and HF and those numbers put on a diagram showed that I'm not really quite sure what I'm talking about now. In a scale from total wilderness to complete understanding, I'm somewhere in the middle, I guess (or hope). Anyway, there was indications that I had not recovered sufficiently from my previous performances and maybe therefore, I lacked in my performances. The conclusion was that before the road nationals next weekend and U6 Cycle Tour a week from that, we put more emphasis on quality training and quality resting to maybe hit some form some time during peak period. As a matter of fact, if this is the case – temporary overload – it should be good. From now on intense workouts with enough rest could really bring some form for the peak period. It still remains to be seen. Thumbs up, that we are right.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to race in the nationals next weekend in Pori and after that I'm eager to find some form for U6 Cycle Tour in Tidaholm, Sweden.