Overall development

Third period of base training is just underway after a week of rest and recovery. Not quite total rest and recovery, but this time almost. I chose to exaggerate the resting week, because it is only the day after tomorrow that I'll hop on a plane to Alicante for the second training camp with the team.

Last block was solid – to the plan and no problems whatsoever. This is the way (knock knock, some might say or do). The block was highlighted by the skiing event, which was one heck of an experience as I wrote. Also, I managed to do my road season opener in the Finnish (or what was left of it) late February and actually managed well – a snap over five hours. As a conclusive remark, all the skiing, indoor training and on the bike outdoor stuff was effective in terms of overall development. Here I am tempted to refer to my profession as I want to elaborate on overall development.

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Ok, here we go. This is an extremely brief intro.

Training, whatever the sport, is not just about completing the planned activities. Obviously, it is more than. In addition to physiological response and development, training usually influences people in many aspects. Say, you complete a 3-week block of base training with something new added into it. After three weeks, one does inherently an analysis whether the training has worked or not. The keyword is the analysis: what did you plan to do, did you do it, how was it, what was good, what wasn't so good and the list goes on. Once answered sufficiently to the questions you are willing to ask yourself – learning can happen and future development benefited.

Secondly, training in cycling is often considered practically physiological. But it is not, it has a great impact of psychology. A good block of training can facilitate self-confidence, self-regulation, mental toughness and again, the list goes on. A good block of training should make a psychologically stronger athlete as well as enable physiological development.

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Why did I want concentrate on overall development? Simply, because I felt that the last block of training taught me lots. I experimented with new stuff, and found bit that shall be included in my training in the future. I also found stuff, that perhaps weren't that effective. Thus, re-testing before totally discarding is required after a bit of modification. Psychologically, I believe I learned bits and bobs. And as mentioned, physiologically it was good. This all makes the second block of base training satisfying and I am eager to begin the third block of the season.

I was planning to add photos to this update. However, as lengthy as this is, I don't want to make it any longer. And as I am not anykind expert in selfies or -elfieswith any letter in beginning, finding photos is tough and there is hardly any space on my memory card to save any selfies.

Not just another race report.

As I've mentioned in social media, I have – in seriously exaggerating terms – conquered other endurance discipline than cycling. It was crosscountry skiing, and it was a week ago. And yet, I don't think my shoulders have recovered, but that is already different story.

My team mates brought up the event, Hyvinkää hiihto, just in a middle of a general discussion and as I have been planning to participate in such mass event – I kind of took the bait. Main reason being that Hyvinkää was near and the date was suitable.

So, the weather on Sunday was clear, but windy with temperatures in slight minuses. I had also learned from Ville, a team mate of mine and a wizard in ski waxing, that in xc-skiing picking the right pair of skis and the perfect ski preparation is a key to success. Therefore, I spent my Saturday doing careful testing of different types of skis, ski waxes and the perfect grind. I think I found one. I picked the skis and prepped them with care for Sunday. After all, the choice was relatively easy. I picked my classic skis with the zero base, because they are my only skis.

On the morning of the event, I saw bunches of keen skiers prepping their skis with passion all around the start area and I didn't have to. Then, I went to the start and after first few kicks and pushes I made one heck of a discovery. My skis didn't glide too well, but they did so forwards and backwards, which wasn't such a pleasure to discover in a classic style event. I couldn't help, but laugh – and yes, but to do a raw push for the entire 40km distance.

The course wasn't so bad for such style. Not perfect, but not bad. The only thing is with a roughened base, the skis just don't work as they should for such style. So there I was, trying to glide with skis, that don't glide – hard it was. Nonetheless, I did my two laps of the course and finished the event anyway. I had good time, and I got what I wanted – good training and mass event experience.

To wrap this all up. I participated, I finished and for the next event I need to change my ski guy, in other words some expertise could help. So, the conditions and skis were against me, and me, my technique and condition was somewhere between terrific and amazing. What I'm saying is that the skis took my chances of having skiing event of my life. And in fact, that is not true. I had the event of my life, as I've never done one before and I learned lots. The importance of skis, position in the group, conditions and so on. Now, what you should learn from this never to blame yourself for unsatisfying performances – it is the equipment, conditions or someone else. And yes, I am just kidding.

About having courage to ride slow.

Riding slow, and now in terms of personal ability, has been pretty hard for me. Now I feel that I have somewhat succeeded in accomodating riding slow in my training to create polarization into my training. One hell of sentence of pretty much nonsense, wasn't it? Surely though, I've been missing that in my training. I learnt it during my first training camp with my new team.

Many of you may have noticed that I changed teams during the off-season. I'm proud to be riding for Finnfalz-Rush Racing and Cyclo Vision from now on. The reasons behind that were multifaceted, but simply put – it just felt the time to make some changes. Major contribution was thanks to my target and the apparent switch of them. I, consciously or not, kind of faded with my track cycling aspirations and fell for road events (with the great exception of criterium racing). The exact targets are taking their form slowly but definitely

So, I spent nine glorious days in Alicante with my new team and wrapped a good block of training in the warm sunshine in amazing company. The blokes are known as Kalle, Saku, Henri and Teemu. Don't ask for kilometres ridden, as that number is ridiculously low. If you want to ask for something, please ask for hours or vertical meters – that doesn't require exaggeration or an endless flow of explanations from me. And besides I told you, that I tried to ride slowly, eh? And hence the preference for counting hours rather than distance. Ok, this was explanations already, but I believe I came to a rather unclear point of what we did. We rode a lot, climbed a lot and consumed a coffee a whole lot (which is not the point though). Quality training time just as planned. And now at home – quality recovery time.

This blog, as apparent, became one pretty messed up flow of thoughts. A sort of brainfart as some could easily call this. I'm happy, if you understood this all. And even more happy, if you enjoyed reading it all. Welcome to my world.

Some photos by the crew:

Port de Tudons after some hill efforts

Font Roja

Espresso Solo at Relleu

Panorama from Font Roja

Riding along with Henri

New steps

Here is a brief recap since the racing season: I've worked, I've trained, I've done bit of planning, I've graduated, I've learned to like XC-skiing, I've considered almost all endurance events on two wheels sort of seriously (not really).

However, admittedly this blog on its current form is not actually what I'd like it to be anymore – I don't really know why - and thus, it is time to give it a fresh start now. I guess there are some reasons other that just ignoring this, which I've tried to first clear myself. Now that I understand those things myself (partially, at least), I can elaborate on them.

The big thing can be found from the short and particularly informative sentence: 'I've graduated'. The late blog was about being student-athlete. As much I'd like to be still one, as it would mean being bit younger than I am. As a disclaimer, I'm not exaggerating of being old now. I'm happy to have graduated and now it is time for new challenges. Riding has been tough during this so called winter. So there is generally not a lot to say about it. Still, things have notably changed as I have joined a new team. Now, I am happy and excited to ride for FinnFalz RushRacing during next season.

More about all this riding, target, goal, challenge stuff in the blog though. Stay tuned.