fitness

🚴 Updating my indoor bike setup

Over the past three years, I’ve traveled more than 7,600 km through the virtual worlds of Zwift (adds up to a ridiculous 11 days and 11 hours on the saddle). This has all been on my main racing bike in a somewhat awkward setup that I described earlier:

I don’t have enough space in my house for a spot fully dedicated to cycling. So, I’ve got the bike trainer tucked in a corner of the basement and then I slide our basement couch out of the way and move the bike in front of the TV when I’m riding.

Auto-generated description: A black dog is lying on a couch next to a stationary bicycle, with a Zwift cycling app displayed on a TV.

The whole setup is a nuisance, especially for some of those really early morning starts. Moving furniture around while in the dark and only half awake isn’t great. So, I’m considering the new Zwift Ride.

I think the pros are (in order):

  1. Always ready without any setup required
  2. Stays inside, so stays clean
  3. Preserves the racing bike, avoiding all the indoor sweat (so much sweat 🥵) and wear and tear
  4. Optimized for indoor riding and for Zwift specifically

While the cons are:

  1. Only works with Zwift. What do I do with it if Zwift goes away or I want to switch to a different platform? (Although, there are developments)
  2. Riding it doesn’t build up comfort and familiarity on my actual racing bike (although after close to 12 cumulative days on the bike, how much of this could be left?)

Given all of this, I’m leaning towards getting the Zwift Ride. There’s a spot in the basement with enough room for it and I like the idea of just getting on and riding. However, the recent tariff nonsense seems to have cleared out the Canadian inventory. So, I have some time to think this over, before making the investment.

For more on the Zwift Ride, DC Rainmaker has a good video.

🔗 What Aging Can Teach Us About Sustainable Success

With that in mind, here are a few lessons I’ve learned as an aging athlete who can still run pretty fast, but is having a lot of doing it.

  1. Stop short. Almost always.

There’s an old adage in running that you should have one more rep in the tank. It’s also called the no hands on your knees rule. Both get a simple point, the risk of pushing to get that final repeat is seldom worth it. The benefit is small, if it even exists.

I’m tempted to write this on my shoes. Good advice that I followed this morning: the workout called for 5–8 reps and I stopped after 5 good ones.

🏊‍♂️🚴🏃‍♂️ Finding the return to fitness sweet spot with RTT

Thanks to a pre-Christmas flu and general busyness over the holidays, my triathlon training took a dive.

This past week, I’ve really tried to get back into it. As a result, my watch and phone have been pointing out that my training load has spiked and are suggesting caution.

At the same time, my readiness to train has been correspondingly increasing. I’ve been using this increase, plus generally feeling good, to keep the training intensity at the right level without overdoing it.

Auto-generated description: Two smartphone screens display fitness tracking data, including training load, heart rate variability, and sleep analysis.

Seems to be working so far. Now that I feel like I’ve regained momentum, I’ll ease off on the training progression to stabilize on a more modest increase over weeks. I don’t need to relearn the lessons of overtraining and injury!

Göran Winblad has a good video on how to use RTT and HRV as one indicator in training. Worth investigating for your training too.

🏃‍♂️ Coming across this World War 1 monument, seemingly in the middle of nowhere while running on a country road, was a good reminder of the sacrifices people have made for us

A stone monument with inscriptions stands within an archway, surrounded by a grassy area and trees, while a running app overlay displays workout details.