Day 6

I’m using the lockout today.  I have a coaching ride to do and being able to ride only 30’ on the PC’s isn’t going to cut it.  Plus, it’s nice out being a high of 40F and sunny.  I’m going to try to get as much time outside as possible, today.

Day 8
Riding indoors again.  It’s dark and 30’s outside, so this is typical for the middle of February.  It was an ideal time for me to pick up the PCs and get in a solid block of base on them and not miss getting in the typical mileage if the weather was nicer.  Still, this is my first winter in a while in the working world (as opposed to the grad school life) so time constraints also factor into this training scheme. 

It’s been roughly a week, and I’ve enjoyed my time on the PCs.  In preparation for them, the number of hours doing one-legged drills seem to have paid off in the form of decreased suffering while riding PCs.  I decided to ramp up the time to 40’ and there seem to be little negative after effects in my daily life which is good as some folks have reported major fatigue or soreness.  I can still ride the short two mile commute to work and go up the stairs fine.  I know that Frank recommends only riding PCs and nothing else for the acclimatization stage, but there’s no way I’m getting a pair for my beater bike.  If it’s any consolation, as a coach I know that riding without “clipless” starts to mess with your pedal stroke, so I always ride like a snail around town on the beater bike. 

Also, for all those folks out there that profess riding fixed gears as a pedal stroke instruction device, I’ve always been against this idea.  Conceptually, PCs are the exact opposite of the fixed gear, and that’s why they provide so much benefit to riding.  I myself tried to get around buying the PCs before I had a job, and found that one can do many hours of one-legged drills, but in the end it’s just inefficient.  It takes at least twice as much time if not more to mimic the same workout.  Me, I was unwilling to watch water flow under the bridge for so long, so now I’m on the PCs and the training has begun.

Today’s stats: 40’ AvgP = 123W; Avg rpm = 74

Day 9 – Goal:  increase AvgP
Stats:  40’ AvgP = 152W; Avg rpm = 77

Day 10 – Goal:  increase rpms
Stats:  40’ AvgP = 142W; Avg rpm = 80