Patience

"The two most powerful warriors are patience and time."
- Leo Tolstoy

Patience is going to be the name of the game this year. Things will take as long as they take. Lack of patience is definitely part of the reason I got hurt early last year, and may have contributed to my flame-out during cross season. This year might have required some extra patience anyway. We've got a new baby coming in a few months, and I'm going to move up to Expert for mountain bike racing (sounds like a great combination!).

As I wrote earlier , I've been spending a lot of time working on my basic movement and flexibility. It's been pretty interesting to learn which parts of my body are reasonably flexible and which parts are definitely not. Progress in some areas has been pretty rapid, but other areas have been pretty slow. It's my goal to be able to pass all of the FMS tests by mid-February, but like I said, if it takes longer, it takes longer, and I'll keep working on it and maybe delay some other things.

Interesting aside, as part of working on this basic stuff, I've been keeping my posture in mind throughout the day. I went to the doctor's this week and they happened to measure my height; the physician's assistant was quite surprised to see that I had "grown" a quarter of an inch over the past year! I don't think she quite believed me when I said I'd been working on my posture.

One of my questions when I started working on this was if it would help me ride my bike better. After a month or so of doing this work, I definitely feel better; I feel like I move more freely (and, apparently, I'm also taller!). Last night, I got on my bike to practice trackstands, slow riding and basic body position in the garage. It was the first time I'd done this in quite a while, so I assumed I might be a little rusty. I was surprised to find that it actually went really well. It seemed like my range of motion on the bike was larger (and easier to access), so I was able to comfortably stay on the bike even when it was leaned to larger angles. Very interesting...

The last thing that had me thinking about patience was an article Joe Friel wrote about "aerobic de-coupling". Essentially, he says that you are aerobically fit when, on a ride of an appropriate length, your heart rate and power (or speed, on a flat / not windy course) are coupled together. If you're not fit, your HR will drift up for a constant power/speed, or, for constant HR, your power/speed will drift down. The idea is that you stay in the Base phase until you see the appropriate coupling... however long it takes.