August 2015: Training Ramblings.....Building, Building, Building

August started off with a bag at Xterra Appalachia, held in Penn Run, PA....if you know where that is well done! It's pretty much in the middle of nowhere but it was a great course in Yellow Creek State Park.  The bike course was "a proper MTB course" as Daryl Weaver put it as we spoke the morning of the race. I had pre-ridden it the day before and it really was! It had a ton of climbing, a hike-a-bike stream crossing and some technical descending...overall a lot of fun.  I had a pretty solid race and came in 4th overall and taking the age group win. Unfortunately this is the final Xterra tune-up race before the World Championships as any others are too far away to attend. From here on out it is training, training training and the start of cyclocross season.

Finishing the run at Xterra Appalachia 2015

Roadside ice cream on the way back from Xterra!

So with that being said, the rest of August was pretty much business as usual as it goes for training...not a lot to ramble about.  We closed out the road racing season at the local Dawg Days Circuit Race (all of 2 miles from the house) where I did my first Cat 123 road race. All was good until being taken down with a couple of laps to go.....luckily no damage aside from a broken saddle!

Overall August was a good month of building with a recovery week coming towards the end of the month.  Typically my recovery weeks include about 60% of volume of a regular "on" week and I have two more blocks prior to Maui, which will give me about 8 weeks of training.  Everything is feeling good right now and the power numbers on the bike have been progressing where they should be and the technical work on the MTB is getting better. Maui isn't known for being a technical course, more of a climbers course so I am hoping that works in my favor on race day. However, any gains I can make in the technical work will only be advantageous for the race and for next year's Xterra's racing, it saves time as well as effort.  As I stated last month I have been going all in on training and the effort is paying off.  The key now is keep the focus and hone in as we approach race day. All too often it is easy to start looking ahead to the following season and getting exciting about those races before finishing out the current season that we have worked so hard for! 

Looking ahead to September, it may turn out to be a little funky in that cross season will start, we have a trip to InterBike and then the Road Race World Championships are just down the road in Richmond. But the trails should be awesome as the Fall riding season comes upon us.

Oh in other training news, the end of August saw beer leave the Banks household.....no more beer in the house until after World's! Will it make a big difference as we aren't big drinkers anyway? It might not but #marginalgains and all that.


What I am drinking this month:

Victrola: Colombia Valle del Cauca Manantiales del Frontino Maragogipe: 

From the Manantiales del Frontino farm in Colombia at an elevation of  5905ft - 6561ft. 
Fragrances and aromas of chocolate, mango, spice, sage, butter with flavors of chocolate, raw sugar, cinnamon, mango, juniper. Slightly lingering finish and a moderate and balanced acidity.

August Total: 576miles/49hrs 58mins/3078 TSS
Swim: 13.00m/7hrs 16mins/ 299 TSS
Bike: 451m/28hrs 31mins/ 1710 TSS
Run: 112m/14hrs 10mins/ 1069 TSS