Saturday is my favourite day of the week. I’m sure Saturday is many people’s favourite day of the week, but for me, I do have a set routine on a Saturday that I really enjoy.
I start the day fairly early – 7am – at my desk with 6 or 7 hours to work on my own projects. Coffee is generally fairly helpful in kick-starting my day. On that front, I’m currently in the market for a “proper” cup of coffee. I’m considering a cafetiere / French press, or perhaps something a touch more elaborate. If you’re a coffee person, I’d really appreciate a recommendation on getting something close (or closer) to a coffee shop latte at home. Please, leave a comment if you have any suggestions.
Unlike any other work day, I get to write software purely for my own enjoyment and exploration. It might sound like I am a massive nerd. And guess what? You’d be quite right.
But a big part of being a nerd is exactly this: sat in a chair, tapping away on a computer for many hours at a time.
Then earlier this year, along came Zwift. Hey, now I can sit at a different computer… but on a bike. And I can get fit in the process.
Now, after I finish the morning’s work (well, I finish at 2pm) I get my lazy backside on to Zwift and put in a session.
For today’s ride I went with an active recovery / FTP Builder ride, simply because yesterday I did a 50km stint and today I’m feeling that a bit more than I expected. I also didn’t want to do anything too strenuous ahead of tomorrow / Sunday’s usually more intensive climb.
Along the way today I hit both my 3 hour riding goal, and the 100km Zwift distance goals. Good stuff. Not bad for 3 rides in a non-typically scheduled week.
I’m semi-tempted to do another 50km ride tomorrow morning. The alternative is a short, but sharp climb. By short I mean 10-20km total ride length, and approx 1km of climb. I’m almost certainly not going to be pushing myself to my absolute limit tomorrow. My legs just aren’t up to it.
I’ve got another early start tomorrow as I have to a real life errand to run for 10:30. This means I can either start early – 8am or so – and get my ride done and dusted before I have to go. Or I will only be on the bike around 11am, and that usually impacts how I feel about my ride choice.
Have to wait and see how I feel when I wake up. And what time I go to bed tonight.
On the plus side, I’ve been weighing myself a little more regularly lately and seem to be approx 11 stone 1lb now, on average.
I say on average as I’ve seen this fluctuate between 10 stone 12lb and 11 stone 7lb within the last two weeks. Not even sure how it fluctuates this much, to be honest.
Still, it felt good to get another 500 calories on the board, even if it was a low intensity ride.
I’m pleased to have hit all the goals I set out too this week. With Christmas in between, getting exercise in before hand, and more importantly, resuming the routine after was something I really needed to be strict about. I saw a bunch of people Zwifting on Christmas Day! Fair play, I’m never going to be that dedicated.
One thing I did try, again, today was riding on the drops.
You can see in the fourth interval my heart rate is slightly higher than the others. This was the time on the drops. Not sure why the heart rate increased noticeably during that time, but I can say I found it marginally more comfortable in that position today, but still far from something I could do for any great length of time.
Is riding on the drops a skill that needs to be learned, or should it feel naturally comfortable?
The biggest surprise today was that I managed 95rpm average. It certainly didn’t feel like that would be the case in the opening few minutes, I can tell you that much.
Funny how the body reacts.
