I'm not a competitive bicyclist--I do marathon ocean kayaking. About three years ago, I read the book, "SERIOUS Training for Endurance Athletes." I set up a spreadsheet, calculated my minutes, and followed the program for a couple of years.
I made definite gains in long distance endurance, but then I seemed to plateau again. My workouts felt stale, and I was a bit obsessed with minutes. I've also aged, and a group of younger people with more time to train (and the advantage of training together) now leave me behind in races.
I started biking again this year, after a 15 year hiatus. Making a kayak go fast is horrible hard work (whereas playing in the waves is delightful). By comparison, I find trying to make a bicycle go fast a more joyful experience. Just like biking, a kayak's resistance goes up exponentially as speed increases--but much faster than a bicycle's (because it's water resistance rather than air). So you can pump out 4 times the energy and only go 1 knot faster. That's dispiriting.
Since I'm just a "fun" bicyclist, I can keep in touch with the joyful feeling of speed. Recently, I started trying to recreate this feeling in a kayak. I've replaced many of my obligatory "overdistance" or "speed" workouts with "angry man" or "enthusiastic man" or "joyful man" workouts. I put whatever emotional energy I have into the paddling, and rest when I feel like it. I even stop sometimes, and just bob in the waves.
The results have been great so far--I've broken through the plateau into a new speed realm a few percent higher. And I'm enjoying kayaking a lot more. I actually look forward to my workouts, not even knowing how long I'm going to spend in the boat each time, or how hard I'm going to go out.
So, a long convoluted intro to my question: what do people here feel is the place of passion vs. planning in training? Is it better to be a machine, a la Armstrong or Landis, or is there room for tapping emotions in the way I'm describing?
Thanks,
NuCommuter
I made definite gains in long distance endurance, but then I seemed to plateau again. My workouts felt stale, and I was a bit obsessed with minutes. I've also aged, and a group of younger people with more time to train (and the advantage of training together) now leave me behind in races.
I started biking again this year, after a 15 year hiatus. Making a kayak go fast is horrible hard work (whereas playing in the waves is delightful). By comparison, I find trying to make a bicycle go fast a more joyful experience. Just like biking, a kayak's resistance goes up exponentially as speed increases--but much faster than a bicycle's (because it's water resistance rather than air). So you can pump out 4 times the energy and only go 1 knot faster. That's dispiriting.
Since I'm just a "fun" bicyclist, I can keep in touch with the joyful feeling of speed. Recently, I started trying to recreate this feeling in a kayak. I've replaced many of my obligatory "overdistance" or "speed" workouts with "angry man" or "enthusiastic man" or "joyful man" workouts. I put whatever emotional energy I have into the paddling, and rest when I feel like it. I even stop sometimes, and just bob in the waves.
The results have been great so far--I've broken through the plateau into a new speed realm a few percent higher. And I'm enjoying kayaking a lot more. I actually look forward to my workouts, not even knowing how long I'm going to spend in the boat each time, or how hard I'm going to go out.
So, a long convoluted intro to my question: what do people here feel is the place of passion vs. planning in training? Is it better to be a machine, a la Armstrong or Landis, or is there room for tapping emotions in the way I'm describing?
Thanks,
NuCommuter