Rollin' and a ramblin'

Had a great Christmas in Vegas and am back and rollin' again. The last three days have been good workouts and the garage is coming together nicely. I'm a little OCD sometimes with my space. I don't like working, whether that be cooking, writing, reading, working out, in a space that's cluttered and dirty. The bad thing is that I'll skip the workout to get the space in order. So this weekend, my gf and I, got the cabinets hung, and some stuff from storage all set up. Pics to follow.
I've written about this before, but I'm a creature of habit and momentum. I have the ability to turn a scheduled rest day into two scheduled rest days. Then I start feeling lethargic. So we are trying a little experiment. I will:

• spend a few minutes in the evening, prepping whatever it is I need for my workouts the next day. Lay out the clothes, gear, check tires, pack lunch, whatever it is I need for the next day. If I can remove all the obstacles that could delay the workout, it will be that much easier to get out the door.
• No complete rest days (at least for a few weeks). Right now my training load is low. For the 2 rest days each week I will take an easy run or easy spin. Just keep moving. Eventually, I'll throw in a full day off, but for now, it's "active-recovery".
• Not pass judgment on my workouts. I will do the intervals as best I can and move on. Some days I'll be firing well, other days, I'll have a hard time hitting the watts. Doesn't matter, just go after each workout with what I've got. Put it in the books and move on.
  

This last one is something that will take some work. I love to race, but only sort of like to train. That's sort of backwards, and it makes it tougher to get out the door some days.

I completed my Functional Power Threshold (FTP) test last night on the bike. This is an estimate of the power that I could hold for 1 hour if I was rested and properly motivated. The test is a warm up, and then capture the average power over 42 minutes (2 x 20 minutes with a 2 min spin in between). I averaged 191 watts last night. What does that mean in the real world? At Boulder Peak this past season, I averaged 190 watts and rode 1:13:12 (21.3mph) (and got off and had a good run). I'm pretty happy on the results of the test considering the amount I've been on the bike since the summer. I'll test again on Jan 20th.

Kia Kaha and Happy New Year!