July 2012 Review

A bit of a write-off month for me. Missed a few weeks due to work & family holiday travel, then struggled to get back into the swing of things for the last quarter of the month...

Mileage - 163km (year-to-date total - 2764km)
Weight - 78kg (steady)

Don't really want to dwell on this 'off month' - no point in any woulda-shoulda-coulda analysis.  I did learn a few lessons though that I will take with me moving forward.

The habit of training

What surprised me most, and caught me off-guard, was how hard I found it to get back into the habit of regular training after the forced month off the bike.

I expected to just resume my usual schedule.  But I was really disorganised, found myself shrugging off some perfect cycling days, and slept-in way too easily.  It goes to show how important it is to have that 'standard routine' ingrained into you, so you just 'get up and go' without thinking about it.

So that's one of my main goals this month - restarting the 'habit'.  I know my fitness and pace will bounce back quickly with that habit and consistency back, so the motivation and reward are both there.  The month has started well cycling-wise, having ridden both days, plus the weather outlook is perfect, so all the stars are aligning...  :)

Racing for the month ahead

The key event this month is the Charles Coin Memorial road race. For me (Division 6 / Masters C), this will be a 72km race (4 x 18km laps) out at Mulgowie, which is south of Laidley, Qld.

Much like the Avanti Classic back in June, I have a shortened preparation for this one.  Learning from that though, I will be trying to get in some much longer rides in prior to the race. 

The keys will be doing the long Sunday club rides for the next two weekends (usually around 80km), and joining some other group rides on each Saturday as well for similar length rides.  I'll fit some faster work in on my weekday commutes to sharpen the legs up as well.

If I can achieve these training goals, I think I can realistically hope to finish with a large part of the peloton come race day.  Not knowing the course, I may be misguided - but that's the goal anyhow.

Hopefully, if all goes to plan, this will be a relatively high-mileage month for me, which will set me up for some good results in the last quarter of the year.