Two Wheel Blogs

One of the great rewards for riding my bike this time of year is watching CTL build.

Hey, bear with me for a minute. Seriously, there aren't really all that many other things this time of year to get excited about in your training, are there? Sure, you can do any number of indoor racing events - roller races or computrainer competitions - but once the hangover wears off does anyone remember? Or care? Do you? And what are you left with, spent fitness and residual fatigue and soreness. Nice. Like I said, there aren't that many other things to get excited about.

That's why, boring as it sounds, I get stoked about building CTL. And I don't mean piling it on in great gobs either. I build it a point or two at a time. And from time to time I give some back. This week marks the last in a CTL building phase for me. Next week I'll give a little back and get refreshed and relaxed and ready for another block of CTL building right after I test FTP.

That's the way it works this time of year. You build a little. You rest. You test. And then you go back to step 1 and start the process over a step or two ahead of where you began last time.

From past experience I know about where I need my CTL to be for me to be at my best, performance wise. When I look at the calendar I know when I want CTL to be at that level. It's a pretty simple process. I map out where I am now and where I want to be later. All it takes from there is dedication to a plan to build CTL by about the right amount each week, each month, to get there.

Now you see why I get fired up about building CTL this time of year. The reward isn't that I'm 2 TSS/d ahead of yesterday or last week or whatever. The reward is that I'm 2 TSS/d closer to peak performance several months from now.