Mega Monday

Ok, maybe not so mega, but its still Monday.

With pro cycling in winter training camp mode, most of the news from my favorite pro sports is on the snow sliding type.  Ted Ligety continued his giant slalom dominance while one of my all time favorite athletes, Lindsey Vonn, opened up about her battle with depression.  This revelation was important on many fronts.  A prominent and respected athlete coming out with this kind of struggle can help many others, including athletes who quite often don't like to admit when something is ever wrong, it sheds light on a even greater misunderstanding of mental health.  With the horrific events in Connecticut on Friday, I believe more focus needs to be given to mental health and how it affects society.  All the talk lately is how Americans' physical health (and the care thereof) affects our economy, our morale and our lifestyles but omits the major mental portion of our well being.  With more dialogue about the mental health issues facing our nation, maybe, just maybe, we can avoid more tragedies like we saw this weekend.

I actually like Mondays.  I see them being like the New Year.  It gives us an opportunity to try again, make things better and work towards another great weekend.

This past weekend saw some much needed snow fall here in Utah and in my home state of New Mexico.  I didn't get out to try my new AT set-up however as I couldn't find a partner.  Most were waiting for the conditions to improve.  With avy danger considerable today, we should see some nice and more stable conditions by the weekend.  Anyone up for earning some turns?

Since I didn't ski and the roads were too wet and snowy for our normal winter training rides, I spent some QT with my indoor trainer and Coach Troy for some basement riding.  I spent 80 minutes with the Spinervals 16.0 Aero Base Builder workout burning 712 calories making sticking to my 1782 net cals for the day quite a bit easier.

Staying indoors was actually a tough decision.  I was trying to debate how slick the roads really were.  There was something challenging about going out on the road bike with some snow coming down, but in the interest of safety over manlyness, I chose the basement.  Training indoors can be quite boring, but at the same time, I believe the dedication builds mental toughness and the quality of the time spent can be greater than that of riding around town.  Riding outside is filled with stoplights, traffic, coasting and interrupted intervals.  I've heard you can count on a good indoor trainer session being worth about 1.5 times what you would do outside.  Sounds good to me!

On tap for tomorrow is an in depth look at my current training plan and my great desire to crosstrain.  Have a happy Monday!