Slacking off...

Okay, it has been some time since I have updated this. Things have been slowing down considerably. Races are becoming few and far between since the season is coming to an end. I have two more weeks of vacation remaining until the end of November that I don't want to really touch unless I have to; and because of the rain we have been getting lately, my yard has come out of it dormancy and I have had to start back in doing yard work. If someone wants to know about the daily ins and outs of my life, I guess I could start writing about it. There is a warning about that, it could cause serious bouts of boredom and head bobbing while reading.

One interesting thing I have been doing has been reading a rather interesting book that I think I will provide a review on.

Base Building for Cyclists: A New Foundation for Endurance and Performance
by Thomas Chapple

This is a book geared toward cyclists of all levels, recreational to racing, though some of the more advanced things are for racers. Mr. Chapple, a licensed elite-level USA Cycling and USA Triathlon coach, covers everything from nutrition to the bio mechanics of bicycling to developing proper skills to creating a proper training plan for your base level training.

The book reads more like it is geared toward Powertap users, but he does make some conversions for using just hear rate monitors. The author of this review uses a hear rate monitor at this time, though he can see how much more use a Powertap would be.

The first half covers basic fitness elements before getting to the training part. He provides guidelines on how to perform ones own fitness evaluation and how to breakdown the information. Also, the reader will learn that there are different critical power (CP) zones and that each one has their own benefit. A couple of examples would be as follows:

Duration	CP Zone	Fitness Benefit	Race Application
12 sec.	CP0.2	Explosive Power	Finishing Sprint,Short Hill,Start
6 min	CP6	Velocity at VO2Max	Moderate Duration Climbs
30 min	CP30	Lactate Superthreshold	Long steady efforts

Several more are presented, and Thomas Chapple goes into some detail on how to work each zone and what needs to do to improve them, as well as which muscle types are involved.

The last half of the book goes into some significant detail on how one can build a good base training plan. He provides some sample plans one can use to create and tailor to their own skills and abilities from the beginner to the more advanced cyclist. Mister Chapple also goes into some detail about proper positioning on the bicycle for different situations such as sprinting and climbing. He also provides a section on efficiency which goes into some detail with diagrams on proper pedaling dynamics as well as providing drills to help improve this area and many others. There is also a great section on strength training which gives detailed exercises which are to be performed during the early base phase of training during the off season.

Thomas Chapple has written a very good training tool. His inclusion of real world examples from his training of athletes, and sample training forms is a real benefit and gives a more hands on feel to the reader. If you are from the old school of "No pain, No gain" or "You gotta ride hard to improve" then you need to read this book. If this book is to be broken down to its basic essence, it would be "Ride slow to get faster" which is chanted several times in the book.

This book can be viewed as a great training supplement to an already active regimen, or a great place to start for someone just wanting to get into riding better and more efficiently. Add this to your library and you won't be disappointed.