Colin's Roller Training Comes at a Price!!! - 15-12-2011
Another experience to share with my club mates.
Lets start off by saying, my New Year's Resolution this year was to follow my instincts, ie. do the sensible thing based on good judgement. If there's a plan, stick to it, if it dosn't feel right don't do it eg. when driving in slow traffic don't try finding an alternative route, it is not quicker. Overall, this resolution has worked quite well so far this year.
Having celebrated my 50th birthday the day before, yesterday evening I climbed on to my new rollers for the 1st time. I have ridden rollers before, just a long time ago. I set everything up in the back bedroom, I moved the guest bed out of the way and put towels under the rollers. - mistake 1; Using my track bike- mistake 2; and following my training plan which consisting of 20 mins warm up, I used this time as an opportunity to build (over) confidence in riding rollers- mistake 3; changing hand position, riding one handed, smooth and ragged pedalling, accelearations etc,before moving on to 5 x 3 min VO Max sessions with 3 mins recovery - mistake 4; I had placed a small table next to me with a bottle of water to drink during recoveries but by the 3rd interval this was empty and I didn't want to interrupt my session by going to the bathroom 5 paces away to re-fill the bottle- mistake 5.
I noticed my pedalling style whilst trying hard made the bike feel like it was rocking forward and backwards so I corrected this with a more fluid 'circular' pedalling style, secondly a tendency to be riding predominantly to the left of centre of the rollers. I corrected this by applying slightly more load to the left leg culminating in the calf starting to tighten slightly - mistake 6.
With the max intervals complete, the final 10 minutes was at endurance pace. Just 3 minutes to go and Iron Maiden's Number of the Beast is playing on the radio, and being a bit of an old rocker I thought, hey let's up the pace in time with the music until the end of the song. Final mistake.
I glanced down at the Garmin, and with just 20 seconds to go I push that little bit harder. "Aaarghh..." cramp in my left calf. With reference to all of the above errors of judgement and unable to free-wheel there was only going to be one outcome. The bike came off the rollers and I landed with a thud on the floor (where the bed was), culminating with a trip to A&E. Thankfully nothing broken, just bad muscle spasms in my back, a course of Codeine and a few days off sick with severe silent treatment / ear-ache from Rita and a life time ban from using the rollers indoors.
I will be appealing against this ruling as soon as I can get back on my bike. See you all on Sunday.
Regards
Colin S
PS...Please post suggestions for my new nickname here!!!
Author: Alex Cooper
Comments
Hey, I just wanted to share this site that has my favorite UGGs - they ship for free and no Tax.
<a href=http://www.cleanlinesurf.com/categories/UGG-Australia/>UGG Boots</a>
Bemannofe - 17th April 2012 at 9:19pm
I promise I didn't laugh(for less than an hour)
You have to be known as The Rock and Roller.
Superb write up
Jon
Jon - 18th December 2011 at 8:46pm
Have a great xmas and a speedy recovery and enjoy a few days off. Guess a good nickname would be "Access" (your flexible friend). I promise I'm not laughing....MUCH!
Alex - 17th December 2011 at 3:35pm
Injury is more severe than just injured pride.
Rita: Can you put your shoes and socks on?
Colin: No.
Rita: Then why do you think your capable of going out on your bike tomorrow?
So I will take this opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas. Hopefully I'll be out Boxing Day.
Colin - 17th December 2011 at 2:59pm
Glad to hear that Rita gave you a good "Rollerking"...
Anthony - 16th December 2011 at 9:05am
"Hindsight" would be a good one!!!!!
Chewie - 15th December 2011 at 5:26pm
Colin great write up!! That's Definatly one way to guarantee a roll around the bedroom!!
Hey, I just wanted to share this site that has my favorite UGGs - they ship for free and no Tax.
<a href=http://www.cleanlinesurf.com/categories/UGG-Australia/>UGG Boots</a>
Bemannofe - 17th April 2012 at 9:19pm