Interval Biking - Jan. 27

Tonight was my first night of exercise in close to 6 months (as if anyone needed another reason to see why this blog was created).

It was tough. And painful. And amazing. It was just what I needed to start exercising once again.

I went over to Kyle’s Bikes in Ankeny to ride indoors with my uncle. Turns out there three cousins and around seven other riders, as well. A nice group of people. We rode to a 48-minute, Carmichael mountain bike training DVD that had us doing an interval workout.

Intervals are a brutal thing. I remember them from high school track and cross country, and I’ve read about them in running magazines, but I do my best to stay away from them. They’re just tough. You work at a high level (high heart rate) for a period of time, with only a brief recovery in between each interval.

We began the DVD with a warm-up, then moved on to a set of 30 second high RPMs, with a 30 second recovery. After a bajillion of these (I don’t remember the exact count, but I believe it was around 15 – 20 minutes of them), we had a longer recovery before beginning a set of 2-minute intervals at high RPMs, with 2-minute recoveries in between. I wish I could remember the details better, but it was tough enough to stay on the bike. Next time I do this DVD I’ll do a better job recording the workout.

Needless to say, I’m stoked to be back on the bike. It usually just takes one good workout to get me excited once more.
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Workout: ~ 48 minutes, covering ~ 12-15 miles.
Reactions: tough, tough, tough; breathing was very heavy, and the cold I’m recovering from was very apparent in my sinuses; on the verge of cramping in the calves during the middle of the ride, but conscious effort to avoid this worked; drank most of a water bottle during the workout, finished it directly after; loved it.