We went to spend time with family for Christmas in Chilliwack/Abbotsford. I decided that while we were in Chilliwack to ride Vedder Mountain, one of my favorite shuttling places to ride. My brother didn’t want to get wet, so I was on my own. Surprisingly enough, I wasn’t the only one riding there. There were a few other guys skipping turkey to shred some trails. I guess I’m not the only weirdo who like to ride his bike no matter what day it is…
Dreamin’ of a white Christmas?
This is what our living room looks like. We have no garage or any other place to set up our “bike shop”, so my mom has let us take over the living room in our rental house. In my opinion, it looks a lot better than a regular living room anyways. What kind of mother would allow this? A mother who wants her children to follow their dreams and is willing to make sacrifices. We moved to another province just so that my brother and I could ride our bikes more often and be closer to the major spots. Sure it helps that BC is a beautiful, we don’t have to shovel snow every day in the winter, and we have lots of family close to us, but that’s still a major commitment.
Just this morning, my dad I talked about my plans after high school and he wanted to make sure that he wasn’t “pushing” me to follow my dreams of racing instead of going to university after high school. Who would ever want to go to university if they could ride their bike for a living? I realize that the journey to the World Cup won’t always be easy or comfortable and there will be times, probably while I’m sleeping on somebody’s couch, where I think that university would be the easier path. In those moments, I’ll just think of myself sitting behind a desk in a hot stuffy room with 300 other youngsters listening to a teacher in the perfect riding conditions and that should kick me back into the right way of mind. Reminding me of that just shows how much my parents care and how much they’re supporting me on my journey.
After a short downhill ride on Seymour, my dad, brother, and I went exploring for road biking trails that we could ride. I was finding that riding on the roads with all the vehicles wasn’t really my thing and that I wasn’t going about it the right way. I didn’t like the vehicles flying past me and the roads around our house aren’t the flattest. There are quite a few hills which isn’t good for what I want to do now, which is build a base endurance. I will achieve that by going for long “easy” rides on relatively flat terrain for long periods of time. Later on in the spring I’ll go riding on the hills and also do some sprint training.
We heard that there was a good road biking/walking path literally right behind our house, so after a short drive, we thought we found where it started. After we got home, I washed my DH bike, changed from my downhill gear to my road bike gear, and went out to try and see if it was what we were looking for. It was perfect. The trail is 10 kilometers long with only 2 or 3 minor climbs and I can do the full 20 kilometers (there and back) in under 50 minutes which means I can keep my average speed 23-24 Km/h. I am working up to being able to ride 50-60 kilometers in one ride, so this trail is the perfect road bike training ground. It is also a very beautiful ride which helps distract me from how cold it is.
I have recently finished reading the book Mindset by Carol Dweck. This chart explains pretty well what the whole book is about. Fixed mindset verses growth mindset. As you can see, having the fixed mindset isn’t going to be very good for racing downhill. I need to be open and ready to embrace challenges, learn from my mistakes, and learn from the success of others.
My dad and I were looking through off season training systems and we came across the James Wilson DB Combo’s Program. We decided it would be a good program because it covers the fundamentals. All it requires is your body weight, a set of dumbbells, and a chair. Since I’m still riding in the “off season” I am doing the 3X a week Optimal Off Season Schedule:
The workouts A and B are the weight training and the 15 M-TRTU is the core training.