watts new, pussycat?

I am attending a pre-dawn spin class on Tuesdays and Thursdays now because it’s too cold and rainy to ride my bike outside very much. As part of it, the coach has you do a lactate threshhold test (LT) to guage what kind of power you can output over two 20 minute periods with a two minute rest in between. This number will help you judge how much resistance to use on the bike and will be compared with the numbers from a second test in march or some time to see how you have improved over the winter.

My output number was around 210, which compared to highly trained pro riders is just above what a kitten with the flu can do.

So, I’m pissed and I want to retake my LT test so my workouts over the next two cold months won’t be less hardcore than they need to be. I can do better. My coach said I can try again.

I’m screwed anyway as a cyclist, because my power-to-weight ratio (PWR) at 6′ 210lbs (95kg) is an extremely sucky 2.21. TdF pros have a PWR of something like 5.61 or twice what my wattage for 20 minutes is.

Granted, those guys weigh more like 150 lbs (68kg), so at my 210 watts my PWR would be more like 3.08 which is more like the ability of an intermediate male rider. Or a kitten on steroids. Maybe an adolescent cat on steroids.

So, as long as we don’t have to go up any hills, I am as fast as most people, but Tour riders are still twice as strong and weigh 3/4 as much. Which explains why I was able to midpack all of my races this year. Among beginner athletes, I’m about average or a tiny bit above.

And I have to get up in 5 hours and head to my Thursday spin and suck it up and get something more like 250. So I won’t fail at life and eventually end up living under a bridge. Because that’s how important cycling is and how important my ironman race is.

I am tired all the time from being at rehearsals until 11pm and waking up at 430am to go spin and then going back to bed for a few minutes. I feel like I am never really rested, nor is my stomach ever really full. It’s very uncomfortable. I’m irritable.

I wish I could take a long shower and go to sleep for a few days and then wake up and ride a dinosaur and meet a girl and eat a steak and go to a party. Instead it’s been raining for weeks and I have a bruise on my face and it’s cold and I am sleepy and I have to be up in 5 hours to punish my legs.

Sometimes I feel like I am being dragged by a rope behind a boat in the dark water with only gulps of air from time to time as I bob to the surface, and all I can do is hang on to the string I am being dragged by.

Having said all that, I know I will never give up.

Someday I hope to understand myself.