Setting personal bests!
Hello again! It’s almost mid January already.. time is flying and the season officially starts in a few weeks with a couple opening races. The big races don’t start until April where paracycling will have a qualification race to see who is selected to represent Team USA at the World Cup events in Europe in May. The World Cups this year are going to be in Belgium and italy. There’s typically three World Cups but there will not be three World Cups this year. The World Cups are an opportunity to compare yourself to other top paracyclists around the world, practice skills, represent your country, just exercise that competitive spirit, and gather points for Team USA so they can take more athletes to the Paralympics every 4 years. Although, during the first two years of the paralympic quad points are not accumulated. There is only one or two points accumulated at the world championships at the end of the second year of the quad. All the other points are earned during the third and fourth year of the paralympic quad. The quad being 4 years before the event. It has not been announced where the selection event will be for the world cups. The World Cups are exciting because it’s sometimes a wake-up call and sometimes great feedback for how training is going. The first two races of the year for hand cyclists are the Swamp Classic in Florida and the Valley of the Sun race in Phoenix. I’m still unsure if I will do the Valley of the Sun this year. There are two small time trials before Valley of the Sun out here in Arizona where the race organizers have a category for hand cyclists in addition to the regular able-bodied competitors.
Training is going very very well. I’m actually producing all time best times at a slightly less than max pace which I’m not purposely trying to reach. This is good news! My new bike has been so great! It fits me with the ergonomic seat and allows for a position where I have a very very strong pull. The pulling motion of my pedal stroke is where all of my power is because of my weaker triceps and virtually no chest muscle so rowing the boat aka the pedal stroke propelling my hand cycle is where my power is. When I can get that perfected it feels so good! I have that on the jet bike almost. I just need to adjust the padding behind my neck and head because the rest is golden. I did my first two 20 minute intervals yesterday and averaged just a few watts below my FTP without a lot of struggle. This is good, very good! Your FTP is basically a intensity that you can handle for 20 minutes at full throttle.. it’s the little things, and some big things, but I definitely have more control over at this time that are helping my training. I expressed my frustrations in some previous blogs about an unfair standard last year. That standard was not realistic when somebody can get medals on a regular basis. But, at this time I’m putting out numbers that are better than anything I’ve done previously. You’ll know next month if I do one of the time trials here in Arizona.
I was reflected to the national team for 2025. So grateful to be part of Loma Linda’s PossAbilities and the US national team as well. The semester starts tomorrow and I am teaching exercise prescription for special populations. Special populations is basically any population that’s not normal without any contradictions to exercise, disease, disability, etc. It’s going to be a fun class to teach as there are so many things for students to learn. It also allows some creativity for students to look beyond what is normal or they may be used to. Other than that it’s the training, teaching, and optimism looking forward.. and lastly, I am so grateful for the weather here in Arizona at this time as it is very tolerable for someone like myself who does not handle hot temperatures well.
I want to thank you if you have read this. I hope you are looking forward to a great 2025 and are working towards goals with optimism. There are resources everywhere to compliment our efforts. More importantly, let your progress and the journey keep that fire burning within!
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