Active Expert: Gale Bernhardt

Bicycle Dreams - RAAM

Gale Bernhardt — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:38:33 GMT

On Sunday night I watched the DVD Bicycle Dreams, a documentary about RAAM (Race Across America). The film follows the 2005 race, an unusually challenging year for the event. I instantly fell in love with the song on the main page of the link, which is featured in the film as well.

While I’ve never been inspired to do RAAM myself, I’ve had a certain amazement and curiosity about the athletes that do this remarkable race. The multiple-award winning film does an excellent job of educating viewers about the race and allowing us to meet several of the racers up close and personal.

What I mean by “up close and personal” is that the film makers allow us to see what makes a RAAM racer tick, including plenty of moments with their support crews. Racers reveal their thoughts, what they fear and how they feel before the race. The cameras then capture the race itself, including the assumed - and unimaginable - hardships.

One of the things I really liked is that the film makers were able to draw out of these racers what I think, to some extent, lies in the heads, hearts and souls of all endurance athletes.

To race across America, over 3000 miles, from coast-to-coast on a bicycle in a goal time of 10 days is beyond my imagination of the possible, normal, reasonable, rational. In the trailer, one rider’s crew commented that in the last 23 hours, the rider had been off the bike a total of 8 minutes. I can’t imagine what it feels like to be on a bike for that long. While I don't want to do RAAM, I will say the film was really inspiring.

If these people (humans, just like you) can do RAAM, you can find a way to reach your first, or next, endurance goal.

Lance Armstrong VO2max 79.5 at Age 16, Training Volume

Gale Bernhardt — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 22:51:47 GMT

Those of you that have been following my blog and recent column know I’ve been doing a “look back at training 20 years ago theme.”

Today’s post featuring “Hotshot Lance Armstrong, Age 16, Plano, Texas” has several key features I’d like to point out:

Earlier this spring I read a column written about Lance Armstrong where the author claimed that Lance’s VO2max as a young person had never been documented or published. I don’t recall the author or column title now and it’s not really that important; but, the author claimed that Lance's high childhood VO2max was fabricated and later published to give cover to high VO2max numbers posted when Lance was well into his professional cycling career. I knew I had read about his high VO2max when he was a youngster, but I couldn’t find the information anywhere in my files. I finally found it in a 1988 Triathlete magazine column. At age 16, his VO2max was measured at 79.5 (world class) - documented below.
In the training column I wrote recently, I noted that in the late 1980s people were doing very high volume training schedules. At age 16, Lance was swimming 10,600 meters, cycling 320 miles and running 30 miles in the given sample week training schedule. Doing some rough estimates at 2700 m/hr swimming, 18 mph cycling, and 8 minutes per mile running (all average because not all workouts are done at race pace) I come up with a weekly training volume around 25 hours. This is a big load and is typical for many of today’s professional triathletes.
“Junior” loves his mom.
Prize winnings went into a trust account.
It’s a fun column to read.

(Click on the column to get a larger and more readable view.)

Have a great weekend.

If you find something or someone inspiring, let me know. Drop a comment below.

Fall Funk

Gale Bernhardt — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 21:45:22 GMT

It happens every year, the Fall Funk. There is a period of time after my last race of the season that I’m enjoying residual fitness and doing all kinds of fun things like long hikes and exploring new trails on the mountain bike. After riding that fitness wave for some four to eight weeks, I notice a few things start to occur simultaneously:

I’m not motivated to get out the door and go for a bike ride in cool weather. (The kind of “cool” that will be “warm” in just a month or so.
The days are noticeably shorter.
As much as I love snow, I don’t want summer to end and I’m crabby about the thought of how fast summer passed.
I’m not motivated to skip eating treats or eat small portion sizes.
I know I’ve got it really bad when I’ll rake an entire yard of leaves rather than ride the bike in coolish weather.
I walked the dog to do errands at the post office and the bank, rather than going to all that bother to get dressed for a run.
I can’t stand the thought of a spin class or going to the gym, I’d rather crab-out and day dream of the good old days (two months ago) when I was in prime fitness.

In short, I’m in a funk. The annual Fall Funk.

It usually lasts only a couple of weeks and thankfully I’m on the back side of it now – I think.

Snow is coming tomorrow and I actually feel motivated to go to the gym and do something – anything (spin class, weights, yoga). That’s today anyway, I hope that feeling survives until tomorrow when I need to actually follow through.

The funk will pass. It always does. I look forward to a new routine with the colder weather.

How about you, do you get Fall Funk?

The Para-Shirt: It’s for Real

Gale Bernhardt — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 15:18:00 GMT

Ah yes, classic. In the quest for more speed athletes often look to make workouts harder with more drag. In this 1987 product review column, the Para-Shirt is reviewed and priced nicely at $26.95

(You can click on the image to make it larger and more readable.)

What are you using right now, for training and racing, that people will laugh at in 20 years?

Just in case you missed the Seat Leash, find it here.

The Seat Leash

Gale Bernhardt — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 16:25:50 GMT

In my ongoing series of looking back at old issues of Triathlete magazine, I found a column on this new technology called “The Seat Leash”. It provided leverage by keeping the cyclist from sliding backwards on the seat. Apparently the Italians used a similar design at World Championships for cycling.

(February 1988)

I believe the technology was nixed because the governing body for Cycling, UCI, deemed it an unfair advantage and triathlon followed suit. Anyone with more information on that ruling?

If Lance Armstrong Can Handle the Psychological Pressure

Gale Bernhardt — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:36:09 GMT

I found this old column and thought you’d get a kick out of it. In 1988 Triathlete Magazine picked five athletes to be stars in the upcoming year. They featured this photo of young, 16 years old, Lance Armstrong with a photo caption: "If he can handle the psychological pressure, he may become one of the greatest athletes the sport has ever seen.”

The column goes on to tell that though his sponsorship with McDonalds fell through others came through, including current sponsors Nike and Oakley.

Mental toughness is one of his best, if not his best, asset.

Pre-race rituals, superstitions, follies

Gale Bernhardt — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:41:48 GMT

Last week I asked people to post pre-race rituals and superstitions on the community message board. People have rallied and added some great posts. SlowBarney added a third category, pre-race follies. Loved it. If you don't have rituals or superstitions, ever have pre-race follies? Read other people's comments and add yours to the board.

Mountain Bike Riding Fruita and Grand Junction Colorado

Gale Bernhardt — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:40:09 GMT

Sometimes, I wish I was brave

Last spring a group of us from Colorado took a trip to Moab, Utah to do some mountain bike riding. From the Front Range of eastern Colorado, a drive to Moab takes some 5.5 to 7 hours depending on which city marks your departure point. So that the entire first day isn’t consumed by driving, many people stop in Grand Junction or Fruita to ride for a few hours before continuing the trek to Moab; which is what we did on our spring trip.

I wish I was stronger

On both ends of the Moab trip, we stopped at a trail head titled “Kokopelli Loop Trails”. While we thought it was a great warm-up day for Moab, on the homeward stop we decided that the Fruita area deserved a trip dedicated to riding the local trails. That trip happened over the Columbus Day weekend.

I wish I could feel no pain

We left the Loveland area at 7:00 am, the temperature was a frosty 18 degrees Fahrenheit, it was snowing and the roads were slick. Though the weather forecasters predicted the storm would be over before we reached Denver, it turned out we had snow and icy conditions well onto the westbound I-70 portion of the trip. An early morning accident at the Eisenhower, Johnson Tunnel rerouted us over Loveland Pass. (Note to skiers, Arapahoe Basin and Loveland Basin have both been making snow and each have one run open.)

I wish I was young

When we arrived at the Kokopelli Loop trailhead, it was 68 degrees Fahrenheit – well worth the 300ish mile trip. We began with Mary’s Loop and headed right to Horsethief Bench. There is some great video of this trail on website by Pete Fagerlin. If you watch the Horsethief Bench video, you’ll get a good idea of what the trail is like. That written, anyone that has ever shot video or even some still shots of mountain bike terrain knows the camera does not do true justice to the difficulty of any given section. To give you another perspective, below is a photo of Scott Ellis and Todd Singiser on the way back up the most technical part of this trail.

I wish I was shy

After a day of playing around on several of the trails in this area, we headed back to Fruita for some excellent food at Fiesta Guadalajara. After filling our guts and rehashing the day, it was back to the hotel to watch several of the videos on Fagerlin’s site and decide the strategy for the next couple of days.

I wish I was honest

On Sunday we popped into the two local Fruita bike shops, “Over the Edge” and “Singletracks”. Both shops were out of the waterproof maps, but we did end up asking one of the people in Singletracks what his recommendation would be. He told us he considers the best area of riding to be the area we visited the previous day. Then, he said if we wanted “rocky, ledgy and more technical” we should visit The Tabeguache Trail system outside of Grand Junction, and ride an area known by locals as “The Lunch Loop”. If we wanted smooth, flowing trails, he suggested we ride the Bookcliffs area, also known as Road 18 Trails and North Fruita Desert Area. We decided to do the tougher trails on Sunday, smooth and flowing on Monday morning before the drive back home.

I wish I was you not I

If you look at a trail map, there are three parking areas for the trail system. Start at the lower trailhead parking lot. If you go back multiple times, explore the higher parking lot areas. We started on the Tabeguache Trail and stayed primarily on that trail, finally connecting to the Gunny trail. There was definitely enough challenge here for us. I was short on photos today, but you can find video of the Gunny loop on Fagerlin’s site.

Sometimes, I wish I was smart

On the final day, we decided to hit the Bookcliff’s area and ride several of the connectors to Joe’s Ridge. After two days of riding, our legs were tired and we decided “smooth and flowing” trails sounded good. Do not assume “smooth and flowing” means mindlessly easy. No. It does not.

I wish I had power

We rode out of the lower trailhead and made our way to Chutes and Ladders. This is a fun trail with shorter, steepish climbs and equally described descents. While the entire trail system is probably smooth sometimes, we found a number of sections deeply rutted from significant rains. The three- to six-inch ruts kept you alert and picking your lines wisely. One false move on a deeply rutted section would grab your front or rear tire. Sometimes the error was recoverable, other times not.

I wish I could lead

After Chutes and Ladders, we headed to Joe’s Ridge. Just as it sounds, the trail runs along the top of a ridgeline. There is not much room for error, should you drift off of the trail. In some sections, there are only inches to spare and in other sections, one to two feet. A tumble down the side of the hill isn’t like falling off of a rocky cliff, but it would be awhile before you stopped rolling. Fagerlin has video of Joe’s Ridge and below is a still shot.

I wish I could change the world

For anyone looking for great singletrack and plenty of options for ride difficulty as well as varying terrain, I’d highly suggest the Fruita area. A couple of good resources include “Fruita Fat Tire Guidebook” and the www.latitude40maps.com “Fruita Grand Junction Colorado Trails Recreation Topo Map.” There are also single-page maps available at the trailheads, if they are in stock.

Let's start over
Let's start over

Note: The italicized sections of the blog are portions of the song “I Feel So” by Box Car Racer, heard at the beginning of the Fagerlin Horsethief Bench video. We felt motivated, and encourage others to do the same, to add our own words after:

I wish I was…

I wish I could…

Pre-race rituals and superstitions

Gale Bernhardt — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:43:05 GMT

I've have, and have had, my fair share of pre-race rituals and superstitions. In honor of this weekend's upcoming Ironman race, tell me about your pre-race superstitions and rituals on this community board.

To get you started, I'll let you know my current pre-race meal is French press coffee and steel cut oatmeal. I've been known to pack my French press, burr grinder and coffee beans on all kinds of trips.

One of my old, dead, pre-race meals (the word "meal" used loosely) was coffee and powdered-sugar donettes. Raced really well for a long time on this combination...then one day I didn't. The cause was obviously the donettes.

I like defizzed Coke (can't be Pepsi or any other brand because they don't work as well, it must be Coke) at some point during really long races.

I found out I should be fearful of mixing particular brands of drink products with other brands (and Coke) because there is some sort of battle in my GI system and I might explode or something similar. Unfortuneatly I found this out after I had been doing the mixing routine for quite some time. I continue to ignore the manufacturer's warning. So far, so good.

How about you?

If you want a high performance business, treat your employees like athletes.

Gale Bernhardt — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 15:54:24 GMT

For years, I’ve suggested that if employers want optimal performance from their employees (translated to optimal business performance), they should employees like high-performance athletes:

· Be sure to include periods of rest and recovery within the day, across a week, months and year. (Encourage people to take breaks during the day. Encourage them to take vacation.)
· If a period of high volume (a relatively large amount of work hours) is required, know that intensity (work speed and perhaps accuracy) will be reduced.
· A period of high intensity (high work speed and accuracy) needs to be relatively short or include ample rest intervals.
· If you want a high performing business (i.e. highly profitable), develop strategies of loading and unloading work for employees to accommodate customer needs, yet yield high employee productivity. This is similar to planning peak performance for racing.
· Know that extended periods of high intensity combined with high volume will eventually yield lower performance, illness or injury. Any of the three, or combination of them, will be costly your business.
· If you tell your employees they need to go fast and furious for a period of time (run a 5K) do not inform them at the finish line that the fast and furious time has been extended for some extended time. (You’ll need to run that 5K pace for a full marathon now.)

Is job burnout basically the same as “overtraining”?

Would your business perform better, perhaps achieve new PR performance, if you treated your employees like athletes?

Old Flowers and Frankenbike II

Gale Bernhardt — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 21:23:12 GMT

Last Sunday morning was our annual fall colors ride on Old Flowers Road. Ten people showed up at the 9:00 am start time with three additional people getting an earlier start. I did a really bad job of taking photos on this ride. If other people want to post photo links in the comment section, that would be great.

The only photo I have is the one below, taken with a timer. In hindsight, I wish I would have had everyone closer to the camera. Also, I’ll work on getting all of the names correct and correctly spelled. For now, left to right: Doug ?, Dave Newman, Bob ? Todd Singiser, ?, ?, Steve Douglas, Mike ?, Doug ?, Scott Ellis, Ron Kennedy, Carl Ciacci, me.

The group ended up splitting again, with five rolling the dice on weather and doing the White Pine climb. The rest of us chickened out and headed back. Turns out the weather cooperated. I do find it interesting that there are days that I just don’t have the spirit to take weather risks, while on other days I’m the first one to say “let’s go!”

Another thing I find interesting is that there are some people that will ride great, no matter what equipment is under their bum. The shining example from this ride was Carl Ciacci, a former Villanova racer. His trusty steed for the day was Frankenbike II. Frankenbike II cannot be classified as a light-weight, ubertechnical marvel. It is, however, a glorious piece of work.

As the name suggests, the Frankenbike family is assembled from the parts from other bikes. Yes, bike grave digging that would make Boris Karloff proud. To be classified as a Frankenbike one of the rules is that if parts must be purchased, the total cost of the final product can be no more than $50. The financial limit is one of the things that makes building a Frankenbike fun.

Carl and his brother constructed Frankenbike I, which I haven’t seen, but can imagine it is a classic. I’ll try to talk Carl into posting all of the particulars about Frankenbike II and also send me a side shot of it so I can post it here.

Do you have some bike parts that could live a new life? A Frankenbike in your future?

Horse poop and shoes - what do you think?

Gale Bernhardt — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:47:04 GMT

Active public trail users, see the community post on the issue of horse poop and shoes at this thread.

26-week training plan advice

Gale Bernhardt — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 22:04:20 GMT

Q. I want to follow your 26-week training plan for my Ironman event from your book “T[raining Plans for Multisport Athletes|http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1931382921?ie=UTF8&tag=galebernhardt-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1931382921].” I do have a few questions, if you have a few moments to answer. I understand if you’re buried and can’t answer all individual training questions for people that read your books and columns.

Basically, I am trying to set up a nice schedule for a day to day routine, like you have outlined in your book. I like to be able to associate dates to particular workouts so that I can mindlessly go about other things. I have this set up in Excel (because I don’t see an online version of the 26-week plan) and was just curious about how I can adjust a few things. The largest issue currently is due to some family circumstances (a death), and some personal issues. I should be in my second week of training; but I am not. Is there any way to reconcile that?

Also, how can I snowboard and ski all winter and still train for an Ironman!? (I’m LOL, but serious too…)

Signed,

Want my cake and eat it too

A. Hey dessert person, the short answer about questions is I will answer e-mail questions if I have time and most of the time they become blog or newsletter columns (like this one). Once I have to start looking at the details of anyone’s training plan, then I charge a consulting fee or I will look at them as I have time – which can be one to six weeks out depending on what I have going on at the moment the question comes to me. The lucky ones hit me at a low workload time and can get more detailed questions answered quickly.

#1 - For you, the easy answer is to take a look at either the 13-weeks to a 13-hour Ironman or the 13-weeks to a sub-13-hour Ironman training plan (both available in the easy-to-use electronic format as well as the book). You need to already be doing the volumes shown in the first week of the training plan and have had a rest week prior to beginning week 1 of either plan. That’s where you want to be going the few weeks before your big race.

#2 - The second step is evaluating honestly where are you “now” (now can be literally now, or in a few weeks when you work your way through the family and personal issues). Begin the 26-week plan at the point where you are “now”. (I don't have the 26-week plan loaded onto Active Trainer yet, so you'll have to use your own Excel spreadsheet for now.) This likely means starting at Week #1.

#3 - You can use the 13-weeks to a sub-13 plan for the last 13 weeks before the race or use the last 13 weeks of the 26-week plan. Either way, you’ll need to chop out a portion of the 26-week plan – probably taken out of the middle.

Yes, you can still do some boarding this winter – just be sure you can do #1.

Hope that helps.

Gale

A photo of Longs from the Front Range

Gale Bernhardt — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 21:18:00 GMT

Last week I told you I’d take a photo of Longs Peak and Mount Meeker from the city of Loveland. Below is that photo. The two peaks are in the center of the photo, with Longs on the right.

This photo is taken from the east side of Lake Loveland, looking west toward the Rocky Mountains. The photo was taken on my phone, so no zooming. From this location, it is a 39-mile drive to get to the trail head and then a 7.5 mile hike to the top. Traveling on the earth, the top of the mountain is only 46.5 miles away. It looks further away.

From the Front Range, it looks like if you would stand on top of Longs, you’d be standing on top of the world. Once on top of the peak, it does feel as though you are on top of the world.

A magnetic attraction for some of us.

Longs Peak claims a life

Gale Bernhardt — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 01:08:03 GMT

Just three days after our group made it safely to the summit of Longs Peak, and back, a man fell to his death near the false Keyhole.

Several of us commented on Tuesday that we were surprised more people didn’t suffer significant injuries on the mountain. In the times I’ve climbed the mountain I’ve seen people clearly unprepared for:

• the endurance required (making it to the summit is less than half the battle, getting off the mountain in a fatigued and oxygen-deprived state is a serious challenge)

• weather changes

• recognizing when they are beyond their physical, mental and emotional capabilities

• the upper body strength required

• the balance and agility required

• the significant dangers that the mountain can present at any moment (lightening, snow, ice, high winds, etc.)

Unfortunately the climb is portrayed as relatively easy, because so many people are able to make it to the summit. The climb is not easy.

While fear can be something that hampers your growth and can keep you from reaching your potential as a human; fear can also save your life. That kind of fear deserves the highest form of respect.

Our group was also tricked by the false Keyhole and fortunately, we had the wherewithal to stop, retreat and find the colored egg markers on a path lower than where we were heading. We saw a young couple on the mountain that day, where the woman was panicked and crying on the climb towards the false Keyhole. The man was telling the woman she would be okay and encouraging her to continue pressing upward. When they saw all of us going down, I believe they somehow decided to follow. Perhaps their gut-instinct or fear told them not to continue up.

We’ll never know.

My condolences to the family that lost a loved one on the mountain.