If you haven’t already, now it the time to set some goals for your next race season. The best way to do that is look back on the season and assess how you did on the goals you set last year. These goals could have been big ones like doing your first 24 solo, 100 mile MTB, or maybe upgrading and kicking but in the pro field XC races. Small goals are important to, such as PR’ing a course, hitting new power numbers, or making a KOM on Strava. Setting goals is the foundation of building success in anything you do and bike racing is no exception.
Once your goals are set , you need to assess how you will accomplish them. You need to ask yourself some questions and be completely honest.
- What are my limiters. what in your training, life or other is holding you back from progressing. How can you improve on the limiters.
- What are my strengths. What do I excel at and how can I improve.
Pick one or two of your limiters and strengths and develop a plan to improve them. You may have a big list of limiters and that’s ok. You only want to pick one or two so you can focus on those and not forget or lose focus on the rest of the things that worked really well during the season.
For an example, when I looked back at last season, one of the things that was holding me back (aka limiter) is how fast I was recovering after races and key workouts. It was taking a day or two longer then the previous 1-2 years. But last year was really noticeable. One of the things I’m going to do to promote faster recovery is to improve my nutrition. Don’t get me wrong, I eat really well, but there are some foods that I know I’m no eating or eating enough of to promote recovery.
How am I going promote faster recover with nutrition? I’m doing two things different this year. First I’m getting FUEL Tested by Boulder Center of Sports Medicine to understand my nutrion needs while training and racing. I have a feeling that I may not be consuming enough calories during training and races and I may be using mucsle for energy. Instead, I want to be using fat and carbs (from sport drink) as energy. The BCSM will do an Metabolic Efficiency test to tell me what I need for different workouts and races. Second, I’m hiring a Sports Nutritionist to assess my diet and create a plan to promote faster recovery.
I’m going to continue the same routine in training that I did last year, for the most part. I will still work on building my power and speed, but I’m hoping that the faster recovery will help me do more of those workouts to make bigger gains in those areas.
If you need help working out your goals for next season, and identifying your limiters (and strengths) contact me to set up an appointment. With a 90 minute consult, I can set you in a direction with goals to help you succeed in 2013.
Thanks for reading.