Also get the bike checked make sure all is ok. 

Matt Schofield said:

Ok thanks I'm just doing the 135 mile ride but I might struggle with the 3 mid week rides with school and everything but I'll give it a go

With lighter nights you should be ok for evening rides and also rides on a saturday so should not be too difficult.

Mark G said:

matthew said:

Gave blood on Thursday night, rode an “easy” 45miles on Friday morning into that wind and rail through Dalby, 25m TT on Saturday afternoon. Is my body technically back to normal for Saturday afternoon?

Matthew: Blood volume is replaced within 24 hours. Red cells need about 4 to 8 weeks for complete replacement so no you will not be back to normal and giving blood a few days before a main race is not a good idea!

I hear what you say, but it was a 2up TT today, so I took it easy! 55:40 quit pleased with that really.

Matt Schofield said:

I was wondering how much training I should be doing leading up to the coast2coast in May  any suggestions?

That is dependent on whether you are doing the 135 miles or 270 miles?  Also how much time you have?  I think you are doing the 100 miles.  You need to be able to ride somwhere near that distance by mid April. So with 4 weeks until then aim for long steady rides at the weekend speed is not important to you but aerobic endurance is so steady state miles and concentrate on getting your food intake right on these rides plenty of fluid about 750ml per hour with 6% carbo to fluid mix and some easy to eat carbo food such as energy bars, jelly babies, bananas.  Take this little and often.

So the next 4 weeks might look like this 

 week 1 - 50 miles ride with 3 rides mid week of distances from 25miles to 40 miles

Week 2 - 60 mile ride with 3 rides mid week of distances from 25miles to 45 miles

Week 3 - 80 miles with 3 rides mid week of distances from 30miles to 55 miles

Week 4- 100  miles with 3 rides mid week of distances from 35 miles to 65 miles

matthew said:

Gave blood on Thursday night, rode an “easy” 45miles on Friday morning into that wind and rail through Dalby, 25m TT on Saturday afternoon. Is my body technically back to normal for Saturday afternoon?

Matthew: Blood volume is replaced within 24 hours. Red cells need about 4 to 8 weeks for complete replacement so no you will not be back to normal and giving blood a few days before a main race is not a good idea!

Yes shame about tomorrow just dont want to get you guys across then have to cancel.  With this sort of activity I dont want to run the risk of snow and ice and that is highly likely with a 9am start.

I had planned

• riding through and off as a team
• leading a team member through a bunch
• race strategy
• and to finish off team lead outs for sprints.

I came 4th, buddy. Big smiles all round. Perhaps I would of been first if I'd of had a coach!

Re. Training, the past 3 weeks it's been quite intense, mostly in the Gym and eating the correct stuff and not quite so much beer. Easy ride on the day before Croft though. I was using Croft as a guage to tell me how fit I am. I guess I can't be that bad then.

Shame about training on Sunday.

Maffers.

So at this time of year if you are a racer targetting early races you will be training that top end fitness with plenty of speed workouts and for road racers short term muscle endurance work.  Make sure you enter races in plenty of time and plan for the season -making sure your season has your rest and recovery periods in and for road racers that want to race the whole season this is particularly important.

I hope the winter has not disrupted your training too much!   If you have any questions then post them on here.