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| This is what it's all about |
So I won
the lottery and got into the Leadville 100 mile mountain bike race. The race works like this: finish in nine
hours and get a big belt buckle, finish in twelve and get a small belt buckle,
go over twelve hours and you get a fat DNF.
Twelve hours for a 100 mile effort on a mountain bike at altitude
(+10,000 ft) is a big ask, sub nine hours – that’s the edge of possibility.
I would
equate a sub nine hour performance at Leadville to a sub three hour marathon or
a sub ten hour Ironman – just on the right side of possible for the mortal
athlete. So my question is: is it reasonable
for a forty eight year old man with low to moderate technical mountain biking
skills to set an 8:59:59 goal for Leadville.
No it’s probably not reasonable, but I’ll do it anyway.
It will
take some serious effort for me to simply finish the race in the allotted twelve
hours much less nine, so I’m going to have to develop an equally serious
preparation program. I see preparation
as a five pronged effort: fitness, body weight, technical skills development, acclimatization
and maintenance of good health.
Watch
the blog as I brainstorm over each of these “five fingers” of my training
program. Feel free to comment as I’ll
need all the help I can get.
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