Usual morning here in Belgium. Cafe, yogurt with muselli, toast. Ride time: 2.5 hours, tempo, with biggest gear sprints every 15 minutes. Doesn't sound that tough, but man. These sprint days take their toll by the end. Even when Bernard gives you an easy pace day, but throws in sprints every 15 minutes. They add up. But they should pay off in racing, especially kermis racing. Got back, quite overdressed in the end, the sun came out as I arrived home and I noticed that the temperature had gone from 14 when I started to 25 when arriving. Needless to say, although I looked quite Euro pro in my leg warmers, arm warmers and vest, I was sweating a bit. No biggie, a nice shower and some food and time for a team session with THE Dr. Andy Pruitt. He is famous as the head doctor and director of the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine, author of many cycling books, designer of the Specialized body fit shoes... the list goes on. Google the name. Seriously. He just so happens to be the father of one of our riders, so had just arrived to visit after leaving the Specialized product launch in Spain. He arrived with tons of goodies for ol' Scott (his son) that many pro riders had also just received for the Tour. As a fit specialist, he offered us the opportunity for a free seminar/consultation. Many of us took advantage of this to ask questions regarding training, bike fit, and and pain or ailments we had. Quite interesting, and incredible to see the answers. He of course backed up the scientific terms by showing us with our own bodies exactly what the problem was (through a series of exercises and movements) to help diagnose and find solutions for anything. I of course brought up my knee, which he spotted directly what the problem was within a few seconds of evaluation, and later confirmed by seeing me ride on a trainer. Apparently, the problem stems from the arches of my feet. My right one is collapsing, causing my right knee to flex slightly towards my frame, which in turn is causing my left knee to even overcompensate even further by flexing out and away from the frame. Basically, my problem is that my shoes (like most) do not provide adequate arch support. So I am now to go out and buy some simple arch support insoles, and also install some 1mm shims on the inside of my right cleat to compensate for this. Shims are already done, and I will try to find these new insoles tomorrow perhaps.
On some separate notes, I have 2 reviews/1 sponsor product placement to throw your way. Kangaroo is delicious. Man, tender, juicy, easy to cut and eat and lean as heck. Cooked it up in a frying pan with some pepper, garlic, and coriander... what a treat! I will definitely be buying some more of this stuff. As for the other review: Compex Muscle Stimulator Sport. Basically, its a small hand held muscle stimulator. You plug in several electrodes to the machine (4 each with a positive and negative electrode) and then attach the pads (similar to small difribulator pads) to the specific muscle groups you wish to target. You then select what type of program to run (active recovery, strength, endurance...) and adjust the voltage and press start. From there it zaps your muscles causing them to contract, looks like you are twitching, at different intervals. I did the active recovery on my hamstrings and calves which is supposed to act like a massage and help promote recovery through increased blood flow. And man it felt good. Felt fresh after, and even better this morning! Pretty cool stuff for sure and we happen to have a couple of them here for our use I discovered as they sponsor us. Check out their website for more info on them. May just try it out again tonight... After this sweet day, its now nice to relax, watch le Tour and then move on to my pre-race day tomorrow. GP Dourges UCI 1.2 in France on Sunday after all, which just so happens to be 190km of French racing. Man, gonna be a hard man's day. Plus after a little research, I have discovered that this race makes up part of the UCI European Tour. Gonna be a REALLY hard day. haha. Well, time for some recovery, perhaps a movie night is in oder...
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