i had some time on my hands.

Although I haven't been posting my rides, I have been riding a crapload recently. This past week I ended up w/ over 222 miles w/ 2 days off. I even added an intense day to my base training as well. I'm finding that the more that I ride, the less I want to type about it. I'm addicted to being outside and riding in the zone for hours on end. I have a bitch of a time focusing in the rest of my life that being able to do one simple thing allows my brain to rest regardless of all the random idiocy that I may encounter.
The two rides I'm posting are a base and "el día de intervalos". The base is a normal ride while the interval is just a long ride full of repeated max efforts. The giant gap on the top (interval) ride is due to me screwing w/ my saddle position. For the past week I've been taking an ergogenic supplement made by Cytosport called Vasostat. Those that know me, know that I love testing out all the performance enhancing supplements out there, and I have anextensivee knowledge on them as well as sports nutrition in general. Vasostat is just one of the Nitric Oxide supplements out there that are the hot pills for all the muscle-bound lifting freaks. [ed.note-good god that was a terrible sentence!!] What I'm trying to say is that there are a million companies producing the same variation on the same theme... I take the Cytosport version because it has more to do w/ cycling, and the company name doesn't sound like I'm taking steroids. It must be late, or the drugs are taking their toll 'cuz I can't write a sentence to save my life.

Anyway, the claims are that it opens the "anabolic superhighway" allowing you to go harder, longer w/out the bad aftertaste. The placebo for this test was that I forgot that I had started taking them. During the "intervalos" ride (which wasn't supposed to be hard) I started to act like an ass and try to drop and/or catch people on the trails as well as giving hard efforts to all climbs that came my way. I even changed the route to add some more climbs! This was a drastic change from the grinding base rides I've been doing since the beginning of the year. In short, I definitely feel the difference based on my own forgetfulness! Whether or not this will work on you, I don't know, but there are plenty of products out there all claiming to be the natural answer; some being true, and some being great ways to make money out of idiots like me willing to try. I believe in the validity of Cytosport's products, as well as my other favorite, E-Caps/Hammer Nutrition. Cytosport has a terrible website, but they are sold on many of the top nutrional sites out there in www land. I'll get into E-Caps later, maybe. I have a habit of not revisiting topics...

I'm getting stronger and it's because I'm taking little white pills. Oh, and I'm putting a ton of effort into the rides as well as eating nutritionally; I guess I should mention that. The hard work/good diet thing does pay off; the pills only help you work harder, longer. I'm going to start to vary the days giving myself long, slow days, w/ short, hard days as well as active recovery rides. It's hard to truly do active recovery as I live on a reletively steep hill, and have to exert myself a little to get home, but for the most part the rides are w/ out much effort. It's fun riding in full kit only going about 130BPM (my max is above 200); people tend to look at you like your crazy. Then again, that's usually from the guy riding the hybrid w/ his white socks pulled up to his knees.

cycleboredom says talk w/ your doctor before beginning any type of exercise regimen, and definitely before you starting taking any sort of supplement. Eat better. Live longer.