My Cyclocross Season typically lasts from the start of September to the end of January.
I’m on the adaptive training plan but would like some advise on how to pick my A race(s) as the plan requests me to pick one.
I have no A races as such, they are all important as they go towards my final league table position.
I normal add the races to the calender as B races but need to add 1 (or more) A races.
Do I add one at the start, mid and end of the season for best effect? Or just in the middle? Or what?
What do you do?
Any advise would be great.
(Already planning for next year )
I’m in a very similar situation. My main state series has it’s “big” weekend UCI races the weekend before US Thanksgiving (typically 3rd weekend in November), a weekend off for Thanksgiving, and then the final weekend, with double points for the last race, the first weekend in December (which is the weekend before the US National Championships). What I did this year was make the 2nd day of the UCI weekend my A race, which led to some lighter work in the two weeks before the end of the series, which seemed to work out (in the last weekend, I managed to podium in my age group for the first time ever, and finished 3rd in the overall). My wife and daughter typically compete in nationals, and I may give it a humble go, hoping to be lapped only once) next year, so I’ve set Nationals as my A race. As a practical matter, I don’t think it makes too much difference–there is a little more decline in intensity in the specialty phase in the week before the A race, but, especially later in the season, I probably end up using alternates (either easier or harder, depending on how I’m feeling) at least half the time anyway.
I’m wondering what difference there would be to adding an A race place holder to the start of September and being ready for the 1st race, or putting it in mid season and working into the season.
Would I run out of steam over the season so to speak in the 1st scenario?
I don’t think it would make too much of a difference–looking back at my calendar for this year, the only real difference before the A race and most of the weeks leading up to it was an endurance ride instead of the usual VO2 max on the Thursday before the race (on a LV specialty plan). On the LV plan, Build went right up to the start of my local series C races, then into specialty. If you have your first race as an A race, you’ll start specialty sooner in the summer, then ?probably continue that throughout the rest of the season. On the LV plan, starting in January, blocks were Base/Build/Base/Build/Specialty–I’ve moved up to MV Masters for next year and there’s a Specialty block after the first Base/Build cycle in late spring. I think the only way to see what you’d be prescribed would be to see what Plan Builder gives you under the two scenarios.
Yes, especially when the season is 5 months long. You won’t be able to hold onto peak fitness for that long. Peak fitness will only last for a couple of weeks, so it’s important to keep that in mind and plan for it.
Over a stretch of 5 months, depending on how far away your races are from each other, it may be worth aiming to have a first peak earlier on, followed by a 1 to 2-week mid-season break, and then a rebuild towards a second peak. If you select one of your earlier races as an A race, and then a second race later on in your season as your next A event, Plan Builder will take care of this automatically.
If your races are all within a few weeks of each other, though, it would probably be best to choose the last race of that block of time to be your A event so you build up to it and end the season strong. Peaking too early and trying to cling onto that fitness as you come back down (often with a lot of fatigue) is no fun – trust me!!
I definitely got stronger throughout my September-December season with a single A race at the end. My main goal next year is to get enough points to cat up. For now, I have things set up similarly, but once I get an idea of the schedule and age group categories, I may add an A race in early October if it looks like I’m more likely to get points earlier.
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