Firstly I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to Welshewe Coaching this past year,
without your commitment to training and determination to suceed, the results of this season would not have been possible.
As we know goals are the one thing that drives success, they get us out of bed on cold mornings, they help keep our fitness on track when it would be so easy to make excuses and sack off the session. They are there to ensure we never take our eye off the ball and continually hit our targets.
Whatever the end goal may be, I believe if you focus on the strengths and weaknesses, provide a solid training platform unique to the individual, then you have a pretty much fail-safe training system.
People who write their goals down are more likely to achieve them. I know I did when I was training for the Commonwealth Games, and without my little black book of training notes and thoughts, I don’t think I would have made it to the start line! A study conducted by Gail Matthews, the professor of psychology at Dominican University, California revealed that people who had written goals on paper had been 42% more likely to reach them – It really helped me, and I always encourage my clients to do the same.
To make continually gains it is essential to measure performance on and off the bike. By this I mean power, strength, speed, agility and most of all heart rate! Heart rate tells us what our bodies are doing, so if recorded daily, this will ensure that overtraining does not occur and sickness is kept well and truly at bay. Always listen to your body, and only train to the distance you race.
When it comes to testing, I like to test with a power meter as the information can be easily downloaded and managed in TrainingPeaks. Also never forget the fun of Strava, as lets be honest, its all about beating your mates and getting KOM’s or QOM’s! You can also spy on what your competition are up to too! Therefore understanding the above data helps you improve training and enables you to become a smarter athlete and have more ownership of your overall performance.
