I don't know if I've ever gone into my pseudo-athletic, pre-triathlon past, but once upon a time, I got back into the cardio thing by attending step classes. Yes, step class! A male colleague suggested I try it out (this was in 1994 at a gym inside my office complex), and at the time, I wasn't in great shape cardiovascularly (I'd been mostly just lifting for about 3 years at the time), and so I agreed to try it out. Well, I guess it brought out my competitiveness, since even though at many sports I'm a complete and total klutz, I was good at this, and not only was I good, I began bringing music, and the instructor asked me to sub in when she couldn't make it.
Step class morphed into this circuit class where you'd spend one minute at a "station," and then immediately move onto the next, keeping this up for about 30-40 minutes at a time. The stations consisted of step hurdles, jump rope, jumping jacks, step class moves, etc., and then this same (male) instructor added an abs class, and I got into that, too. Once again, when the instructor couldn't make it, I would sub in and make stuff up, and usually make it harder. Some attendees would grimace when they saw that I was going to lead a class, as they knew I would give them a run for their money.
When the weather warmed up, I suggested we take the circuit class outdoors, and we did. This let us add fun things like 1' sprints, running jump rope, skipping, etc. I have really fond memories of this class since we looked pretty silly doing this stuff, but all the while we'd see people leaving in their cars to go eat lunch out, many returning with fast food bags in their hands. Also, we got some suntan!
Well, it was an off day for this class once in 1998 when I thought, "I wonder how far it is around this building complex on the running path?" I had never run before, and since I had been doing running jump rope and sprints, I thought I should try and go all the way around. So I did, and it wasn't that bad, so I did it again. That was the start of my running, and well, you know where that went...
So I have a history of mastering something and then trying to step it up to make it more challenging. The same is true with other non-triathlon things that I do. When I learned to sew, I found that the more difficult the garment to make, the more I enjoyed it. I actually love sewing really intricate things with lots of details to them. Same with gardening. It's easy to grow many plants, but for awhile I experimented with stuff that's a little more finicky, but in that case, Mother Nature won and I realized that it's just better (I think) to only try and grow what naturally likes to thrive in my little piece of Earth (and I don't do indoor plants). Same with cooking. I generally cook pretty (to me) simple stuff most weeks, but when I have the time, I really like making something that has all sort of ingredients and steps to it.
OK, so when I was asked to lead the trainer class, I thought I could just lay down one of my usual workouts which would be plenty hard, but yesterday, about an hour before I needed to leave, I made something up that I thought would be good and a little different for me. I train with power, so everything I do is expressed as % of FTP, but others can use % of 40K TT HR or pace.
I got to the shop around 6PM, set up LGL and did some easy warmup myself. I ended up doing about 15' on my own, and then when we officially started, gave everyone 5' to warm up, while I explained the zones we would be using, that I didn't care what gears you used (use whatever gets you to the prescribed effort level), and then we reviewed the workout itself. Anthony had given me a flat box that had held a bike frame, and I wrote the zones on one half and the workout on the other and stood it up against the counter so everyone could see it while we worked out.
Here's the main set of the workout we did:
3xspinups (30" spin, 30" easy)
3x(2' 105-110%, 1' cd)
2' cd
10' 85-90% (tempo)
2'(1'), 3'(1'), 4'(2'), 5'(2') 100% or FTP
3x (60" squat, 45" rest)
2' cd
13x30/30 (30" @ 110%+, 30" easy)
2-5' cd
During the spinups, I asked people to call out their cadence, and we got some pretty amazing numbers. I had called the 105-110% "balls out" level, just because it's easier to say plus, well, that's what you want to do! Everyone got their sweat on pretty quickly, and at one point, a couple who lives in an apartment above the shop came down and made us turn down the music! As they were leaving, I told them they could just come and join us, but I guess they didn't want to.
I was facing everyone so I could see their faces and all the sweat pouring off of them, so I hoped they were getting a good workout. After we finished, several people came up to me and said that it was a good workout, and I was happy because I worried that maybe I wouldn't make it hard enough for some of the folks.
When I downloaded my power data this morning, I had evidence that it was, indeed, an awesome workout. For you power junkies, here's how it panned out. Please note that my FTP on LGL is currently pegged at 205 watts, so you can see on the TSS line that I ran at 89% of FTP for that workout!
If I am asked to lead the workout again, I will gladly do it. I made myself work harder even as I was yelling out intervals and stuff, and it was really fun.
This morning I am going to do my track workout on legs that may protest, but I don't care!
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