Outdoor Practice: 06/01/2006

Like our recent practices, today's practice had a few exercises that combine the fitness group with the race group. Before we began our warm up, coach ARA discussed with us how to take advantage of the wind when racing on a track.

The diagram on the left shows the direction of the wind in turquoise. Assuming that everybody's skating in counter-clockwise direction, if you are the skater in red drafting behind the skater in blue, you are in a good position to attack. As you move to the right hand side of the skater in blue, you would be protected from the wind thus making it easier to pass the blue skater.

However, if the purpose is to protect your teammate from the wind, it is best to drop back at the opposite corner of the track as seen in the diagram on the right. As the red skater move from the front of the pack to the right side of the pack, he can protect the blue skater from the wind.

After this discussion, we began our 22 minutes of warm up. Originally,  coach ARA and EG intended to have the fitness group skating in a pack while the racing group lap us in pairs. However, a few laps in, the speed of the fitness group was too slow to make this exercise practical so each group did their own warm up. We had a number of new skaters joining us this week so we had a larger pack than usual. For our warm up, we skated in a pack and the lead skater would drop back after one lap.

Next, coach EG assigned different drills to our group depending on how much training we've done in the last week. For anyone who skated or biked for over two hours, he would skate in 20 minutes periods with two minutes of break in between. The skating would focus on holding the recovery position (i.e. toe dragging) for two seconds before the next stride. For new members, EG would worked with them on the basic position and various drills that we've practiced over the last few weeks. For everyone else, the remaining of the practice would be non-stop skating in the basic position because logging miles is key here.

I was a little embarrassed to be skating in the third group because, well, it meant I didn't do my homework so I need to log miles during TISC practice instead [sigh...]. As I was skating around, I vowed to log the requisit miles next week so I wouldn't be in the same situation again. The next 90 minutes was rather uneventful as you can imagine. However, I did discover a couple of things. When the small of my back became sore from bending over for too long, skating upright or not skating as low do not help to alleviate the soreness. My back muscle needs stretching in order to relax and the best way to stretch without loosing my balance is actually to skate even lower, tighten my abs, and reach forward. A little counter-intuitive but it worked quite well. The other thing that I discovered was a bit more frivolous. For safety reasons, we are not allowed to listen to music with headphones during practice. However, logging miles without a change of scenery nor music can get a little monotonous. Before long, I was singing while skating. Probably not the best idea as I was singing out of tune. I figured since I wasn't skating in a pack, it wouldn't be too much distraction anyway. The good thing was it made the 90 minutes passed by much quicker because it kept my mind away from the how-much-longer-do-I-have-to-skate-my-muscle-is-sore mentality.

Our practiced wrapped up with more pack skating with the racing group. Less than three laps in and I already couldn't keep up with the group. ARA said that I could have kept up if I had stayed in the draft. Hmm...

Cool-down was a pyramid of five laps with the third lap being the fastest.

After our practice, I asked EG for some feedback on my skating. He said that I do not turn out the toes as often and I skated very low. However, he observed that I have a tendency to step on the left forward inside edge. I need to pay more attention about it next time I practice.

Technorati: pack skating, drafting