Done with training camp!

Team Slipstream’s winter training camp in Silver City, New Mexico finished up yesterday after 2 and a half weeks of consistent solid training together.  It was nice to have few media and sponsor commitments at this camp and just focus on training hard and recovering.  I really lucked out because as soon as I came to camp it became snowy and cold back in Boulder for a solid 2 weeks.  We timed this camp down to the final hour in terms of getting good weather.  We had great weather the whole 2 weeks, save for one semi-wet/snowy day.  Then the last 30 minutes of our last ride on the last day it started dumping snow, the sharp kind of flakes that really sting your face when you are motorpacing behind a car into the wind at 40 mph.  Ouch!
After we got home to the Holiday Inn, it kept snowing and blowing and freezing, leaving a sheet of ice and snow that made it impossible to ride the next day, so it was a good thing we were all heading out!  When we got to the tiny glorified tuff shed of an airport outside Silver City for out flight to Albuquerque, we were informed of the cancellation of our puddle jumper flight, despite bluebird skies and zero wind.  The airports computerized weather tracking system was down, so we werent gonna fly, and miss our connections to all corners of the globe. Luckily charter planes could fly, and we just so happened to have the right amount of people, so we took a charter plane instead.  Not a bad way to go, I tell ya.  We were a bit late and landed in ABQ only minutes before our connection flight left, but fortunately for us that flight was late too so we checked in and walked on the plane with time to grab a coffee!  I was home in Boulder having a Chipotle burrito by mid afternoon!  Now thats a good travel day!
We did a bunch of different stuff at camp.  First up was dialing up all our new Felt race bikes and TT bikes.  Im glad I wasnt a mechanic at this camp.  Those guys were busy all day every day.  I dont think we did a single day of training that didn’t involve specific interval efforts prescribed by my coach Allen Lim.  He came up with some creative stuff to keep it interesting for us.  Ill tell you what though, I’m pretty tired of rotating and TTT efforts…we beat that into the ground for sure.  We worked with psychologist Julie Emmerman, learned all about our vitamin and supplement regimine, did morning core workouts, and got a bunch of massage and chiropractic treatments.  Thats about the total body treatment I think.  Its amazing how much more effective and hard you can train with all these resources for recovery!
The riding around Silver City was really nice…cruising through the Gila wilderness and seeing only 5 cars in 5 hours.  One day we did a charity ride to support a local bikes-for-kids program.  Another day we rode in shorts and jersey in the cold for team photos, and on other days we spent a lot of time in two groups chasing eachother TTT style.

Im sitting in Winter Park with Karli watching it dump snow while Loren is out coaching at a ski race.  Another week in Boulder getting a good dose of home and Ill be off to Europe to start the season.

Thanks for checking in, more stuff from the season’s first races to come!