Move over volume, it's time for intensity

Talking with a good friend, David, today, he pointed out an interesting fact - I'm not training for any long course races this year. So why am I spending so much time going long and slow?? Example - today I went out on my long run. I have Broad St. coming up, which is a 10mile race, but I ran 18 today... A great run, and I feel great about it, but I don't need to put in that sort of mileage training for a 10 miler and then some shorter races this summer. The longest run as part of a race that I have planned after Broad St. is a 10k. I've only been doing 1 interval workout/week for the past couple months. I think it's time to step it up. I understand that building a strong aerobic base is important, but right now I want to go fast. I need to build my top end speed to be more competitive. So, I need to get the wheels spinning!

I'm not going to change anything for the next 2 weeks, but I am going to try to bump up to 3 intervals workouts/week after May 6. I'm thinking 2 will be on the bike, and I'll keep my 1 on the run. Then I'll see how my body responds. I think I have enough of a base under me right now that I'll be able to hold off injury even with the added stress of high intensity training.

Another suggestion he made that I am looking into is switching crank length on my bike. I currently ride with 175mm length crank arms. From what I can gather, shortening to 167.5 or 165 should let me raise my seat a bit, giving me a more flat back and aero positioning, and it should also open up my hip angle a bit while I'm down in the aero position allowing me to breathe a little better and without requiring such a large range of motion with my legs - and I am quite inflexible, so this should help me quite a bit. The downside to shorter cranks is said to be a little less torque/power, however, from what I've read on slowtwitch (and I even saw an interview with Lance Armstrong), I think the marginal decrease in torque is outweighed by the comfort and breathing, so there is actually no net loss of power. Lance said he rides a 172.5 on his roadie and a 167.5 on his TT bike. If he's doing it, it must be right, right?

OK- the busy week shall begin with a little less sleep than I wanted. Maddy was down in Miami for a bachelorette party this weekend, and her plane got delayed, so she won't be in until 1:30am. No biggie though. We'll make it work.

Thanks for reading.