Training
Tips and thoughts and how hard it is to pickup a new sport in your 40’s
Training for the Retro BMX State Titles
It is that time of year, when everyone is stepping it up a gear and training hard for their state titles, this year I will be racing my Retro BMX in both the Tasmanian State Titles and the Victorian the week after. Training for me is now at the hardest intensity that it will be over the next week or two and then I will start to back off a little to give my body a chance to recover and be fresh as I possibly can be, to give the best performance that I can. I have no illusions as to my ability and am staring down the barrel of last place at the Victorian State Titles and quite possibly the Tasmanian titles as well, but you never know, if someone takes their foot off the gas, I will be there to pounce and will happily pass them as I
The pointy end of the season
The end of the 2017 BMX season is fast approaching with a few large meets left for the year, Knox Thunderdome, Tasmanian State Titles and the Victorian State Titles. After travelling all over Victoria this year, racing the Victorian State Series in which I placed 2nd for 40+ retro, I am excited to be going on my first interstate trip to race retro BMX at the Tasmanian State Titles in the second week of November. In reflection, my year was an interesting one, it had a change of trainers, from James Tait to Luke Cristiano, it was full of niggling injuries, loaded with self doubt and apprehension and my mind in overdrive with thoughts of the crash in 2016 that had me out of action for a while, it was these mental battles that I had to overcome as I was getting faster. I can now say that I feel
Retro BMX racing, sprint training, what off season?
It is the off season for us old retro BMX racers, a time where we can sit back, relax in front of the heater on a cold winters day, drink beer, eat pizza and not have to worry about when the next race is. That lifestyle of luxury is fast drawing to a close with the first open meet only a few weeks away and whilst my fellow retro racers have been hibernating and hopefully getting fat and lazy, I have been out there continuing training if for nothing else but to keep my fitness base in tact. Todays torture test saw me back at Edithvale velodrome for some sprint training on the bike with some laps of the running track in between. Everything started off easy, a couple of laps of the velodrome, followed by a lap of walking the running track, in total a 1400 meter warmup. It
James Tait, I swear tries to kill retro racers
Tonight saw myself back training with the dastardly James Tait for the first time this year, fellow retro racer Michael Herceg was also in attendance and rumor has it that retro racer Brendon Marshall was a no-show after training last week where he was brutalized and too scared to return. Our warmup started with some relay run throughs of side steps, butt kicks, grapevine shuffles and jumping, seriously what is with the jumping lately, last week with the secret trainer and this week with James, I think I may have given him some ideas with my last post, I am definitely going to have to avoid that in future. With Michael and I on opposing teams, it was game on and the grapevines were serious business, I busted out the dance skills from when I was a teen back in the 80s and grapevined shuffled like a champ, Michael was
Rebuilding old bikes, rebuilding old bodies
The last week has been an interesting one, whilst I had planned to step up the number of days I was going to train, I found that I was without a bike, the old Vortex Cruiser has gone through a rebuild and the crank bolt that goes through the chain wheel and into the back of the crank, turns out I had accidentally sent to QLD, when I traded my 180 cranks for 175s, fortunately the bolt was sent back express post and I received it Friday and had my Vortex BMX built just before race time. Tuesday saw me back with the secret trainer, doing further strength training, mixed in with a bit of cardio, whilst I feel the muscles around my knee getting stronger, the training doesn’t get any easier, the weights build up and with the bit of cardio mixed in, I am constantly out of breath
Horrors of a slam ball
Track Attack is last weeks news, so this week saw me back with the secret trainer on Tuesday night, where I was introduced to the horrors of the 20 kg slam ball, which I will talk about in more detail later in the post. My intention for this week was to step up my training to 3 nights, then step it up to 4 nights per week, from next week. How ever my Vortex cruiser is currently going through a rebuild, thus I am bikeless for the week, so the step up in training will begin in earnest next week, back training with the evil one James Tait on Mondays, then Tuesdays and Thursdays with the equally evil secret trainer and Wednesday night gates at Frankston BMX track. How ever I digress, my training as always started with squats on the squat rack with only 5 kg on the bar,
No more excuses when it comes to nutrition
With the first race of the 2017 Retro BMX racing season completed and about to step up my training in a weeks time, I figured it was time to stop being lazy and start paying attention to my nutrition, more importantly what I am putting into my mouth. Our bodies are like a machine, the better fuel we put in, the better our bodies perform. So with that in mind I thought I write this post and give a few of my ideas to help others out. Working in a produce department at a major supermarket, you would think that I would be eating fresh and healthy fruit and vegetables every day, truth be told I can be just as lazy when it comes to food as anyone else, I do eat a couple of pieces of fruit every day whilst I am at work, but on weekends I don’t