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Last night at about midnight, I was woken up by what I thought was the battle for the end of the world. After assessing that statement in my tired brain, I realized that such a battle would never be fought up here in Fort Kent. Since I had ear plugs in, all that I could hear were loud crashes, which, after removing the ear plugs, I soon realized were thunder. It would be a safe statement to say that I slept poorly last night, constantly repeating this waking up, starting my thought process, and trying to get back to sleep, throughout the night.
Someone build an ark!
In the morning, when I awoke for good, the rain had stopped. A dense fog on the range precluded the possibility of me shooting in my workout this morning. Soon, after I had finished my breakfast, the fog turned into a light rain. By the time I went outside to begin my skate rollerski workout, the light rain had become a sheet of water falling from the sky. Thankfully, the temperature was about 60 degrees, so the threat of succumbing to hypothermia was only slight.
On the schedule for this morning was skate rollerskiing with upper lactate threshold intervals, preceded by some max sprints. In total, the workout was to be a little more than 2h: 30 long. Because the workout was designed to improve and economize my lactate threshold, I packed my Lactate Pro to take some measurements.
Field use of the Lactate Pro
Usually in a workout with eight intervals, I will measure blood lactate following the third and fifth interval. In my opinion, taking a measurement before the third interval would produce a value that is falsely low (because the body is still reacting to the stimulus of the intervals). With the value I obtain after the third interval, I can determine the heart rate value that I need to go at to produce a certain blood lactate value. By the time I take the second blood lactate value following the fifth interval, I can determine if my prediction was correct and whether I am going at the correct pace. If the value after the fifth interval is too low or too high, then I can adjust that for the remaining three intervals.
Flying blind, but with the intuition of a goose
Unfortunately, today my heart rate monitor died after my first interval. Either water got inside the casing, which is supposed to be water-proof, or the battery died. I was left for the remainder of the workout to guess based on feeling and two blood lactate values whether or not I was going at the appropriate pace. Since I was doing the intervals around the rollerski loop that I have gone around thousands of times over the past three years, I knew where I needed to start and finish to get the right amount of time. Still, it was a bit disconcerting not having an objective tool to measure my pace in real-time.
One thing that I have noticed over the past three months that I have been actively using the Lactate Pro is that I have become better acquainted with using “feeling” to determine proper pacing. It was a surprise, however, that today I was able to get to the first blood lactate measurement and get a value that I expected. On the fifth interval, my blood lactate fell to slightly below what I was aiming for in the workout. The rain made my skis quite slow, and perhaps it also kept me mentally from going faster. Yet, it was still a successful workout, but it reemphasizes the importance of having both the Lactate Pro and my heart rate monitor.
Avoiding hypothermia
In the middle of the workout, I took thirty seconds to run inside and turn the sauna on inside the lodge. I knew that I was going to be cold and wet, and that the sauna might be helpful in getting me warm and dry. After my workout, after eating and drying off from my swim-like rollerski workout, I jumped into the sauna. Fifteen minutes later, I was all better. Someone said that the forecasters are predicting rain for the next two weeks. I might be able to handle it with a smile for a week, but after that it will be difficult to approach the weather with a positive attitude. Either way, there is still a lot more training to do.
Peace,
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