Watching the Olympics and Paralympics has gotten me fired up about upper body training. There are multiple sports like kayaking, canoeing, and rowing in the Olympics that require "upper body cardio". Rowers will say the power from the stroke is mostly from the legs but it's still a good upper body workout too. In the … Continue reading Olympics, Paralympics, and Strength Endurance →

I talked about challenging ourselves to motivate training, but carefully choosing the challenge, in a previous post. I recommended there that shorter challenges are probably best to motivate training that leads to optimal health. I violated my own rule recently when I decided to train for a century, decidedly not a short challenge. I'm glad … Continue reading Challenges, Adventures, And Balanced Training →

It is well known in the exercise science literature that older adults have less ability to produce powerful movements, like a standing vertical jump from a bent-knee position. Power is force times speed, so you could lose power from a loss of strength (thus less ability to produce force) or from your muscles getting slower … Continue reading We Lose Power With Age Because Our Muscles Get Weaker- Not Slower →

After doing my century on Friday I was sore the rest of the day, especially going down stairs. This persisted through Saturday. I felt a lot better by Sunday. I just did a really easy recovery spin on Saturday, then on Sunday I walked with hand weights for 20 minutes, then did an easy ride … Continue reading A Couple of Days of Soreness →

I was already toying with the idea of canceling the Sacramento century and just doing one from home. With GPS, it's not really necessary to do an organized challenge because you have your training log to show what you have done. But what was really driving this is that the air quality out in the … Continue reading Century From Home! →

As I mentioned in a recent post, I've been disappointed in my cruising speed on my recumbent, and thought my rear thorn-proof tube might have something to do with it. So I replaced it with a regular tube. I also noticed my front tire was a bit low so pumped it up. What a difference! … Continue reading More Century Training- Cruising Speed Increases →

There's been a debate for some time over whether single-sided strength training has and advantage over double-sided (doing a one-armed chest press vs doing a conventional barbell bench-press, for example). There are reasons to expect it to be better, such as getting your obliques involved in a one-armed chest press, and the fact that the … Continue reading Single-sided Strength Training Improves Endurance Performance →

Curbing Traffic: The Human Case for Fewer Cars in Our Lives is the name of an interesting book I recently read by Chris and Melissa Bruntlett. I've previously discussed their book Building the Cycling City: The Dutch Blueprint for Urban Vitality which describes the history and implementation of measures taken to make Dutch cities bike … Continue reading Active Transportation and “Curbing Traffic” →

Tuesday I went for a longer ride to try and increase my cruising speed on the recumbent. There's an odd phenomenon on the recumbent that I appear to be "leg-limited": my heart rate remains below my aerobic pace which is around 120 beats per minute, but if I try to go faster it's my legs … Continue reading Working on Cruising Speed →

This is a question relevant to the Western US with all the wildfires we've been getting lately. ve always wondered if I'm doing more harm than good if I exercise outdoors on a day when the air quality is worse than moderate. An interesting study done in Taiwan answers this question. There are parts of … Continue reading Better To Work Out in Bad Air Than Not Work Out At All? →