My much anticipated Seven Sola SLX 29 frame arrived yesterday. I have to say it is better than I even imagined! Beautiful, sexy, work of art are words that come to mind. It tips the scales at 3.1 pounds. The attention to detail that Seven puts into their frames is incomparable (and I own a Serotta cross-bike and a Moots road bike). The sculpted stays, curved tubes, meticulous dropouts and smooth welds are a sight to behold. I can’t wait to build this thing and get on it. That will have to wait until Monday however as my Lefty fork will be arriving at that time. This means I will be fondling and caressing my new race horse all weekend.

My parts selection is complete (see pics below). Honorable mentions go out to some super light scandium cockpit parts (seat post, bar, bar ends) by KCNC. Wicked light and quite stealth. SRAM XX drive train parts. 11-36 cassette, chain, rear derailleur and rear shifter. Only rear? Yes. I will be running a svelte 1×10 set-up this year. No need for extra cross-over gearing here! I’m going with Rotor cranks and chain ring again this year. I really like these things. I will have a 34 and 36 tooth rings to choose from depending on what the course conditions call for. Adding an MRP chain guide to the mix to make sure my chain stays on as I’m hauling ass on this bike. And finally, a favorite for the last three seasons, NoTubes ZTR Race wheels, in a 29′er version with a Lefty front hub, to keep things light and accelerating with ease. I received two sets from Stan’s. I’m having one tied and soldered, by ace mechanic Doug B. at WRC, for extra stiffness for the snappiest accelerations on tight, turny courses.

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I’ve been following along with my frame’s progress on Seven’s Frame Tracking system on their website. Pretty cool! I’ve caught word that it may arrive as early as tomorrow! Check out some of the progression descriptions. Another reason why riding a Seven is truly and experience!

First week of March (first week of second Base Phase) went off without a hitch. Definitely my best week of training of 2010. Monday I hit the gym for a heavy strength session followed by a one-hour massage. Tuesday I was back at Masters Swim for the first time since October. It was rough adjusting to the 5 am wake-up call, but it felt good to be back in the 50-meter pool following feet. Suprisingly I was able to hang onto Hairy Jason’ss feet for most of the swim. I asked him half way through if he was pushing or cruising and he said pushing. That tell’s me I’m improving in the water! After the swim on Tuesday I hit the treadmill for speed intervals followed by a 15 minute hill-climb across the street up Green Mountain to the radio towers. Finished up the run with an easy downhill cruise and a little foam roller time to work out the kinks. Solid run sesh! Later that evening was Trainer Workout 9A with some LT efforts followed by Vo2 intervals on the bike.

Wednesday I was back in the pool for a speed swim with short fast intervals followed by a hefty pull set. After the swim I was back on the bike for a 3 hour ride up and around Evergreen and Lookout Mountain. Getting back home I threw on the running shoes and hit the roads for a 15 minute transition run. First of the season. Later that evening I was back on the foam roller and yoga stretches to loosen up before bed. Thursday was another 5 am wake-up call for Masters. I was a little less fresh today and swam down a lane to keep things under control. Later that morning I hit the track for some mile repeats. First track sesh of the year. Wasn’t thinking I’d be up for much, since the previous weeks of treadmill milers were so brutal and the legs were tired. However to my surprise I managed to pull off a series of sub 5:40 miles which I was very happy about. That evening was Trainer 9B with more intervals and by this time I was feeling the fatigue a bit.

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Think back to high school biology if you will, studying the cell and energy production. Remember the mitochondria? The powerhouse of the cell that produces energy in the form of ATP (adenosine triphosphate) from glucose via the Krebs Cycle. As endurance athletes, mitochondria play an important role in our ability to perform. You can think of them as our aerobic engines. A primary goal of the aerobic training we do is to increase our mitochondrial density in our muscles. The more energy producing mitochondrial “engines” we have in our muscles the more work we can do. Sounds good to me.

Now what if you can maximize the efficiency and production rates of each of these powerhouses? In essence increase the “horsepower” of these aerobic engines? Well you can with certain key components needed during the energy producing process of the Krebs Cycle occurring within your mitochondria. According to the researchers at Ideal Health, Energen provides optimum amounts of a key component of the Krebs cycle, alpha-ketoglutarate (AKG), along with vitamin and mineral activating cofactors to enhance effectiveness.

Product Highlights

• Contains effective amounts of alpha-ketoglutarate, the Krebs cycle compound often found low in metabolic testing.
• Magnesium and potassium, important cofactors in cellular energy production, are included in their bioavailable citrate and aspartate forms.
• Energen also contains lipoic acid, a unique nutrient which functions as an antioxidant by helping to “recharge” other antioxidants, and also acts much like a B vitamin, helping to convert food into energy.

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With the help from Pearl Izumi and Rudy Project the 2010 EPC Kits are in production. These are the kits that the EPC Xterra Team will rock at as they dominate the Xterra Series events as well as all the EPC coached athletes at their events. We even have a limited number of extra kits for any friends and fans of EPC interested in flying the EPC colors in their training endeavors.  Send me an email to reserve your kit today. Sizes and quantities are limited!

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Last week was a nice recovery week from my first Base Phase block. Kept on training, but lightened the load, dropped the speed work and intervals in favor of some easier riding and running and lifting. I only did one swim session to allow for a full recovery and absorption of the last several months of swim training. This week I begin masters swimming on top of my regular swims for more volume and speed in the water. Cycling was light with my two trainer sessions performed at a much lighter effort and a 40 mile easy ride on the weekend out to Chatfield Res. to catch some friends finishing a running race out there. Running was just a couple easy runs on the treadmill and a 75 min trail run on snowpack and mud yesterday. Only two weight sessions with fewer sets. Wednesday I got out for a very nice XC skate ski at Frisco Nordic Center. It’s finally been snowing up there and the track was great. Got in some good hills and hard efforts trying to mimic the Olympic racers I’d been watching earlier that week in TV. They make it look so easy!Over the weekend I hung out with Kathy’s kids and took them to see Danielle (EPC’er, future Xterra star) race an indoor track meet at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden. She did the 5k on Friday and the 3k on Saturday. I had never been to an indoor track meet. Pretty cool and she did great!

So back to the grind stone this week.  READ MORE