With nine weeks remaining until the start of the 2019 FNB Wines2Whale Shiraz, Joanne and Sean Badenhorst began their preparation in earnest. They’re a married couple with full-time work commitments. This won’t be their first stage race as a teammates, but it will Joanne’s first Wines2Whales. Sean has done four previously.
His
With a super busy work week, I only managed three weekday sessions – a tempo session on Monday evening and two High Intensity Interval Sessions, both of which I was unable to complete. I think I’m just exhausted. I’ve not slept well in a while and wake up at 04h00 daily to get some early work in before the world wakes up…
On Saturday, we did our first long ride at Cradle Moon. We’d done a ride there two weeks before and saw that one lap of the Blue and Yellow route was 26km with 506 metres of ascent. That meant that two laps would be around 52km with over 1000 metres of ascent, right? Nope. Not according to our devices. My Polar M450 gave me 50km with 850m of ascent and Joanne’s Garmin Fenix 5S gave her 54km with 861m of ascent.
It was still a decent ride though. It got hot, dry and dusty and Joanne impressed me with a fastish first lap and a gritty second lap where I could see she was struggling physically a little and mentally a lot.
Our objective is to try and do weekend rides that simulate the distance and elevation we’ll be faced with at Wines2Whales. Not that easy when you live in Joburg…
I had to work on Sunday, so couldn’t do a long training ride, while Joanne needed a rest day after a big riding week.
My week:
Monday: 31km, 1hr01min Tempo session at Power Lab
Tuesday: 36km, 1hr10min HIIT session at Power Lab
Thursday: 35km, 1hr11min HIIT session at Power Lab
Saturday: 50km, 3hr58min Long ride at Cradle Moon
Total distance: 152km
Total time: 7hrs10min
Hers
After a initial 2 weeks of consistent training, 1 week a little easier and another 4 weeks building, this last week was pretty tough. I think I am training out of fear at the moment. Although the distance of W2W does not scare me, the amount of climbing does. I am no featherweight, and even though I am hoping to lose a few Kilos before the start of the event in November, I am not going to ever be fast on the climbs. I have a fear of suffering, of letting myself and Sean down, and a recurring fear of not finishing something that I have started.
With this fear, I pushed through, what was a big week, for me:
Monday: Some cross training in the form of a session at cRESULTS Digital Boxing,
30km, 1hr6min Tempo/Threshold session with VO2 Bursts at Power Lab
Tuesday: 26km, 1hr Easy Tempo session at Power Lab
Wednesday: 43km, 2h49min easy MTB ride Cradle Loop
Thursday: 26km, 1hr11min Easy Tempo at Power Lab,
35km, 1h38 Easy Cradle Road Ride
Friday: 8,25km, 42min Skills session at PWC Bike Park
Saturday: 54km, 3hr58 Tough ride at Cradle Moon
Total Distance: 222km
Total Time: 12hrs22min
Limited entries are still available for Wine@Whales Pinotage and Shiraz. More info at: www.wines2whales.com
