If you read my previous “Motivation Monday<\/a>” posts<\/a>, you'll know I was somehow suckered into riding the Monkey Knife Fight on April 14th<\/a>.\u00a0 I'd suggest you read those posts<\/a> to get an idea of what I've gotten myself into and where I've been so far in terms of training.\u00a0 The short, short version of it is this: it's a spring classic, PA style.\u00a0 That means dirt roads, gravel, steep climbs, shitty weather and lots and lots of fun.\u00a0 And beer.\u00a0 There's a beer sponsor.\u00a0 I think it's Funk Brewing<\/a>, actually.<\/p>\n In past columns, I've detailed some of my training theory behind a ride like this<\/a>.\u00a0 Yeah, it's lots of muscular endurance<\/a> and plenty of VO2 max work<\/a>.\u00a0 No, it's not glamorous at all, but it gets the job done.\u00a0 In all honesty, training never is glamorous, is it?<\/p>\n I've also gone on to explain how you can tell when your fitness has climbed enough for an “out of order” fitness test<\/a>.\u00a0 Since then, it's been pretty quiet.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Well, there are a couple factors\u00a0I'll detail today.\u00a0 But in reality, it's just been grinding out intervals and hoping to get fit enough to not die.<\/p>\n And what's my plan for not dying on this thing?\u00a0 Click through the jump to find out!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n So we're a week away from the main event.\u00a0 In 5 days, it's time to do the dance of the monkey knives.\u00a0 In fact, the Monkey Knife Fight organizers are delighting in torturing us with details of each<\/a> and every<\/a> “hellingen” on the route.\u00a0 And they're rating it by how many “knives” it is instead of stars.<\/p>\n Cute.<\/p>\n Why do I bring this up?\u00a0 Well, partly because this ride is starting to scare the shit out of me.\u00a0 No joke.<\/p>\n If you've been paying attention to the news and weather, or god forbid you LIVE in the northeast, you'll know our winter has been heinous.\u00a0 Sure, we had a couple of nice days in February.\u00a0 Maybe one or two were even over 70 degrees.\u00a0 But March was a complete washout.\u00a0 As in, I've ridden outside two times in March for a total of about 44 miles outdoors since February.\u00a0 All the rest of my training, including any hard interval work, has been stuffed inside on the trainer.<\/p>\n This matters because it puts me WAY behind the 8 Ball in terms of fitness.\u00a0 Normally, on any given year, we'd be out riding a dozen times in March and April.\u00a0 This year, yesterdays 43.5 mile training ride was the longest thing I've done since last October!<\/p>\n Well, I'm solidly fucked, aren't I?<\/p>\n Maybe not…<\/p>\nPlaying Catch Up<\/h2>\n