# 13. Starting Over: Building Base and The Long-Term Vision I Needed
Three to six months to the best bike ride of your life. The secret: build slowly and consistently.
Last week, on a weekday before a major holiday weekend and just prior to the arrival of a mild heat wave, I decided to take off work and attempt my longest ride yet. I had a hunch that this particular Friday was a gift from the gods—not too hot, not too trafficky. There were no guarantees, of course, but if I’ve learned anything from over a year of Ironman training, it’s to make the most of the times when luck is against you (flats, wind, rain—all of them opportunities for acquiring new skills) and to take equal advantage when luck seems to be on your side.
The plan was to ride 90 miles over hilly terrain, crossing from one side of Vancouver Island to the other, east to west, with an elevation gain of over 5,000 feet. My hunch about the traffic proved correct. The further west I rode, away from major cities, the fewer cars and RVs haunted me up the steep hills and around the tight two-lane scenic-highway curves. Clearly, they were all waiting one more day to hit the open Pacific in droves.
Meanwhile, the weather was ideal—dry, mid-70s, with deep blue skies and fresh gusts of clean wind. I rode past glittering lakes, along roads shadowed by giant cedars, and into open valleys with views of snow-ribboned mountain peaks. I got turned around a few times on logging roads, hitting dead-ends that weren’t clear on my digital maps, but miles are miles. And they were gorgeous miles!
As usual, I doubted my stamina, but I also knew that once I got past 30 or 40 miles, my confidence would grow. Just before 60 miles, when I met my husband for a quick switch-out of Gatorade and water bottles, I started wondering if I should quit while I was ahead, get some takeout, and go home happy. Instead, I pushed on, and the scenery grew only more majestic, the road even emptier, the shoulders smoother, with some steep downhill sections to reward me for all the uphills I’d done earlier that day. If I’d turned around soon, what glorious riding I would have missed.
Around mile 70 (about five hours), I felt tired again, but I had entertainment in the form of an audiobook and music. (I use Shokz wireless bone conduction headphones that sit on the cheekbones, so there’s no risk of failing to hear cars or natural sounds.)
At mile 90, I hadn’t yet arrived at the planned meetup point with Brian, due to my extended mileage from some wrong turns early in the day, near Courtenay, prior to joining Highway 28. I’d also picked up my pace—a nice surprise. 93 miles, then 95. Could this be happening? When I spotted Brian approaching in our silver Honda Fit, I waved to him. “Fifteen more minutes? Can we spare it? I could actually complete a century today!”
Already, we’d been on the road since early morning, with a late ferry to catch, back over the mountains and onward to our island home. Brian had used up some time doing a trail run with our dogs, but mostly he’d spent the day driving and sitting in the car, waiting for me. Even a few extra minutes could turn our celebratory evening into an exhausting, inconvenient one.
But Brian didn’t question my resolve. He motored up ahead, ready to meet again in four miles—exceedingly steep miles, as it turned out. I watched as every tenth of a mile ticked by, feeling the excitement of a lifetime goal within my reach. Tired, I nearly wobbled on a soft stretch of gravel just beyond the hard shoulder. Don’t crash now! I hit a sharp piece of gravel. No flats, please. Heavy gusts had been hitting my side for the last ten miles, and they didn’t let up. Focus. Don’t celebrate too soon.
I hadn’t thought to get a new water bottle from Brian, and I’d been dry for the last half hour, but only this mattered: closing the final gap, one steep minute at a time. How do those Tour de France cyclists do this sort of steep, high-mileage ride not once, but over and over, across twenty-one stages? No idea. And not my problem, either. For me, a century in one day is hard enough to fathom.
When I saw the odometer turn over at 100 miles, I wanted to cry. And to think that the ride was not only finished, it had been fun! I hadn’t spent the last several hours wishing it would be over, or thinking “Never again.”
I’d felt strong nearly all of the way. My mantra, “Trust your body,” worked, as did my reminders of why I could trust it: because I’d built up to this effort slowly, my quads and heart stronger with every successive effort.
All day, I had tried to absorb the lessons of each moment, letting them sink into me, hoping the thoughts would one day become automatic. It was a mental game I’d been playing on all my long rides over the last four months. Every ride over sixty miles had proved to me I could do it. Every steep hill had taught me not only to shift well and manage my effort, but also to absorb the meaning of each heart-pounding minute. You can do this. You are doing this. Don’t be afraid when it feels hard. You’ll recover. Keep spinning. Keep breathing. Every hill, stronger. Every ride, stronger.
I had to invite the feeling of muscular effort, to make friends with it. I had to turn off the overzealous cognitive monitor that resides within my skull, the part of my brain trying to protect me from overexertion. I had to change my way of thinking, from “Oh no, I’m starting to get tired,” to “There’s nothing wrong happening in your legs, and your lower back will complain, but it will recover. This is when the improvement happens. This is exactly how it should feel1.”
And also: “Don’t think about the next thing. Appreciate this time. Be Here Now.”
When my brain couldn’t supply all those motivational phrases, I narrowed it down to the simplest one.
Stronger.
Aspiration, observation, fact. I was stronger. I was, every single ride, getting stronger—which was not at all how I’d felt late last year, when every ride left me feeling fatigued and broken.
60 miles, in Joshua Tree, California, in March. 70 miles in Yakima, Washington, in May. 80 miles on the steep backroads of a logging area between Cowichan Lake and Port Renfrew, in British Columbia, in June. And now this, 90 miles—except it turned out to be 100—between Courtenay and Gold River, BC.
Not only were my rides ever longer, they were faster, too. Even though I told myself I didn’t need to rush on every ride, all of my 70+ mile rides were fast enough to count as Ironman pace (my planned average pace, which is about 14 to 15.5 miles per hour on hilly routes, an improvement from last year’s 12 to 14 miles per hour). If I could just keep that pace up, I wouldn’t be eliminated.
If it sounds like an easy, natural progression, it was an ease that was hard-won. In my last post, I shared my “Winter of Discontent,” which itself came after a summer in which I ignorantly backburned cycling; then failed to thrive even with the help of a coach, courting injuries; then got COVID and lost at least half of the fitness I’d gained.
That post was about hitting rock bottom, and starting again, at what felt like square one, especially mentally. Regardless of whatever fitness I had, I couldn’t go for a single bike ride without huffing and puffing and—more important—doubting myself. The doubt itself was the worst part. How could I possibly ever ride 100 miles (the century, a major cycling milestone) or 112 miles (the Ironman distance), when I’d never ridden any distance comfortably despite training a year? All of the training programs I’d read online recommended at least one “long slow easy ride” each week. Ha! All of my rides were slow! And none of them were easy! When was I ever going to get better?
I’ve given you the happy ending first, because it’s what I needed to visualize and believe in—what I couldn’t even imagine back in January. I would have given anything to read someone else’s account, even if it was anecdotal, suggesting that you can be at a plateau or even lose progress and then find yourself—six months later—in the greatest shape of your cycling life, and enjoying it. Finally!
Does this mean the next time I go out for a 20- or 30-mile ride, which is no longer an intimidating distance, I’ll remember everything I’ve written above and feel confident and ready to take on every hill? Strangely, no! The first minutes of every workout of every kind (cycling, running, swimming) I always start out illogically resistant. But with every passing month, the struggle and the doubt get smaller and more manageable, more able to share my inner soundtrack with other voices, the ones that say “Good for you” and “This feels great!”
Since this post has gone long, I’ve set aside as part II (to post soon2) the particulars of “building base” and finding some great routes, like the rides I did in Joshua Tree and Yakima. But for now, I just want you to know it’s possible, in whatever endurance pursuit you are attempting.
If it’s too hard all the time, start over. Find a gentler way. Be patient.
Follow the cardinal rules of building base fitness, according to cycling and triathlon expert Joe Friehl: consistency, moderation, and frequency.
And most of all, know that you can re-train your brain. Every good ride will become part of your mental repertoire, a success you can re-live during those times you’re worried about the challenges ahead. You can do it. After doing it many times, you will know you can do it. And that changes everything.
I’m often asked why I train for Ironman. This is why. Every training lesson applies to the rest of my life, including my life as a novelist and book coach. Ironman teaches me to have big goals but to pay the most attention to the work of the moment, right in front of me. It also teaches me that my brain (and yours, too!) is a conservative, overprotective worrywart, ever-concerned about avoiding discomfort. “This feels hard” is all too often translated into “I must be doing something wrong; I should give up; I can’t do this.” Instead, “This feels hard” should equal “This is exactly what I need to be doing in order to learn and grow. I am so lucky to be having this experience.” The good news is that our brains, already open to challenges, can be trained to value challenges even more. If we experience rewards after doing hard things, we become more open to doing hard things: a virtuous cycle.
My pet peeve is when a newsletter starts with “Here’s the reason I have been taking so long to post,” especially when every post starts that way! But I will explain in this footnote that I now understand why there are so few Ironman newsletters out there. When you have to decide how to fit in one more workout—in a week that is always a few hours too short—it makes more sense to train than write. I continue to find myself struggling to train 9 to 11 hours a week, even knowing I need to hit some 12-13 hour weeks soon. But there is a huge upside to writing these posts as well. Not only do I hope to inspire others, I also want to remember the journey. For me, this is a once-in-a-lifetime quest. Thanks so much for being part of it! I’d love to hear from you!