Ninja Training 101

Welcome to the world of ninja Training summarized in a blog post.

What is Ninja Training?

Ninja Training has two definitions;

A. Dressing up totally in black without lights and climbing and descending cypress totally by feel. (IPod with Rally like directions around i.e; Medium Left.). This is not recommended however I am positive I know a couple people who train like this

B. Ninja Training is abandoning the coordination involved in organizing rides with people, planning routes, meeting at designated times and having structure in training. Ideally some night riding is also involved

This weekend could be looked at as my first ninja session of 2009. After work on Friday gunned it home and hopped on the road bike for 1:50 with the daylight remaining and did a 60km ride out to Iona and back via UBC both ways.

Saturday morning decided to show to the club ride and headed out on the Tri bike with Jared, did a couple loops of Iona, headed out richmond for a bit of a sojourn through Steveston then back through UBC with a couple of hard efforts. With ride back and from st georges was most probaly around 95km. Ride route is here, may have missed a couple parts

After a quick lunch and trip to Speed theory for some bike stuff drove to the ferry. After ferry and buffet dinner had 40km ride on road bike into Victoria. Ferry was alte so this involved some ninja riding.

Stayed at Dave and Rhea's 1km from the start of Times Colonist. Went and grabbed package in the am and after warmup and the like the last few minutes ticked down quickly as always. Pain clock then started and we were running. Race report will follow but had a good race, poor section between 5km and 8km but managed to hold position relative to others from 3km on and ran down 3 people in the last km and had a strong finish.

After post race chill headed out on the bike with a quick stop in a fort street cycles. Got advice on differnt routes back to the ferry to avoid quadra and ended up going on the galloping goose trail. My turn off for interurban came quick and although I had my lite back pack with my Newtons and running clothes decided to head out on the trial for a bit. ran out of pavement at km 10 but kept on riding the road bike on the gravel path (a couple interresting short climbs trying to get traction and ended up riding till km 45. Knowing I had the ferry journey back, hit the road a t this point and after a lunch of salami and a mars bar headed back along sooke road before another 10km or so on the trail and then up the coast to the ferry. In the end 5 hour 20 minutes on the bike at a good recovery hr (legs were shot from the 10km) and about 130km of riding (can't gmap full trail).

Ride map is here Definetely not high intensity riding but with about 45km on gravel was definetely a cool ride at a relative low intensity. Hitting hills on west saanich at the end made for a good workout.

Ninja weekend summary;

Avoided all "organisation" in workouts - Partial check, did race and show up to a club ride. Clkub ride did end up being a choose your own adventure.
A lot of solo riding - check
no real plan - check
Night riding - check
Off road riding - check
Absolutely shattered - check
Exotic Locations - Do Sooke, saanich, steveston & victoria count?
No one really knowing exactly were you are- check

In 48 hours
- 325km of riding (200 miles)
- 10km running race (time 35:46 - 48th overall)
- 2 Bc ferries buffets