It's great to be in Tulsa Oklahoma and to have the opportunity to be part of this event. LEGENDS will have a tent and we'll be competing in the race. If you haven't been part of this amazing event, you've missed one of the nations top cycling events. Be sure to download the 2013 Tulsa Tough Tour Tracker App, it's your guide to all of the events, and go to www.tulsatough.com for more details. See you June 7, 8, and 9 in downtown Tulsa.
TULSA TOUGH - History/Wikipedia
Saint Francis Tulsa Tough Ride and Race is a three-day cycling festival in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It features non-competitive riding through scenic areas around the Tulsa Metropolitan Area and professional level races. It is held each year on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the second weekend in June.
Saint Francis Tulsa Tough attracts professional and amateur racers from across the country racing criterium style races on three different venues in the streets of Downtown Tulsa and along the Arkansas River. Prize money rivals the largest purses in the nation. The quality of the venues and the top level race operation already has professional teams making Tulsa an important stop on their annual racing schedules.
In 2008, Tulsa Tough's women's pro races were selected by USA Cycling to be on the prestigious National Racing Calendar. Based on voting by racers, race officials, and announcers, Tulsa Tough was ranked in the top 10 out of 30 NRC races in only its third year. With this proven success, the men's and women's races were again on the National Racing Calendar for 2009 and after the event were ranked in the top four among all NRC events. Top professional cycling teams plan their domestic racing schedules around NRC events, assuring a high level of national attention on the hosting events.
Saint Francis Tulsa Tough offers two days of tour rides with 50 km, 100 km, 200KM, and 100 mi options each day covering nearly 400 miles of Northeast Oklahoma hills and scenery. All routes feature aid stations and rolling support for riders of all sizes and abilities. The tour rides are expected to grow to well over 5,000 riders as cycling enthusiasts discover the challenging, epic riding available in Oklahoma's Green Country.
Saint Francis Tulsa Tough has received national attention from major cycling publications and continues to be a topic on cycling forums and in the media.
Saint Francis Tulsa Tough is jointly promoted by the Tulsa Sports Commission and Tulsa Wheelmen and is supported by corporate sponsorship. Guidance for the event comes from an executive committee made up of several Tulsa area cyclists and business people.
Thanks Wikipedia. Read more at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_Tough
Showing posts with label legends tulsa. Show all posts
Showing posts with label legends tulsa. Show all posts
Friday, June 7, 2013
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Five Questions You Should be Able to Answer by Now
Wednesday, April 24, 2013 at 9:03AM
As the weather warms up and you start moving from the treadmill and trainer to the trail and road, your thoughts are likely turning to your racing calendar. Actually, you’ve probably already got your first few early season races under your belt. But did you really do all your “homework” in the base period to set yourself up for success? Take our pop quiz and find out. Here are five questions that all athletes should be able to answer by this point in the early season.
Q1. Which events
are your “A” races and which are your “B” races?
You likely have
a calendar of races set up by April, but is it prioritized? Prioritizing your
schedule is one of the first things that should be done when planning your
season. “A” priority races are the ones you want to peak for and be at your
best. “B” races are events that will help you prepare for your A race or are
events you want to do more for the fun of it.
This is a task
that can get complicated if you let it. In a perfect world, your A races are
well spaced out through the season. Realistically, you can only have two to
three A races per season. The shorter the distance of your A events the more
you can have, but you still need to beware of over-racing.
With your A
races set, you can find B priority races that will prepare you for the A race.
There are several questions regarding B races. When should they be, how many
and how to train for them are the most common. In a perfect world these B
events are the right distance and timeframe away from your A race and don’t
require travel. While it is impossible to set concrete rules regarding A and B
races, there are guidelines. The longer in distance the A race, the farther out
on the calendar the B race should be. If it is a long event like an Ironman, it
is better to have two or more B races. It would also be good to start with
shorter distances and work your way to longer events. Running a 5k two weeks
before an Ironman won’t hurt, but it isn’t the best race prep either. In the
real world, you will have to make some decisions.
Q2. How much are you traveling and how will you train through your travels?
In this process,
consider your summer travel schedule. Family vacations or work travel can have
a huge effect on your training and racing. There are obvious scenarios to
avoid, like traveling just before your A race. Even if you are not travelling
just prior to a race, you want to consider how it will affect your training. A
two-week vacation during your build phase is less than ideal - unless of course
you can fit your training into the vacation. Running is the easiest to work
around, with cycling and swimming being harder to accommodate. Your ability to
train while traveling will depend greatly on where you are going, what you plan
on doing and the facilities available, like a pool or gym with a stationary bike.
Research facilities ahead of time and have a plan for when you will get your
workouts in. Minimize the interruption of travel as much as possible.
Q3. Should I race my B events, or should I train through them?
Once the B
events are scheduled you can turn your attention to the training. While they
may only be a B priority event, it can be hard to go into an event less than
100 percent. Hopefully your B races line up well with the A races. If so, your
training should be progressive and you can train hard for the B race while
still preparing for the A race. As a general rule, if the B event closely
mirrors the A event, race it, if not, train through it.
Remember, just
because you make a race a B event, that doesn’t mean you don’t take it
seriously. It is only your preparation for that event that is not optimal. B
events are great for determining where your fitness is, working on nutrition
strategies and choosing equipment. B events are also a great way to work on a
specific weakness or aspect of the A race. For instance, if you are not a good
hill runner, or your A marathon is on a hilly course, find a hilly 10k or half
marathon, focus on hill training, then use the B event to gauge your
improvement. B events are the stepping stones that prepare you for the big A
day.
Q4. When are you starting your race-specific build?
With the A race
in mind, you should know when exactly your training is going to become more
race specific. By “race specific” we mean training at the goal heart
rate/pace/power you want to achieve in the race, and training on a course
similar to the race. After all, if you don’t train at race intensity you can’t
expect to race there.
In general, an 8
to 10 week block of race specific training is good for long events, and 6 to 8
weeks is ok for shorter ones. This is where a properly placed B race can be a
great advantage. Having a half marathon that you will run at a faster pace than
your goal marathon pace 8 weeks later, is a great race specific workout. Keep
in mind that for an A race, your build phase should end 2 to 3 weeks prior to
the event to allow for a taper period. There is little you can do training-wise
to improve your fitness in the last 2 to 3 weeks (simply not enough time for
the body to fully adapt), but doing too much can have a negative impact by
putting too much fatigue on the body.
Having a coach is the best way to ensure that you get your
race specific build right (and in fact your whole season), but if you want to
follow training plan instead there are many options. Plans will vary depending
on the event, your goals and experience. You want to find a plan that strongly
mirrors your own commitment level and available time. Once you have decided on
your plan, stick with it and don’t second guess three weeks into the plan. Like
any plan in life, you need to allow for enough time to see the true fruits of
your labor.
Q5. What are your current threshold and zones?
Threshold is a
very important element to your training. It is a zone that you should train in,
and it also sets your other zones, like aerobic capacity and recovery.
Threshold is the effort you can steadily maintain for one hour. It is a
powerful predictor of fitness and can be used for pacing in all sports and
distances. You can monitor your threshold via heart rate, pace or power
depending on your sport and the device you have.
Hopefully you already know your threshold pace, power and/or HR, but if not you can determine it with a simple field test. With this determined, your other training zones will be properly set so that you can do structure zone training and proper periodization. Here’s the key though - as you do more work at threshold, especially during your race specific phase, this value changes. For instance, you may start with a run threshold heart rate of 160, then six weeks later after some training at threshold, it may increase to 170. This would also change your other training zones. That’s why we recently created the Threshold Improvement Notification Option to help you stay on top of your threshold value. (Read more about why you would want to make sure you have this feature turned on at this point in the season)
So, how did you score? Can you answer the above questions with
certainty? If not, now is the time to get on it and play some catch up! If you
can finalize your plan and set your preparation in stone within the next couple
weeks, you will be on the right track throughout the year
Friday, April 26, 2013
UCI's Stance Towards Anti-Doping
LeMond not optimistic
about UCI's stance towards anti-doping
- April 23, 07:30
Believes governing body must be
separated from drug testing
Three-time Tour de France champion Greg
LeMond has reiterated his long-standing view that the UCI should not be in charge of
running the sport of professional cycling and that he firmly believes the sport
as a whole, including riders, teams and race organisers, want the sport to
change. The UCI, on the other hand, has done little to change the mind of the
sole US Tour winner.
LeMond's
most recent comments came from a discussion group held at the University of
Texas, Austin,symposium on doping in cycling. The
event held last night was dubbed "The Real Price of Winning at All
Costs". The outspoken former professional, who sat with a brace around
most of his chest after breaking his back, was part of a panel that featured
his wife Kathy, Betsy Andreu - the wife of one of Armstrong's former teammates
Frankie Andreu - and USADA's general counsel Bill Bock. Armstrong was
invited to attend the discussion in his home town but declined the offer.
"I'm
hopeful the riders want to change, I think the race organisers want to, but I
am not optimistic where UCI stand in doping," said LeMond. "Most of
the big scandals have been criminal. Festina involved the police because it was
trafficking."
"Drug
testing has to be separated [from the UCI]. It's not a game," he added.
Still
a passionate supporter of the sport LeMond remained firm in his belief that
cycling is capable of change and that it would be up to the riders and team to
ensure it follows the right path. With so many former riders turned managers
remaining in the sport, removing the old ways is arguably going to take time.
"I
want to see cycling get to where I can say I can see a real winner."
LeMond
also threw in a shot at the International Olympic Committee, which UCI
president Pat McQuaid has held a position since 2010, stating that the Olympics
should not be playing a heavy-handed role in how the sport is run.
"I
believe cycling is an incredible sport and really do believe the riders want to
change. It should be the riders, it should be the teams, they should get rid of
the UCI. I don't care about the IOC – I'm sorry. We actually destroy the sport
every four years. I never raced the Olympics. The Tour de France was enough by
itself. When you think about World Championships, Olympics, 10 guys get to go
from the US and we are letting guys from Switzerland (UCI) destroy the
sport."
One of the key messages brought up in
the two-hour discussion was that the outcomes following the USADA's Reasoned Decision document
into systematic doping at the US Postal and Discovery Channel teams was, and
remains, not just about the fall of the once seven-time Tour winner Armstrong.
Bock
was quick to outline the tactics employed by UCI during their investigation and
suggested that no other sporting body has refused to cooperate in such a way.
"It's
the same people involved, it's the same problems we have always had in the
sport and what UCI did in our case; we the brought the case under US rules and
UCI rules. We clearly had jurisdiction over an American athlete to bring the
case, we went on for a month and when Lance Armstrong's lawyers filed a case in
federal court here in Austin, Texas and took the position that Lance had only
agreed to play by UCI rules not by US rules, UCI dramatically changed its
position and said 'that is right, that is the position'.
"They
[UCI] asked us to drop the case, they don't just ask, they demanded that USADA
drop the case.
"We
asked the UCI for information on Lance Armstrong and they said 'no, he hasn't
consented to you having that information'."
The
fallout from the 1,000 page dossier was about uncovering and exposing some of
the ingrained problems the sport of professional cycling has endured. It's the
UCI who want the public to believe the problem lies simply with one man,
according to USADA general counsel Bock.
"I
think the ultimate tragedy would be if this whole scenario is viewed as 'The
Lance Armstrong Affair'," said Bock. "That's how the UCI want
everyone in this room to view it. Their view is, Pat McQuaid [said] in his
press conference 'Lance Armstrong has no place in cycling'. They want you to
believe that, 'look here's the problem over here, it was Lance Armstrong, now
look over here and it's a different arrow'."
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