I’ve been keeping my eye out for nuggets of wisdom related to training and having a successful tour. This page contains those nuggets (in no particular order).  Having them here gives me a central place so I don’t have to carry them around in my already cluttered brain!

Double Shorts – on days when soft tissue is tender, a friend who has done a similar cross country tour suggests weaing two pair of short. The extra cushioning helps and mid-day you change so the outer pair becomes the inner pair. This helps with moisture management and provides the tender tissue with additional relief.

Long Distance Training Tips- The PACTour web page (www.pactour.com) is a good resource for information on training for a long distance, fast paced tour.

Back it off –  Can’t remember where I saw this on the internet, but I think this could be a key concept for me on the tour.  The advice is to set your touring pace about 3 mph SLOWER than you normally ride. The author mentions how going 3 mph faster leaves you in a coma, and 3 mph slower gives you a pace you can mantain virtually forever.

I have actually experienced this on my training rides with Dave. His pace is about 3 mph slower than mine and when we ride together, I go more his pace than my normal training pace. After rides with Dave, I feel fresh and not at all depleted. And, our ride times are not significantly slower than for my harder training. (Note that I’m not saying my training rides should all be done at Dave’s pace. Not a all. )

Training Volume – Mike Munk suggests on his website (www.bamacylist.com) that if you can ride 65%-70% of the required daily distances for several days that you’ll probably do fine on the tour.