Back to updating

After a few weeks of not updating the blog I'm finally back. Tough to remember back to May 17th to figure out everything I've done since then. A fair amount of cycling but nothing really crazy, used my commute to work as a workout, regular old swimming, getting a run in with Matt when he was out here and I got in another race.

The race was in Ludlow, MA and it was okay. The swim was pretty rough. I didn't have any weight to throw around, instead I got thrown around pretty good which kind of surprised me. Anyway, I was 4th out of the water after trying to keep up with Jason for the first half of the swim, he was just too quick to hang with on the second half. On the bike I had a slight brain fart during the transition and it was slower than it should have been but I got out there and was feeling pretty good until the mile of construction. I just took it really easy over that part because I want my bike and rims to hold up so I can get to Vineman! I had a couple of people pass me on the bike but not many so I was please about that. It was nice having a few climbs in there so I could change muscle groups. Heading into the run I was feeling pretty good but the speed workout I tried doing two days before the race had caught up to me and I ended up finishing pretty strong but man did I feel like crap at the end. That's okay because I did what was necessary to win the 30-34 age group and get 9th overall. I was please about that for a little while but now I've moved on and want to do better. Jason won the Clydesdale division so right now we're tied on Grand Prix points. We'll be going for the tie breaker when we have the Webster rematch in a few weeks. It'll be a good chance to see how far I've come since last year.

Since that race I've done my first track workout (Tuesday night), three swims of a little over 3000 meters. Two trainer rides, two weight workouts, two solid ab workouts.

Today was a great day for working out. Yesterday after time on the trainer I worked on the tri-bike and lowered the front end and brought in the rest pads for my arms. It felt pretty good today, definitely more aggressive than it had been so hopefully I'm more aero. I held a pretty solid average just over 20 for 31 miles with a whole bunch of stops and having to slow down in there. Took a two mile warm down after the 31 and then took 10 minutes to change up and then went for a 10.22 mile run. I ran with Liz Welch and we were at a 7:43 average at 5.22 and then came back with 7:56, 8:04, 7:57, 7:53, 8:06. So we were 1:20 at 10.22 then just walked .25 and loosened up at the cars. I got to try running with the Fuel Belt which was really good to have. I ate sport beans while running at each mile. All in all I felt surprisingly good. I definitely have a lot more speed in me and I'm pretty sure I could have run those back five miles at 7:15's without really killing myself. Only bummer is my good knee started hurting a bit at mile 8. I'm surprised because I don't usually have any pain. I think it must be from my pulled muscle in the other leg and all the weird walking I'd been doing to compensate. I'll just rest it tonight and try to kick it out in the water tomorrow morning.

Despite the pain right now I'm pretty psyched about the half Ironman. I think I might really be able to rip it up much more than I originally expected. I think that 5 hour goal is long gone right now. That's only a safety barrier so if I'm 4:59 I can convince myself I don't suck, but right now if that's where I finished I'll be awfully surprised. 4:50 would be pretty solid if the weather is good. I'd be interested to see if I can crush that though. Should be fun, I'm looking forward to it!

Monday - Thursday May 14-17

It's been a busy few days.
Monday - Swim in the morning. It was fairly tiring because there were lots of fast 25's from the blocks with push-ups after. It really beat me up. At lunch I headed to the gym and hit the weights. Unfortunately after the gym I didn't have time to get through my lunch before a long meeting and I doozed off for a second and I got caught during it! That's never good. I skipped my planned run Monday night in favor of resting.

Tuesday - Run after work. Got some hills in there and a nice long loop around a pond. 7.53 miles at 8:10 average. Just cruising and enjoying sucking in all the pollen. Total time was 1:01.

Wednesday - Swim 3,400. Lift at lunch and then 65 minute lactate threshold workout on the trainer during the thunder showers. Those lactate workouts are pretty tough. I hope they pay off.

Thursday - Today was the day I was worried about, I decided to attempt 10 miles running and I know the jump is more than 10% but I've got to get up there and get it done. I had an all day meeting in East Providence so I headed to the bike trail after that and just followed the mile markers. I went out 5.19 miles in 42:03 and then just tried to descend the miles coming back. I was something like 7:50, 7:42, 7:38, 7:32, 7:36. I can't really remember but the splits are on my other computer. I'll check it out later. I felt fairly controlled but I thought I was going a little faster. I resisted looking at my watch during the run because I didn't want to be influenced by the times. I just wanted to get the miles in. I ended up with 10.38 in 1:22:22. It was a 7:57 average. I at least have confidence that I can run 13.1 miles when I have to. Just don't know if I can do that after 56 miles yet. I'll give it a shot one of these days.

All in all it was a good day and it's been a solid week for workouts. Hopefully I'll be able to keep this up and have enough confidence in my abilities to get under five hours at Vineman.
27 minute swim - 2:40 bike - 1:45 run. That would get my under 5:00 even if I took my time in the transitions and I think it's reasonable.

Super Sunday (Steve)

Today was a good ride. 56.2 miles. 3:08. 18mph, 139avgHR, 3800 feet ascending, 3600 calories gone.

But it was also a great learning experience. I experimented to see what would sit well with me and timed out the nutrition. I started the morning with some OJ and a banana. Then as the ride approached, s pack of Sport Beans and some water about 30 minutes before the ride.
I brought two Power Bar Double Latte gels and another pack of sport beans, a bottle of Accelerade and a bottle of water. I wanted to put down the PowerBar gel at mile 20 regarless of if I felt like I needed it and then the sport beans at 35. At mile 20 I put down the gel and it went down easier than any other gels I've ever had. That stuff was great. I think I really noticed when it kicked in too. Mike and I each put them down at the same time and at the same moment we each commented on how energized we suddenly felt about seven miles later. At mile 35 we put down sport beans. They were harder to eat on the bike but still tastey. I want to drink more when I'm eating them (which isn't a bad thing as long as you have the water) so I might end up saving those just for running because I really like them on the run.
After the ride I couldn't believe how good I felt. I threw on the sneakers and my legs still felt fresh. I wanted to go for a jog but Mike didn't have running gear. He felt just as fresh and we each did the same thing for nutrition. Last week we were each wiped out after 50 miles, today we each felt like champs after 56 miles and loads of hills. Definitely a good feeling and gives me more confidence as we approach Vineman. I know last week the thought of 56 miles scared me after how the bike went. Today I say bring it on. But there's a big difference in riding that in three hours as opposed to trying to hold 20mph for the ride. The nice thing is I didn't feel like everything was bouncing around in my stomach after the ride when I put my sneakers on and jumped up and down a few times. That's how I feel after the Clif Shot so I think I found something that works for me. I'll try to stick to the same sort of plan when we do our century next Saturday.
Now I can't wait for dinner!

Saturday - May 12 (Steve)

Saturday was a quick bike ride over to Bryant. It was just a good way to test out the roads for a commute to work and also to see how it would be for riding today. The ride wasn't bad. It was fairly hilly so it was a pretty solid hour workout with a backpack full of stuff I needed to bring to the swim clinic. Rowdy is one enthusiastic guy about swimming. It's great listening to him talk, but he didn't offer anything that we don't already say to the kids, the only difference is kids listen to you when you've earned a gold medal in the Olympics. The funny thing about it all is he didn't even spend a combined 10 minutes on breast/fly, but hey, he was a freestyler and a damn fast one at that. After Mike, Jill and myself headed up to Wheelworks (where I decided on NOT getting the Zenith, I opted for a sleeveless after trying on that Zenith). One thing I can say is if you're thin the Zenith makes you look like the most fit person in the world. I got to model it there once I got the thing on while the other Wheelworks members checked it out. It was actually pretty cool. After we went to ATA Cycles which was definitely one of the best shops I've EVER been in. They only carried high end bikes. Mike and Jill each tried out the Kuota K-Factor and loved it. I want to dump the Giant and get a bike there. Their fit room was awesome too. I want to go there and get a Kuota Kalibur without a doubt. I need to do this before the end of the year. I love that bike.

Finally Friday

Well, I'm glad that my wave at Vineman is going to go off 20 minutes ahead of Matt's. From the looks of things we might cross the line at the same time.

Today was the first time I felt like a swimmer back in the water. It was kind of surprising given my past few days of beating myself up but it actually felt good...good means better than all the other swims to date.

600 swim last 200 - 25Back/25 Free
3x (4x75/4x50/4x25) Evens fast stroke, odds free. One round of each.
800 Pull - I held 1:11 - SCM not LCM
300 K/S by 25
Even after the swim the scale at PC had my at 158. After stepping on the scale I was totally looking forward to the left over munchkins still at my desk. I've never looked forward to getting into the office so much.

Lunch was a good weight workout. I went particularly hard knowing I was going to have an easy evening.

Evening workout was just 25 minutes of core work. Something good and mindless just follow the routine and enjoy it. After that it was time for a huge dinner.

Now with a happy belly and time to relax I'll get my cycling gear ready to ride over to Bryant in the morning and help out with the Rowdy Gaines clinic.

Base 2 Rest week (4/9-4/15) (Matt)

Monday 4/9
Run 42:00 approx
Swim 1300+
300 mix
2 x 150 free k-d-s
4 x 75 50dr-25sw
8 x 50 :55 held 32-33
The 50s were assigned in the training plan. They were hard. I am slow.

Tuesday 4/10
Bike 1:20:34, 21.3 miles, 15.9avg@126HR
8 x 1:00 hill repeats, 2:00 recovery
That was the last of the hill repeats, and I won't miss them!

Wednesday 4/11
Swim 800 various

Thursday 4/12
Swim 1650
600wu
1050 straight free/back loco 1-6

Friday 4/13
Bike to Las Tuna Canyon (but not over hard side of hill)
1:39:18, HR 134avg/167max, 16.7mph, 27.6 miles
Mostly up going there (54 minutes), mostly down coming back (45 minutes)

Saturday 4/14
Run 1:22:07
Long run after work. A bunch of trees were being cut down around my little place here, and I was very upset-so I took it out on the run. That may have been a mistake!
10.8 miles, 151avg/166max, 7:36/mile

Sunday 4/15
Bike easy 59:10, 17.0 avg, 16.8 miles

Base 2 Week 2 (from 4/2-4/8) (Matt)

Monday 4/2 off?

Tuesday 4/3
Bike Hill repeats 10x1:00 w 2:00 recovery
total time=1:13:05, wu=26:33, 15.3mph avg, 18.7 miles, HR=128avg/167max

Wednesday 4/4
Run 40:29.1 Hilly loops
wu=1.3 miles, then 3 x ~.8 miles, run back (#3=6:26.5)
total 5.0 miles, HR=149avg/167max
Swim 1500 later

Thursday 4/5
Swim 1600
I think it was on this day that there was representative from Huntington Hospital at the Y, and she had a Tantita Body Fat scale. So I ponied up, and saw these numbers:

Weight 177.6 lbs
BMI 22.2
Fat % 16.5
BMR (Basal metabolic rate) 1840 kcal (calories for the rest of us)
Fat mass 29.2 lbs
FFR (Fat Free Mass) 148.4
TBW (Total Body Water) 108.6 lbs

I used one of these scales when I was in the thick of Ironman training, and I got some absurd number like 4.6% body fat. I don't know if that was accurate, but I do remember a fellow IM guy remarking that I was looking either really sick, or really fit (or both, I guess, depending on your definition of sick). Anyway, accurate or not, I have a different body now, and we've got a lot of work to do!

Friday 4/6
Bike 2:23:21 Large loop, from streets, to bike path/river, back to streets. After warming up for about 56 minutes, I did a "tempo" section, going north on the San Gabriel River Bike Path, from the Rio Hondo Dam to the north dam (can't remember the name). I got a flat tire about 6 minutes in, but after that I went again. The total time of "tempo" was 24:03@142HR. This felt good! For IM I used to train my long steady rides around this pace, so it wasn't exactly hard, but solid anyway. There was another 1:07 to go after that.

Swim
500 wu
18x100 free 3@1:35 pull, 2@1:30 swim, 1@1:25 swim, the 2-2-2, then 1-2-3
200 warm down
2500/40:00

A good day!

Saturday 4/7
Run in AM, before lessons! Like 730am-that's hardcore! Went from home, to Rose Bowl Golf Club and back. It was all made bearable by Kathleen biking along with me.
8.2-8.4 miles, ~1:13, I think. First long run in a while.

Sunday 4/8
Day off, tired...

Brick Day Thursday

I ended up not cycling into work like I wanted. At 5:30 this morning weather.com was saying there was a 40% chance of showers after 4PM. I didn't like those odds since I would have had to ride home with a bunch of stuff in my backpack that wouldn't like to get wet, like my laptop. It was kind of a bummer because I had everything ready to go and I had my route planned. Pretty soon gas will be $5 a gallon and I'll have no choice but to ride my bike so there'll be plenty of time to do it in the future. Instead I headed down to the basement and did a Spinnervals time saver workout. I meant to do the level 7.5 recovery/technique because I was hurting a bit from the lactate threshold workout the night before. Instead I must have selected the level 10 anaerobic threshold workout that consisted of a bunch of 90 second reps above your 40K pace. That one hurt pretty good and I was one sweaty mess after. After a quick shower it was off to work.
Luckily there were munchkins at work right next to my cube. I think I threw down 10 of them before anyone else even knew I hit them. Suddenly people were wondering where all the chocolate ones went.
I bolted out of work at 4:40 so I could get home to do my brick. I headed out on my road bike for 21.43 miles. It hurt. I was feeling the past two trainer workouts and I kept telling myself to back off because I was running after. I ended up with a 19.5 average (1:05:48 ride time). Average heart rate of 140 and 1154 feet of climbing.
After a four minute transition (luckily I'll never have to enter a combination on a padlock, unlock my front door, put my bike inside, get out of my cycling gear and into running clothes in a race) it was out the door to start the run. I sort of felt pretty good on the first mile and was 6:59 for the mile with a heart rate of 159. I slowed mile 2 down to a 7:18 mile but my avg heart rate went up to 165. The next two mile I was 7:28 pace with an avg heart rate still climbing to 168. Then I just warmed down nice and easy.
Run totals were 4.15 miles. 30:38. Avg Pace 7:22/mi. Avg heart rate 165. Total Ascent 503 ft. This leads me to believe the watch couldn't come close to working out the climbing I did Monday because today was virtually flat compared to Monday. One hill Monday was more climbing than everything involved in my run course this evening.

All in all it was a very successful day. I'm going to have to start logging what I eat and get advice on that (I know, first thing will be don't eat 10 munchkins just because they're there), but after my shower I jumped on the scale and it said 154.5. I said that can't be right and did it again and it was the same. I'm eating a lot, I'm getting protein. I have lots of fruits, sports drinks, grains, wheat bread and snacks throught the day so I should at least be maintaining weight. I don't really want to get much lighter unless it's going to make me faster and I don't think that is going to work out for me. So tonight I'm loading up on the ice cream!!!

blast from the past (from Matt, who else?)

(This, as I'm listening to some Velvet Underground I have never heard before...and then a quick transition to DEVO's Day My Baby Gave Me a Surprize!)

The last time I updated, sometime in April, I filled in the action thru March 23...ugh. SO, without much further ado, I will attempt to do update one week/day, and I should be completely up to date in about a week!

Sunday 3/25
Bike 3:00:52 w Brandon. 17.0mph, avg HR=133, 51+miles
Mostly easy, except for climbing. Went up Route 39, or San Gabriel Canyon Road. There is no easy way to climb, at least in the shape I was then. Good day!

Base 2 Week 1

Monday 3/26 Day off?

Tuesday 3/27
Bike 1:11:23 17.8 miles, avgHR=129, avg=15.0
But those numbers are deceptive, as this was a hill repeat session. Warmed up for 29:43, then did 8 x 1:00 out of saddle climbing, recovering 2:00 between efforts. I usually couldn't make the entire 1:00 standing, and had to sit the last 15 sec or so. These hurt a LOT.

Wednesday 3/28
Run 40:26.2 5.4 miles HR=155avg/170max

Thursday 3/29
Run 43:16.0 HR=144/164
Swim ~2000
-10x50@1:00 really easy
-1x500 various
-1x900 at even pace 12:05
Just over 1:20/100 on 900, which was fine with me.

Friday 3/30
Bike 1:21:47 127avg/155max 16.7mph 22.8 miles

Saturday 3/31 nothing-at caboom show all day!

Sunday 4/1
Run in Griffith Park w Brook. Kinda hot, but slow pace, so easy. ~1:00, sub 130HR.

Wednesday - May 9

Swim - Lift - Bike - Eat.

Today was a good swim, of course I felt as expected after the way things have been going lately. No big deal it was still nice being in the water.

At lunch I hit the weight room and went over my usual circuit which felt pretty good as well. I was dragging a little in the afternoon and it was tough to motivate myself to get on my bike tonight but I did an hour of lactate threshold work trying to keep my heart rate up for 20 minutes with 10 minutes recovery and repeat. By the end I was starving and had to get home and throw down a pizza and some Chips-a-hoy.

Tomorrow I'm going to see what happens if I attempt to ride to work and do an evening brick. We'll see if I actually roll out of bed when the alarm goes off, or if I sleep an extra hour and just drive in. I also have no idea what the roads would be like biking in since I haven't driven them but maybe I'll find out tomorrow.

Tuesday - May 8 Rest Day

Tuesday was a rest day. I went to EP and swam the workout there just cruising around working on what's left of my technique. One nice thing was I got some respect from the triathletes there thanks to my St. Anthony's performance. They also gave me some good advice on building speed for running. Now I just need to get some running technique!

Getting lazy?

Last night I slept like a rock after yesterday's 50 miler. When the alarm went off this morning I was just all confused. Got out of bed, grabbed my work clothes and knew if I went to swim I would probably fall asleep at work. Can't have that so I went back to bed to try and catch a few extra minutes and told myself I'll just go to EP tomorrow night. Now that I'm not coaching I have all this freedom with my evenings!

At lunch today I had a good solid weight workout. I tried to add some lunges with some light weights, just 25's in each hand. I knew I was planning on attempting to run the hills after work.

After work I did make it out to do the hills in Smithfield. I mapped out a nice 6.2 mile course that would take me right back to the parking lot at my building so I could run around the building as a warm-down. I had three large climbs. One I did twice as part of a loop and it is .7 of a mile up and the other was the street my office is on and it's .55 of a mile with a pretty constant grade. I tried to pour on some effort on the last two climbs as I was still recovering from my .55 mile downhill to start off the run. Maybe I should do a few laps around the parking lot to get my legs warmed up before they get all beaten up on the downhill.

Totals for the run were 6.56 miles in 53:20. That's an 8:07 average.
Max speed 9.9mph
Ttotal calories 856.
Average heart rate 157.
Max Heart Rate 175
Total Ascent 955 feet.

Not too sure if my legs would be pleased with me if I did that once a week. Maybe I'll have to do every other week. I felt like my knees took a pounding on those downhills. At least now I can understand how running uphill can help your speed. Boy my heart rate would shoot up when I was trying to crank up those hills.

For the 6.2 miles I was at 50:15, 8:06 average. My end of summer goal will be to do that run 8-10 minutes faster. Not sure if that's possible, but it's a goal.

Cycling weekend

I didn't get my long run in this weekend like I wanted. I wanted to do a run after one of my bike rides but I ended up hanging out after them or having something to do so tomorrow night will become a run evening I think rather than Tuesday/Thursday. I'll try and bring my stuff to work and do a five mile hill run after work.

Yesterday was an aerobic day on the bike. We went out with Liz and Jill for 30 miles and I just kept the heart rate pretty low and did pretty much the whole ride in the small chain ring. Ideally I would have ran after this ride because I was plenty fresh.

Sunday started off as a colder day, only in the 40's outside and very windy. Wind was supposed to be up to 30mph today but we were determined to get out for 50 miles. Well, we did it and there was nothing easy about it. Once we got outside and saw the direction the wind was going we knew it was going to be a long day because for the most exposed stretches which are usually pretty fast ones, we were going to have winds in our face and what winds they were!

I was trying Clif Blocks on the ride today and I aimed to take three at mile 10 then three more at mile 30. At mile 10 we were battling way too much wind to take the break and have some snacks so it ended up being more like mile 15 and 30. I found out I'm going to need some more nutrition in Vineman because I was pretty dead by the end of the ride. I suppose we only really rode 45 miles because we warmed down the last six miles we rode. Could I have ran 13.1 miles after that ride? Hell no. Run/walk? Maybe, but it would be a struggle. I'm going to have to start shooting for a 50 mile ride each weekend. I'm thinking on the 19th I'll try for a century to see how that goes if the 50 isn't hard next weekend.

Friday - May 4

Maybe it's time to change the description of this blog so I don't refer to myself as a swimmer because I'm convinced I no longer am a swimmer.
This morning started with another swim where I felt like I had no idea what my body was doing, but this time it didn't bother me at all. I've come to accept that my swimming is strong enough to beat most triathletes and triathlon seems to be worth having lousy swims right now. This morning I did feel great when we did the 10 minute pull set. Everything felt balanced and I had better body position thanks to my flotation device and paddles. Next week I'm going to get some inflatable water wings and see if those help.

At lunch I hit the weights and did my best to keep from losing more muscle. Tried to work the legs pretty hard because I think I need to get more strength there to ride faster.

My evening workout was an 80 minute trainer ride. Man did I sweat like a pig (do pigs really sweat?). It felt pretty good anyway and I'm looking forward to heading out tomorrow on the road bike for an easy 35 miler.

By the way, yesterday when I said I was looking to run 10 miles this weekend, I've decided that's a bad idea after some reading and some e-mail exchanges with Jason. I'll probably do something with speed work this weekend instead and next weekend I'll aim for a long run.

Thursday - May 3

After a day of flip-flopping back and forth on if I should run and coming up with all sorts of excuses not to run, I dragged my lazy butt out for a run. The goal was to get out there and do a recovery type run. I decided to head out on a loop that could either be just over 6 or just over 7 depending on how I felt. I didn't feel great starting off because I had some tight muscles but I figured they'd stretch out over the course of the run. I was going about 7:30's to start off but quickly fell down to an 8:00 average. It was nice being out there just plodding on through the run but I couldn't figure out how to get any speed even though that shouldn't have been the days focus. On the run I wasn't hurting, just having a little trouble with breathing because it was a little more chilly than I would have liked and it was drying me out pretty quickly. I decided to stretch the run to the longer course because I'm training for 13.1 miles now. At mile 5.0 I had a 7:59 average. Over the next 2.5 miles I held just under 7:30's. The run totalled 7.56 miles and the total time was :59:11. Nothing really fast overall, but a good starting point for 7+ mile runs. I might aim for a 10 mile run this weekend just holding 8:00 and see how that goes. That'll be the goal anyway. If I don't do that I'll try and do a brick with a longer bike ride and a shorter run.
Today's average heart rate was a rather high 161 and the max was 174 which came over the last two miles. I can only expect that my swim tomorrow is going to be all sloppy once again but maybe miracles will happen.

Wednesday - May 2

Still feeling the effects from racing, Monday was a rest/travel day. Tuesday was a super easy 35 minutes on the trainer just spinning the legs while watching TV. Wednesday was time to get back in the routine and start focusing on Vineman.
The morning swim was a complete mess for me. Thank God we did some pull with paddles in there.
400 Swim
12x50 :60 4K/S, 4D/S, 4Swim
300 Kick Sprint last 1/4 of each 25
6x25 Kick easy/fast by 25
5x200 Pull or swim 3:00 descend 1-3. 4 Easy 5 Fast
50 Easy
12x25 choice 2 easy 1 fast
300 easy

At lunch I hit the weights and kicked the weights back up after lifting light last week.
It felt okay. I don't feel strong but I don't feel as weak as I do in the water right now so at least I've got that going for me.

The weather was perfect for a ride or run after work but mentally I wasn't there. If I had a workout buddy who would have pushed me into it I certainly would have gone in a second. But I was kind of lazy and a little tired so I got on my elliptical for 45 minutes and did that with very little resistance so it was more like jogging and then did 40 minutes of abs work. It wasn't a workout that totally broke me down but it left me feeling like I had plenty of energy which was good. Today I hope to run. I brought my running stuff with me incase I just felt like running right after work. I've also got my swim stuff incase I want to head over to EP for a swim but I know running is more important right now. Guess I'll have to wait and see what happens.

Race Day

Sunday morning came and the alarm went off at 4:35AM. I woke up nervous but had a pretty solid night sleep which is very rare for me. Guess I knew I needed it.
I grabbed my gear and headed down to the van with Jason and his dad, off we went to the race. We got there in the pitch black somewhere around 5:30 I think, maybe a little earlier. Had to find our bikes and then off we went to make sure everything was ready for our transitions.

We had a great morning. Nice and cool at the start, the water was really calm and there was nearly no wind. After battling the wrong lines for worst set of porto-john's I went over to try and unpack my gear as best I could in the dark. Jason and I then grabbed our wetsuits and headed over to the swim start. We got to watch the pro's take off and then got ready to line up for our wave. The sun was just coming up over the water and at 7:10 our wave ran into the water and headed out towards the sun.

Swim-
On the swim I just let Jason go. That was my plan all along and I know no one believed me because they say I'm too competitive to let that happen (right Sam?) but I stuck to my plan because I would have had to kick to keep up with Jason. I didn't want to kick at all since I knew my legs were going to be doing ALL the work after the swim. Might as well be nice to them at the beginning. So I found someone else to draft off for a while but he couldn't pick a line to save his life so I just pulled in front and then swam in and out of the elite women so he couldn't pick my line and draft off me. It was a nice easy swim for me and I just cruised it all. Heading into the transition I was taking my time because I can't run without shoes for some reason. I took the time to put on my watch, grab my helmet, put on my shoes and glasses, then grabbed my spare tube and co2 then off I went jogging my bike out to the transition. Mounted the bike and off I went.

Bike-
I headed out over the brick portion and just seemed to have trouble getting going. Heading out on the course I had a chance to see the pros shoot by on one of the straight aways while they were heading in the opposite direction. It was pretty cool to see them tearing it up like that. I should have been paying more attention to what I was doing rather than them. Eventually I started to feel pretty good, maybe that was half way in and I started picking up the pace pretty good. Wound up finishing with a 22.0 average. Headed into the transition for the run, couldn't find my position on the rack. Ran right by my area and ended up seeing Jason's bike and having to turn around and head back slowly until I found my gear. It sucked because I lost at least 40 seconds. Once I found it I racked my bike, had some Gatorade, put on my socks which I should have done before the bike so my legs wouldn't have been wobbly, threw on the sneakers, race belt, hat and then grabbed some sport beans and put them in my jersey then headed out on the run.

Run-
The run was good and hot and I like the heat. I kept thinking of what Sam told me about starting off that first mile with a high cadence and small steps. That felt pretty good and I was going 6:45 miles according to my watch over that first mile. I was trying to keep that pace up for a while because I saw someone way off in the distance who I thought ran like Jason, but he was without a jersey and I knew Jason had the Wheelworks jersey, I assumed he took it off in the heat. So I pressed on. Eventually I did see Jason and knew he must have had a fantastic bike to be way out there. Big props go out to him for his first two-thirds. During the run my right quad kept feeling like it wanted to cramp up a bit so after the half way point I tried to shut it down a little and cruise out to be sure I wouldn't bonk before the end, because the race was hurting a little! During the run I was eating two sport beans at each mile and throwing some water on my head. The sport beans helped out a lot and they were easy to eat. The longest stretch had to be just before the finishing stretch because you could see the 6 mile marker from far away on the only really straight stretch. After that people were yelling 100 yards more. Since when does 100 yards equal two-tenths of a mile? People are crazy. I ended up sprinting the last 50 yards because I could see the clock at 2:25 so I knew I was going to get a 2:15 which I was pretty happy about.

So there you have it, 2:15:22 which I'm happy with. There were definitely some areas I can pick up so next year I hope to be faster. I can probably take some time off each leg and a solid amount off the transition so I think I could get under 2:10 with some good training and not putting much time into coaching in the future. Racing was fun and I felt pretty fresh after it. I'm NOT looking forward to Vineman, I'm actually kind of afraid by it because the 6.2 miles of running at 7:11 was painful enough I can't imagine what 13.1 will feel like.

So that's how the race went. It was a good learning experience and the Eaddy's were great hosts. I'm looking forward to racing again next year. I wish I could do it again this weekend.

Florida

After arriving in FL on Thursday we put the bikes together, unpacked and then grabbed our running stuff and headed out for a few miles running. It was good to be out since I hadn't ran in a week. We only went three miles but it was good to get use to the heat for a little bit.

We went for dinner after the run which took longer than the triathlon, so our early morning swim plans got changed to mid-day which was fine by me so we could swim in the sun.

Friday morning we got up and went down to the bike course to see how it was going to be. It was a nice course but with traffic the first 7 miles it was a pain because of all the lights, but what are you going to do? The point was just to cruise the course but Jason was feeling good and putting the hammer down for some stretches while the Zipp 808's made love to the road. So it was a pretty fast ride for something that was going to be just cruising. I think we averaged 20.4 or something like that. I've never rode 25 miles that were so flat. I knew after that ride I was going to get my ass handed to me in the bike leg of the race but I had the confidence to know I could probably average 22.
Later we headed to the pool for a swim of 3000 yards which is all anyone ever really needs to do for triathlon.
I know we ended up spending way too much time walking around at the triathlon expo and not resting our legs but it was a lot of fun.

Saturday was a rest day and we went for a bike ride of about 35 minutes with some quick spinning. I definitely felt a little tightness from Friday's ride and I was having front deraillure issues again. Confidence in bike going down.

Once again, we spent way too much time on our feet that day and probably over eating on foods that weren't going to keep us energized and hydrated. I made it a point to drink tons of water Friday and Saturday because of the heat knowing I needed to be well hydrated on Sunday.

Race Week

Okay, so it's been a while since my last post so I want to summarize what happened heading up to St. Anthony's.

Saturday April 21 - Went for a ride with Jason. Good thing too because I discovered that the Tufo tubular clinchers are pieces of crap! If anyone out there reading this doesn't believe me then e-mail me and maybe I'll send you one unused. What a stupid mistake buying those. I'm glad I didn't wait until race day to try them out. At least the Reynolds rims held up and seemed to do a decent job.

Sunday April 22 - Another ride. I think it was 30 miles. Pretty sure that was on my road bike. Can't really remember now.

Monday April 23 - Morning swim and then lift at lunch. Somewhere along the line I realized I was having a deraillure issue and couldn't get into the big chain ring. Had to scramble to get the bike down to Providence Bike before they closed to have the cable changed. They ended up seeing that the bottom bracket was also the wrong size, 19mm instead of 20mm. So I had to get that changed too.

Tuesday after picking up my bike I got on the trainer for 35 minutes to make sure everything worked as expected and then started breaking it down to pack it up.

Wednesday was a swim/lift day and packing up at night.

Thursday was an early morning and then off to FL.

Friday - April 20

Today was another good day of training, and you know what? The sun finally came out and warmed things up. We might as well have been in CA today. When I rode I only had to have a light Under Armor shirt under my cycling jersey and tights...but we'll get to that.

The day started as all Friday's start, with a swim. It was a good swim, I'm feeling a bit better in the water. 3200 meters on the day with a good mix of strokes and one good long swim thrown in there for good measure. Our training group totally kicks ass right now as we consistantly have 12 or more fast people in the pool all doing the same workout and having John coaching us has been great. He's really getting into it for a morning workout. Maybe that's because we could easily school the college team.

Lunch time was the standard lift. I added a few different upper body exercises and laid off on a few leg ones only doing three sets of leg press, calfes and extensions.

The evening ride was fun. I got out on my road bike for a quick 30. We took a slightly more rolling course where the pavement isn't as fast as our usual time trial type route and I was wearing my fantastic new Garmin watch. It was a good ride, felt great being out there and once again I did most of the work. We started off a little quick but we were each feeling pretty good. We didn't start hammering until mile 10 and then brought the average up quickly over the next few miles to a little over 20 and held it there for a while even with the climbs. I was working a little harder than I was letting on to Mike and once we hit mile 20 I wanted to work the next 4.8 miles to make sure we at least worked hard for a solid 40K effort. We ended up battling the next four miles and just tearing it up. After that we sat up and kept the rest of the ride pretty comfortable just over 20. I just plugged the watch into the computer and the feedback is amazing! Great maps of the ride, the speeds at every point, elevations, heart rate, all sorts of graphs. Very cool stuff. Unfortunately I didn't stop it after we pulled into the drive way and hung out before coming inside. It wasn't until I was in my basement so that killed the average on the last 7+ miles after the 24.8. In total we rode 32 miles, for the 24.8 including warm-up we were 1:13.11
Average Speed: 20.4
Max Speed 32.4
Average heart rate: 146
Max Heart Rate: 168

Tomorrow morning I'll be going out with Jason and we'll be riding on a nice flat course that's paved pretty well so we're going with race wheels. Should be interesting.

Wednesday/Thursday - April 18/19

Two more solid days of workouts.
Wednesday started with a swim. We did some drill work where I figured out how to roll again. That was nice. Something even better was we used paddles! Grand total was just over 3000 meters.

At lunch I hit the weights for 40 minutes and felt pretty good. After work I hoped on the trainer for my aero base builder once again and only worked up an average rate of 136 even though I was working pretty hard.

When all was said and done I jumped on the scale and it said 159.5! Yikes.

Thursday I got a run in. Nothing fast, nothing exciting...6.2 miles at 7.8 mph from start to finish, just wanted to try out the sneakers I was planning on racing in, then walked for 5 minutes. I think that totalled 51 or 52 minutes. The scale at the gym said 159.0 so I had an evening of Chinese food and soda. Yum.

Tuesday - April 17

Today I went for a run. 7.0 miles 50 minutes.
Started off at 7.8 for 10 minutes. Then 8.0 for two minutes, 8.6 for one minute, 8.2 for 3 minutes, 8.8 for 90 seconds. 8.5 for a while and jumped up to 8.8 and then into 9.3. So I did some speed work followed by some quicker pacing. I was just really bored while I was there tonight. I think I like running in the morning much better. There's less on my mind and I'm not starving the whole time I'm doing it. Either way I'm glad I went because I was about to leave while I was in the parking lot and saw how crowded it was. There's now 5000 members at my gym which is what the enrollment is capped at and it sure felt like 90% of them were there.

Tomorrow will be a swim, lift and bike. Next week I'll probably tone it down some and relax even though I haven't exactly done a lot to taper off. I'm really excited for the weather more than anything. I see it's supposed to be 87 the day we get down there! It's about time I'll see some sun and feel some warmth!

Monday - April 16

After a night with little sleep thanks to loads of wind, trees falling down and driving rain I dragged myself to the pool for my Monday workout. It was a good workout, we got to use paddles!
600 Swim
16x50 :55 Free/Stroke by 25
3x300 pull
2x150 breathe 3-5-7 by 50 2:20
6x75 easy/moderate/fast by 25 1:15
12x25 Easy/Fast :35
300 Easy

A good quick moving workout.

Lunch -
Got in a good lift at lunch for 35 minutes. Did a little more legs than I should have but I'll start cutting back on that.

After work -
Spinnervals aero base builder. Average heart rate was 139 and I sweated something awful. I've been slacking by not doing those DVD's and I know I really should be doing some of the more time trial specific ones rather than always opting for the easy way out and going for aero base builder.
Total time 1:15

Followed that up by 20 minutes of core work and then some chicken parm.

Past few days

Been a few days since an update so here's what's going on.
Thursday I managed to squeeze in a run at lunch. Just 35 minutes and 4.5 miles. I think I just tried to keep it at 8.0 for the run until I warmed down.
Thursday night didn't do anything but coach.

Friday morning got in a swim. I actually got to throw on the paddles and forget about my legs for a while. At least I had some speed with the paddles. Now I have to find a way to have speed without them.

Headed to the gym at lunch and got in 40 minutes of weights and added some more leg work.

Saturday I went out for a run. Excited to have the new watch like the one Jason has, the Garmin Forerunner 305. I finally got to see my heart rate while I was running. Well, I had to hold the watch real close to my face to see the heart rate because that's so damn small but it's great to see the speed and distance during the run. Too bad I hit start/stop rather than lap at one point and didn't realize it until two miles later when I hit the button again. Oh well, now I know better. It was about mid-30's and very windy. On part of the run loop I felt great! I'd look down and see that I was running 6:52-6:45's. Oh yeah, that was down hill with the wind at my back. Then on the otherside of the loop while I was going up hill with the 30 mph winds in my face I was running at nearly 9:00. That sucked. I didn't feel real good and it made me rethink my goal of running 7:30's back to running 8:00's at St. Anthony's. It just hurt running. But there were lessons learned, like my dinner the night before was a brownie and a piece of bread. Not real good but I didn't get home until 10:00 so I wanted some empty calories and then wanted to get to bed.
After the run I sat around at practice because there were enough coaches. Then went for a ride with Mike. This time we actually saw some other cyclists. We had the opportunity to pass some people and we certainly surprised some people. Lesson number two for the day was when the wind is working with you don't work at 100% because you're eventually going to have to come back into it. So after warm-up as we went to turn on the 20 mile course that I like to hammer there was a guy all decked out riding a Trek TTX and he wanted to ride with us. I told him to grab Mike's wheel and hang on because we were about to go. I quickly set the pace at 25.2 (remember the wind was with me) and after about 30 seconds Mike was the only one hanging on. I got to learn how accurate my computer was because I had the watch also tracking my speed and they were pretty close. 7.4 miles into the ride we were AVERAGING 26.4mph then hit the turn onto 44 which is usually pretty fast. The wind started swirling and we were getting knocked around, when we turned around we started to really feel some resistance. Once we got back onto 118 it was like someone was standing infront of my bike with their hands pressing against my handle bars and their feet were firmly on the ground. I kept trying to press on as hard as I could but the lack of nutrition and the 7 mile morning run were catching up to me so I sat up and shut it down right at mile 15. Average through there was 21.8 according to the watch, 21.9 on my bike computer. Good thing I didn't have deep dish rims on that ride or I'd be updating the blog right now from a hospital bed because I was getting knocked around out there. We finished out the loop for a total of 25 miles on the day with just over a 20.5 average. I guess that's not bad but I was kind of discouraged. This week I need to make up for the lack of bike training the past few weeks since coaching started back up. I'll shoot for four hours this week and then two hours next week before heading to FL.

One thing I really have to do is hop back on the nutrition bandwagon and stop eating nothing but carbs for dinner. I really need to find some more energy foods and stick with that.

Tomorrow I'll pick back up with a swim/lift/bike and I'm looking forward to getting all that in and hopefully rallying through a solid week of training.

Wednesday - April 11

Today was a solid day for workouts but not so good on the food. I started off with a swim this morning and felt okay, just slow.
Short Course Meters
500 75Free-25Breast
2x(2x150 build by 50 2:20 6x50 :45 3 and 6 fast)
6x25 Odds Free Evens Breast :35
4x25 Odds Free Evens Back :30
2x25 Odds Free Evens Fly :25
300 Kick
Some other stuff to take us to 3000 I can't remember what it was.

At lunch I got in a decent weight workout for 40 minutes but after I had loads of bad snacks from the pot luck lunch that we had at work.

Tonight was just a drag coaching since I only had three kids and the other coaches didn't show up. What the hell? I'm supposed to be getting away from this stuff right now and handing it off. I still think we need to close down Bryant and just move those kids to PC. Then I could have got more training in tonight!

Tuesday - April 10

Today was a run day and I feel like I actually made the most of it despite being all tired and lazy. The gym is a lot more crowded now at 6:00AM than it was in the winter. I guess now that people know the summer is coming they're all trying to lose weight. So of course that means there was no where to stretch because all the mats were occupied by some big girls who looked like they were taking naps or something so I just headed right to the treadmills.
I couldn't decide if I should just run for 50 minutes at a relaxing 7.5 mph like last week just to get some base miles again or if I should have done some speed which I haven't done much of.
I ended up varying speeds for most of the run keeping the treadmill at a 1% incline.
Warm up:
5min @ 8.0
5min @ 7.6
Main Set:
1min @ 7.7
1min @ 7.8
And that continued up to 9.0 then came back down to 7.7
Went for a few more minutes at 7.7 then 8.0. and then worked my way down to 7.0 dropping each minute. Totalled 55 minutes for 7.4 miles. At 6.2 I was 45:15. I'm hoping I'll have the legs to be about a minute faster than that at St. Anthony's after the bike.
Even though I was feeling a little sluggish on my bike last night there's a voice in my head telling me I might be able to get under 2:10 at this race but everything has to be perfect. I don't know why I'm thinking that, it would be nearly impossible for me and it'll really depend on the cycling.
19:30 swim
1:04:30 bike (23.1 mph) Not sure if that's possible for me
44:15 run (8.4 mph) Might be possible, I know I can do this fresh
2:09:15 without transitions.
That's like a 2:13 with transitions. I think I'll need to be under 2:10 to get top 10 in the age group which is my goal right now. I know my goal should be to have fun completing my first Olympic distance race, but hell with that, I want to show up and be competitive.

Monday - April 9 (Steve)

Good stuff from Matt. I especially like the map with elevation on his ride. He finished 6 feet lower than he started. I guess CA really is sinking into the ocean. I hope there's some left in July so I can race the Vineman.

Yesterday I took a rest day. Just spent an hour or so walking around at Wrentham were it was cold but sunny. Lots of good deals on workout gear so I stocked the heck up!

Today was a better day in the water finally, still not nearly as fast as Mike or Stuart but fast enough to make me feel good about it. The big story about my swimming was my backstroke. I don't know where it's coming from but I think I'm figuring it out.
400 Swim
9x50 :60 2 drill - 1 back
6x125 free 1:50 evens faster than odds
6x75 1:15 odds free evens stroke or IM
6x25 2 on :35, 2 on :30, 2 on :25 Free/Stroke
300 kick
100 10Kick-roll
8x12.5 fast
9x50 :55 2 drill - 1 back

At lunch I got a good quick 35 minutes of lifting once again. This time I added some extra leg work just trying to do squats with some 50lb dumb bells in each hand since there's no squat rack.

After work I took the night off from coaching so I got on my bike for 30 minutes and then did 30 minutes of ab work. I managed to figure out what was wrong with my bike when I was riding Saturday and I couldn't get all my gears working. Looks like I've got a busted chain! Guess I've got to drop some more money to replace that. Think I'm going to go with SRAM rather than Shimano this time.

Tomorrow should just be a run as long as I can wake up in the morning.

long overdue recap pt 2 (Matt)

OK, more as I remember it...

Thursday, March 15
I think I did a brick. In the schedule, it was supposed to be a 35/10 brick, but of course that is an awfully short amount time. So, I rode to the Rose Bowl, warmed up, and did 4 loops at kind of a race pace, trying to hit 8:45 or so on each one. 4x8:45=35:00! See how scientifically I determine race pace? It's actually pretty close to what I hope to actually hit. The Rose Bowl is about 3.05 miles around, so doing that in 8:45 would yield 20.9 mph, which would give me about a 2:40 for 56 miles. I'd be happy with that.
Someday I'll find the actual times written down somewhere, but it was something like 8:40-8:44-8:49-8:44, which was good, but the HR was in the upper 150s, which I certainly hope I'm not at during the race.
I biked back home, quickly changed (like 2 minutes!), and ran out of my house at a decidedly un-70.3 pace, about 6:40/mile for 1.5 miles. That was my 10 minutes right there, so I backed off a lot, and shuffled home. I will NOT be doing that pace on July 22.

Friday, March 16
I don't see anything written down, so maybe I swam, or not. I have not terribly good at remembering to record swim workouts. But I also remember that my feet were hurting me, and not in a good way. I thought I was developing stress fractures, but 5 days off just told me I had done a perfectly bad combination of too-steep hills, too fast speed on concrete, and too many miles on 18 month old shoes. Live and learn, hopefully.

Saturday, March 17
Biked after a long day (6 or 7 hours) at the pool. 25.2 miles, 17.3avg, descent amount of hills. Using this tool, http://www.sanoodi.com/route/matt-connery/unnamed/2007-03-31/14-20-00/
It only shows 22 miles, but it also shows the elevation gained and lost, and a profile map, all TdF style.

Sunday, March 18
no run in the AM, as my feet still needed a break. I swam in the afternoon, and while I can't remember the warmup, the main set was simply 1x900, moderate pace, but timed. The first timed swim I did for the this training was awful, averaging something like 1:22 or 1:23 per 100, and felt worse. I had run in the morning before that swim, and I think it had an effect. This time I was expecting better, and I got it-12:03, 1:20+/100. This I can accept. it may not seem fast to you speedsters, but while training for those IMs a few years ago (Ironmans, not Individual Medleys!), my goal was simply to hold 1:20s as easily as possible for an hour. In training my pace got faster than that, but come race day, with no walls, and an intense desire to save my eneergy, I took it relatively easy, and got exactly that pace, whhich got me out of the water around 60th OAL! Steve, when you were saying your pace would make you faster than 90% of the people racing you were off by a bit-it's gonna be more like 99%. In other words, don't sweat the swim, literally or figuratively. And especially don't be doing swim workouts so hard that they affect your other more important disciplines. Just make sure you do some 2000-2500 straight swims, and as much open water stuff that you can fit it.

Monday, March 19th-off

Tuesday, March 20th
Swim
400 (75fr-25k)
2x150 free k-d-s
200IM k/d
4x50 1:00 (12.5fast-12.5ez-25drill) my version of strides in the water
4x25 :35 (called for in schedule)
4x100 1:45 hold 1:15s (called for by Danny Lowe)
total: 1500/30 minutes

Wednesday, March 21
Run 35:01 HR 145avg/162max
relatively flat loop at Y

Thursday, March 22
Bike at noon ~80 degrees
1:32:28/136avg/18.3mph/28.2 miles
Surface streets to Rio Hondo Bike Trail and back
Swim
900 straight=(25flyK-50fr-25basw-50fr-25brK-50fr)x4
6x150 free k-d-s (3-2-1 (75/50/25), 3-1-2, 2-3-1, 2-1-3, 1-3-2, 1-2-3)
18x50 free=(6@:50, 5@:48, 4@:45, 3@40) see, they all add up to even numbers of minutes, so you always start the next set of intervals on the 60!
100 easy
total 2800/45:00
twas a good swim week for me!

Friday, March 23
Run 37:58/143avg/159max/5.0miles/7:35 per mile
rolling hills, 72 degrees

Phew, more later...

Saturday - April 7 (Steve) In the Zone

With all this morning stuff this week I knew it was going to catch up to me. I didn't realize the thing that was going to catch up was my sleep cycle. Wide awake at 5:30. So I tried to figure out if I should stay in bed or start my day. 15 minutes later I decided it would be best to start my day. So I grabbed my gym stuff and headed off to the gym hoping to run for an hour before I had to be at PC to coach at 8:30. I rolled into the gym about 6:15 all fired up and ready to go. I was a little concerned when I only saw two cars. Turns out my gym opens at 7:00. I tried to find their hours on-line but they weren't there. Doh! So I sat there trying to figure out how long I'd have to run if I waited until 7:00. Not long enough because I wanted an hour. So back home I went to dig up my cold weather running gear. (It was only 26 degrees at that time). After finally finding all my gear I headed to PC. I figured I'd just park there and run before workout. Unfortunately since all my watches died at the same time I had to pull off my cycling computer and throw it in my pocket so I'd know what time it was. I got to PC and started running at 7:30 so I figured I'd get 50 minutes in. I basically just did 3 loops around campus:
http://splitr.com/maps/viewroute.php?id=18
I felt awesome when I was starting off. Turns out I just held a nice steady 7:30 mile pace through six miles and then warmed down nice and easy to take it to just under 6.5 miles in 50 minutes. Maybe I was a little faster but I definitely had a lot more in the tank. I was just enjoying being out there breaking in my new sneakers which are now blood stained from ripping apart my ankles. Guess I should invest in higher socks. Oh well, now my sneakers just look meaner.

Did some stretching at the pool and showered and changed up and figured I was done with working out for the day because it was too cold to get out on my bike since the clothes I would normally wear on the bike were now drenched in sweat from my run. But Mike kept pushing the issue so we hit a bike shop with a clearance on winter gear and I picked up a warmer top. The big debate was how hard to work since I just ran and Mike was a little sore. It was much colder than we expected once we got on the bikes but I don't have many opportunities to get out there before St. Anthony's so I just blocked out the cold and after warm-up just decided to get down to business. After the warm-up we went through a hard 15 mile stretch and delt with the wind. I was totally in the zone through the first part of the ride. Just down in the bars everything was clicking and I felt worlds better than last week. The pavement is great, the road is pretty flat and the first light comes at mile 6 on the hard stretch. All I could see with my head down was about 10 yards of road ahead of me so I was just focusing on those 10 yards and cranking the pedals and keeping my speed up. I'm so use to Mike being right on my wheel I almost never do a head check. At one point I eased up a little at mile 5 to have some conversation with Mike as we cruised up towards the light but he wasn't there. I've never put distance into Mike on a ride before so I figured he must have been hurting. At that point I was averaging 23.84 so I toned it down for the rest of the ride and we came bumping in at 22.1 through 15 and 21.8 when we turned into warm down a few miles later. With warm-up we only went 25 miles but I felt good after. Didn't hurt at all. I'm hoping for warmer weather next week or the following week so I can get out there and give another good effort. The bummer about the ride was after mile 10 I was having gearing issues and was stuck with only my easy two gears or my hardest two. The middle six were jumping around. I guess I need to go over it and tighten everything up because the bike is just breaking in. So I know I could have gone faster but I couldn't ride the gears I normally would so I just threw in the towel and did some super spins and then tried to turn some big gears.

Tonight I'm looking forward to refueling because right now I'm 160.5 but I feel like a champ. None of me feels sore or tired in the least. I just hope I feel this good on the 29th!

Friday - April 6 (Steve) Swim/Lift/Bike

Thank God it's Friday, and Good Friday nonetheless. That means since I work for a cool boss he let me go early.
The day started off with a morning swim. I think I need to hang up the goggles because things just aren't working out in the water. Unfortunately I got stuck in a lane in between Mike and Stuart while neither would switch lanes with me saying they were going to back off because they were sore etc etc etc. Of course that wasn't the case and I got my doors blown off on both sides, but that's okay because swimming isn't the focus right? Even my bad swimming is going to be better than 90% of all the triathletes. So on to the next workout.

With the day being quiet at work and finishing up a lot of stuff around 11 I found time to hit the gym at lunch for some weights. I got a solid 35 minutes bouncing from one exercise to the next and then did some old medicine ball stuff for my core.

My boss cut me loose a little after 3:30 so I went and gave some tech support to a friend on the way home and then got home and got on the bike for an easy spin for 40 minutes followed by 25 minutes of my Hard Core Conditioning DVD. Guess my abs are getting pretty strong because it felt pretty easy. Then headed out for a nice Armenian dinner. This was a very good day.

Wednesday/Thursday - April 4/5 (Steve)

It was great to read Matt's update and see what he's been doing. I'm glad I could provide some motivation at some point in time!

With coaching back on I'm trying to settle back into a routine and figure out how to work everything in. I know I'm going to get the swims in Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning. I'm thinking running will come Tuesday and Thursday mornings and a Saturday or Sunday. I'll have to work the bikes in at night and on weekends.

Wednesday I got my swim in. It felt pretty good but I still couldn't come close to matching Stuart (who obviously missed his taper for New England's) or Mike (who clearly sold his soul for the fountain of youth).
SCM:
400 Swim
300 IM Drill
300 Kick 50 moderate 25 Fast
3x(2x75 Free 1:15, 6x25 :30 2 of each)
15x50 :45 2@80% 1 all out.
300 easy

At lunch I hit the weights here at work and tried to figure out that crazy weight machine they have where you have to adjust every little bit to do another exercise and it seems like more trouble than it's worth. But my arms were shaking by the time I finished lifting which was pretty much a non-stop 35 minute workout.

This morning I slept in until 5:30 and went to the gym for a run. Today's goal was get back in a rhythm and feel good again so I didn't want to adjust any speeds. I actually stuck to that! 50 minutes at 7.5 then went a five minute cool down decreasing speed each minute. I held up okay but mentally I was beating myself up for not sticking with the treadmill through the middle of March and around New England's because my running was feeling real good. Now I've got to get it back to that point before St. Anthony's. I'll aim for two treadmill runs of at least 45 minutes a week and a run of at least an hour on the weekends.

Gotta thank Matt for reminding me to rest once again. I had a long stretch there without rest but I took one this week on Tuesday. Last rest day was March 22, the day before New England's. I also picked up a book on eating for athletes 'Food for Fitness'. It's a Chris Carmichael book and I started reading it last night rather than wasting time on-line looking at Cervelo's on Ebay. If I come across anything enlightening I'll be sure to share it. I'm anxious to see where Chips-a-hoy fall in his recommendations.

long overdue update, pt1 (from Matt)

Err, umm, no excuses, let's just try to catch up! These may be incomplete, or missing details, of completely omitting workouts, but I'm trying to put this all together from various scraps of paper on my desk...

Thursday March 8
Bike 1:45:19
128avg/162max
17.0mph avg

Saturday March 10
Bike 7am
1:46:58
31.9@17.9
125 HR avg
Run 5:30pm
31:01
HR: 140avg/153 max
Fairly flat, early ride (for me). I had to nurse flats on the way home, owing to not bringing enough spares. Lesson learned!

Sunday March 11
Run 1:00:57
7.3 miles=8:21/mile
HR 152avg/169max
This was a while ago, but I remember that I wanted to beat the avg pace that SJ had done the previous day. So, thanks for the motivation!

Monday March 12
Day off? I can't remember. Normally I will try and take Mondays off, or if anything do some kind of strength workout. I know some of you out there don't like your days off, but the are essential. It is only when you rest that you're body recovers, and actually gets stronger. And I firmly believe that if you don't take regular days off, you're body will eventually "claim" it's own day off, but it will probably be associated with sickness and injury, and it could be more than a day.
"Eat before you're hungry, drink before you're thirsty, and rest before you're totally worthless."

Tuesday, March 13
Bike 1:25:41 HR 129avg/161max
16.7mph avg, 23.8 miles total
24:00 warmup easy
5x3:00 drills
8 x (:30 out of saddle hill+2:00 recovery)
ride back home
I can't remember if this was the first hill session I did, but it was tough. I'm not used to climbing out of the saddle, but I have been assured by Brandon Heflin, friend/former roommate/triathlon coach, that it will help me to recruit more muscles for climbing. I chose a gear right in the middle of the block, a 39x17 I think. This is a 5-6% grade, judging from past readings from a Specialized computer, and from info gathered from http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/. That site is a fun tool to use to judge distance and elevation.

Wednesday March 14
Run 45:13
avgHR 142, max 169
Very steep hill, and I could only do 5 of 8 planned 30sec climbs before my knee really started to hurt, and not in a good way. It was on the side, kind of ITB, but not really. Anyway, I stretched, it still hurt, so I started to wobble home. On the way back, however, the pain melting away, so I did the remaining 3 intervals on gentler inclines. I think, in retrospect, that the discomfort was due to the extreme crowning of the road due to the extreme grade. Lesson? Either do hills on sidewalks or natural surfaces, or in the middle of the road!

Much more later...

Monday - April 2 (Steve)

I know it's supposed to be a recovery day, and my body is telling me it should be a recovery day. But today was the first day of Little Rhody Masters so I had to be there. I'll be back in the swim of things M, W, F mornings 6:15-7:30AM. I felt like I looked like a rec swimmer there and damn was it rough. Guess a week out of the water isn't a good thing. We had a nice group of 8 motivated people which was nice. Good thing workout wasn't a killer.

Meters:
4x200 Odds Free, Evens Free/Back
12x50 2 Free/1Stroke :65
5 minute kick
3x100 50 10K Roll/50 Swim
6x150 2:15 3 and 6 fast
300 easy

Sunday - April 1 (Steve)

Sunday was a good day to get on the bike so I had to take advantage of it. Mike and I got out for 24.5 miles and averaged just over 21 (21.03) with warm-up and warm-down. A few miles into the ride I got aero and just started turning the pedals. We were moving along pretty good and there were a few points where I really felt like I had to recover but we pressed on. Mike did one short pull on the ride but I was going 29.5 in his draft. It was definitely pretty hard and we had to coast for about a half mile to get our legs back after that. All-in-all it was a good ride and the roads were paved so much better than the 40 miles of rough road the day before. I think my neck and shoulders still hurt from that today!

Saturday - March 31 (Steve)

Today was a good day out on the bike. It wasn't always easy and the roads weren't always fast but we covered just over 40 miles and we passed a good number of cyclist who didn't have what it takes to keep up with us. It was a little frustrating not having my computer working so I don't know what I was holding when I was pushing it. I know I had some good hard runs but I also know I have a looooong way to go before I'm ready for Vineman. I was feeling a good bit of cramps at the end of the ride and right when I went to get off the bike my hamstring cramped up as I swung my leg over the top tube. I like the way the Giant rides. There's a few things that need to be tightened up and adjusted but other than that it should be able to make it through a flat 24.8 miles just fine. A rolling 56 miles in CA is a whole different story. Actually I know it can make it through 56 miles no problem...that wouldn't necessarly be fast and I sure wouldn't have an easy time running 13.1 miles after. Good thing I still have a few months to go but I know it's going to be here pretty quickly and it takes a good amount of time to gain more strength and endurance so I can't be slacking off now! Best I can tell I should have been riding all winter outside like Mike has been. He managed to beat up on us pretty good, especially over the back 15 miles of the ride. Right now I'm looking forward to getting more speed and doing some bricks after riding longer distances. Oh yea, I'm also looking forward to days that aren't in the upper 30's when we start our rides!

Friday - March 30 (Steve)

Today I started off with a 35 minute bike ride on the trainer. Mixed up the gears and tried to keep the cadence up. Nothing real special.

This evening I wanted to get about an hour running in. I ended up going just about 50-55 minutes, unfortunately I had no watch and I got stopped by one of my neighbors as I finished the run and he chatted for a bit so I had to estimate how long I was talking to him. Ended up being 6.75 miles just at a nice easy pace so I think the run was closer to 50 minutes based on my previous averages. It was a nice day out and it felt good to be outside. I knew I went just the right amount when both my shoes came untied at the top of the street.

Tomorrow should be a good day on the bike, unfortunately it's going to be cold but it'll be good to get the tri-bike outside for a spin!

Thursday - March 29 (Steve)

Tonight was a short bike ride. Shorter and slower than I wanted but it was good to get outside. I went out with one of the consultants at work who is doing an MS 150 this year so I dragged him around the hills of Smithfield. We were out just over an hour and battled the wind. Even with the wind it was fantastic to be outside and get some fresh air on the bike. I realized that even thought I love my road bike I feel much more comfortable on the tri-bike right now. Maybe that's because I've been riding in that position more this winter than I rode my road bike in the past few years. Tomorrow I'll drop my road bike off for a tune up and Saturday I should be taking the racing bike out with Jason.
Total for the day 17.5 miles 70 minutes.

Wednesday - March 28 (Steve)

Today was a day back in the weight room. Tried to keep it moving in there. No rest between exercises. It felt good to have my arms shaking in the afternoon. I need strength back.

In the evening I went over to EP for the LRAC open house. Not many people showed but the ones that were there registered so the team will move forward.

Tuesday - March 27

Today I wanted to get back in the weight room, but decided tomorrow will work better since I have to go to a meeting in the evening and won't be able to workout. So I'll lift at lunch tomorrow. Yesterday I got on the trainer for 40 minutes without paying attention to much. Just wanted to spin out the legs and boy did I feel good. Maybe it's the shaved legs I don't know, but I can't wait to take that bike outside and race it.
Tonight I went for a run since it was in the low 60's. I didn't take a watch (battery is dead) and I just wanted to go out and stretch the legs since I didn't run since last Monday. No sense in over-doing it now.
The first two miles felt kind of rough with the breathing and all the sand in the road from the snow this past weekend, but by mile three I was trying to figure out how to stretch out the run for a little more distance but not so much I get injured so I managed to take on just over a mile and ended up with 5.93 miles in 45 minutes. Just nice and easy. I only picked up the pace over the last two miles because I was starting to feel like a champ then.
I stretched out a little and then did 30 minutes of the Hard Core Conditioning workout. Okay, it was actually 27 minutes before I stopped. Now it's time to eat!

New Day New Attitude

Today I'm over the weekend. I've moved on and I'm refocused on a best attempt at these triathlons, then after that I'm going to get back on my game for swimming. Next year I'm going get some weight back and then whoop the hell out of people.

Wed - Mar 21 (Jason)

Is there such a thing as a reverse brick?

I took advantage of my evening off from class and got over to the gym for a 30 minute run. 5 minutes warm up. 5 min @ 6.5, 5 @ 7.0, 1 walk @ 4.0, 4 @ 6.5, 5 @ 7.5, 1 walk @ 4.0, 4 @ 6.5, 3 warm down. 33 minutes total. 3.3 miles including the walking and warmup. My Shins were tight, loosened up and felt good and then got tight to bordering on pain at the end so I just shut it down.

Hustled on home and hopped on the bike. Probably a little under 15 minutes in between. Almost the first 10 minutes felt awesome. Just cruising at 22-22.5 at 92-96 rpms. Kept the pace going for another 10 minutes but I was clearly hurting. 2 minutes easy. Then 4 intervals: 1m hard, 35s easy. 2 minutes warm down.

Totals: 30 minutes running, 30 minutes cycling, 20+ minutes of ab work on the day.

March 20, 21 (Steve)

Just a couple nice easy swims. I know I'm logging one before it happened, but I know I'm going to get in real easy tonight and just cruise around. Last night I just swam 3000 meters again. Worked some 75's and the rest was pretty much drilling and easy swimming. Tonight I'll go about 2200-2500 and I'll throw in a few fast 25's. My rhythm in SCM feels so much better than in yards. Maybe I should move over seas where I can swim meters all the time. I'm kind of anxious to see how the 200 breast is going to go since I haven't been putting a whole lot into my swimming. Part of me thinks it could wind up being blazing fast for me, but I'm not really sure. Guess we'll have to wait and see. Tomorrow is a rest day and then Friday, Saturday and Sunday will all be spent at Harvard.

Monday - Mar 19 & Others (Jason)

Quick recap from the past few days. Saturday, my friend Bob invited me out for a run, promising 5.5 miles. Turns out, he's not in the greatest of shape these days. I did 5, he and our other friend Erik did 3.5. I did a nice easy warmup with them at 13min miles, then took off for about a mile and a half at around 8:15 pace (that's 7.2 pace for those treadmill folks), then walked for a while back to the others and stayed with them until there was a mile and a half left on the bridge. I got my heart rate up pretty high and had a tail wind, but running at 7:00 pace for 1.5 miles was like heaven on earth compared to the 10+ minute pace from earlier in the week. Total of about 5 miles when all was said and done.

By the way, running in the sunshine, outside is SO the way to go. That was simply heaven.

Flew back on Sunday, helped Sarah shovel out her car, then came back and had lunch. Before going out to dinner with Steve and his oh-so-understanding wife, Roxanne, I managed to hope on the trainer for a 40 minute interval workout.

This morning I did a 15 minute core workout. Tonight after class, I hoped on the bike for an hour from 8 to 9pm.

10 minute warm-up spin
3 x { 5 min - fast spin 95rpm approx. 20.5mph
      5 min - harder gear at 92-95rpm approx. 22.5-23.5mph
5 min recovery spin
4 min (1 left, 1 right)
1 min fast spin
5 min - hard gear, build from 22 to 24 mph
5 min warm down

Avg Speed 20.1mph. Definitely whipped afterward, but that's a good thing.

Monday - March 19(Steve)

Quick recap of Sunday...got on the bike for the aero base builder workout. One thing's for sure, if my riding has drastically improved from last year to this year I owe it all to coach Troy from Spinnervals. It felt pretty good but I really need a computer on there and a heart rate trainer to get better feed back on my workouts because I know I've done swims in the past that felt fantastic and they ended up butt-ass slow, and I've had lousy swims that were some of my fastest. That was it for Sunday, no running.

Today I got on the treadmill for 40 minutes and it sure didn't feel good. Felt like a struggle right from the start. I just wanted to go a nice easy pace which felt rough so I increased speed gradually as I went on. 10 minutes 7.6, 5 minutes 7.8, 5 minutes at 8.0, 11 minutes 8.6, 9 minutes 6.5. Ended up at 5.0 miles.

Tonight's swim didn't feel that bad. I ended up getting a 50 breast down to 35 high or 36 low in meters which I was pretty happy with. My other ones were :37's and my freestyle's were coming in at 30.0, back and fly were each about :35. This week it's important to feel good in the water, too bad this meet isn't SCM. I'll swim tomorrow and Wednesday, take Thursday off and then let the racing begin with the 100 back on Friday!

Saturday - March 17 (Steve)

Okay, so it wasn't actually a very active day unless you want to count shoveling snow but I don't remember seeing that in the training plan. Today was distance day at New England's and I just kind of went and lazily slugged my way through it. At least I beat my seed time. Nothing real good about the swim. I realized I totally forgot how to swim the 1000. I was out awfully slow just swimming with the guys on either side of me. That was a mistake because by the time I realized that I was going to make the swim without a problem and I should probably just drop those guys it was too late for me to do much of anything. I guess it's good to shake off some rust and realize I can pretty much even split my swim, but if you're coming in 10:50 on a 1000 you'd best be able to even split it at the very least. Oh well, I ended up second in my age group which is what I expected without a fast suit or a shave. Good enough for a day lacking motivation and for the warm-up I did. I'm actually looking forward to the 200 breast Friday and I don't know why. I know I can't expect to be sub-2:10 with the few swim workouts I've done but for some reason I think I'll be right around there so I'm anxious to see how it all plays out. I felt good in the water today, just took me a while to get moving and it was tough to get motivated over on my side of the pool without anyone around me. Maybe next year I'll actually try to crank it up on distance day. Guess it's good practice for triathlon. If I can do my swims with as little effort and be nearly that pace I'll be in good shape. Tomorrow I hope to get in a bike and run just because I know I'll probably try and get three swims in this weekend before the big meet...which after the 200 breast really doesn't matter that much.

I've got extra motivation to get running now that Jason has said he managed 1.5 miles at 7 minute miles without any pain. Must have had a wind at his back.

Friday - March 16 (Jason)

Woke up at 4:30 to squeeze in a quick ride on the trainer before heading to the airport for my flight to "sunny" Florida. Just 21 minutes.

Cycling on Trainer
Total: 21 minutes
2m Warm Up
8m Solid
3 x ( 2 hard, 1 easy )
2m Warm Down

I know it wasn't much, but it was nice to get in something other than a round of golf today. (102 for the golf wasn't too bad after not picking up a club for 9+ months. I could definitely get addicted to that game again.)

Thursday - March 15 (Steve)

Today was nice and easy. Just a swim tonight and it wasn't even all that long. Good thing too because I couldn't get anything going. This 1000 on Saturday is going to be rough.
400 Swim
500 25Drill/75 Swim

4x 200 Swim 3:00 (2:20's)
100 Fast 1:30 (1:02's-1:03's)

6x100 descend 1:40
8x50 Fast Stroke
200 easy

I could barely get a 50 breaststroke at :34 in there where I should be coming in :32's. I just have to keep telling myself my swimming is going to suffer with all the triathlon training. Just the way it's going to be and I'm going to have to accept it. It'll just take some time. Tomorrow I will most likely rest or just take a short spin on the trainer to have plenty of energy for the 1000. I was hoping to run before the race but with the forecast it looks like there might be too much snow on the ground to run. I'll probably try and get in a good swim workout first if I can and then swim out the 1000. We'll see how it goes.

Thursday - March 15 (Jason)

After last night's debacle, I got up and swam this morning. It's nice to actually be able to push athletically rather than being limited physically like running.

Duration: 1:15
Total Distance: 3800yd

700 Warm Up

8 x 50 on 1:05 - quick (held :30s & :29s)
8 x 25 on :30 - 2 x easy/moderate/no breath/fast
200 kick (2:48)
1:00 rest

8 x 50 on 1:05 - quick (held :29s & :28s)
8 x 25 on :30 - 2 x easy/moderate/no breath/fast
200 kick (2:47)
1:00 rest

 4 x 50 on 1:05 - quick (held :29s & :28s)
12 x 25 on :30 - 2 x easy/moderate/no breath/fast
200 kick (2:47)
1:00 rest

Practice ended here because the team is tapering.
I added in the last set just to get a little extra.

5 x 100 on 1:20 quick & smooth (held 1:03s)

200 Warm Down

It's not what I'd call stellar, but it sure beats running! I'm off to Florida tomorrow morning. Hopefully, I can get up and get in a trainer workout before heading to the airport, then get another trainer workout in on Sunday when I get back. No running until at least Sunday, probably Monday at this point.

Wednesday PM - March 14 (Jason)

One Word: Frustration.

Shins held me back tonight. No ability to push myself. 4.3 miles in 44 minutes. I'll let you do the math on that one. Avg HR = 139. Fastest speed at any point was an 8:13.

Iced for a long time. Took Advil.

I'm ready for the adaptation phase to be over.

Brick House Wednesday - March 14 (Steve)

Today was my first real brick where I went from my bike to the road, not a bike in the gym to the treadmill. Only thing was I did my bike on the trainer. All day I was looking forward to being able to get outside since it was near 70 and I had all these unreasonable expectations that I was going to get out there and tear it up the way I have been on the treadmill lately. Keep in mind my only two timed runs in the past 5 years have come last year, 3.1 miles at the Webster Triathlon and I think I averaged just under 7 minute miles (22.44 including the transition), then the OCY Triathlon which was 3.1 and my run was 21.17 so again just a hair under 7 minute miles. Both of those were without any training for running. So with the work I've put in lately I was anxious to see if I'd be that fast for a longer distance. So how'd it all go?

I got home at a good time, got my running stuff ready near my bike and got on the bike. Today the bike felt pretty comfortable. I didn't feel like the aero bars were too narrow (maybe all that stretching yesterday helped!). I cruised in the small chainring for a five minutes then went a 10 minute cycle of the big ring and my 14 trying to crank for :30 and then back to the small chain ring for :30 recovery. Then five minute spin followed by 10 minutes of 50x13 at a high cadence for one minute with a minute recovery. Then the last five minutes was warmdown with the last three just high cadence with an easy gear to get the legs ready to go.
Quickly put on the running gear ran upstairs for a glass of water and out the door. Three minute transition for a complete change.

Then I headed out on the running route. The workout schedule called for a 30 minute bike followed by a 10 minute run at half ironman pace. I know I should be sticking to the plan sort of but I wanted to be longer and faster. I tried to push the first mile and came in at a disappointing 7:03. I felt like I was going a lot faster so I guess I don't have a good feel for speed unless I'm on the treadmill, or treadmills aren't accurate. I kept the pace up through where I was pretty sure the two mile mark was then toned it down slightly because I was putting too much pressure on myself and kept thinking I should be faster. So I started doing some :30 hard, :30 pace for 10 minutes to help time go by. Then some stretches just seemed to take forever. Those roads go by much quicker on my bike. By the time I got back to my house my watch just rolled over to 35 minutes for 4.85 miles. I know I can certainly keep that pace up through 6.2 miles, but my bike will be much more intense over that hour. If I do keep that up I should come in 44:50 for my 10K at St. Anthony's. I think that's reasonable as long as I don't start off as hard as I was trying to start off today. I'd still like to be faster. I'm not going to get to do my brick next week unless I move it up to Monday because I'm going to rest my legs slightly for the three day swim fest at New England's.

As I sit here and update this now I feel like I should be satisfied, I still want to be faster and I don't have a lot of time to find speed. If I try the same workout next week I think I should be able to be faster just since I'll know the route a little better and be able to plan ahead a little better. I was sure to take 15 minutes after the run to stretch out the legs really well. Got to take good care of them. Swimming tomorrow night should feel good since I haven't been in since Monday and I feel like I need to be surrounded by water.

Total for the day: 35 minute bike/35 minute run.

What have I been up to?

Hey guys!

Sorry I've been missing in action, I've been doing the work (mostly), I just haven't been putting it down here. But all your workouts are keeping me motivated, so thanks.

More soon...

Matt

Wednesday - March 14 (Jason)

I took a recovery day yesterday because my body was simply shot. After getting home at 10:35 last night, walking the dog, and doing some work, I finally went to bed around midnight. Up at 5:50 for 40 minutes on the trainer before heading to law school for my law review proofreading hours.

Cycling - 40min + a little bonus time

10m Warm Up
3 x { 6 min - alternate 1m left leg, 1m right leg
    { 2 min - both keeping smooth and strong
4min Warm Down
2-3min working on getting in and out of shoes while on bike

Wasn't too tired after this, and it was good work for individual leg action. I was able to be smooth at 24mph & 85-88rpm for 2minutes after each set of 1 leg drills.

The shins are still sore, but I'm going to probably try running a short while.

Tuesday - March 13 Part II (Steve)

Thanks for the comments Matt. If I want to make the aero bars wider I'll have to cut the tape on the bars and slide them out some more, but I'm thinking it's because the ones I had on my Cannondale were out very wide. I hope it's just a matter of getting use to it. I didn't have any real pain, just some discomfort over the back of my shoulders and I figure I'll give it a little bit to adjust because I spent the winter with the wider position on the Cannondale. I definitely plan on getting a professional fit, I have a gift certificate for it but the guy that does it at the place isn't there that often and his next appointments aren't until May! So I'll have to make due until then. I just want to get my body use to the setup right now. Perhaps I need to stretch more which leads me to this evening...

Tonight the East Providence pool was closed because someone dropped a deuce in the pool in there was no swimming. So I came home and did a little of that "S" word. That's right I actually stretched. I actually got home while the sun was up and did a DVD of Hard Core Conditioning. I could only handle 35 minutes of the non-stop ab workout and then put in a DVD that was Yoga for the Endurance Athlete. Guess that's a good way to finish off the day. Now it's time for a nice big plate of pasta.

About today's run, I guess I know I can't hold that pace for St. Anthony's. Sub 40 minutes would be awfully fast for me. But I'm pretty sure if I just had to run a 10K I could do it in 42-45 minutes I guess. I have no idea how it'll be after 70 minutes on the bike. I'll definitely do my best to try and be in this range but that might not be realistic because I know I'll have to get the legs warmed up for running before I start trying to crank it up or I'll be toast.

Tomorrow calls for the brick for me. I know it's listed as a 30 minute bike 10 minute run, but again I'm feeling confident about my training so far so I'm going to shoot for 45/45. I'll mainly try to spin out the bike at a good clip and then try to crank up the run pretty good for about 1.5 miles then just jog out the rest as a warm down/aerobic recovery. It's supposed to be just about 60 tomorrow so I'm hoping the rain doesn't come in and I can get out of work a little early to make a good night out of it.

Tuesday, March 13 (Steve)

Today's goal was "high endurance run" with 8x:30 intervals, but before we get to that...
The morning started off with my first trainer ride on my tri-bike. It felt good! Big ring felt better than the small ring. I think I'm going to get to like that 50 tooth chain ring much more than I thought I would. I don't know if the bike just fit me a lot better than the Cannondale or if it's all that carbon that just made the whole thing seem so much more enjoyable. If I have any complaints it's that the aero bars are set up as wide as I can get them and it sort of pulls at my shoulders a little more than I'd like but I have a month to get use to it before it's first true race and four months to get use to it before the Vineman. I wound up doing some hard intervals because it was fun even though I just wanted to keep it relaxed and get my legs warmed up for the day. Since I'm not 100% sure on the placement of the cleats since this is a whole new pedal system for me I should probably be taking it easy to get my legs ready for it and to take care of my knees. But I was stupid and pressed on. Check back in a few days/weeks/months to see when the knee pain creeps in.

High Endurance Run:
Busy day at work but I still managed to grab some time to hit the treadmill. I know I probably could have gone outside today but I don't have a watch to do intervals. I've got some huge hills right around my building but no pace clocks, so treadmill wins.
Started off 10:30 warm up at 7.8mph (the entire run was with 1% incline). Then jumped into:
10x :30@9.5/:30@8.0
This made time fly by and felt better than the warm up but I sure don't think I could hold the 9.5 pace for 6.2 miles.
Then jogged until 30 minutes @ 8.5 and warmed down five minutes @ 6.5mph.
Total distance 4.75 in 35 minutes. I've decided the work treadmills aren't nearly as nice as the treadmills at my gym, but it's a great convenience so I shouldn't complain.

Tonight will probably be a swim at EP to get ready to swim the 1000 this weekend. I'm not expecting anything fast this weekend, maybe just cruise in at 11:00 or something like that. Unless the swim is really interesting tonight it's probably not worth mentioning. I just want to get in the water and swing my arms some.

Monday - March 12 (Steve)

Today was supposed to be my high intensity swim/bike day. I was unable to get any cycling done with the day and I'd prefer to flip flop the run and the bike between the Tuesday/Wednesday on the schedule so I brought my running stuff to work. I didn't get any time to be able to run so I'm going to shoot for the bike and run tomorrow. Bike should be in the morning and run at lunch. I'd like to finish the day up with a swim at EP if I can get out of work at a good hour. I actually geared my swim tonight for triathlon and did very little stroke.
Short Course Meters:
300 Swim
300 Pull (no paddles)
6x50 K/Dr :55 IM
3x100 descend 1:30
12x25 build each 3
3x100 pull 1:30
12x25 2K 1Swim 3 of each
300 Pull
8x50 :50
200 Easy

Then we had a parents meeting for the next season for Little Rhody Aquatic Club so the swim had to be quick and short. Then it was straight home for 24!

Monday, Mar 12 (Jason)

Holy hip flexors and calves, Batman!

6am Wakeup for a little fun on the trainer. Popped in "Stranger Than Fiction" with Will Farrell to keep me company this morning. I was just looking to get in about an hour with a number of longer moderate-hard intensity long intervals. Definitely was hurting (the good, non-running kind of hurt) by the end. Doubt if I'll do anything when I get home tonight.

5m Warm Up
20m Moderate-Hard Intensity at 95-98rpm approx 21mph
2m Recovery Spin
10m Mod-Hard higher gear at 88-90rpm approx 21.5-22mph
2m Recovery Spin
10m Mod-Hard as before at 85-90rpm (consistency goes as I get tired)
6m Warm Down

55m Total

Sunday, March 11 (Jason)

Worked around the house today. Recaulked the bathroom tub, so I went over to the gym for a quick run and shower in the evening.

Run - 30 Minutes - 3.09 Miles
5 at 6.2mph, 5 at 7mph, 5 at 6.2, 5 at 7.2, 6 at 6.2, 4min walked warm down at 3.5mph

Left shin splint really kicked in at 26 minute mark, hence,the walking at the end of the run. I'll take some advil tonight and probably avoid running tomorrow.

Rest Day

Today was my rest day. I really wanted to get on my bike but I know I've got to take the rest days. That's why they're there. This morning I got my tri-bike all lubed up, cables tightened, gears adjusted and ready to go after putting the pedals on yesterday and getting the cleats on the shoes.

I got on it for about 10 minutes to spin through the gears and see how everything felt. The size feels perfect, almost better than my road bike. The shifting could afford to be a little less quirky but I think that's because of the compact crankset on there. Sure the wheels could be more aero but I didn't feel like dropping the cash on the Zipp 808's but you'd have to admit that even if I don't ride this bike fast it would have been one of the best looking bikes with a set of Zipp 808's. Maybe I'll find a cheaper alternative before the big race so I don't get smoked. I'm not too worried about hills on this bike. With the 50/34 up front I'd imagine hills will be a breeze with the 11-23 cassette. I already enjoy climbing on my road bike and that's a standard 53/39 11-23. Give me that 34 and I shouldn't have to hit the 23 I hope. Can't wait to take it out for its maiden voyage! Maybe I should take it to a bike shop first so everything I tightened doesn't come apart on my like it did on my Cannondale when I made all the adjustments myself before the OCY Triathlon last fall. This time I'll at least get out there and try to do a trial run on the bike rather than just race with it.

I've got a set of Tufo tubular clinchers on the way, unfortunately the place I ordered them from didn't have any more red in stock so I'm stuck with yellow. I know it's not going to match as well. But that's okay as long as their fast!

Saturday - March 10 (Steve)

Thanks to Jason I don't have to type up the swim workout, just take the 500 off the warm-up and there you go. The swim was good practice for open water with all the bouncing around. It was like swimming at East Providence, only with more waves. Good thing workout involved lots of 25's to keep things under control.

Run...
The run was good. It was fantastic to be out in Boston and be able to see where you're running to on a nice clear day. It sure beats the loops around my neighborhood where you'll probably never see much more than a few hundred yards ahead of you and you'll be sharing the road with all the MA/RI drivers in the area. In other words, you're better off on the treadmill for safety. The run felt good. Nice aerobic pace, covered a good distance without pain and just worked on the endurance run. Running around the Charles is a great loop and I'm looking forward to doing it again. One thing I'm very glad about is being dressed appropriately for the weather. Hat, gloves, long pants, Under Armour shirt, dry fit shirt and Pearl Izumi jacket. Some may think I was over dressed but I drove by the Charles on my way to the pool and it was a big sheet of ice. There's no way wind coming off that was going to feel good. Luckily I was prepared, tomorrow would have called for the shorts and two shirts but not today.

After the run was also productive as I got to hit New Balance and get some new sneaks. Another set for training and one for racing. The racing ones will be a little lower (according to the guy in New Balance who seemed to know what he was talking about) but offer the same stability as the 857's I'm running in now. He said it was the lighter version. So for an extra $35 I'm getting less sneaker!

Until tomorrow, rest hard!