Just Hold On

Well I am here, I have made it to the taper. I have to say I feel pretty dam good about it to. With one more day left in June I have cleared 1000km and worked 40hrs a week.

Swim: 31,650m
Run: 173.5km
BIke: 811.4 km

Total: 1016.5

And it wasnt even that bad. Last year I never cleared 1000km while working, the only month I cleared was the month before Clearwater after I was laid off. I guess I am getting better at this training thing? Needless to say I feel ready. I was a little worried this year because I took my training into my own hands to help me understand and test my own training theories. At the beginning I knew it would be hard to stay motiviated, not having some one to report to. But I was able to design ways to keep me accountable. It seemed to have worked, and I have the mileage to show for it. I was also able to really crack down on my nutrition this month and really start feeling good about my eating and training nutrition. Overall I feel very ready and now I just need to hold it together through this taper and hope for a nice day next week to really lay it all on the line.

Solid Swim

Well it was the first tri of the year this weekend, and it went well. The day could not have been more perfect. It was calm not to hot and just a gorgeous day to be out on the race course. Even though there was no real pressure on this race I always get myself worked up. I get axious around triathlon people and I begin to doubt my abilities, when I really need to just calm down. I was up really early around 4:30 a.m because I had to use the washroom, but I did feel rested, it was not a nervous restless wake up. I stuck with my game plan this morning and just focused on hydration and had a banana. This stratagy has worked for me in the past with running races. I have also been on the other side were I take on too much food and that never works out well. This was a good race at a hard effort to really see how my body was going to respond.

I was one of the first people at the race, it felt good I dont like being under any pressure. I took my time set up and did a really long warm up session. I had enough time to go for a ride check my bike out, a run see how the legs felt, and a decent swim. I really wanted to warm up the swim I had noticed in training that a longer warm up was key to feeling fresh in the water. The rest of the morning was pretty standard and nothing really threw me off. I was able to get in all my bathroom breaks and I felt well hydrated and not over full.

Swim

At the swim start I felt ready to go and had actually managed to calm myself down quite a bit. The start was nothing special and kind of uneventful. My basic plan was to draft most of the first lap, fall into a pace and then progressively pick it up in the second lap. But to my surprise I strated out strong and ended up in a zone all my own just off the lead pack and in front of the rest of the group. As much as I wanted to draft I could not squeeze in the oppurtunity. The leaders were not far off and I didn't feel I was over exerting at all. But I stuck to the game plan. Coming out of the water I heard my girlfriend tell me I was not more then a minute behind I was stunned and I knew there were only 3 guys ahead of me.

Bike

When I started the bike I felt a bit queizzy, It took 5-8 min to really get my legs under me and fire up a good hard push. It was a 3 loop course and by the start of the second lap I was in hammer mode. I knew one of the guys in front of me and I had taken him out I was unsure of the second guy. I thought my nutrition plan was working well but it was here where I saw it begin to faulter. I needed a gel for that last 20 mins of the ride and I would have been perfect. I began to feel fatigued.

Run

Here is where I really realized I needed that gel. I just could not settle into the steller run times I had been putting up in training. It was a good lesson learned. The run was fairly uneventful I pushed through it running mostly by myself taking on water and trying to salvage the race.

In conclusion I was happy with it. My bike and run times were consistant and I put up a new PR swim bringing the total time to 2:13:10. More importantly I think I have my nutrition plan perfected for the olympic distance, I will be able to seal it on the next race which is not until August. But until then happy training and keep checkin back for updates on training, the taper and Ironman 70.3 Rhode Island.

D

1:11:11

Well it happened my first 1st place overall finish! Sure it may have only been a local duathlon but I was the best athlete there on that day.

It was a long week, including an 8hr over night shift at the post office which doesn't really help with recovery. So it was a tough week non the less. But when I arrived on Tuesday night to the duathlon and realized that the guy that beat me last week wasn't there I knew this was my chance to do it, it was my turn to lead the pack.

My warm up went ok I could feel that I was tired and I was really just hoping I could keep it together for this race. The weather was no help either with a strong east wind and some light showers. But when the gun went off it was go time.

I broke to the front right off the start to show my place in the race. It was a 2 loop run and bike course and I could hear the pack behind me for the first lap. I averages a respectable 6:01 pace and going into the second lap I could hear my gap opening up. I was first into transition with a first run at 15:22.

In transition I saw the others who were chasing me. I started out on the bike hard, but I was really feeling it in my legs I was just not recovered from the week enough. I was still able to hold off the guy chasing me for 3/4 of the first lap. We then proceeded to play cat and mouse for most of the second lap until I decided to just stay within reach right behind him and really make him push into the hurt zone. As we came into transition I snuk past as he removed his shoes and beat him into transition.

As we started out on the run I could see my stratagy worked by keeping him in the hurt zone he was hurting even more on the run and by the end of the first lap I had opened a substantial gap. I could feel it now my only goal was stay cool stay even and dont slow down. I usually dont look back but I took one quick peek with 1 k to the finish and saw that this race was mine. Fueled by adrenaline I picked up the pace to around 5:55/mile. I sprinted hard to the finish from about 300m out and it felt good.

I had done it I had won first overall, and the race was not a blow out I raced it and I won. It felt really good. The creepiest thing was my watch time was 1:11:11. Very weird. But overall I was happy and I am really going to focus on recovery for next week. Because as fun as these are I really dont need to be killing myself every week this early in my training and at a distance which isn't really close to what I am racing. But I can chalk this up to another sucessful race and a good start to another season.

Fresh Race Season Report

Well you can train all you want but you can not control the weather. Mother nature will do what it wants when ever it wants. Last week was beautiful, the weather was gorgeous and my taper was going well. I though on Wednesday I would take a look at the forcast for my first half mary of the season on Sunday. It read like this:

Wednesday :Sunny high 15
Thursday: Sunny high 10
Friday: Slight cloud high 10
Saturday: 1mm Rain in morning high 8
Sunday: Wind gusts up to 80k, 2 cm of snow -3 and -10 with windchill.

Really? Are you F&%king serious....... Yup. I thought to myself this is a sick joke. And I hoped and prayed that environment Canada was wrong as per usual. But as the days counted down it was not looking good.
It was a mental battle all the way to the start line to accept the fact that it was not going to be the best day. But when the gun went off I went out full tilt PR or ER, and I was on a decent pace too my split at the 10k was 40:32. But eventually all the little slips and the cold weather got to my system. I tried to take in some water that I didnt need and it caused me to cramp up and the 60 k freezing wind nearly stopped me in my tracks. I tried as hard as I could to keep pushing but it was a hard fought battle out there that day. I ended up with a 1:32:48 only 30 sec off my Pr and in the given conditions I was happy with it, and it was good to get a half under my belt early to see how my body would react.

Not wanting to waste my fitness I was back at it again on Tuesday for a duathlon at Birds Hill Park. It was a 4k run 26k bike and 4k run. I was unsure of how it was going to go i felt ok, my calves were tight, but ready to go none the less.

The race was suppose to start at 7 but due to technical issues and bad organization it started at 7:30. So I ended up warming up twice. It was nice to get my bike race ready, I forgot how sharp it looks. My dad was rockin a new bike as well a Cervelo P3, he got lots of compliments on.

Anyways when the gun went off I took off to the front of the pack with me and another guy. He was about 20 seconds per mile faster then me and slowly broke away throughout the race. But I held a strong 2nd until being slowly passed by another guy. I came off the run in 3rd place (run one 15:15), and went out on the bike hard. I caught the guy that passed me within 5 k of the bike. After catching him he slowly crept passed me once as I was recovering, until I passed him one last time and that was the last that I saw of him(bike 41:00). My second run was solid I got into a nice groove quickly and was able to shake my arms out and stay loose. It showed because my second run was only 10 seconds slower at 15:24. For a strong 2nd place finish.

In reflection for next race the only thing I would like to improve on is a faster transition I took my time in there and used it as a little recovery. That and I am going straight to the top next race just sayin. Total time was 1:11:38 next race sub 1:10:00 PR or ER.

Yes this is MAY 1st in Winnipeg

Gotta hurt a little bit (Race Report)

Last weekend was the final of the puma series, the 15k. I had felt good all week, had a couple of really good speed sessions and I should have know I was going to need to recover some where in there. I went for an easy run on Friday and Saturday am I could start to feel the recovering process. My legs were flat. Which is good, it means I really maximized my speed training. My goal for the 15 was to hold my goal half marathon pace, and not go totally bananas, I have become pretty good at maintaining even pace and it make for a much more interesting and calculated race. I guess its a good bad thing with the Assinaboine park course is that its 5 k loops. Good its easy to time your laps and stay consistent, bad it can be a little annoying mentally especially on the 2nd lap.

I arrived early, completed standard race warm. I could still feel I was not fully recovered, but the nice thing about racing is the atmosphere covers up some of that weakness. The gun went off and I settled into a pace quickly. I could tell I was going to have no problem worrying about going out fast. The first lap felt ok I had a split of a high 20 I was happy with that. Going into the second lap was tough knowing I wasn't even half done. But I was still hitting my mile targets. I used others in the race to block some of the wind and really strategies my race slowing down an speeding up but still maintained goal pace. The third lap was just much easier mentally knowing that the finish is coming I was able to just tune out and finish up what needed to be done. Overall I didn't think I was going to be as consistent ant as I was (maybe varied 5-10 sec per lap) and I was happy with that considering that I started out fatigued. The total time was 1:03:48.

Social Running (Race Report)

This past Sunday was the longest run I had to do in my half marathon training. The run was 16 miles. I have a love hate relationship with the long run. Sometimes they go really well and they are relaxing and sometimes it is just a really long painful couple of hours. This run however fell as part of the puma series. The race was a 10k (6miles) and the long run required 10 miles easy and 6 miles at half marathon goal pace. So I decided to show up early and bang out a few miles and then use the race as my harder effort.

In the morning I had nothing but a banana to eat, as I had eaten a lot before I went to bed. I find eating little in the morning has had a positive effect on my running. I stared out running the 3 mile loop at the park at a nice relaxed pace. I ended up running beside a friendly, very fit looking Asian fellow. The beauty of not running with headphones is that I was aware and enjoying the moment. We started to chat he was doing 22 miles that day! Last year he qualified for Boston, he said he usually runs 2 marathons a year. He was interested in triathlon and asked how we train for all three. I said its always 2 a day and told him how the fitness in each of the sports is somewhat transferable.

I then moved on to the second lap feeling good I had some power bar after the first 3 miles. On this lap I met up with an older runner that I knew was fast. He is well over 50 and can still crank out 5 k times in the 17's. He was very friendly and is one more person to talk to at running events.

I managed to complete a little over 6 miles before the race started. I was happy with that. My goal for the race was just to run even 6:50 mile pace. Little did I know I was in for a surprise. I started out a little to fast of course due to the race atmosphere and the slight downhill of the course, but was able to settle into a rythem. I was drafting off anyone in front of me to conserve energy. Then my competitive edge sparked up as I saw a kid that was maybe 10 in front of me. So I worked my way up there and eventually pasted him. I gave words of encouragement to others who looked to be struggling because I know what thats like, and I was really grateful I was having a great day. After the first 5 k I grabbed a water and a power gel. My first lap split to my surprise was a 20:49 averaging a 6:39 pace. In the second lap I led most of the way paying back to some of the people I sucked on for the first lap. My pace was way under what I was aiming for I was averaging about 6:40 a mile feeling very relaxed. At the finish I pulled a guy all the way into his PR and that felt pretty good. I had a total finish time of 41:58 Which was a total suprise to me I was not expecting that at all.

After the race I cooled down with a 3 mile easy run bringing me to my 16 miles. And I have to say it was absolutly painless. It was nice to run this Sunday and really enjoy the social aspect of running and the sense of community. I felt included as part of a group. It was a very nice way to spend a Sunday.

Good Start (race report)

Well Despite horrible weather I managed to PR my first race this year! As I mentioned in the last couple weeks posts I have been running more and have cut some weight. I knew I was in condition to PR but waking up this morning it was raining and cold. Unlike yesterday which was beautiful. As usually I was extra conscious this week about sleep, diet, and alcohol consumption. I felt ready coming to race start I was up yearly about 2.5 hrs before race start I only had a banana because it is just a 5k and I wanted to stay light. Had a little coffee on the way and one energy gel about 20mins prior to start. I had run my plan over in my head breaking it into 3 one mile segments, and I wasn't to nervous.

When the gun went off you can not help but take off. I was concious of this and settled into a pace within the first km. In the first km theres a down hill and an uphill so I guess they kind of balance out I think just being aware of the course helped. I tried not to look at my watch often but I did glance down time to time to make sure I was close to the pace I wanted.

In the second mile there was a windy section which I was able to tuck in behind someone to conserve energy.Then I took the lead I knew that I was running strong and I didnt want to miss my goal cause I was following someone else. I was still feeling strong here and my main goal was just to stay even. I knew I had a good first mile and if I could maintain for the second and finish strong it would be a good race.

Coming into the third mile I finally started to feel some hurt. So I tried to focus on form and not just pushing. Its a downhill finish so I tried to really use it and be as effeciant as possible. When I could see the clock I saw I had a possibility of breaking 19, even in the snow. This was more then I though possible to I really cranked it at the end. And..... I DID IT 18:57. I broke the 19min barrier. I was thrilled, almost puked, but thrilled non the less.

Overall its a good start to the season and the theme of PR or ER.