Social Icons

twitterfacebookgoogle pluslinkedinrss feedemail

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Bolder Boulder - One Day Later

Today was a very nicely appreciated day off to let the legs recover from yesterday's 18-mile run. While they felt fine yesterday, today the legs are a little sore and a little more sore than I would have expected. However, tomorrow's lunchtime bike ride and early afternoon massage should fix that right up. I've found the best cure for sore muscles isn't a hot tub (though it feels fantastic) or a massage (ditto), or an ice bath (uh, not ditto), or Advil (but it does help), but actually an easy workout on the bike (for legs) and an easy swim in the pool (for arms). Nothing hard at all, all Z1, maybe Z2, just get the HR up and blood flowing through the muscles. And follow it up with a good stretch.

We'll see if I have anything left after tomorrow's ride and massage to go swimming afterward.

3 Miles, 6 Miles, 9 Miles

No, it's not a geometric progression, it's my workout from yesterday:

3-mile warm-up for the Bolder Boulder.
6.2 miles for the Bolder Boulder.
9-mile run home.

The race was great though I missed my time goal. This was mostly due to my not doing my math homework ahead of time to determine exactly what pace I needed to hold to make my time goal. As a result, and as you might expect, I missed my time goal.

What was my time goal? I'd hoped to break 43:00. Actual chip time: 43:48.29. A full 16 seconds faster than my previous 10K time done at the Canine Classic 10K just weeks ago. Mile breakdown is as follows: 6:54.51, 7:06.74, 7:14.62, 7:02.44, 6:51.08, 7:08.24.

I started way too fast and saw my 1/2 mile split and slowed down. It's hard because the course is downhill for the first 3/4 mile. But, it's not a race to the first mile marker and once we all settled in I started passing a bunch of people. Because I qualified for the B wave I'd thought things would be better than racing in the C wave a few years ago in which I spent the bulk of the time weaving in and out of people and darting through gaps where I could find them, but it turns out the same thing happened, only to a lesser degree. There's always people who go out way too hard and you have to go around them because they've blown a gasket. It's particularly bad in the corners where everyone seems to move in to the apex and slow down. It's very frustrating actually. I was told by a friend, it's not much better in the A wave though I'd think that the faster you run, the less people with whom you have to deal.

But still, I can't be too disappointed. it's still a new PR and considering I've been doing Ironman training for the last 7 months the fast twitch muscle fibers are working pretty well. As I only plan on doing Olympic distance or shorter next year, I'm very curious and excited as to just how fast I can become.

After the race, we gathered in our usual section (work employees) where I chilled (literally, it was getting cold) for a bit before deciding that it was time to leave. Finding my sister, we walked back to the car, got ready for the long run home and headed out. I wasn't feeling great for those first 1.5 miles, but after a short stop at her boyfriend's apartment for her fuel belt, I was feeling good. The legs felt great and I was moving. I suspect it was the caffeine from my sports drink, but I didn't care. The run itself went by really fast and I can only hope this will be the case in my Ironman. The last mile was all uphill as I made my way from Baseline over to South Boulder Road via several open space areas on a bike path and what I can only describe as Louisville's version of L'Alpe D'Huez complete with a ridiculous number of switchbacks including some connecting segments that are so short you literally take one step before having to do a 180 to continue on the path.

I don't even remember my time and haven't yet downloaded my HR data but will do so soon.

More laziness

Sigh...back to the blog.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Holy Cow!

Sunday's 14-mile run was the first where my wife rode next to me on her bike while I ran. It was also the first time I had to deal with several ornery cows. They may be cute and funny, but they are NOT friendly. On the way out, one made my wife and I traverse around the path a bit dodging cow pies to avoid getting too close. On the way back, no less than 5 bulls were hot footing toward the path on an intercept course before changing direction when they hit the path and trotting away. It was, by far, the most nerve-wracking moment I've experienced while training.

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

A Recovery Week - Yay!

Hooray for off weeks! I feel absolutely AWESOME. My total volume for this week is just ridiculously low compared to my on weeks. It's a fantastic chance to recover, heal, and see about fitting in a massage at some point.

So far, it's working great. I feel great and am having great workouts when I have them. In today's Master's swim class I felt absolutely awesome. And then I got totally schooled by some VERY good triathletes in my lane. Our intervals were on around 1:26-28/100m and while I was able to hold the intervals, I was NOT able to maintain contact with the others who were easily swimming sub 1:20s. As crappy as that is, I know I'm getting stronger and if you had told me in 2006 after I moved here that I'd be consistently swimming in the 1:20s I would have asked to take a toke of whatever you were smoking. But here I am, 3 years later and 40-50 seconds faster.

The only keys that currently come to mind are patience and to not be afraid to move up or down a lane to test the waters or when you need a recovery swim.

Weekend Workouts

Saturday saw a cold and rainy day in Colorado and along the front range. Originally having been slated to do a 120-mile ride, after having a come-to-Jesus meeting with my coach we will be reducing my bike mileage and increasing my running. That said, my 120-mile ride was reduced to first 3 hours and then 4 but since it was raining, I did 3 hours on the trainer and then a 2-mile run on the treadmill.

Sunday, I did a 12-mile run outside (the weather was MUCH nicer) and it was a really good run. I started to fatigue around mile 8/9, but gutted it out and was able to maintain a good pace for the entire middle set.

For the week, I wound up running a whopping 42 miles! Yay! And the legs felt good. 6.5 weeks until race day and I think I'm on a good track. Caught the problem early enough.

Friday, May 1, 2009

A Rather Decent Week

For all the running I've done this week, the legs feel like they're in good shape and the intervals I had to run on Tuesday and Thursday turned out pretty decent. I'm fatigued, but it doesn't seem like I'm as fatigued as I've been in the past.

On that note, after Master's on Wednesday I had a good chat with Laura (Billy William's fiance) and Kerrie/Glenn all of whom think that my training regimen has way too much volume. So I had a long chat with my coach about scaling back the cycling and upping the running here in the last month or so before my taper so as to get my running to a decent state because I feel like it's really been crap up to this point. I've not yet been able to complete a long brick - well I did one, probably 50/11 but that was so long ago. My legs shouldn't be so shot after a ride that I can't do at least some running.

So, we changed my long ride and long runs and it will be really interesting to see how it pans out in this last month or so. I'm not worred about the swim at all. I'm only slightly worried about the bike - to the extent that I need to make sure I take in enough calories and stay in Z3. My big fear is the run. With no bike, I'm not worried that I couldn't do a nice long run - but with the bike, everything changes....have to be smart and have to be prepared.