Open Water Fun!

I completed the open water swim training with Cambridge Tri Club yesterday. It was great fun and I actually felt quite good! My sighting was ok and I managed to get plenty of drafting practice. I thought I had trouble swimming in a straight line but some of the feet I tagged onto were going round in circles!

Earlier in the day I had completed a brick session; actually it turned out to be a mini triathlon as I swam 1k, biked 20 miles and ran 5 miles. The aim was to chug along at a 'brisk' pace without pushing myself too hard. I did the swim as a negative split with an easy first 500m and a build over the second 500m. 16:30 was ok considering the relaxed first 500m. I maintained a 20.5 mph average on the bike and 6:40 per mile for the run. Quite a good session, though I could still feel the turbo session that I did on Wednesday in my legs.

Some RAF guys in racing action this weekend:

World Champs Standard Distance Vancouver - Dale, Kelda and Bev.

World Champs Sprint Distance Vancouver - Dave Lassen.

Bala Half Ironman - Turbo Man Pullin and Reg 'DNF' Swallow.

Prayers for you guys - race well.

Turbo Time

The intensity is ramping up now and I completed my first turbo effort session yesterday. I had forgotten just how effective turbo training is - no junctions, no free wheeling, no falling off! Great for smoothing the pedaling action out too. I have a Cateye Cycle Simulator, pictured left. It is a real heavy duty beast and advertised as the only turbo that you can do full on sprints in........I checked this and you can!!

Anyway, I was going to do a peaking session of short efforts of 1 min duration. However, the wise old (very old!) Turbo Man advised me that a short max effort peaking session may not be ideal right now for my long distance goals this year. I could see his logic - I just thought that a short effort session would inflict the most pain on myself! Turbo Man advised that 2 x 20 min threshold efforts would be far more beneficial. As I had not done this session before, I had no idea what my threshold, in relation to power output (Wattage), was. I warmed up and did a few spin ups to lubricate the legs and then hit the first 20 min effort. Bare in mind that the power output is relative to the turbo trainer being used - so not worth comparing Wattage between turbo trainers - especially those renowned over power reading Tax Flow turbo trainers!!.

I selected 250W as a starting level and maintained this for 10 mins. Then 5 mins at 260W, 2 mins at 280W, 2 mins at 300W, 3 mins at 310W. 10 min recovery spin and then the next 20 min as 10 min at 260W, 2 min at 290W, 3 min at 310W, 4 min at 330W, 1 min at 400W. Then 1 min rest followed by 5 x 15 second flat out sprints in the hardest gear on 1 min (that is 15 sec sprint, 45 sec spin). managed to top out on the sprints at 850W. After that lot I was rather tired!

I though it was a good session, but Turbo Man tutted and showed me the error of my ways! i had crossed over too many intensity levels. Better off to have maintained a steady power output for each 20 mins and save the flat out sprints for later in the year. Trouble was, I had no idea what level to aim at. Next time I will go for 2 x 20 mins at 290W and see how that feels.

For the very first time in my triathlon training, I am going open water swim training on Friday! Looking forward to that...........I must swim in a straight line....... I must swim in a straight line.....I must......

Ouch!!

Look at this horrible little plant. Imagine hundreds more growing like crazy due to the freaky wet and warm English weather. Now imagine a silly runner going down a country path and deciding to carry on despite the mad over grown nettles making the path invisible - yes, it was me 8-( My legs got covered in stings so badly that I could not sleep last night! After 30 miles of biking and 11 miles of running I normally have no problem sleeping. Yesterday, though, I was up pacing the kitchen, raiding the cereal cupboard at midnight.....eating is a good way to take your mind off that fact that your legs are burning from nettle stings. And they still burn this morning! i must have encountered a particularly virulent strain of nettle. Enough complaining though!

This week is my last big training volume week. Monday was a 3.3k swim set which included 2.5k continuous (the 4k swim in Almere is driving me on to swim further!), and an easy 30 miles on the bike. Felt ok, considering the TT brick session the day before. Tuesday was another EZ 30 miles into work (felt awful!) and an EZ 11 mile run - complete with nettle episode above. I wanted to get to the local bike TT this evening but that won't happen for various reasons. So, it's turbo time! A full on hard turbo session should replicate the TT effort well.....looking forward to that!

8 Seconds Would be Nice!

Well, it stayed dry for the 25 mile Time Trial this morning. I had to be up at 0430 for a 0633 start - just like triathlon really! I finished in 1:00:07. 8 sec faster and I would have preferred 59:59! Nevertheless, I am happy as I have not done any really max effort work on the bike this season - that starts this week. I felt strong and could maintain a good pace; I just couldn't up the pace for more speed. I got to the roundabout at 15 miles and in the distance I could see a crazy guy leaping about the A1! As I got closer I could see that it was non other than Turbo Man offering great support - thanks dude. He was on a big run and stopped by to view the suffering of us cyclists!

I finished the session off with 6 x 1k running with 90 secs recovery. Maintained 3:30 pace for the runs so happy enough with that. Quite a hard morning!

EZ Ride and Roast Dinners

I always know when I am fatigued because I start to dream of roast dinners whilst I ride my bike! Today I did a swim technique session in the morning and an EZ 25 miles on the bike. After about 10 miles on the bike I started hallucinating about roast dinners! I was in recovery ride mode and going very slowly but I still felt weak - there is never a roast dinner available when you need one! I had to make do with some rice pudding when I got back to work

With hard sessions on Tues and Wed, coupled with lack of sleep, I suppose I need to take it easy. Hence tomorrow will be another easy day, as will Saturday. I have a 25 mile TT on Sunday and I want to give that a good blast, so no need to be tired on the start line! This will be my first 25 mile TT outside of a triathlon bike leg and I am a bit wary of it - mixing with all those 'real' cyclists is scary! The worst thing is the start time. There are 150 entries and I am off at number 3 at 0633! Not sure if my legs will be awake by then! I would love to break the hour for the TT but I don't think I am capable of that; not that I won't try!

Respect

Did 45 mins swim technique this morning as I was tired from yesterday. The thunder storm last night had my youngest, CJ, keeping me awake far too much! Did a good run session today too:

Warm up 10 mins

20 mins tempo

10 mins EZ running

20 mins tempo

EZ running to fonish.

Clocked up 10.8 miles in the process and the 20 mins were quite hard. By 'tempo' I mean fast enough so that it is hard but you can mutter short sentences! Apparently this type of session is key to being a good distance runner - well that is what the gumph I received from the London marathon people said. I did the session with Mark Hutch here at Henlow. He has been training well for 4 weeks now. Today he felt bad and so nearly stacked the session after one loop of the course. However, he hung in there and finished - respect dude. Legs pretty tired now after 2 reasonably hard days. I will have a recovery day tomorrow - but not too much as i have to keep up with Daz 'fast man' Sharpe. Daz is trying to use some kind of mental torture to wear me down ..............................it's probably working!

A Big Volume Day

After a rest day on Sunday and just a 5 mile fartleck run on Monday, I was ready for a big day's training. Today was:

Bike easy to work 30 miles - av 16mph
Swim at lunch 30 x 100m on 2 mins
Bike home with efforts 30 miles - av 19.6mph

Was on the single speed so it was really a case of keeping a tempo pace all the way and blitzing the hills as hard as I could. Pretty tired from the ride back now. Swim went ok but I am slow......even slower than Daz Sharpe, I am sure!

An easy spin into work tomorrow and a 10 -12 mile 30 sec decreasing interval run session tomorrow - I'll explain tomorrow if anyone is interested!

Catch you later friends.