Week in Review (1/22 - 1/28)

This is my fourth prep week period. One more week of prep before I begin bumping up the volumes as I progress into my first build phase.

Overall I'm still feeling solid - though definitely not as peppy as when I started. Since the holidays I also lost nearly ten pounds. I had gained about seven or so over the holidays and now I'm three below my "fighting" weight of 150. Apparently I need to start eating more! I plan to start doing more eating directly after workouts to help with recovery and also throw in a few more snacks during the day.

This weekend turned out to be a bad one for training - had to flip my long run and bike days and then was only able to get half the time I had wanted on the bike on Sunday. The skip was partially due to things I had no control over, though I think that with better planning I could have found a way to get the whole workout in.



Still doing fairly well with the heart rate zones. Numbers probably would have been better had I completed my long bike on Sunday but overall things are about where they should be with a majority of my time being spent in zone 1.



Injuries

Groin injury: Definitely getting better, though I'm still a bit sore after my long run.

Lower back - left side: Still a bit weak though definitely getting better due to focusing on stretching in that area. I think also that going to single limb based workouts during strength training (single leg lifts, single leg squats, etc.) has helped to balance things out a bit.

Right foot: No Planchar pain at all this week. I suspect that the issue was my running shoes. I picked up a pair of Asics 1110's to gain a bit more cushioning which probably helped.

Left elbow: My joitn pain is not getting better. I think it's a touch of tendonitis. It's not affecting my tri-specific workouts but I can definitely feel it during some of my strength training and throughout the day. This week I plan to cut back on any any strength exercises that put a lot of stress on the elbow and see how it goes.

Next Week's Adjustments
For next week I plan to adjust my nutrition and bump my swim times up a bit. I'm finding I don't have enough time to complete the prescribed swim workouts so I'll try to start a bit earlier and see what I can fit in. Will also be adjusting my strength training to not stress my elbow. Finally, the big goal next week will be to complete all workouts as prescribed.

Catchup and Tag

Ok, so first I have to apologize for posting so infrequently over the last week or so. Last weekend we had a new addition to our family - a 16 month old golden lab named Luke. To say he's been a handful is a tremendous understatement. We're the third family he's had and he's had little to no training and needs a lot of work. The good news though is that every once in a while we get a glimpse of the dog he'll become and we know he's going to be worth it.

As it turns out I've been tagged by Sheila! So here are my responses to the tag questions:

1. Describe a memory from your first triathlon ever. During my first open water swim at the Lake Zurich tri I remember thinking "that's it?" as I hauled myself up and onto the beach. Before the triathlon began I remember looking out at the 1K course and doubting that I'd actually be able to make it. The turn buoys looked so far away. Fortunately it was a time trial start so I didn't have to worry about a mass start. Despite that though I was consumed by doubt and trepidation as the official gave me the nod and I reluctantly waded into the water. In the end the swim went by much faster and much easier than I expected - proving once again that the anticipation is much worse than the reality.
   
2. Describe a memory from your most recent triathlon. At the Deer Creek tri I remember turning a corner and being blown to a standstill on the bike. The winds that day were some of the worst I've ever encountered during a triathlon.
   
3. What's the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to you in a tri?. I once started out of T1 without my bike. Somehow I momentarily lost my mind after putting on my helmet and cycling shoes and thought I was starting the run. A volunteer saw me coming towards the run course entrance and began laughing hysterically. It was then that I realized that not only was I going the wrong way, but I was also missing my bike!
   
4. What's the most thrilling thing that's happened to you in a tri? Turning the corner and seeing the finish line at Ironman Wisconsin. Added bonuses were seeing that my time was under 13 hours and catching sight of my family cheering wildly moments before I ran across the finishing line.
   
5. What is something you discovered about yourself by doing triathlons? I discovered that a lot of decisions I've made were based more on fear avoidance than personal fulfillment. Fear of failure. Fear of not being accepted. Fear of not measuring up. Triathlon has taught me to face and exorcise fear which has empowered me to make decisions for more significant reasons than simple fear avoidance.
   
6. What is The Big Goal that you're working towards? The Big Goal this year is Ironman USA. Every day I make sure that I'm doing something to contribute towards the achievement of that goal.
   

Week in Review (1/15 - 1/21)

All workouts continue to be solid. I'm getting a lot better at focusing on the goals of the workouts on my training plan, though it's difficult to follow them to the letter, especially the biking workouts since I'm doing spin classes. This was week 3 of my prep phase - another two more before I start adding more weekly hours as I move into base training.



My time in zone 1 is getting better as well due to a lot of focus keeping my distance workouts in lower heart rate zones. I still think my current heart rate zones are not correct though. My tri club has a coach that offers LT testing so I'm going to arrange a time with him to do that as well as a gait analysis of my run.



I missed my run target this week by a little over ten minutes, though in the grand scheme of things I don't think this will hurt me! My long run was tough because of the weather conditions - snowy and pretty slick. I used this to my advantage though. If you strike with your heel in slick conditions you end up on your butt pretty quickly. So the conditions forced me to focus on running flat footed during the entire run, which will hopefully help my run form along.

Another positive this weeks is that an old groin injury that has been plaguing me for months is starting to go away as is some left side back pain that started creeping in a few weeks ago. I think that switching my stretching routine to yoga and mixing up my core routine has definitely helped, as has dropping the intensity of my workouts due to the prep/base training nature of the workouts.

Anticipation

Sometimes our minds see mountains where there are really mole hills, especially when anxious anticipation is in play.

Over the past couple of weeks I've had a weekly meeting at work that I dread every week. Without getting into details I'm basically spearheading an effort to standardize the use of a particular technology across our division. The other participants in the group are very senior engineers (most more senior than me) whom I have little to no control or leverage over. Despite this I'm expected to drive the team to institutionalize the adoption of technology that many of them would rather not have to deal with.

As the meeting date draws near I begin obsessing over the agenda items. I try to anticipate all the issues and arguments that will arise and how I'll deal with them. I try to be completely prepared for anything because I don't want this particular group to think I'm a fool. Particularly because many in that group will be involved in determining whether or not I get to progress up the company ladder. The morning of the meeting my mind is spinning with various scenarios and agonizing over what I may have forgotten or prepared insufficiently for.

This sounds an awful lot like the run-up to a triathlon doesn't it? You spend tons of time agonizing over your training schedule, your taper approach, your pre/during/post race nutrition, and your gear selections. My wife loves teasing me over the fact that I spend more time obsessing over what goes into my tri-bag than what goes into my suitcase for week long family trips. I have to laugh because she's totally right. And those of you that are OCD like me don't see any problems with this either!

And yet despite all of my obsessing over this meeting I've performed just fine. Many contentious and difficult issues have come up (most of them things I didn't anticipate or prepare for) and yet I've handled each of the issues with calm and controlled ease, coming up with spontaneous solutions or negotiating compromises with the ease of a seasoned politician. My frazzled, overwhelmed "pre game" state is replaced by my intense and focused "game time" state as soon as I enter the room.

I'm able to do this because I've learned to by training for and competing in triathlons. Sure, I'll continue to obsess insessently at ridiculously silly details and scenarios leading up to game time. Did I bring enough clothing? Do I have enough tubes in my tri-bag? What if it rains? Snows? On and on it goes. And yet when I hit the line I'm prepared to accept and deal with whatever the day brings whether I'm fully prepared for it or not.

Week in Review (1/7-1/14)

Overall I'm feeling pretty dang good. Still in prep phase so this week looked a lot like last week. The good news for me was that my energy levels didn't suffer too much this past week so my body is reacting ok to the sudden 30% increase in weekly hours. I've been doing more Yoga to help compensate for the additional load. It's actually accomplishing two things - keeping my fairly limber, and increasing my body awareness - which helps big time when doing form workouts.

I really need to focus on reigning in my Tuesday and Thursday bricks - keeping them at the heart rate I'm supposed to be at. When I feel good I tend to push a hard but I still have a few more weeks at this level before I start adding more time so if I don't reign it in I'll implode soon. Fortunately the overall percentage of time spent going gonzo on the spin bike is low compared to my overall averages - thoguh I don't have data for my swim heart rate so the results may be a twitch off. Graphs show that overall I did a better job of keeping my heart rate more towards zone 1 and minimizing the time spent above zone 3.

Long swim on Friday felt extremely good despite my poor fueling choice the night before (see the Sea Monster post). I had really good balance and rotation throughout the 3K straight set and had enough in the tank to go hard for the last 300 yards or so.

This weekend the weather turned bad so I did three hours of spin bike on Saturday for my long bike (back to back classes plus I showed up an hour early). While not as much fun as being on the road it certainly beat the hell out of sitting in my basement.

Messed up on my navigation for Sunday's long run. At a certain point on the great western trail I had a choice between heading back or heading deeper using an untried route. Of course, I took the untried route, which added 1/2 hour to my planned 2 hour run. I kept the pace pretty slow to avoid causing too much damage though. Good news is that I now have a new 15 mile route which I can reuse later as I move into by base and build phases.

Gory details available on my Training Peaks public site.

Training Time Per Week


Heart Rate Zones

The Sea Monster

While stretching my shoulders a bit after my swim this morning I noticed the woman in the lane next to me was looking at me and desperately trying to suppress a giggle. When she saw me glance over she couldn't contain herself and burst into uncontrollable giggles - her eyes welling up with tears. I quickly tried to decide if she was truly amused or just plain nuts.

"I'm sooooo sorry - I couldn't help it!" She gasped in between giggles.
"Help what?"

More giggles, starting to shake now. I glanced around the pool evaluating possible escape routes.

"It sounded like I was swimming next to a sea monster!" she replied and then launched into an absolute fit of laughter.

Nuts was looking like the right call at this point. And then I got it.

For the record, Indian food the night before a long swim is not a good idea. In fact, it's a very, very bad idea. My stomach was a burning caldron of bubbling marsala chicken and curry laced dal. As I swam I kept having to burp underwater. I guess my burping was a bit louder than I thought.

I promptly joined her in hysterical, shrieking laughter that caused waves to ripple across the pool. What a great start to my day - a 3K TT swim and spontaneous shared laughter with a complete stranger - priceless.

Negative Thoughts

We've all heard it at one time or another. That little voice or thought that whispers in your ear. "You can't do it." "You can't go any further." "You're not fast/strong/good enough." In the midst of struggle and adversity it slithers up from our personal pit of fears and manifests as a thought that invades our consciousness, erodes our resolve, and undermines our confidence.

One thing I've learned from practicing Zen is that these thoughts are really just that. Thoughts. No different from any other thought that rambles its way through our consciousness. They only have meaning to you if you decide to give them meaning. They only affect you if you choose to let them affect you. Thoughts by themselves can't harm you if you don't let them. It's what you do when you get them that determine their affect on you. Do you solider on? Do you quit?

In Zen meditation the idea is not to block all thought. The idea is to not be affected by them. If you can do this then you've essentially blocked the affect that negative thoughts can have on you by not reacting to them. The thoughts will still be there. They still continue to slither through your consciousness like the dark snakes they are, looking for opportunities to snuff out the fires of determination. But you just choose to not be affected by them. You choose to let them come and go without having an affect on your mental state. Do this and you'll take away all the power that negative thoughts have. Master this and you'll master the mind.

Week in Review (1/1 - 1/7)

Last week was my first week of "serious" training in preparation for Ironman USA. I ended up about 40 minutes above plan - due to a bit of floor work on Monday which is normally my off day. I was a bit concerned at how my body would hold up given the sudden increase in workload. I had been working out somewhere in the order of 8 to 10 hours a week but my new plan called for being at 13:20 for my prep period (shooting for 800 annual hours of training). To get there I added an additional bike/run brick on Tuesday evening, a midrange run on Wednesday, and bumped my long bike on Saturday. Everything else remained the same.



Despite the additional load I felt very strong, had good energy, and my form felt solid on all workouts. I did have a tough time keeping my heart rate reigned in on the zone 1 and 2 workouts - especially during my long run on Sunday. Overall though my training graphs show most of my work being done in zone 1 and 2 which is good.



I had been having some issues with my groin and lower back which I now believe were due to inadequate stretching, as well as poorly focused strength training. I've revamped my core/circuit/stretching block to more of a functional strength training approach - mimicking the movements of triathlon under weighted resistance, as well as working on strengthening the supporting muscles in order to avoid imbalances. In addition I've incorporated a lot of Yoga into my stretching routines. This should help me remain relatively injury free through the season. Guess we'll find out!

The gory details on my workouts and results can be found by selecting the "My Training Peaks Data" link on the sidebar.

Tacking

Back when I first moved to the Chicago area I crewed on a J24 racing sailboat for a couple of summers. For a while I played the role of rail monkey (which essentially involves scrambling from side to side as the boat tacks in order to counterbalance - everyone starts here) before "graduating" to managing jib and finally the spinnaker (the big and often colorful sail used when running with the wind - takes a ton of concentration and skill to deploy, fly, and recover).

In order to navigate swiftly around a course it's necessary to periodically perform a maneuver called tacking. This is essentially a combination of changing the heading of the sailboat, redistributing weight, and readjusting the sails to maximize the amount of air they're catching. It's a frantic time - the helmsman steering and shouting orders, the rail monkeys scrambling across to the opposite side rails and trying to avoid getting whacked by the boom as it swings across, the sail owners (those assigned to manage particular sails on the sailboat) adjusting any sails that need to be adjusted, getting them up, getting them down, etc. But once the tack is complete and the sails are trimmed the sailboat leaps forward like a greyhound after a rabbit.

During a tack there's always a point where the sails go slack. The air that once filled them and propelled the sailboat forward is dumped as the sailboat angles head on to the wind at the midway point of the tack. Once the tack is complete the sails are quickly trimmed up by the crew to maximize the amount of air in the sail for the new heading. Failure to properly trim the sails will turn you into a bobber - bouncing up and down on the waves until the sailboat can swing around and pick up the wind again.

I was reminded of all this during today's workouts. The last few weeks I've been midway between a tack. Surprisingly I've gotten in a lot of my "planned" workouts but I've kept them at an easy, relaxed pace, and didn't sweat it when I missed a workout or overindulged a bit at dinner. My sails ruffled in the air and my momentum slowed.

But now I'm on a new heading - my prep period. I've completed the tack and I'm trimming the sails by committing to my plan and bringing the right amount of intensity and seriousness to my workouts and my nutrition. Everything I do from now until July is in preparation for Ironman USA. I can see that particular buoy bobbing up and down in the distance. There will be several tacks needed in order to reach it. From prep, to base, to build phases. During each transition there will be an ever so brief period of slack in the sails as I readjust the heading. But once the tack is complete the sails will be quickly trimmed and I'll be off - running with the wind as alternating splashes of pleasure and pain wash over me.