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Setting my sights Tri
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Good luck with the half mara, I did one once with hardly any training under my belt (in fact it's the only half mara I've done). It hurt but proved I could do it, which was the main thing as I was returning to normal exercise after serious bronchitis and onset of exercise induced asthma. Inhalers are wonderful things!
You have some good distance races planned but I wouldn't worry about the Oly too much. I've never done one, but mainly because they are mostly sea swims and I hate saltwater. I did pool-based sprints in Feb and April last year then a HIM in December.
For winter training I'd suggest doing your midweek rides on the trainer, or spin classes if you like them, and a long ride outside. see if you live near any other keen cyclists who will keep you company, also makes you less likely to pike out too.
Summer down here is great, bit humid though. Reaching temps of 27 in our neck of the woods but a couple of degrees less at Taupo. Looking forward to hitting the course at the weekend for my last really big weekend.
Trog - The winter training is a real problem, more so for the bike though where the winds and ice make it unsafe, and whilst 5 hour rides through the Peak district in May were great for IMA, then sitting in a garage for 5 hours is no fun at all.
Currently I'm slumping around with the worlds worst cold that I've had for a fortnight now. Don't underestimate the problems of winter training.
Not sure I like the idea of cylcing round the Peak district - sounds like an awful lot like hard work to me!! This winter hasn't been too bad so far down here in Surrey. Sods law will dictate that next winter will be constant snow, ice and gales so I'll have to be confined to indoor cycling.
Only reason for wanting to do an oly is for confidence; seems like an awfully big step up from sprint to middle distance. Most of the ones I've looked at so far are lake swims though a couple are sea. Not done any open water yet (obviously) but not too worried about the thought of it. Reality might be different, only time will tell. Fortunately there are two or three open water swim lakes not to far from here so come will be heading out to try it for real at teh earliest opportunity.
D74 - few people I know have had long term colds this year. Hope you manage to shift yours soon, must be really frustrating.
I'm with you on the step up idea..... I've only done sprints and am doing Cowman and Vit this year. I've only got 3 weekends to find an oly - onto the BTA threads soon......
Things are looking up. Not sure if it's the lovely weather over the past few days, the effect of circuit training finally kicking my core/back into activity, reestablishing steady routine or a combination of all these, but finally my running at least seems to be getting back on track and motivation has returned.
Improvement started with steady 5.8 miles last Wednesday which I managed with no probs; speedwork on Thursday (7x800m) was much closer to what I would expect for that session; XC race on Saturday felt like I was running really slowly but averaged 9.30m/m which whilst still relatively slow, is a good minute per mile quicker than I've managed recently. Finally 10k race yesterday was only just over the hour, again some way off pb but still a satisfactory step in the right direction.
On top of all this, I am now the proud possessor of a very smart shiny new bike. Spent far too much and it's probably much higher spec than I actually need but what the heck. Having ridden up and down my road a few times on Saturday to try to get used to clipless pedals, I ventured out on real roads today albeit on an almost entirely left handed circuit, just to get a feel for it, run through the gears etc. Sooooo much nicer than my old bike and more comfortable too, though only did about 10 miles so wouldn't expect to suffer any major discomfort over that short a distance anyway.
Still haven't decided on an oly event though probably going to go for Merchant Taylor on 18/5. Only others that caught my eye are in late July/August which might be a bit too close to Vit for me.
You normally need to allow a week to recover frome a sprint or oly (perhaps up to 2 weeks after an Oly to recover if you really gun it).
Just heard from the first of the crew to arrive in NZ. He'd not had the best of flights and arrived totally knackered. Fell asleep whilst eating, so he was suggesting making sure in your plans to get there early! He went via HK, which I seem to remember is the 'wrong way' for jet lag. Going via LAX is supposed to be better I think.
Glad things are picking up Trog. GFI
Interesting comment on recovery times above. Is recovery a complete rest or just an easy week in the normal schedule of training?
The recovery time post oly for me more of a confidence thing. Since Vit is my main target for the year and anything above sprint is unknown territory would rather get the oly out the way early. I do have this tendency to think 'there's stacks of time to train' and suddenly realise that there isn't
So, if I do the oly early it'll give me a training target to ensure I don't slack off cos I know I can finish a sprint without huge amounts of training. Post oly I'll be in a well established training routine (I hope), the race will give be a better idea of weak areas, so will then be able to adjust training accordingly. That's the theory anyway!
When are you travelling D74? I've been both ways to but can't remember which was more tiring. On any long haul flight my strategy tends to be, eat whatever is offered, drink lots of water, sleep as much as possible and try to get into new time zone while in the air, so if early morning arrival, make sure I sleep for last part of journey; if later arrival, stay awake for last part of journey. Haven't really given much thought about travel particulars yet, depends how much time I can actually spend out there. Think last time, when I went via HK, I had about a week prior to marathon and felt pretty well adjusted to time change after a couple of days. I guess a lot depends on how hassle free or otherwise the actual journey is. I'll probably aim for at least 10 days before the event so I can spend some reasonable time with my friends before heading to Taupo for Tues/Wed of race week. Of course I may be able to persuade them to take time off and spend the whole week in Taupo with me but it's a bit far in advance to start worrying about that sort of detail yet!
The last time I travelled to NZ I went via LA and slept for the second half of the journey so that when i arrived at 5am I would be alert. Managed to stay awake until 8.30pm when i started to doze off during Mythbusters. The next day I felt fine and don't even think I had jet lag at all.
The trip before that I left the UK late at night and went via Singapore, arriving in NZ around lunchtime. Stayed up until a reasonable hour then had to wake up early enough to get to work for 8am the next day (do not do this!).
As for recovery, I've not done an Oly but when I did my half ironman in December I went for an hour's fast walk the next morning to shake off the aches and had the next day off too then all training was back to normal. I don't worry too much after a sprintl, maybe have a lie in and do a session after work (but nothing too strenuous).
I fly next Thursday via LAX. I think Andy's problem was that they didn't sleep at any point on the flight. Too excited looking at glaciers over greenland, then it was a bumpy flight from LAX to AKL and they are nervous flyers so didn't get any rest.
I am so chomping at the bit to get out of here and to the airport. Would be even better if I'd done any training whatsoever!
I envy you going at all. Ah well, only 54 weeks or so to wait!
It will fly by. The last 22 weeks have been really quick when i think about it. In that time I've managed to fit in a few bike races and a half ironman.
Also had to work heaps and keep the other half sweet (yes dear, i know we're going to Taupo again but I'll buy you a curry to keep you happy).
Well, entry is in and flights are booked. 283 days to go.
Did my first Oly (Merchant Taylor Tri) a couple of weeks ago and enjoyed it. Was expecting to struggle on the bike - it's not the flattest of rides - but actually found it easier than expected so obviously the regular rides around Box Hill are paying off. Time wasn't anything special (3:35:44) but each section was quicker than I was expecting so pleased with that.
Now I just have to get my head into serious 'you need to train properly' mode. Swimming confidence has dropped a bit since I did an endless pool session and saw how rubbish my stroke appears. Also tend to be very tense around shoulders/neck for first 500m or so of OW sessions for some reason.
Next on the calender is a sprint tri at the end of June then Vitruvian in September wih the usual assorted local running races thrown in for good measure.
260 days to go.
Reading the Bala reports has frightened me into starting to take a slightly more serious approach to training for Vit.
Swimming is coming on nicely and am now feeling more comfortable in OW. Did 2 circuits of Heron for the past couple of weeks (so 1800m ish). Dont have a waterproof watch so no real idea how long it took. Just one lap yesterday, partly cos I slept through the alarm so was running a bit late and partly cos I gave blood on Tuesday so didn't want to overdo it. As it happens, I got into a good rhythm much quicker than previously and felt generally more relaxed and comfortable.
Have been neglecting the bike a bit since oly in mid May but have been out twice this week and have a 48 mile charity ride on Sunday. This morning's ride included twice up Box Hill - oddly second time up was easier. The downhills were great - mucho wheeeeeeeeee factor!
Running has been going really well. Feeling the cross training benefits of swim/bike training - even managed a pb at the local 5k time trial last week. Struggled a bit at tonights speedwork session though. Blood doning didn't seem to affect me on the bike this morning but definitely felt the effect this evening which didn't really surprise me. Should be back on form by next week hopefully.
Looking forward to Beaulieu sprint tri next weekend.
Longest bike ride to date today. A 48 mile charity bike ride with Happychap which included (for anyone who knows the Surrey area) Leith Hill, which I expected to be tougher than it was, White Down which defeated me and a slightly less nasty hill somewhere around Ranmore which I just about conquered by thinking of the Pirates in Nice and borrowing Mick n Phil's chant of 'easy, easy, easy'. There was also an unexpectedly long climb quite early on which seemed to go on for ever.
First opportunity to really try out aerobars and associated profile bottle. Found the bars pretty comfortable though need more practice to increase confidence: first sign of slightly uneven road surface has me back on the hoods. Found the bottle almost impossible to drink from.
Highlights of the day: first caused major amusement to Happychap watching me trying to take a drink from aerobar bottle. Second was major fit of the giggles after losing the 'squeegy' out of the top of the bottle resulting in me getting a cooling shower every time I hit a slight bump.
Lessons learned:
1. need to adapt drinking tube in aero bottle so I can actually use it
2. need to find someway to keep squeegy in aero bottle
3. don't look too far ahead when going up tough hills; it's demoralising and invites failure!
We were out for about 5hrs but 1hr of that was spent at assorted refreshment stops. So not the fastest ride out but, given that I've not been much beyond 30 miles before and there were some toughish climbs, a good day all the same.
Hehehe
Queen of the Mountains
Just found this thread Trogs - you kept it quiet.
It's an exciting time you IMNZ me IMCH. Interesting reading about the bike - we need to do lots and lots. I can feel a lesson in the endless pool coming on as well.
I know you said it dented your confidence but you've been much better in the swim since. Was it that or the Monday swim sessions with Colin do you think?
HC - probably the Monday sessions in combination with reading/watching lots of online stuff and TI DVD. Plus I think seeing footage of myself thrashing around made me aware of the many bad points so made me concentrate on improving those aspects.
D74 - hiya! Thanks I'll try the straw through mesh method when I've got a replacement mesh. I was amazed how long it kept on splashing - still got the occasional splash when there was less than 1cm in bottom of bottle. Kept me amused though
Hi Trog - I'm going to be with you in NZ - we've managed to sort out flying opver a week in advance and have a load of info about getting around thanks to D74. Not got anything booked other than the time off!
Flights will be next month with bonuses.....
That'll be 3 Pirates then assuming we all make it to the start line, which I'm sure we will.
I've got friends in Auckland and Palmerston North so will spend most of my time with them. Have been to NZ a couple of times before so have done much of the main tourist bits. One friend knows someone with a holiday home in Taupo so she's investigating whether it's available for our use during IM week.
deleting double post
Trog, you've got a good training route if it takes in Box and Leith hills and white down.
Re the aero bottle I had the same problem. In fact the yellow thing flew out in whitstable the other day and when I stopped an old dear on the path shouted out "I thought that was your brain love"! I've now drilled a hole either side of the hole and use a cable tie to keep the mesh in place. I also found I couldn't drink when on the aero bars. But can if I go down to the drops as I can bend my arms more and still see where I'm going. It doesn't help that I cut the tube too short!! Oops.
Trog - My father in law is in near Aukland and I think will be coming down to support.
We've not started any organising yet - plenty of time. Last time we just booked our flights and the first hotel and played it by ear after that - had a great adventure.
Happychap's been draging me up Box Hill every week since about May and for the last few weeks we've been going up twice. HC usually disappears into the distance fairly early on though. She's much stronger than me on the bike and I'm sure was only beaten by the hills on Sunday cos she was on her old bike.
As for White Down and Leith, I shall keep those for special occasions! I shall have to go back to conquer White Down but need to work on leg strength and hill technique first. Having said that, if I start from home and then follow the route we did on Sunday it'd give me a total ride of nearly 70miles so might try to do it a couple of times before Vit. Not sure I'd want to do it during the winter though when I'm going to have to do most of my long rides cos I suspect it might get a little slippery when wet.
Aerobottle tip noted. Wiggle do spare parts if you haven't got suitable bit of plastic tube lying around.
You're very kind
My head had a serious attack of the CBA's up White Down. And I had a very nice gentleman to look after as your stormed up the hill. Kick your a@se next time.
I have been thinking though...
Can't believe I haven't spotted you two on the Box.... but hopefully I won't be going back there any time very soon....
As for the yellow mesh, you should have done a loop of Windsor bike after the Oly race - I did last year and picked up loads of spares
We sneak out early HW so no-one can see us.
It really helps with the Sandbagging later
HC - would hardly describe my ascent on Sun as 'stormed' and I have no doubt that you'd have no trouble beating me up if you put your mind to it and no, that's not a challenge
.
Nice relaxed swim at Heron yesterday - two laps in about 40mins. I seem to be getting better at swimming in a straight line or perhaps I'm just getting better at sighting - though did almost manage to swim into the bank at one point
Twice up Box this morning. The hill itself was no harder or easier than usual though it does seem to be getting shorter. Rest of the ride was pretty rubbish, struggled to maintain a decent speed or cadence, even on the flat bits.
Found a temporary solution for lack of mesh for aerobottle - cut a circular bit from a kitchen sponge and jammed that in the top. Can't refill on the move but it does keep the water in. Plus, if it's hot (and the road is smooth), water absorbed by sponge could be squeezed over head!