Ironman 2011 Training Thread

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  • I have just realised that Wales in 5 weeks on Sunday!!! So that leaves 2 full weeks of training left then really! Argh, I signed up in September, where has the year gone?
  • <gulp!>

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    it's ok ... we know what to do in this situation...

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    . PAAAAAANNNNIIIICCCCC
    <runs around arms flailing>

  • Question for the experts out there. I'm in for IM Wales, and as above, only 5 1/2 weeks left. I've been training consistently all year, with a slant towards running, as that's what I struggled with last year in Bolton. SO running this year has been a minimum of three times per week, and I've done a hilly long run over over 13 miles every week this year, and built up to last week where I made 22 miles in 3:40, feeling fresh.

    Swimming is what my swimming will be, made the LCW, and keeping it ticking over so not too concerned.

    Bike is OK, done my long rides, did the LCW 112 miler, and felt OK after, and the last couple of weeks I've been blitzing the local hills, and feeling much better on them.

    However, I feel I have lost some bike speed. So I was thinking of dropping some running, and just keeping it ticking over with one long run per week, keeping the swimming ticking over, as I'm currently doing, and spending the time a normally run in the week, two runs between one and one-and-a-half hours out on the bike, focusing on race pace and higher intensity speed intervals, backed up with my usual long rides, which are generally hilly.

    Any flaws on the plan?
  • good luck LTP, hope the travel, sleeping, race plan, nutrician all go well for you...been a journey to this point...enjoy enjoy enjoy
  • I believe you can track the Regensburg crew on www.ironmanlive.com

    Race reports next week......I hope!

  • Damn, I can't believe I missed Lee. Not sure if you'll get to check the forum before the big day, but if you do GOOD LUCK, I will be thinking about you on Sunday and sending you positive vibes. Enjoy the day, and remember no matter what happens what you have achived getting there is genuinely awesome, and you are my hero.
  • M.Tri - don't see any flaws in that plan at all.

    you may find the bike speed dropping off as you're tackling more hills and been doing a lot of runs.

    my training at the mo is very much bike focused using lots of hills - many of them worse than Tenby and many of them - so I can arrive in Wales and hope the bike will leave me with some semblance of energy before tackling the run which will be hang on for grim death.

    since I developed the hip flexor problem a couple of months ago, my running has taken a back seat so a) I can get the flexor sorted and b) I can carry on biking and swimming. it's fine over short distance but once I get past an hour or try to push the pace, it comes back at me so I'm not going to risk pulling it again so it will have to do. if it goes during the event, I won't worry as long as I can finish - priority is getting to the start line!
  • M.Tri looks good to me as well PBed at Outlaw last year by doing stacks of bike at the expense of run and found the increased bike fitness took care of the run fitness.
    I am gonna up my swimming tho and living near the sea is a bonus cracked another 2 miler sea swim this evening in an hour so looking good on that front plan to do that twice a week I have binned the pool completely

    I am gonna do a stack more MTB ing after IM Wales I was going to build up a steel hardtail as a treat but my budget was pretty tight, then i spotted this http://www.merlincycles.co.uk/Bike+Shop/Bikes/Mountain+Bikes/Kona+Bikes/Kona+Blink+-+2010_K-BLINK.htm

    ticks all the boxes and £500 if you build it from the box it seems a bargain and MRS RBM said I could have it so I got an order in before she changed her mind image Happy Days


  • Thanks for the feedback. Just done my second 22 mile run in a week, and decided it's the last long long run between now and Tenby. Bike focus now, with a mix of speed intervals and hills. Swimming will just tick over.

    Excitement of Tenby building now, website getting updated daily it seems, everything is getting real.
  • One hour turbo this morning.  Just over a week to go now and I'm not sure whether I'm taking it too easy.  Just been doing an hour of running and then biking alternate days.  Very little swimming but I think I know I'll just be slow on that!   Plan a 10 mile run saturday and then a 40 mile bike sunday.  With all the travelling I will have little chance to train for 3 days before the event.

    What will be will be   image

  • nicely blagged bike RBM!

    I have a 95 mile sportive on Sunday over the Sussex hills including the delights of Ditchling Beacon - will be a good test of my legs.

    did a 9 mile run home from the office last night and the hip flexor has started grumbling again. hey ho...
  • FB - what is that sportive? Was hoping to do one on Saturday but couldnt find any as I want to catch the Hyde Park elitet race on Sunday
  • it's the Haywards Heath Howler on Sunday. choice of 3 distances - 93/60/38 miles. entries on the day available if you change your mind

  • FB there's a little stinker of a hill near Ardingly, that you probably know about. Found it doing an SRS Events ride back in early July - Cob Lane...reminded me of the sharp hills on IMW route.

    After the Sportive I have been back to it a few times...and now my back is on the mend I am going to go for more punishment this weekend.
  • Think i'll head out tomorrow instead - if i do a sportive i wont finish at home and be able to follow up with a run

    100+ mile run with an hours run afterwards hopefully image

  • just off with Wilson the mighty iron dog to catch the train down to Par then run the coastal path back to Looe around 22 miles should be stunning image
  • right in the thick of the season now. Some finished, some racing this weekend, a some putting in the final push.

    I did a 4.5K OW non wetsuit yesterday. That was tough without the wetsuit. Will try get in 2 X 5K (wetsuit) and 2X 4K (non-wetsuit) in the time left to IMW.

    My back seems all good now, will go for another physio this week to iron out any more wrinkles.

    Next week will be my last big run, I will try fit it in mid-week and will do 20-22 miles. I'll then keep running ticking over and will prioritise bike...similar to you mtri.

    RBM that coastal path run, sounds like a great session.

    Happy training folks and happy racing Regensburg.
  • Back and totally cream crackered in a good way about 4 hours of very hilly off road running also 3 miles before the end we stopped for a swim in one of the bays and a latte image very civilised
    BIG bike session planned for tomorrow
    Wilson is sleeping now image he is a very tired dog
  • sounds like an awesome session ridge!

    hope everyone has an enjoyable training/racing time this weekend image

    im in the post long ride snoozy zone, 87Mish followed by 15 min run.

  • I'm in that zone WW, 103 miles followed by 1 hour run, now just eating what ever i can get my hands on and catching up on the female's elite hyde park race this morning.

    What i dont like about these long sessions is that they actually take a whole day. I didnt get out the door until 8am this morning and it was 5pm by the time i had finished/cooled down/ showered etc. Fortunately i only have one more next week then can enjoy an extended taper

  • can i ask a cheeky favour? can someone find the thread that i think WildWill started on Run/Walk strategies for an ironman?

    i tried the search function but funnily enough there are a lot of threads with "run" and "walk" within thier text..image

    i'm pretty confident in the strategy i have planned but fancy checking a few things

  • It's getting quieter in here!  Is it just IMW and Henley left? 

    I'm doing my last week of long distances this week but will be reigning in the bike and trying to do some runs now that my foot is better, hopefully 5 weeks before the event some run training will actually help ...

  • CL - we didn't do Cob's Lane thankfully as, after 90 odd miles that included Ditchling Beacon plus numerous other climbs around the Ashdown Forest and elsewhere, it would have been taking the piss to stick a 20% hill in there so close to the finish!

    'twas a tough ride all the same, and getting absolutely drenched in a huge rainstorm didn't help me smile much. not helped by puncturing and another guy behind punctured at the same time so we stopped together....but what a fecking numpty!! he didn't know how to get his rear wheel out and had no tyre levers, didn't know how to use his mini-pump - so I ended up wasting more time showing him what to do. I didn't have the heart to tell him as I left that he hadn't checked inside his tyre to see what might have caused the problem as he saw me doing so.

    3 more weeks of the big stuff and then chill for Wales for 2
  • FB I did Ditchling Beacon a few months ago right at the end of what was a very long ride for me at the time. I managed to fall off going uphill... very embarrassing especially as there were a queue of cars already behind me, each I'm sure had great pleasure going past me as I lay on the floor with a red face!

     I managed to find a 23% hill towards the end of a long ride on Saturday somewhere in either Kent or Surrey... As I sat down and tried to spin up in a low gear I thought my front wheel was going to rise and I would fall backwards it felt that steep!

    My GPS had run out of battery causing me to get extremely lost (nor be able to say where exactly this hill was or prove it... I may have exagerated it a bit, anyway it bl@@dyhurt!)

  • "As I sat down and tried to spin up in a low gear I thought my front wheel was going to rise and I would fall backwards it felt that steep!"

    ah - the old mountain bike problem. had that happen many times on the MTB - you need to get your weight forward on the saddle nose and over the bars to help stop it. easier to say than do though! and 23% is going some - I know a 25% one down here in Zuzzex but it's mercifully short at about 200m at that pitch.

    it was absolutely pissing down on Ditchling Beacon - OK going up, but not so easy coming down with all the water on the road. I hadn't done it for a very long time and I was surprised how easy(ish) I found it - it's just long really.
  • Yeah I found I had to shift forward and even stand on a couple of occasions. Great practise on tired legs though.

     The 23% came from the sign as I approached it, am I right that this only means the steepest part of the hill and not the average? It had a couple of turns in it which really were the steep parts - i dont think the couple of cars were happy being stuck behind me as an older car would definitely had problems. I want to find it again so that I can go back this weekend, might have to play around with a streetmap to see if I recognise anything.

    I think if I went back to DB I would have no problems, as you say it's just lengthy isnt it? (If I remember correctly) When I did it I was barely into my training and it came at the end of a lengthy 75m London - Brighton route, where as before that I dont think I had been over 60m.

  • I think most of the % signs only mean the steepest section - not the average. thankfully!!

    going up DB this little bloke went tootling past me at about twice my pace and standing up but with hardly any rocking around of the frame. I just thought you're taking the piss as he made it look so easy. don't you just hate some people? grrrr
  • On the subject of steepness.... stepth... just back from a very informative recce of the Etape Cymru course, several parts of which appear to require the participant to kit-up with carabiners, crampons and climbing ropes. Most of my biking to date has been relatively flat mile-munching across Cheshire, so I'm especially gutted that nearly 6 hours of clog yesterday amounted to only 63 miles and contributed only 21 training points. Never mind. It was incredibly rewarding stuff - stomping my way up the Horseshoe Pass and down the other side, where my bike speedo stopped reading at 70kph. We got to the bottom, turned a little hairpin over the river and began the climb up past Eglwyseg, through a couple of fords and up over the mountain onto the moors, where we said hello to a frighteningly fit pair of Wrecsam Tri guys in training for IMW. We topped out at about 420 metres and I'm reliably informed that there are parts of the climb that are approx 25%. As per your note above, FB, it was fairly galling to have a local guy swan past on a milk ride as i ground out every horrible pedal turn. The scenery up there, combined with the sense of achievement were easily not worth the pain..... just kidding!! Threw in a few more climbs and managed almost 1,000 metres of ascent in the first 15 miles.

    I'm hopeful that this is going to see me in good stead for the Vit. And also for the full Etape in early Oct. It would be really cool to ride that event with some of you, so if you fancy it, let me know. I'll put a separate thread up because I'm sure the little description above will have tempted the masochists among you! 

  • Also on the subject of hills............. I'm off to attempt Embrunman tomorrow  image

    The whole family are going and we're driving down, which will be an achievement in itself!   Setting off at 0330hrs for a 0800hrs ferry from Dover.  The race is next monday the 15th August.

    I'm absolutely /forum/smilies/confused_smiley.gif[/img]h@ting]sh@ting it but i always knew that this might be a race which just spits me out and leaves me by the side of a road sobbing like a true Englishman!

    I know that some of you have expressed an interest in this race in the past so i will write a report when I get back to assist any of you who want a go in the future.

    I dont possess gadgets like I Phones so any updates will have to wait till I get back from France (hopefully!) in a weeks time.

    Au Revoir   image

  • Hi Slim, I did wonder which race you were doing when you said you had a week to go, couldn't think of one.  Just looked up Embrunman, it's all in French and I didn't pay much attention in French class at school, but it looks like there is a big hill in the middle of it ...?

    Good luck, look forward to reading your race report! image

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