Third race of the year

What: Bedford Traktors Tri 

Where: Bedford, Bedfordshire, UK
Organiser: Galeforce Events
Course details: http://www.galeforce-events.com/
Distance: Swim 400m (Pool), Cycle 25km (Road), Run 5km (Tarmac path around park)
Closed Roads: No
Marshaling: Marshals at every major turn and junction. Sign-posts at every turn.
Facilities: Toilets/changing/showers in leisure centre, lockers, café, warm up swim area, tri shop, massage (not free)
Technical: Chip timing. Mats at swim out, bike out, bike in, finish
Freebies: T-Shirt (pretty reasonable), 2 chocolate bars, juice box, bananas and water at finish

This would be the third time I was going to tackle this course, one which I actually quite like.  I was doing it to support my Dad, it was his first triathlon last year and he had a score to settle after pulling out in the autumn version of this race. I just wanted to get around in a time that didn’t put me to shame.  I’ve been a bit lazy since I got back from Barcelona. I’ve only averaged 4 hours of training a week if you include my commute to work. Cue some frantic swim sessions during the week to check I could still swim short distances quickly, bizarrely all the LSD swimming has improved my short swims too. Nice healthy dinner of fish and chips (oven cooked at home) earlish night and up at 5am.  Packed the bikes into the car and off to registration at 6:15.  Registered, got marked up, got a free t-shirt (possibly even wearable in public) and back to the car to get the kit ready.  Racked my bike then started to have a panic over which glasses to wear.  It was cloudy and spitting with rain. Sunglasses? Or high contrast glasses? Cloud not so thick so thought I’d go with the sunglasses. Met a few people in transition and had a chat, finding out that there were road works on a blind corner on part of the bike route. With traffic lights. That wasn’t to be a problem though as they explained in the race brief they had put a marshal there to take numbers and stopped time.  Cue more rain and a swift decision to change glasses before transition closed.  The end of the race brief signalled time to head into the pool and to the hidden toilets to tend to the pre-race AD before there was much of a que.  After a couple of trips and an Imodium I was confident I had done a better job than BP and there would be no environmental disaster. Headed outside to turn my Garmin on and then poolside to collect my chip and warm up.

The format for the swim is number order start about every 15s so had a chance to talk to the lady in front of me, who I assured that I wasn’t swimming that well so would be unlikely to catch her up.  Then my turn came to swim.  The swim was pretty uneventful really I kept my distance from the person in front, but made over 66m on the person behind.  I hit the halfway point on 3min 11s and finished pretty much bang on my estimate of 6m 40s.  One of the nice things about this tri is that they left you use the steps to climb out the pool. Out the door and into transition. Glasses on, number on, hat on, umm, shoes! Shoes on, bike, and off to the mount line. Hopped on the bike passed a couple of people in the car park then out onto the road.

Having told the nice lady in front of me that the swim is my strongest discipline and she would no doubt take chunks out of me on the bike and run (she looked pretty fit) I passed her within the first 200m and never saw her till after I had finished. I soon found that I’d done the straps on my shoes up wrong and the right one was catching on the teeth of the chainring, so had to slow down, undo the strap a bit and put the end on the Velcro. Was still flying along though and got lucky at the first set of traffic lights.  Thought I was going to get stopped as there was a car waiting on the other part of the junction, but they stayed green for me. I nailed it through the next village and up the hill. Short break on the flat than powered on again down onto the end of the bypass and into the next village. Check of the watch and a little maths suggested I was averaging over 30 km/h. Sweet. Along the rolling country lanes and got overtaken for the first time, I had been three up at that point. But my carbon-trick-bike-and-pointy-hat guy was always going to be faster than me so now shame there.  Then to the traffic lights, I could see they were red coming up to first corner, but then saw a fluorescent vest bobbing up and down in front of them. It was the marshall doing star jumps to get them to change, which they did. Thanks given to the obviously dedicated marshals as I passed. Round the corner, slow, left handed, accelerate, slow, left hander. Quick drink before tackling the hill. Two more carbon trick bikes passed me on the way up then settle in for the short, sharp, seat of the pants descent into an almost blind T junction. Nice flat ride on the tri bars before the last major hill. One more fast guy passed me before the descent, where I overtook him and another slow rider, settle down on the tri bars again and the last 5K back to transition.  Little bit of cat and mouse with the fast guy on the way back before the dismount line, where he decided to stop before the line and get off. Having taken his feet out of his shoes. What was the point. Quick trip through transition and onto the run course.

As I exit transition there is my dad doing his third lap, give some encouragement and power off. Next up was one of my Dad’s friends, ask him how many laps he’s done (he beat me in the Autumn one, so I had a score to settle there) and get “one” as the reply, hmm, could be close.  Then an uneventful run.  I have to say I felt pretty strong on it though, although the kids doing the aquathon took some of humility. Didn’t get chicked by a little girl though, so can retain some male pride. Final lap and put everything I had into the last 500m, quick glance at the watch and I was flying. Up the finish chute and get a mention over the PA “James from Bridgtown” over the line and remember to stop my watch.

Look at the history and see 1:17:30, less 5 seconds for the early start, 1:17:25 unofficial. 3 minutes 39 seconds faster than last year, and a 21 minute 5K. Awesome. Great event, great organiser (I do like their events, done 4 tri’s with them and all have been great) and well marshalled.

VOtwo 3.8km swim at Box End

Where: Box End Park, Bedford Google Map
Organiser: VOtwo
Course details: http://www.votwo.co.uk/votwo2007/docs/Long%20swim%20@%20Box%20End%20final%20details.pdf
Distance: Swim 3800m (OW- Lake)
Marshalling: NA
Facilities: Showers/Toilets/Changing in waterski centre facilities. Café serving breakfast rolls for spectators (and finishers too I guess)
Technical: 3 clockwise laps of the larger lake then out and finish on land through gantry.
Freebies: Swim hat. Water/Tea/Coffee. Various cakes, cereal bars and pureed fruit bars.

Having bought a helix this year I really want to do some swim events, so after doing the Bournemouth version of this last year decided I would try and do 3/4 in the series this year.  First race was at Box End, just outside Bedford. A waterski lake about 3km from my parents house in the fields around where I grew up.  I did a sprint tri there last year (in the other, smaller, lake) so had some idea of what to expect.  Although with all the hot weather recently I was a bit concerned about it becoming a non-wetsuit swim.  And just to calm my almost nonexistent nerves last night my mum pointed out that someone had to retire from the sprint event last year after a rather nasty bite from a fish. They get into the lake when the river floods, with no fisherman to catch them they grow quite big.  Thanks mum.

Got up and had my usual pre race breakfast at the appointed time then my dad drove me around to register before the start.  The car park looked pretty full so there was going to be some competition. Registered, got my swim hat then donned my wetsuit ready for action. Made sure the right bit of my neck was bodyglided this time (shoulders to hair line just to be sure) and didn’t pull the suit up too high like in Barcelona. Race brief and into the water. Rather nice temperature actually, and I made it a bit warmer too.  Took a few warm up strokes and positioned myself on the left side 3 people back.  Got the countdown, with a ‘sometime in the next 5 secs’ supposedly to avoid false starts. Airhorn and we were off.

Seems I had positioned myself about right as I kept roughly on the feet of the person in front and no one swam over the top of me.  All was going well for the first 300m till some idiot decided to swim from the left side to the right side at 45 degrees to everyone. Managed to swim into me knocking my left goggle off. Onto back, empty goggle, start again, only lost about 10secs I think, but annoyed me. Then on to the melee that was the first turn. I ended up in the middle of a pack here so had to take a slightly wider line, but made came in on the inside at the next buoy 100m away. Tight rollover turn that Mr C showed us on the rookie day and I was off, quick check of the watch and a bit over 10 mins, good pacing, if not a little quick.  Somehow managed to get disorientated and ended up on the far left again though, until I started swimming through weed, back onto the inside line searching for some feet to draft off but finding none.  Down to the start area and another couple of buoys, nice tight turns again and onto the second lap. 20mins 10s done

The first leg of the second lap is where things started to go wrong.  I nodded off a bit and next thing I knew I was about 10m further inside the course than the direct line. Whoops, what an idiot. Sighting, Sighting, Sighting. Thought I’d try breathing every 3 to keep an eye on people swimming the correct line whilst I corrected but abandoned that when I started to feel dizzy. Then just as I approach the first turn buoy my swim hat starts to feel funny, then it stopped feeling funny. I guess that was the moment I lost the organizers swim hat. On to the second buoy and a split of 10:35, pacing still good then.  The rest of the lap was pretty uneventful.  22:04s for the lap.

First leg of the third lap and I repeat the mistake of the second lap. What an idiot. Make a major correction and get in with a pack of other swimmers, holding on to most of them till the second buoy, by which stage my tight turns and extra power opened up a bit of water and I closed on the next grouping. About 400m from the finish I upped my speed, turned out that was about 100m too soon and the woman I passed on the final stretch chicked me with 50m to go. Numpty, there wasn’t enough left in the tank to go after her though as she had saved more than me. Up to finish and I kept swimming longer than the people in front. I swear I got some strange looks from a few of the spectators for doing that. Up onto my legs. I can stand, run up to the finish in a time of 1:04:58 – better than I had hoped given my 1900m time was 34 mins 3 weeks ago.

Run Leg

Bike Leg

Swim Leg, and part of the bike leg

I finished it!

Swim start

After the pro women went off I got in the water to warm up.  Acclimatised to the water as per rookie day then got 200m or so of swimming out and in to warm up.

15 minutes before the start was called into the pre start box with all the other pink swim capped, neoprene clad madmen.  I can feel my heart beating now, faster than normal rest rate.  At this point I realise I put my and goggles on but forgot to put my Garmin on.  Muppet.  Run out of pre start to find my Mum who had the bag with it in, slap it on wrist and regain composure.  Course was an L shape; out 200m from the beach, right turn, along 600m, left turn, out 100m, left turn, along 800m, left turn, 300m into shore.  The buoys were nice big 4ft inflatables with 12x4ft sausages tied to them.  They looked huge from the shore, but once in the water that was to change.  The slight swell made the last one was near invisible, especially with the first turn buoy close by to confuse you.  The yellow caps went off and we had 10 minutes and into the start box.  I tried to positioned myself on the left hand (outside) side of the start as the first turn was a right hander.  This was to prove one of my best decisions of the day.  A few people felt they had more of a God-given right to be at the front than me so I started 3 back.  1 minute to go and everybody is encouraged to clap.  Then the airhorn sounds and we’re off.

The oh so keen starters were not in fact top swimmers and I was soon swimming straight over the top of people.  I was surprised at how smooth neoprene sliding over neoprene is.  I managed to stay on the outside of the pack into the buoy and put in a wide turn.  I had made the perfect start decision, there must have been 15-20 people treading water at the buoy as the sausage had blocked there turn as the mid and left sides had pushed them back.  I was however set up for an inside line at the next buoy.  This leg was uneventful, but seemed to last forever, I was worried that my swim was going to be appaling.  As I approached the buoy I had a look and it was only 13 minutes in, 800m in 13 minutes, not bad all things considered.  I had the inside line at the buoy and executed a flawless 90 degree rollover turn and on to the next one 100m away, another perfect turn and on to the long homeward stretch.  Sighting was a bit useless here, the buoy was so far off that it was hard to tell which was which, so I just sighted on the mass of heads and frothing water till I got near the bouy.  A few near misses with feet on the leg, but still hadn’t been kicked.  My goggles had a bit of water in them though  I thought I only had 500m to go so left it, turns out I was looking at the wrong buoy and actually had 700m to go, but by the time I realised I had decided to just soldier on.  Another perfect turn and into the beach, this was a bit more of a melee as people tried to position themselves.  I came in great till I could touch the bottom, hit button on Garmin, fill suit with water and stand up.  Out onto the carpet and I’m already getting the suit off, 20m from the water and I have the top half off, running well.  I may have overkicked in the swim or the compression thingies in the new Helix may do exactly what they are designed to.

34 minutes 22 seconds

T1

Into the tent, find my bags, rest of the wetsuit off.  It knocks the timing chip off with it so repkace that.  Get red bag, glasses on, helmet on, number of, sit down, socks on, shoes on, wetsuit goggles & hat in bag, rehang bag, out to bike. Get to bike and push out to mount line, on bike and I’m off.  Push button on Garmin and I’m flying, lots of people out cheering.

4 minutes 7 seconds

Cycle

Look down at the garmin after 500m and see all it is saying is “recovery heart rate”. F***. I think it is doing its best impression of crashing again. Stop and start it, nothing, hmmm.  Will deal with it when I get out of town. Negotiate the narrow streets and a nasty speed bump and before I know it I’m at the first aid station (3km), decide I don’t need anything anyway and push on. Realise what I had done with the Garmin is push the stop button not the lap button and everything is fine again, but missing the first 3km (which I semi sulked about the rest of the bike and run legs) 5km in and I’m starting to overtake the carbon + deep rim trick bikes.  What am I doing wrong? Am I going to blow up? Then I see two police motorcyclists with blues flashing, they were leading the elite men around, 5 minutes later they had rounded the turn mark and were passing me on their second lap. Overtaking more and more blinged up road and TT bikes now, on my entry level alloy+Tiagra bike.  What if I had a pimped out bike?  Avergaing 38 km/h on the flat but the headwind was bugging me now.  So were the 2 guys that I was playing leap frog with.  Approaching the turn mark at the far end of the course in Matro at this point, get bottle from frame and refill aerobottle, then whilst trying to put it bake in the cage drop it, in the middle of the course, oh well.  Turn and into the aid station.  This is where I should have learnt some Spanish, at least the Spanish for “isotonic” and “energy” .  That way I wouldn’t have taken the bottle from the guy shouting aqua blah blah blah thinking he meant water with energy stuff.  I didn’t learn this till after the next aid station, as the 1.5l I took with me lasted till just after the third aid station pass.  Still screaming along I decide to take some solid food (energy bar) onboard as about an hour had passed.  Mistake number one was not opening the packets pre race.  Number two was not wetting mouth before taking a large bite. Number three was drinking energy drink to try and wash it down.  Needless to say I didn’t finish the bar. Before I knew it I was at the halfway point, 1 hour 14 minutes after I had got the Garmin working properly.  WTF!  That was a pretty dammed fast 45K.  After taking another bottle from the first guy at the aid station I set off up the ‘slope’ out of it, noticing that KM marker 666 lies at the peak of the ascent/apex of bend. Now I start overtaking female races who must have started 20/25 minutes before me.  Slightly lower speeds now, only making 36km/h on the flat and still wondering if I had overcooked it. Empty my aerobottle and refill from the first bottle I took from the aid station.  Take a sip and realise it is plain aqua, not aqua with anything, plain old aqua.  Balls.  Then as I rethink my nutrition strategy my stomach decides I doesn’t want to hold onto it’s contents and I just stop short of projectile vomiting whilst doing 40 km/h ‘downhill’ on the aerobars.  Hmm, I slowly finish the water off over the next 15km and take a bottle from the middle guy at the final aid station, refill aerobottle and it’s isotonic, phew.  I was still catching quite a few people, they obviously went off much harder than me and it had caught up with them.  I got ‘chicked’ at this point.  The only time on the bike leg in fact. There were now a fair number of Spaniards lining the streets cheering everybody on, which was very nice as I needed all the encouragement I could get on the few short ascents there were.  I used the little ring more on this lap.  As I passed KM marker 650 my saddle and my perineum decided that they were going to become mortal enemies over the final 18, letting me know of every dispute they had.  But still I soldiered on..  At this point the phantom disc rider kept appearing behind me, every now and then I could have sworn I heard someone dropping don a gear and the sound of carbon rims on tarmac but everytime I looked back there was clear road for 200m.  Coming to the end of the lap and it was up the hill to KM marker 666.  The grim reaper decided he wanted my quads as I passed it, ouch they burned. Just the final stretch through the town now and back into T2.

2 hours 35 minutes 54 seconds

T2

I don’t really remember T2, my bike was in it’s rack and I finished in running kit so I must have passed through it, but I just can’t remember it.

58 seconds

Run

If there is one word to describe the run it is ouch.  I started off quite strong, running at 12km/h so I eased off to 11.3 km/h to avoid blowing up.  There was an aid station at the start, but the next one couldn’t come soon enough as I pounded the tarmac in the midday sun.  Water and isotonic here, most of the water went over me, but some was swallowed.  It came in little bottle which was nice though, no stupid cups.  About 4km in and I had my next reflux moment.  I couldn’t stomach High5 energy gels last time I used them on a ½ marathon, so decided to avoid them like the plague at aid stations to try and stave off the stomach problems.  Next thing I now there is a little boy on a bike appearing in front of me.  The course was well marshalled by the local police at virtually every pedestrian crossing, but this one had slipped the net and I missed kicking the wheel of his bike (and probably face planting) by less than an inch.  By km 5 my bladder was bothering so I stopped by a mound of earth and had a pee, turns out it was outside a sewage works, a little thing that amused me for a while.  At the turn point ¼ way into the course and the next aid station.  I took on Gatorade, a handful of orange quarters and a bottle of water.  The oranges were wonderful and were to become my fuel at the aid stations.  Back pounding the pavement and I had obviously picked some sand or something up in T1 as the ball of my left foot was raw, every footstep hurt.  My quads were starting to tighten and I was sinking into the ironman shuffle.  I think I managed to run tall for the rest of the race with Conehead’s words ringing in my ears, but my quads were having none of the high knees so I was still shuffling.  Plodded on for the next 5km and back into the race area and the next aid station (which you go through twice in 500m) more sweet, oranges and a ramp up into the bike park, around the edge of that, and then a taunting run past the finish chute before doing the whole thing again. Still a 58 min first 10.55km.  All I remember about the second lap is that 2.5km is too far between aid stations, my feet hurt like hell and my quads and I were not on speaking terms anymore.  I think I got ‘chicked’ a lot as well.  A walk-run strategy was employed till the last 2K when something inside of me fired up and I pushed on at 12km/h to the finish.  Finishing nice and strong, up over the line, before two nice girls walked me to the recovery area past someone who handed me a medal and shook my hand and lots more people that wanted to shake my hand

2 hours 03 minutes 30 seconds

I passed the line on 5hr 53 minutes and 51 seconds, having started 35 minutes after the first wave.  I am now a middle distance triathlete (not Ironman branded, so not a half ironman) with a fairly respectable 5hr18min51s finish having run a 2hr03min half marathon finish.

A low volume week.

Monday was some sort of recovery run.  Turned up the club run session, which was descending sets.5 min run, 5 rest, 4 run, 4 rest....1 run.  I didn't run too hard during the ons, and slow jogged during the some of the rest breaks.  Calf felt a bit tight, guess that is to be expected.  A decent run season all told, felt much better for having gone out and done it.  Nearly 8km in total.

Tuesday was my swim session, was the only one in the lane reserved for the club for the first 30 minutes so got quite a few dirty looks from the other people crowded into the other lanes. Oh well.  After 400m of crawl and backstroke to warm up a healthy dose of kick sets then some drills.  Did some drill sets then, 75m sets of 25 kick, 25 drill, and 25 full stroke with 10s between sets.  Quite like these as it gets kick and drills working together without getting boring.  Main set of 5x200m on 4:00 and then some more kick to finish off.

Wednesday brought my weekly spin session.  Forgot my HRM so felt rather naked during it.  Didn't have the benefit of the fan either so ended up rather hot.  Felt like I had actually worked hard after it though.

Thursday was to be my rest day, in the end I've had three (Saturday and Sunday too, oops).

Friday was my second swim session of the week at the club session.  Reasonable warm up of 4 x 125m then a  10x100m main set.  Coming in on 1:43 ish.  Not wonderful, really want my shoulder to get better so I can improve on it.

D day is getting closer and my training is suffering badly now, not gonna have much time in the evenings for trainings for a while whilst I try and finish my thesis.  Hopefully something good will happen next week.

T minus 13 weeks and a 10K PB

I seem to have moved to weekly updates to this blog, a side effect of writing a thesis during the rest of the day.

Monday was the club "run" session.  Running was not the main activity, it was suppoosed to be simulated hill reps, and consisted of doing 40 squats, 125m sprint, 30 squats, 250m sprint, 20 squats, 375m sprint, 10 squats, 500m sprint.  Then back down the pyramid.  Did I mention the squats as a warm up and cool down?  Well I'd call that a squat session personally, it felt nothing like hill running.

Tuesday morning brought the swim session.  It went rather well for me.  It was made up on the fly, but I managed most of the session before I felt anything from my shoulder.  Plenty of kick sets and some 200m efforts.  The afternoon is when Monday's squat session caught up with me.  My legs started to hurt a fair bit, so compression tights on as soon as I got home, and slept in them overnight.

Wednesday morning and the compression had done nothing for my DOMS, no morning swim.  Come the evening they had loosened a bit, but not much.  Wednesday evening was a spinning session.  Turned up to the gym 30 minutes early to run on the treadmill first only to find them all in use.  Mostly with women walking on them. What is the point of that? Really what is the point of going to the gym, getting on a treadmill and walking at 5 km/h with no incline?  Is there any cardiovascular benefit from it?  I could rant for hours on this subject and my proposed solutions to the problem, but if you've read this far I don't want to bore you too much.  Eventually managed to get on one for 15 mins before spinning, a reasonable 2.5km effort at 2% incline.  Spinning session was good and my legs stayed loose. 

Thursday was a rest day.  Friday was the club swim session in the evening, after the 4x100 warm up it was 8x100 on 2:15, all things considered did rather well coming in consistently on 1:37/1:38.  About 3-4 seconds slower than a month ago, but considering the volume of training I've been able to do it isn't too bad at all.  Then following this it was 6x50m kick.  My kick has progressed a lot and came in around 1:08 to start with.  Was told to kick faster and slightly deeper and managed to come in on 1:06. Incidentally I was beating some of the guys in the fast lane, which was good to know.  Some pull and a cool down and a total of 2000m at a reasonable effort with no shoulder pain at all.  I think I may be able to get back to proper swim training soon.  Only problem is I start my job next week, so can't swim in the mornings anymore.

Saturday was a sort of rest day, spent 2 1/2 hours walking to and around the shops.  I'll call that taper training.  Sunday was the Winchester 10K.  I entered this last weekend as a few people were doing this, so as I'm not ready/have no time to do a duathlon next Sunday thought I would do this.  Having worked out my projected pace of 12.5 km/h based on my half marathon time I positioned myself in the 43-55min start bin along with the others.  The start horn goes and it seems lots of people can't read as I get stuck behind lots of people walking.  OK it was a bit of a quagmire on the rugby pitch, BUT YOU COULD AT LEAST JOG.  After 200-300m managed to get on the path and was again stuck behind people that were way to far forward. Dodged a few of them then came up behind the girls from the club who were running well, up the hill and out onto the road and my path was clearing.  I was running way faster than my projected pace.  After about 2.5K I hear a "that's where you got to" from Mark who ran up behind me, he overtook me and made it 10m in front of me, where he slowed down, or I sped up, but we stayed that way for about 5K.  A few step hilly bits, but no much to report till the turn at 6.4K onto the dual carriageway.  Something happened here and I could see I was slowly reeling Mark in, that spurred me on, and around km 7 I passed him and managed to hold on for a km.  The hill took it out of me too much and my HR shot up to 92% and I started wheezing.  Mark passed and I tried to get back on the downhill section.  But that was possibly my undoing.  HR spiked again and a more serious bout of difficult breathing.  With him now out of my grasp about 20m in front, I pushed on for the last km.  The finish was on gravel which scuppered any chance of a decent sprint finish, but I pushed hard with everything I had left in me.  Crossed the line in 45:36 officially, 45:23 self timed from when I crossed the start line.  177/764 overall, but I'm not sure how much value a statistic like that holds.

That is it for this week, just realised I've written more than I have on my thesis over the weekend. %$^&. 12 weeks to half distance hell.

Another weeks training down

Wednesday was a club spinning session.  Same session as last week slightly lower average heart rate, but that's probably because my legs were knackered from the previous few days training.  Thursday evening brought a run.  A few loops of the common, wasn't really feeling it though so done as a gentle L2 effort.  Managed a reasonable distance, partly because I needed to work out where the flats I was viewing on Friday afternoon were so it turned into a 11.6 km run. Friday evening was the club swim, 2100m in total, my shoulder just about managed to hang in there. The 100m efforts were fairly average as I wasn't pushing too hard, the kick sets were pretty decent though, under 65-75s for 50m.

On Saturday I went to the TCR show.  First order of business wetsuit.  Tried on a 2010 Blueseventy Helix.  Wow, what a nice wetsuit. After some fitting advice from Dean I had it fitted nicely and it felt really really good. It was so much more comfortable than my Orca S2.  You can really feel the isolation of the shoulders and arms. Unfortunately all the retailers were under orders not to discount them, so the best deal I could get was about £40 off.  My BCTTT discount will be being used this week or next to seal the deal on that one.  Whilst I was there I also had a free 15minute sports massage.  Oh my god it hurt.  Said I was having some shoulder pain and it was quite bad in the muscles around it, so had it on my neck and shoulders.  I can't say it was relaxing, apparently Camilla went easy on me as she could feel me twitching.  I felt pretty good afterwards though so it worked nicely.  I may have to have a few more of them when I finally have some money.  I managed to be quite restrained otherwise, only subscribed to Triathlete Europe, bought some compression tights and a nice lightweight cap for the run in Barcelona.  Got a free mini kit bag and technical t-shirt with the cap as well bargin.  I managed to come away with an armful of gels as well. TFN were giving away 3 packs of High5 gels, so I managed to acquire 4 bags, plus some other gels so not a bad effort.  Managed to feed myself on carb gels, sweets and energy drinks as well.  Perhaps not the most balanced diet and it did give me a bit of a sugar buzz.  But I know now that the Cliff Bar Shot Bloks are really nice, albeit expensive and I shall be buying some of those come the summer.  The Torq energy drinks are bad either.

Today was a sort of rest day.  Went sailing for 4 hours which doesn't really count as training, still sport though and it appears we came 4th and 3rd in the two races so not a bad effort.  was going to go swimming but my shoulder is disagreeing with the sailing so holding off.  Might go in the morning if I can drag my sorry @r$€ out of bed.

Pain free swimming, and pain inducing turboing

This morning started with a swim session.  I managed 900m of front crawl in total, 2x200, 1x400 and 1x100m, all without feeling pain in my shoulder.  So I didn't push it too much too soon I also mixed in 600m of FC, BK and dolphin kick.  Good news at last,  so tomorrow I'll go for another short swim session.

Tonight was murder on the turbo.  Another endurance set.  After the first 10 minutes my quads were complaining.  So I pushed on for another hour. Oww oww oww. The set was 10 minutes on aerobars, 5 mins off 3 times then 5 on 2.5 off twice. They are getting easier, the first two just seemed to fly by, the third was getting tough and the shorter ones were all I had left in me  To cool down I did 4x1 mins single leg drills.  These seemed easier than the ones I did last week.  There are some serious dead spots in my pedal stroke though.  More single leg drills are in order. Maybe in my warm up as well as cool down.

A couple of runs

Yesterday morning I got to go and play in the mud.  I went for a run in the fields by the river at my parents.  It was a nice run, started off a bit quick, but was soon slowed down as the mud got wetter and thicker.  I crossed over the river and ended up on an area of wet mud where building work had recently finished.  Bedford mud is really clay, London was rebuilt with bricks dug from Bedford.  I picked up so much mud my shoes must have weighed an extra 500g each.  I now agree with the idea that weight is 7 times worse on the feet than on the body.  It was like running through treacle.  Looped back and down by the river where I was running at christmas. Managed 13.5 km in 1hr15, not a bad effort considering the terrain.

Tonight's club training was 4x1km reps. It was cold and it hurt.  4 good reps all things considered.3:43 (downhill), 4:04 (uphill), 3:48, and 4:08.  Max HR pushing 89% on each set, with average HR about 85%. Good % recoveries during the short rest periods.  My calves were burning by the end though. Oww.  Swimming tomorrow, a chance to see if another week off has allowed my shoulder to recover properly.

Runs, Turboing and Fraudsters

So I've been lazy with the blog for another week.  Monday brought the club running session, short sprint sets.  Wasn't really feeling speed after the brick session on sunday.  Had a little issue with the Garmin as well, the screen locked an the keys became unresponsive, not sure if it was a gremlin or I managed to lock the keys.

Tuesday I got up and went to the pool, my shoulder wasn't up to it though so had to make do with some kick sets.  I think the planks in the cool down of the running might be the culprit there, oh well.  Tuesday evening I decided to do a Turbo session.  An hour set, in front of the radiator.  Doing 10mins on tri bars, 5 mins relaxed on hoods/drops.  Good workout, although a tad wet.

Wednesday was spinning in the evening, somehow I managed to achieve a decent HR in the session, not sure how but it worked out alright in the end.

Thursday and I did the same Turbo session again, this time I weighed myself before and after.  Lost 700g even after drinking 700ml of fluid.  Hmmm a tad hot I think.  Then training possibilities took a down turn. 2-4-1 cocktails at the triathlon club social + late night + early morning = not feeling good. So when the Friday night swimming session was cancelled Friday became a rest day.

Then Friday evening went bad.  whilst browsing the 220 forum I came across a post about the Challenge Barcelona.  It seems I have been duped into entering with the former organisers who have been stripped of the contract.  This is all rather annoying, having followed a link from the main Challenge site I entered.  It seems that this organiser is still selling places for the event, with this years dates even after they have had their contract cancelled.  After searching the internet it seems challenge have promised that all age groupers can race without having to pay twice, so having emailed the new organisers I'm hoping my place is guaranteed, although it is a week earlier, so I now have a weeks less training time.  All a bit of a mess really, my credit card company should hopefully cover the fee, but as someone that is very careful about ordering online a rather stressful experience.

Swim Thugs and Brick Sessions

I had another swim yesterday, the shoulder is getting much better. Managed 1750m, 200m warm up then 550m of kick drills split either side of 5x200m.  No pain, and acceptable effort levels (3:30 dropping to 3:45 on the 200s).  Well I say no pain, I mean no shoulder pain.  I left the pool with a headache and a sore spot on my head.  Forget "Swim Nemeses", I discovered a new breed of swimmer, the Swim Thug. 

Doing my kick sets at the end in the free swimming section (not too many people in it so no point holding up a lane), minding my own business doing FC kick, I saw a learner swimmer heading towards me.  I moved right up against the lane rope, should have been plenty of space.  Well not for this guy.  He seemed to be doing a new variant of finger drag, lock the elbow and swing the arm out wide, dragging fingers in the water for the recovery.  I got hit full force on the head.  It hurt like hell.  I'm used to a few bumps and bruises swimming, but people normally have the courtesy to appologise if they hit you that hard.  Didn't even appologise in the changing room afterwards either.  Thug.  Swimmers like that should have to pass a proficiency test before using a public pool. Hmm... rant over

After all the discussions of brick sessions on 220 and BCTTT, I got the crazy idea to do one this afternoon.  90 mins on the turbo whilst watching a film on sky (Live!, I wouldn't recommend it).  Not bad going, based upon my speed and gearing it didn't feel too much unlike a flat road.  Spent some reasonable time on the aerobars, although I really need to get some new extensions, those draft legal short things aren't wonderful. A 1:46 transition while I put some more clothes and shoes on.  A poor time but, in my defence I was so hot it was like getting dressed in T1 and I did have to tie my shoelaces.  Then an even more despicable 28 minutes for a 5.2K run, didn't even have serious jelly legs.  I'm gonna need to work pretty hard on that.

Not a bad week in all, 3 runs, 2 cycle sessions and 2 swims (the 5hrs 40 it took isn't sooo good).  I can start bringing some more swim sessions in again next week at last.

Injury and Laziness

I've been getting rather lazy with updating this blog.  A bit like my indifference towards training.  My shoulder has still been hurting, so no swimming for me.  That translated into me taking the entire weekend off training. No runs, no turbo time.

Monday was club run training.  Some sprint sessions involving 1min, 30s and 20s efforts with standing rest. Some good speed work, I actually overtook a cyclist.  Now if I was the cyclist I'd be pretty ashamed of that. Speed topping out at 23 km/h.  Looking at the data My speed built in the first half of the longer sets and tailed off in the second half.  My pacing was obviously off.  Succeeded in pushing my heart rate properly into L4 on them, with 1 minute recoveries (on the longer sets) of around 20-25%.  Short but sweet session.

Tuesday I went for a steady run, but it just wasn't feeling good.  Shortened my plan from 11 to 8 km as there were just too many niggling things whilst I was running.  Probably dehydrated when I went out.  SO 8 km, 48 minutes L2a heart rate.

Wednesday was a spinning session.  Started the evening off with a 2.5K warm up on the treadmill, I won't be fresh when I get on a bike normally, so why do it in training?  I don't know what my HRmax for cycling is, but assuming it is 5-10 bpm lower than running then I didn't do too bad on the HR zones compared to usual.  A mixture of "hills" and "endurance" sets in the session.  I tried to pretend I was on tri bars on the endurance sets, it seems to get the heart pumping a bit harder.  The reduced lung volume maybe? I managed to hold out at a reasonable effort level.  I really wish the spinning bikes had tri bars though. I have a number of wishes when it comes to spinning bikes, they would pretty much make it a bike on a turbo though.

This evening I decided to get back in the pool.  My shoulder has been getting better, the pain has moved from the joint round into the Trapezius muscle, so I figured I could give it a go.  My shoulder held admirably.  I managed 5 x 200m at an easy effort, only noticing my shoulder mildly on the last length.  My speeds haven't dropped too much either, which is good.  Consistent 3:30s for 200m, an acceptable pace for an easy evening session.  Still need to hold of on the swimming a bit longer, may try again on Saturday.  My biggest problem is the inertia of coming back from injury.  Training is addictive, but like narcotics, when you have broken the addiction you don't necessarily have the desire to get back into it.

It may have been wetter on the turbo than outside

Since I can't swim at the moment, tonight was a turbo session.  Having got changed and ready to go, seems my rear wheel developed a puncture over the last week.  Cue a race-esque tube change.  The old one seems to have split open, no damage to tyre so must just be age.  With a bike ready to go it was time to start.   Tonight's main entertainment was the Top Gear Africa special.  An hour of L1/L2 cycling, in a hot room  later and I was virtually dripping with sweat.  Then onto the next set, Spinervals 23, a half hour tempo/TT sprint workout.  I was pretty wrecked after that.  Top tip, white cycling jersey + hot room + buckets of sweat = bad idea.  Suitable for use in a private home only, it was so wet I could wring sweat out of it.  I'd call that a successful session.

A good session, the 1 1/2 hours went fairly quickly, seems the hour TV + spinervals to finish combo worked out pretty well.  Next time three bottle of fluids, or a cooler room.

Fit for the knacker's yard?

Seems my shoulder is properly damaged and it is time to rest.  Feeling good I turned up to swimming on Tuesday morning, did a few 200m warm up swims then the pain returned.  Cue stopping front crawl and 1000m of kick drills to avoid completely wasting the session.  It seems it is time to rest it properly, a full week off is in order, as hard as it is to take.  I haven't stopped training completely though.

Running doesn't cause pain, cue a 10K run before lunch yesterday.  I saw a break in the clouds and decided to go for it, luckily I put my decent waterproof jacket on when I went out, 10 minutes out and the sky decided I wasn't suffering enough and unleashed an unpleasant mix of rain and snow on me.  Oh well, I pushed through it finishing 10K in just over 51 minutes in L2a/L2b.

Then in the evening I went to the spinning class.  My legs have only just forgiven me.  A one hour class that was predominantly "hills".  I just couldn't get my heart rate out of L1 on them, my quads and hamstrings hurt too much.  The sprints were good though pushing my heart rate right up into L3 territory.  I felt somewhat wrecked afterwards, I really must buy some compression tights, maybe next week I'll wiggle some and write at home that day...

Anyway, full rest day today, maybe a turbo session tomorrow.  We'll see what the weather has to offer before planning the weekned session, it would be nice to get out into the New Forest for a run.

Rest and a run.

Sunday's brick session never materialised.  My shoulder injury caught up with me, I went to the library to get a book and the process of carrying it home (it was 900+ pages, 20min walk) seemed to agravate it again.  So I binned all training and focussed on 'the thesis' instead.  Likewise I binned swimming this morning just in case, it seems fine this evening so I have a go tomorrow morning.

Not wanting to be lazy for too long I went to the club run session, intervals tonight. They were a set of 0.5K, 1K, 0.5K, 1K, 0.5K runs.  I was quite pleased with my performance, it's good to have someone to push yourself against sometimes.  According to the Garmin I ran all the 0.5K efforts at above 15kph, sustaining 17-18 in the final one!  My HRmax was a bit disappointing, only getting 172, but hey that is something to test a bit harder one day, the RPE was 9-10 though.  The other bonus of the Garmin is that I can analyse my HR recovery, with 1 minute figures in the region of 25-30% of what I think my HR max is.  Now according to coach Troy figures of 20-30% are "Awesome".  It also seems figures in that ball park mean i'm unlikely to have a heart attack, which I'm a bit young for anyway but hey.

So 7K run all in all today, a good session, and back to the pool tomorrow.

A long run

This afternoon the rain stopped.  So I decided to go for a run.  I made a slight mistake in wearing one two many layers but it was a pretty good run all in all.  I started off with the aim of doing two big laps of the common (~10km).  Even though I was slowly boiling away inside my jacket I was enjoying the run so I added an extra loop in.  Then I extended it further taking another detour on the way home and made it 15km, in an hour 20.  A pretty reasonable zone 2/3 run.  Only spoilt by dog walkers.  I don't mind well behaved dogs off the lead, but if you have an unruly dog, please, please, please keep it on the lead.  Each time a dog runs up to me and stops in front on me making me stop, as cruel as it sounds, I get more and more inclined to carry on running through the dog.

A good run, maybe a brick session tomorrow, I'm thinking of a 45min turbo then a 5k run.  I find out in the morning if I can be bothered.

End of good weeks swimming

Yesterday capped of a good weeks swimming.  I got two sessions in, the first not as long as planned, and club training in the evening.

In the morning I mananged to do my warm up in a very crowded pool, seems everyone wanted to swim on Friday morning.  the plann was for a 7x200m  main set.  Did the first 200m, coming in on a respectable 3:15.  Started the second 200, got the wall after the first length, pushed off, took a stroke with my left arm.  When I took the next stroke with that arm I realsied I must have pulled something as whenever I tried to push against the water it hurt a lot. Finsished did two more lengths and realsied the pain wasn't going away so binned the session. Rather annoying really.

I went to club training in the evening in the hope it was better, it was mostly although my shoulder joint wasn't going to let me forget it was there with a dull ache.  The session went reasonably, some good 75m FC/25 backstroke kick sets to warm up, some 150s and 50m kick sets then a 400m effort.  Having been quite pleased with my 6:52 earlier in the week, I was hoping to match it, and I did.  6:37 and I wasn't giving it my all because of my shoulder, things are looking up on the swim front.  That 30 minute 1.9km I have in mind in just 126 days time now looks like it is a reaslitic prospect.  Now if I can just get my bike and run fitness in suitable order I may have a good race and season ahead of me.

Running at last!

Today started off with another swim, not as far as i'd planned (2750 not 3000m) as I was performing badly, mostly due to to spinning last night I think.  It wasn't the most enjoyable swim, the lane was quite busy and halfway through my 4x400m set two meatheads from the swim team joined the lane.  They obviously had ideas about owning the lane as swim etiquette was lacking, I got hit mid calf 4 times by one guy.  Tap my feet and I'll let you past, hit me in the calf and it'll piss me off and slow me down.  Doing fly down the middle of lane is not particularly friendly either.  Anyway, finished off with some more kick, my legs are hurting less now which is good.

This evening I was in for a treat, the snow and ice is gone, so I can go running.  It may have been dull laps round the dark paths of Southampton common, but it was nice to be running again.  Timings weren't exactly wonderful at 45mins for 8km, but it was a reasonable zone 2 workout.  And it is good to be training again.

I think a gentle swim is in order tomorrow morning, nothing too taxing before evening training.