Steven Lords Website

Ready To Go

Posted on May 21, 2010 by lord_lordy

Here’s the bike all ship shape. It’s clean, it’s lubed, it’s raring to go. Been managing to keep my nerves in check so far and long may it continue. This has been achieved by focussing on the fact this is all meant to be fun. My nerves seem to all be about other people passing me etc… so I just focus on this is my race and my best performance comes from just racing it as if I’m on my own.

I did a 40 mile ride yesterday split by the briefing at La Santa. It was a pretty easy ride and helped me settle and feel good. For many many weeks now I’ve not gone more than a day or two without riding so I felt it was best not to have 3 days off from cycling just before the race. This morning I swam a lap of the course. felt nice and comfortable in the water and thought about how I would approach the swim. As long as I keep my head the plan is not to redline at the start – instead just head off steady and try to have a stress free swim. I do need to get in the pen early to get a decent spot. It’s another one of those things that rattles my nerves and again it’s really not the racing it’s the worry about not being able to place myself on the front line of the swim. Easily solved though by getting in the pen pretty early.

Tomorrow morning I will have breakie even if I have to force it down. Cheese and peanut butter omelette – it’s served me well for so many long training days I will stick with it.

Tomorrow is all about enjoyment. Yes, I keep telling myself this, so it must be true. I’ve even managed to convince myself that not going to Kona would be for the best. This is a nerve settling strategy because I would dearly love to go but until I hit the run I’m not planning on it being a source of stress or a source of going too hard.

The forecast is for light winds and hot. Given my run is relatively poor at the moment it’s really not what I wanted – I wanted strong winds. That said it’s probably better for Jo and given the choice of ideal conditions for me or her I’d pick ideal for her. I still feel I’’m winging it on the run like I have the last few races. I’ve not done what I would like to have done training wise but I’ve done whats right for recovery from injury. I feel now the foot is completely repaired. I have no issues with it at all from what I can tell other than the odd blister I never used to get. I feel tomorrows run will be a true reflection of where I’ve got to in a year since returning from injury. Last year at this time I was still months away from running but I was finally back on my bike. It still amazes me when i think about it and that keeps me grounded, allowing me to just enjoy being able to do this stuff. In fact, I’ve just received a good luck email from my sister which rather echoes this sentiment. She always seems able to say the right thing ahead of a race and this time was no exception. I was almost in tears in the cafe as I read it. I will keep it in mind as I race tomorrow.

Posted in Race Preview | Tagged Ironman, Lanzarote | Leave a comment

Pre Race Thoughts

Posted on May 19, 2010 by lord_lordy

The picture today is of our EverydayTraining athletes out here in Lanzarote ready to race. It’s very exciting not only racing here myself but also having a couple of guys I coach out racing as well.

The work has been done now with only a few light sessions to go and now more time is spent visualising the race together with just relaxing and not thinking about the race. The only training left to do is a short run this afternoon, a swim and ride tomorrow and that will probably be it. I rode yesterday and felt really fresh and strong. It was confidence building. Running still is just difficult to sense. It feels better than New Zealand but still just not quite there.

A big focus this race is going to be on fueling. I will be fueling more than I normally do and will make a bigger effort on the bike to fuel. The feeling is I ‘bonked’ at New Zealand and want to try and avoid that. I spent a lot of time thinking back over previous races and the penny dropped about the one time I’ve run under 3:10. In that race I was very conservative on the bike early on and at 80 miles felt able to pick it up a notch. That is what I will aim for here – early on being conservative on the bike, getting fueled and then see how I feel later. This will take serious self control on my part if I start getting lots of people go by. That said, I’m trying to trust my bike form to give me a pretty decent split without busting a gut. On the run I feel sub 3:40 will be a big step in the right direction and sub 3:30 would have me over the moon.

I’m realising now how much I want to go to Hawaii. That is the target though in my head I’ve reconciled not going and know what my plans will be if I don’t qualify. The number of slots has reduced this year and I’m estimating 7 in my age group. Based on last year that means I really need to be under 10:07 hours to be in with a shout. Realistically what could my time be:

Swim: 56
T1:5
Bike: 5:35
T2:4
Run: 3:30
Total: 10:10

As I’ve said before I reckon it’s touch and go for a slot.

The other factor I think I’m getting right this time is my weight. My first year of Ironman saw me race at 157lbs and 158lbs – both were excellent races. My next three races saw me at 165lbs and for all three I raced well. Since then I’ve been 170 or over whenever I’ve raced (bar Kona last year – 168) and on the whole have not raced great – only twice having what I viewed as good races, both to qualify. I added weight to my Ironman Times sheet and it was an eye opener. Once again the facts being a little different from the memory of the facts.. I was at 170lbs at the weekend and can see I’m getting a little leaner so am happy it’s heading in the right direction. 5lbs lighter than at IM New Zealand and 8lbs lighter than when I went 3:18 at Taunton Marathon 6 weeks ago.

It doesn’t matter whether there is a physical benefit or not. I believe there is and thus feeling lean and prepared puts me in a better frame of mind. From now I’m trying to keep my nerves under control as I don’t want to feel as nervous as I did before New Zealand.

Posted in Race Preview, Race Week | Tagged EDT, Lanzarote, Training Camp | Leave a comment

A Week To Go

Posted on May 14, 2010 by lord_lordy

It’s really just over a week to go till the race. My training is easing off and I enter what I find the most difficult period. Training decisions are so much harder now. Way out from a race pushing and just getting on with sessions has less risk attached. Now there’s always a question about whether it’s the right thing to do. This combined with the usual feeling of lack of energy, achy legs makes it a worrying period.

This past week I’ve done several rides but made a point of none over 5 hours. This meant that the first three days of this week I did 4hr, 4hr and 5hr rides. Been off the bike for 2 days now and plan a final long ride tomorrow. This has worked well in the past – the weekend before Busselton I did back to back long rides. I won’t do quite that much this time. During those rides there’s been a few harder efforts on particular hills but generally the riding has been lower intensity.

Now we’re at La Santa I’ve really been able to get some good swimming done. Lots of long steady swims, loads with full gear. I tend to breath to my right but in this race the line of buoys is left so breathing that side would be good. Rather than just try to breath that side I’ve focussed on bilateral breathing in the hope it will balance out my stroke. I’m feeling better in the water than I have for a while. I’ve found that big swimming a week out from the race can make a big difference for me come race day. So this high volume steady swimming will continue till we leave Club La Santa on Monday.

After this afternoons ‘sun tan swim’ I had a chat with Bella and Stephen Bayliss. They’re both looking fit and had been thundering up and down the pool the whole time I was there. Stephen said I was looking pretty fit myself. Lets hope he’s got a good eye for that sort of thing. Certainly I’m getting a little leaner. The buffet here allows for easy Paleo eating and I’ve been pretty strictly paleo since arrival (the odd ice cream during a ride excluded!) and as expected despite eating TONNES I am getting leaner.

The big question mark for this race has always been the run. How good will it be? I’ve been very conscious of not pushing too rapidly trying to force me back to where I was. Many years a go I had a period of 5 years where I couldn’t run at all. I kept pretty fit from swimming and spin classes. When I finally could run I went at least 2 years with just easy conversational paced running (some VERY long runs). I was aware that my aerobic fitness would allow for faster more intense running but my joints, tendons, ligaments probably would not. This approach meant I went ten years without anything more than a niggle and never really had a period when I couldn’t run. Then of course I snapped a tendon … thats a whole other entry as to what may or may not have caused it. Anyway…. again I’m being very wary about pushing too hard. Thus I’ve slowly increased my volume first and still done no real intensity. The volume has not gone that high but at the moment I’m seeing improvements.

In fact, at the moment it seems almost every run feels a little better than the last even though my legs often don’t want to run before I head out. Today I ran my 10k route with Russell. After the first 3km of climbing we started to slowly increase the pace. As is often the case this happens without any sort of word passing between us. I felt I had the better of Russell… you know that feeling you’re almost ‘half wheeling’ someone. With 2km to go though the pace upped further and it became clear that I was no match for Russell. With 1km I couldn’t stick with him. Not long after he’d broken away I justified to myself that it was wise not to go as the pace was too hard for me. A good dose of reality. Yes, my running is improving ,I feel good running but I just could not match that pace. It’s not back where it can and will be. Hopefully good enough to gain a slot but if it’s not, I am happy that I’ve not pushed and risked injury to get the speed back quickly. I’m starting to run well and know I can push on for the summer. With luck that will be for a great run at Kona but failing that it will be focussed on a stellar run in Busselton.

Posted in Training | Tagged Lanzarote, Training Camp | Leave a comment

Within Two Weeks

Posted on May 9, 2010 by lord_lordy

We’ve just been to a lecture by Ron Hill. Great stuff I could have written the script. He’s run every day since some time in the 60s. He went 26 years running twice everyday other than Sunday when he’d run once. When asked about shoes – as close to barefoot as possible. The high heel and support of modern shoes he felt caused most injuries. As for stretching … not a fan but if you believe it works then there’s probably some benefit to you ! There were some uncomfortably looking athletes in the audience … this went against all they read in the press.

On to my entry…

Entering the final two weeks before Lanzarote and I always find this a strange time. How much more should be done. Suddenly decisions about whether I’m too tired become trickier – the usual just get on with it has much more risk now we’re so close to a race.

The above picture is my Bike training stress chart and you can see that finally I’m seeing a return to improved bike fitness. The massive riding at Epic Camp has meant I’ve spent ages with reducing ‘bike fitness’ despite riding a reasonable amount. Out here I’ve done some long, hard riding and it’s showing. My fitness is up at levels above where they were for my last 3 races and I must admit that it definitely has shown on most rides here. I have been riding really strong. I’ve finally gone under 30 minutes up Tabeyesco and am now finding that a reasonable effort is getting me a time of 32 minutes. Tomorrow I’m planning on reps and we’ll see how I manage across numerous repeats

This return to bike fitness is clearly as a result of more biking. In the four weeks since the Taunton marathon these are my ride mileages:

139, 92, 130, 146, 137, 105, 108, 92, 114, 108, 114, 105, 104, 127, 55, 70, 108.

Thats a reasonable sequence … just like the good old days and I must admit the motivation is largely “Eddington madness” which I’ll hopefully report on success at the end of the year.

Once in Lanzarote I’ve felt great on the bike. This ended after last Tuesday when we did a monster 200k ride with Russ, Marc and Mark. We lost Marc after Mirador Del Rio, we’ve no idea how he missed the garage stop but we were puzzled enough to go back up Mirador Del Rio in search of him. We should thank him as it made the ride harder. Then the 5km climb from Tahiche to Teguise I did my utmost to drop Mark (Russ wasn’t even playing at this point). I tried jumping him, grinding him down and finally was satisfied to just not have him go by at the finish. I think he was cursing me at the end but I it did us both good.

The following day I felt so ill – it’s easy to blame it on such a tough ride but my upset tummy makes me think it was something I ate. I had to take a whole day of rest and only yesterday started to feel better but today took it easy just in case.

It’s only a few days missed from the plan but this close to a race it really makes you question your preps. Suddenly I don’t feel great on the bike. Luckily yesterday i managed a 32:30 assault of Tabeyesco at the end of the ride so that improved my mood.

Have I overdone it ? Thats the worry now. I’m sleeping like post Epic, averaging over 9 hours for the past 10 days. Hopefully this is me repairing. On paper my bike fitness is clearly there. On paper my swim fitness isn’t but as Jo said that won’t make that much difference I’m still swimming well. She is right. Running, I just don’t know. Last week I did two 3+ hour long runs and this week did over 2hrs. I’m best prepared since surgery but still just don’t know. When i run I feel better but only race day will I find out.

My big target this race is to FEED. I am going to eat a lot more on the bike than I have in the past. I’m going to ensure I have a good breakfast. Part of me feels I had a good race in me at New Zealand but I just didn’t fuel well enough. My aim is to be conservative on the bike… hopefully my fitness will mean even riding conservatively I’ll get a decent time. This should also allow good fueling.

Will I qualify ? I honestly don’t know. I’d probably err on saying I won’t. I don’t feel my running is there yet. That may be a protective response as I’d love to be out there with so many good friends already going… it should be a blast. However, it’s been full bore since getting back to being able to train and I think I need a break. If I don’t qualify I may just have a decent break come the summer ready for a concerted effort to get some good performances in the southern hemisphere races this winter. I feel not qualifying will be a load off my mind and allow me to relax a little and focus on getting fully running rehab’d.

Posted in Training | Tagged Bike, Lanzarote, Training Camp | Leave a comment

Balance

Posted on April 30, 2010 by lord_lordy

You hear a lot about balance in peoples life. It’s especially the case with ironman athletes probably because training takes so much time if you want to attempt to reach your potential. Something I heard YEARs ago has always stuck with me:

“A time management expert is giving a talk to trainee management consultants and he holds up a big jar which he fills with rocks and asks if the jar is full. He gets a enthusiastic yes from his audience. He then gets some pebbles and pours them in giving it a little shake to fill up the gaps and asks again “is the jar full”. Catching on to the theme there are a few ‘no’s from the audience. He then pours sand in and fills all the gaps. “Is it full now”. “Yes!” is the response to which he pours in a little water filling it completely.

He asks the audience what they think the moral of the story is. One bright spark answers “no matter how full your day is you and always squeeze in a little more work”. This answer gets nods of approval.

“No” he replies “the moral is, if I’d not put the rocks in first they would never have fit”

The important things in your life are those rocks. Make time for them first since if you don’t it’s so easy to fill your life with sand and water – those minor items can take over.

I feel lucky at the moment that my rocks are Jo and triathlon training. Luckily the latter is a rock for Jo and I hope I’m one also. It means we’re pretty in balance and can fully enjoy being out here training. Retreating to Lanzarote for 4 weeks gives a real feeling of balance – it’s only temporary balance but whilst we’re here life is so simple. Internet access is the local MacDonalds which means we’re ruthlessly efficient in our use of it. It also makes you realise that constant connectivity is really a tonne of sand and water in your life. We’re doing no less a job with our clients by not getting emails the instant they are sent. There’s better balance by not being able to respond immediately.

We’re lucky that we have friends out here as well doing similar things. Our days are a wonderful routine. In the sea at 7am for an hours refreshing swim before a leisurely breakfast and chat. For me it’s tended to then be out all day on the bike followed by a run. The day finishes with a leisurely dinner shooting the breeze with friends. I’m so tired sleep is an absolutely joy.

I’m starting to feel fit again. Been riding ever stronger on the back of 3 consecutive 7 hr days. This afternoon I did my second 3+ hour run in 5 days and felt great. My focus has been on comfortably, economic running and I feel I’m getting there. Swimming is getting strong though this morning I got a lesson in what real swimmers are like. Mark Racher is with us this week. He just (we’re talking 0.01s) missed out on the Sydney Olympics for 200IM. This guy has gone 2:01 for 200IM and 1:50 for 200 free. He cruised alongside me in the sea today and despite a much slower stroke rate easily went by. I hung on his feet for maybe 30 seconds and he wasn’t even trying. I tried to see what he was doing different but is so difficult to spot. We talked afterwards … yes he has some physical differences that help – for instance, large hands, large feet and an arm span wider than he is tall. Thats not enough though … he also had periods of doing 100k of swimming a week for years ! This allows him to swim twice a week and still easily come out with the front pack of swimmers every time. Certainly puts it in perspective when I feel I’ve done a pretty big weeks swimming with 20k !

Posted in Motivation, Training | Tagged Swim | Leave a comment

Lifestyle

Posted on April 23, 2010 by lord_lordy

A completely unrelated picture to the title of this post. This is my training stress balance chart for this year for my biking. I’m going to start by covering recent training. The yellow line above is Training Stress Balance. In my mind it being negative is making you fitter and positive is recovery and being ready to race. That big negative at the start of the year was Epic Camp and since then it’s been positive since. The blue line is fitness and it’s been declining since then until recently. So … what did it take to get it negative again. Some hard long riding:

Sat before my marathon – 113 miles 7 hilly hours
Tues – 139 miles in just under 8 hours
Wed – 93 miles, 5.75 hours including 9 repeats of Box Hill
Sat – 130 miles, 8 hours – at pace with a group initially then lots of hills on my own
Sun – 146 miles, 8 hours – hard core pace throughout. Only 2 left standing
Tue – 137 miles, 7.5 hours – fast riding with Russell
Wed – 105 miles, 6.75 hours including 12 repeats of Box Hill
Thurs – 108 miles, 6.5 hrs … feeling tired at last.

It’s like the good old days. Riding long. It’s certainly removed one of my doubts about my New Zealand training – lack of over distance riding. In a 12 day period I rode 971 miles including 4 rides of 130+ miles.

It highlighted to me that the above graph doesn’t do everything. It suggests I’m losing fitness but at the moment I feel great on the bike. I think it’s taken this long for the Epic Camp riding to kick in.

On the swimming front it’s not so good. I’ve been only just managing on session a week. I’m trusting to 3 week weeks of big swimming in Lanzarote will sort me.

The problem with swimming when I’m in London is it’s so hard to get it done. The pool is 5 or 6 miles across London. The sessions are early or late and in general when I’m in London I just don’t get enough sleep. I used to be able to cope with this when I worked but now I just can’t.

I’ve been making conscious efforts for many years now to get my lifestyle as I would like it. I’m getting so close. I stopped working in the city. Got rid of loads of possessions and as a result loads of costs that has allowed Jo and I to live the dream. We realised though that a large part of doing that was the generosity of friends and family – putting us up (as well as putting up with us) and storing stuff. This has allowed us to move around and focus on getting our coaching business off the ground. This is going well but now we need a base. We’ve had nearly 18 months of this and we both find it increasingly frustrating when we’re back home but don’t have a ‘home’

So…

I’ve bought a house in Taunton. It’s a lovely little 3 bed terraced house. Easy reach of station, pool and all the facilities. No need for a car and plenty of space for bikes and visitors. The aim now is to continue with this flexible lifestyle whilst owning and maintaining a home. It’s exciting and will prove whether we’ve got to the point that this life is sustainable. One thing I’m trying to avoid is a regular job – ie regular hours. I want to be able to move around – not really overseas (though thats nice) but more be able to spend time in London with my sister and to see friends and time in North Yorkshire with my mum.

Having a base will also give opportunities to try some things that have been put on a back burner. The first one is wheel building ! I did my course a year or so ago and now I’m looking to invest in a wheel building jig and start out by building up some strong training wheels. Hopefully I’ll get a few customers willing to try them and then my reputation will grow !! Watch this space. First thing is to keep fingers crossed the purchase goes through.

Tomorrow we’re off to Lanza – just 5 days late because of the volcanic ash … not too bad. Looking forward to having training as my focus again.

Posted in Training | Tagged Bike | Leave a comment

Experience

Posted on April 12, 2010 by lord_lordy

Just had a really fun marathon experience. Achieved my goals for the marathon and had a good confidence boost. Read about it here.

There have been a few questions posted as comments. I decided I will not answer them with a comment as I have in the past as I lost all comments recently. Instead I will include them in a post. So a couple of questions (one on Ultras and the other on fueling) are answered at the bottom of this post.

I’ve recently had a couple of pretty scary experiences on my bike and it got me thinking about how both related to advice I’ve been given by experienced cyclists in the past but I guess have not taken seriously enough feeling I was experienced. The funny thing about experience is that it’s measured, normally, by time spent doing something. Someone that performs an activity a lot and does so successfully without accident or mishap is viewed as having good experience. Unfortunately, good fortune can merely reinforce a bad model of the world. The person that rides for years without a helmet and doesn’t have an accident is not proof that riding without a helmet is safe. The person that walks in the hills without a survival bag, waterproofs etc… and never gets caught out is not proof you shouldn’t carry them. Advice is best taken from someone thats experienced the accidents / mishaps and come through successfully. So … hows my experience measure up ?

RIDING ON ICE

I think I was ‘lucky’ enough to come off on ice very early in my cycling career and did so without mishap. It certainly makes me cautious in cold weather when approaching wet looking bends. I’ve ridden with people that don’t slow down at all for these and when asked invariably have never come off on ice. They don’t tend to heed the warning but are seen to ride slower once they’ve had their mishap.

FIXED DOWN HILL RIDING

I was told about the dangers of riding fast downhill on a fixed. Your chain might jump. I just couldn’t figure how that would happen and pretty much ignored the advice. Up till last week I had 15,000 miles of fixed riding ‘experience’ that reinforced my model of this. At about 15,050 miles of experience I had my chain jump off at 27 mph downhill with a car following. I was lucky to maintain control and lucky the driver was aware of what was going on. Seeing the massive scar in my chain stays is pretty scary. Now it’s happened I can see why – when going that speed you can’t pedal quick enough to keep tension in the chain. The back wheel can speed a little creating slack at the top, a bump at the wrong time can bring it off. At those speeds you’ll do very well to stay upright. Fixie riders out there – heed the warning.

WHEEL RIMS WEARING OUT

I’ve done a lot of riding. 91,000 miles since I’ve started keeping a training diary (just over 6 years). I knew that rims wore out. I’ve even replaced the odd rim. Recently on my road bike I’d noticed that the front brake was incredibly juddery under braking. I checked the rim for blemishes but saw nothing. I did notice the concaved section of the rim and concluded it needed checking and probably replacing. I figured it would last another week and I’d check it in for a service when i got back from Lanzarote. Coming down the path from Taunton station on Thursday there was a MASSIVE bang. Like a gun shot or an engine backfiring. Enough that everyone around including drivers looked over. My front rim had quite literally exploded. Around a quarter of the rim a sliver of rim had separated abit like I’d gone round it with a tin opener. If I’d been going faster it would have been the whole rim and the wheel would have disintegrated. If last Wednesday I’d ridden one extra hill in Surrey it would probably gone then at 20+ mph rather than at 5mph …. I don’t want to think about the consequences. So …. 90,000+ miles of experience before I learnt that one.

INNER TUBES

Another one learnt recently. How many of you carry inner tubes in a saddle bag and just leave them there. I was out riding and had a puncture. Both the inner tubes I was carrying turned out to have corroded valves that snapped on inflation. Luckily I was riding with someone so there were other tubes. Speaking to the mechanic at Cycles Dauphin he said it was common and he recommended carrying them in plastic bags to keep the water off

CHAIN TOOL

It always surprises me how few people carry one of these. I luckily learnt my lesson in my youth and always carry one. I can think of 4 occasions since I started triathlon where I’ve needed one – twice for me and twice for someone I’m with. In all cases it was a simple task to get us moving again but without the tool then we’d have been on a minor road trying to hitch a lift. My advice is learn how to use a chain tool and carry one.

GRAVEL ON CORNERS

I have never some off on gravel on a corner. Every time I’m with a group gravel is pointed out. I used to wonder why they’re doing that. Now I realise it’s because the combined experience of the group includes times when crashes have been caused by gravel. I’ve decided this is one I don’t want to learn myself so I now slow down for gravel.

It seems that positive experience will reinforce your model of the world but it doesn’t make it the right model. How does this translate to triathlon and training. I have been wondering. People say you always learn from a bad race but I’m not so sure it’s so straight forward. A bad race doesn’t mean your training is wrong and a good race doesn’t mean it’s right. With Ironman you race so infrequently and the variables are so many it’s a very tricky experiment with a sample of one. I believe the benefits come over the years and consistency in your approach despite good or bad races is key to find out if it works. I firmly believe it’s not that tricky. Well … let me spell that out. I firmly believe it’s not that tricky to get consistent decent performances. Ironman nicely rewards hard work. I don’t think I’ve ever not got the result I deserved. You put the work in you get a result. I think the tricky part is trying to get that stellar performance – the one that gets the maximum out of your preparations. I feel that it’s those final few weeks of build and taper that are key and it’s certainly where I falter. I’m great at consistent background training which is probably what makes me good at the Epic Camp game but as yet I don’t think I’ve ever brought myself to a peak of preparation for a race.

+++++ ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS POSTED AS COMMENTS +++++

Why do I not aim for some Ultra Triathlon – double / deca etc… It had crossed my mind. I did an Ultra with Jo in May 2008 and we did very well. We did it together and were second overall. We both felt I’d have had a great shot at winning if I’d raced it on my own. So I entered another Ultra for June last year – unfortunately I snapped a tendon in my foot. Now I just don’t know whether my foot would handle the level of running and whether I’m willing to find out. The deca’s where it’s an Ironman each day does sound like my sort of thing though … a massive 10 day Epic Camp! Having said that I don’t see me doing one of those. Utlras though … if I this year the running goes well I may be tempted next.
You asked about fueling. Before I let you know the typical things I eat I would just ask you to try stuff out for yourself and also think logically about ‘advice’ given and whether it’s logical. Try for yourself doing a long ride without carbs. If you have breakfast before you start then treat yourself to a nice big omellette with cheese and bacon – NO CARBS. Then head off and see how you feel. So many people just resort to munching carbs as soon as they feel a little peckish. Resist the desire. In my experience that just sets up a vicious circle where you’re blood sugars are never quite right and you just want for more carbs. I can do a decent pace 100 mile ride on zero food. Whether you need it when you are working hard I’m not sure. They say that carbohydrate metabolism gives off more energy but I just don’t know. i wonder whether this is another myth and i’d like to find some research on it. I don’t really notice a sudden increase in my energy after carbs … certainly don’t notice anything better than any other fuel.

I start by saying I’m not perfect when it comes to this stuff. I enjoy eating cakes and the like and regularly can’t resist. I try and limit them to the middle of rides where I’m pretty sure I’ll use the sugar pretty promptly and hopefully it won’t trigger too big an insulin response.

Day to day I would start my day with an omelette – 4 eggs, cheese and perhaps some meat or onion, peppers. Lunch often wouldn’t happen as I’ll be out training. For snacks whilst riding – peanuts though if I can find them roasted almonds. Pork scratchings, biltong, beef jerky. Sometimes I’ll eat a whole chicken if I can find a rotissary. Evenings – large portion of meat together with salad or veggies – we’re talking loads of salad / veggies. Minimal starchy veg though. Regularly follow that with a large fruit salad with full fat natural / greek yogurt. Normally add a large handful of nuts and more often than not peanut butter.

I’ve maintained massive training volume on a low carb diet. Epic Camp would see me eating LOADS of bacon, egg, peanut butter for breakie. Gordo estimated I was eating 8 eggs. Lunch I’d avoid the wraps but create my own by use cold meats as the wrap rather than bread. Dinner I’d just avoid the pasta, rice, potatoes. Last year I did 120 hours of training in two weeks at Club La santa. I’d breakfast on scrambled egg with tuna and walnuts. Then I would have the odd snack during the day and in the evening have multiple plates of meat and salad from their buffet. It’s probably the leanest I’ve been in recent years following that and ask Jo or Rachel I was eating a serious amount of food but zero processed carbs.

It seems a regular response, to suggesting that the evidence before our eyes over the past 20 years is that the low fat advice is not working, is that it’s because people aren’t following the advice. Being someone that is actively trying to not follow this advice I can tell you just how hard it is to do. Go to a supermarket and try to buy foods that are high fat, high protein and low carb. It takes a lot of effort and certainly more money. Given that I’d be surprised if there’s anyone out there that’s trying to follow the low fat advice but accidentally not managing it. In fact, those that are not trying to follow any advice will almost certainly end up with a high carb, low fat and protein diet by default. I think it would be very fair to say the majority are heeding the advice given and it’s not working. Why is it that, despite all the advice we’re being given and all the foods being manufactured that match this advice, the cost of health is increasing so hugely. Surely at some point we should start questioning it. I’m trying in my own little way to get people to question it. Hopefully eventually there’ll be enough momentum for governments to see the evidence and have the guts to say the advice given was wrong and was based on (very) bad science.

Posted in Critical Thinking, Nutrition | Tagged Bike | Leave a comment

Taunton Marathon 2010

Posted on April 11, 2010 by lord_lordy

marathon

SHORT REPORT: 3:18:05 and pleased !

LONG REPORT:

There were no nerves for this race. I was so relaxed because this really was just a see where I am race. I didn’t taper for it other than my running was reduced a little. I did a 7 hour hilly ride the day before and felt that this race would not let me hide from where my running was at. I feared that it was no where near where I felt it was. That I was seriously kidding myself that I can run a 3:30 marathon at Lanzarote. I wondered whether I would even manage that in a straight marathon.

I stuck to my plan perfectly. That was to go easy and comfortable on the first lap and negative split the second lap. My hope was that running comfortable would be 8 min miles at worst. The first two miles didn’t feel great but 7:48 and 7:49 were OK. I was running relaxed and the splits got quicker and my running easier over the next few miles. It was nice and comfortable but as I relaxed I sped up and after seeing my splits would ease off. Mile 11 has a big hill in it and I was determined to keep the split under 8 min/ mile so I pushed hard. After that I didn’t see much point in holding back and just kept running comfortably. I got through halfway in 1:40 and felt very strong.

I immediately picked up the effort levels on starting the second lap. Now all the half marathon runners had gone and I could see people ahead to pick off. no one passed me the whole second lap and I must have passed 30+ runners. What a great feeling to start the second half not worrying about surviving put focussing on pushing harder. At one point it dawned on me that at my age 3:15 was good for age start at London. I was going to be reasonably close but realised this late in the run it was not possible to make up that much time. I felt strong and comfortable right through to end of mile 23. After is was harder but I didn’t fade. Looking at the splits above I’m so pleased that I was faster on every mile in the second lap other than mile 12. The reason for this was it has a very steep downhill – on the first lap I just let gravity do it’s job but on the second my legs weren’t up it so I had to take it real easy down the hill.

Second half in 1:38 to give me 3:18 marathon. I hadn’t overdone it which was proved by the way I’m walking now (the day after). I was over the moon with that. Well away from my best BUT the most enjoyable marathon I’ve ever run. First time I’ve ever negative splitted a marathon and it made for a really pleasurable experience. Taunton is far from a fast course and I feel with tapering, loss of a few pounds and 6 more weeks training there’s no reason that 3:30 is not achievable.

Posted in Race Report | Tagged Marathon, Run | Leave a comment

Healthy Diet

Posted on April 1, 2010 by lord_lordy

This is a topic I’ve tried to avoid for a while largely because I get so worked up about it. Several years ago, I believe it was immediately post my first trip to Kona I decided to start reading up on nutrition. Till that point I had just not thought about it and taken as gospel, as “common sense” what I had “heard”. I literally devoured books (see the list here. ) and slowly became pretty shocked by what I discovered. Suddenly it dawned on me I’d been literally brain washed. Perhaps thats strong but I’d been fed so much of the same information that I felt this was beyond questions it was ‘common sense”. Just ask on a triathlon forum and I’m sure you’ll get a tonne of responses about low fat high carb dogma. Mention of the alternative will often be derided as a fad. Look at articles in magazines, the diet section of most training books – it’s all just a copy of the same dogma. Even diabetic organisations promote high carb diets even though Type 2 diabetes is insulin resistance so eating a high carb diet is surely questionable.The impression by sheer weight of numbers, opinions given by non experts and supposed experts alike, is that this has somehow been proved.

My reading made me realise that the advice given by government, doctors, dieticians, nutritionists on the whole was more or less the complete opposite of what is healthy. I remember, in my 20s when I followed the low fat, high carb diet and avoided saturated fats, thinking how this didn’t seem to make sense. If this was true then I wouldn’t get fat eating sweets (they’re the perfect high carb low fat food!). I would think how we all now a good honest belgian bun would make you fat but surely that was mostly sugar (remember carbohydrate is effectively sugar). I wondered how come there must be so much fat in it.

I started to do a little survey myself… completely informal and not scientific but it was intriguing. Friends / family that were thin but didn’t exercise I asked what they ate. My sister for instance almost never had cereal or bread for breakfast. Instead preferring scrambled egg and smoked salmon. Jo’s sister said she wouldn’t have ‘carbs’ (inverted commas since she meant pasta, potatoes, bread not green leafy veggies) in the evenings as they make you fat.

I felt I had to do something about it. I looked into nutrition courses and dietician degrees but soon discovered that the problem there is that they are taught the government dietary dogma as fact. What makes this worse is they are taught this at University and as such will tend to believe this as true. It also gives them authority over the rest of us. Similarly with doctors – get in to any debate about diet and if there’s a doctor in the house it stops being a fair debate since the assumption by most is they ‘know’ the answer. My understanding is that doctors are not taught much about nutrition they are taught how to treat symptoms that present rather than how to prevent them. Just think of the current view of ‘preventative’ measures. This involves screening for disease. How exactly is early detection preventing a disease since if you detect it you’ve clearly not prevented it. These screenings may give the impression of helping cure by early detection – but statistics can say anything. Given that the measure for a successful cancer intervention appears to be survival 5 years from first diagnosis it is pretty clear that detecting the cancer early will give an increase in this measure even if the person lives no longer.

What could I do ? I really felt his was such a big issue. Health spending is going through the roof. In theory medical knowledge and techniques are improving massively but we’re not as healthy. Anyone my age should just think back to their youth. The fat kid at school was just that a single kid. The chances are they weren’t even fat by todays standards just big. Walk down any street and look at people and decide whether they are overweight (a game I used to play on my walk to work) – it’s seriously scary.

The only thing I could do was in a small way try and influence the people I came into contact with. This proved incredibly frustrating as I was just hit by the old dogma and not being ‘qualified’ I was in no position to refute them but when I asked the people repeating the dogma back to me what proof there was they’d look utterly utterly stunned. Proof? It’s common knowledge therefore does not require proof. Wasn’t the world being flat “common knowledge” once ?

So I stopped being so evangelical about it. Now if nutrition / diet comes up in conversation I try and quietly move away. If someone asks me directly I will give my view and I take a little pleasure in seeing that invariably the people that follow the advice find huge benefits.

What’s caused me to write about this ? It’s having just read (in a single day) “ Big Fat Lies “ by Hannah Sutter. Here’s a lady that was equally shocked by what she discovered about diet advice. She had the guts and wherewithal to do something about it. She gave up her job. Set up a company and wrote that book. Good on her. I recommend reading her book – it’s not long and may change your life.

Hows this all work with me? I’ll be honest I’m not the best advert for these eating practises. I’ve not cracked it. I know though that I feel a lot better when I do. I have more energy, have no tummy fat and just feel better. I slip back in to eating chocolate, cakes etc…. and it’s amazing how quickly I get a small belly back on me. Thats with the level of exercise I do. I feel for those overweight people forcing themselves to the gym to try and lose weight. The determination they have would be so useful directed elsewhere since exercise is not going to solve the problem. I average 30+ hours a week of hard exercise and I KNOW I will get fat if I eat incorrectly. Right now I’m 20lbs over the weight I’ve raced at in the past. Yes you got that right … 9kgs. Doing 3 or 4 hours of gentle exercise each week is not going to make the difference. Switching you body to ketosis is. This is a completely natural state which is unfortunately regularly confused (by supposed ‘experts’) with ketoacidosis which is a dangerous condition that Type I diabetics can suffer from. Ketosis is triggered by low carb diet and once there you feel full of energy and not hungry. To get to that start you can’t be eating processed or starchy carbs and unless your exercising a huge amount your fruit consumption should be restricted to berries.

I’ve struggled to switch to this diet but when I have the results are fast and impressive. I’d started to realise just how addictive these ‘bad’ foods are. I thought it as just the way it was and I needed more willpower. Now I realise that many of these foods are designed that way. They are addictive and simple triggers can make you ‘feel hungry’. Proper hunger comes on slowly and is satisfied with proper food. Hunger for these foods is generally triggered, it is a hunger for a specific (normally carb based) food and the hunger will pass if the trigger is ignored. These triggers can be set up very quickly. When I used to walk to work I’d occasionally stop and grab a coffee. Sometimes I would have a donut. Without fail, if I’d done this, the next day as I’d approach that coffee shop I would suddenly feel starving and crave a donut. Generally I couldn’t resist it but if I did the hunger would be gone before I got to work.

I recently read a book – The End Of Overeating which explains all this and gives techniques to try and get over these impulses to eat “hyper palatable” food. Armed with this I am again trying to notice my triggers and avoid them. I can tell you it’s difficult but I feel sure the health benefits of winning this battle are huge so i fully intend to persist.

Posted in Nutrition | Leave a comment

Is My Motivation Back ?

Posted on March 21, 2010 by lord_lordy

What a frustration. It’s a beautiful day outside and I’m not out on my planned long ride. Each time I look out and see the weather I just feel almost queasy inside… gutted. It’s been a while since I’ve felt this sort of frustration, almost like guilt that I’m not making the most of the weather.

Last night, as I went to bed early in order to get up at 5am for the ride, I went down to my sisters basement to find it in a couple of inches of water. I spent the next few hours with my sister and her husband clearing out all the water and getting it under control. Following this I just needed to relax so we sat and had a glass of wine. It was now gone midnight so only 5 hours sleep in prospect. The night before I’d only got 5 hours sleep before getting up early for a ride and I knew that Sunday night could prove similar ahead of early morning swimming. This was not good. I set my alarm hopeful. I was so tired when it went off but I woke up and contemplated what to do … during that contemplation I fell asleep and the decision was made.

It is probably for the best but all the same I still feel a little guilt. Yesterday I did a 80 miler in the Surrey hills mostly in the pouring rain and I felt super strong. I was riding well but it still felt like a relatively easy ride. I was so looking forward to todays 100+ miler.

Well it’s not going to happen now. Instead I’m going to try and get a couple of hour run done. Running is clearly my limiter now and for the performances I want I need to get out running. I’m heading to my mums on tuesday and will have access to the hills to run in. I’ve also entered the Taunton Marathon in 3 weeks which should provide the motivation.

For those of you that have posted comments on my blog in the past – apologies all of them have been lost by Apple. Pretty gutted and pretty poor from them.They’re all stored on their server so there’s nothing I can do. Why they don’t do backups I’ve got no idea.

Posted in Motivation, Training | Leave a comment