Ironman Wisconsin Race Review

Posted on September 9, 2008 by lord_lordy

Chuffed to bits with my race. Read all about it here.

Not much time for this entry so may write more about my race later but some quick thoughts now.

I was so nervous when I woke race morning I could hardly eat a thing. With hindsight this perhaps was a sign I was up for this.

Swim – The swim went awesomely. Great position for the start, got clear of the pack without redlining – a first for me! Had the feet of the lead guy for a while but decided his pace was too quick. This was probably wise but when I heard he did 49 minutes I can’t help but wonder “what if” … I’d had the chance but made that split second decision better to ease off and lose his feet. The fastest pro swim was 51:52 so given my 52:25 swimming on my own I like to think I would have been with the lead pro pack if I’d started with them !!

Bike – did not feel good on the bike for the first 80 miles. My legs really didn’t feel like they wanted to do what I was asking of them. I stuck at it which was very pleasing indeed. Also pleased with myself that I showed restraint on all the hills – I probably worked less hard on them than on the flats. This may be what result in my final 30 miles being the strongest on the bike. Also shows that you really don’t need to feel good to be racing well.

Run – I pushed it the whole way round. That was enough for me – I’d kept focus and didn’t ease off. It was important that I showed myself I could still do this. I finally felt tough again.

To cap it all getting on the podium and the Kona slot was awesome. Still gives me a real buzz to get a slot. So back to Hawaii next year again. I can hardly believe it !

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Ironman Wisconsin, Madison 2008

Posted on September 7, 2008 by lord_lordy 
Time: 9:43:39
Swim: 52:25 (2nd AGer)
T1: 5:33
Bike: 5:18:20
T2: 1:36 (fastest!)
Run: 3:25:47
28th overall, 3rd M35-39

Race Analysis here.

Felt more nervous the morning of this race than any I can remember. I urged the alarm not to go off as I lay awake for the last 10 minutes wishing for some legitimate, face saving ‘out’ which I knew wouldn’t arrive. 4am off the alarm goes. Very few words are exchanged between Jo and I though I believe I may have said how nervous I felt. Couldn’t even face food, forced down a couple of pieces of beef jerky and some nuts. I didn’t worry about this as I knew from past experience and some reading that provided you’d eaten ok during your taper the pre race breakfast was not really that important.

We headed down to transition just before 5am. I’d decided I was not going to faff – check the bike and get outa there. Both Jo and I were faff free zones and before we knew it we were done and it was only 5:30am. Luckily Madison is based at this great centre called Monona Terrace so there was loads of space indoors just to chill out. We sat for about 40 minutes and I did something I’ve not done before in a race – I laid down and just tried to relax and eliminate all thoughts. Each time the race came to mind I tried to push it aside – very “Mark Allen”.

Headed down to the water – wanting to get in early to ensure a good start spot. Was in about 20 minutes before the start. Warmed up till the Pro’s went off and then moved into position. I went right to the front on the prime line. I also tried to play it smart with the small talk. People often ask what time you’re going to do – I think both to help seed themselves but also to help pick feet to follow. So when asked I said “low 50s” – the hope being it would encourage people to start behind me. With hindsight I think it encourage the fastest swimmer to start next to me !

Gun goes and I stuck to my plan. Slight change on previous races, decided I wasn’t going to go balls out but instead try a slightly more conservative approach and do just enough to stay clear of the masses.

This worked great and slowly I edged away. The guy to the left of me was moving quick and the guy to the right was doing well, but unlike me he needs to raise his head to sight and he lost loads of time each time. I spoke to him after the race and he said he just couldn’t stick on my toes … that made me feel great. Anyway… the guy to my left is going great guns and I get on his toes. Very soon we have gapped the whole of the field. I can’t believe it we are a pack of two out in front. I stick with him for a while but the pace is too much for me especially as it’s quite difficult to stay bang on his toes so I decide to let him go. He slowly pulls away. Every so often I take a big breath and look over my shoulder to see where I am. I can’t quite believe it but we are miles ahead. By half way the nearest group is a full buoy behind. This is awesome. Continue smooth on the second lap and really enjoy it as I pass loads of Pro’s and start to go by age groupers on their first lap. Exit , though the chasing pack had closed alot I still came out 2nd age grouper in 52:25 and I’m buzzing.

Wetsuit strippers are awesome – this is something unique (in my experience) to North American Sports Ironman races – they have loads of people ripping off your wetsuit – BLISS. Run up the Helix, one of the several unique features of Wisconsin – a mere 3 or 4 storeys of spiral multi storey carpark entry ramp with loads of spectators cheering you on. Then inside for transition – carpet… nice ! Massive run through transition before down the other Helix and out on the course.

Wisconsin has a very demanding bike course. In it’s own way it’s as challenging (terrain wise) as Lanzarote. In fact, I would say it’s a more technical course requiring real patience in order not to blow up. It is massively rolling and care must be exercised not to blow up. I’d decided that my approach would be to NOT work hard on the uphills – this would be measure by keeping my breathing controlled. First 20 miles a german guy in my age group goes by at a fair rate of knots, I see he’s going to be well away by the end. [ASIDE: I spoke to him after the race and asked what he does to be so quick on the bike. Turns out he was a professional cross country skier and then did 10 years of cycle racing !]. I stuck with my plan but did not feel that great at all. Decided not to look at my average speed but felt ok about my pace just based on the few riders that I saw. It was clear that I was pretty much with the pace of the race around me and since I’d finished the swim so far up that couldn’t be so bad. I then started reeling in some of the female pro’s so despite not feeling great I must be doing ok.

For the first time I had a bento box on my bike and I had kendal mint cake and nine bars. The former was a great success and the latter abit too chewie. I’m not really one for nutrition by the numbers and go rather by feel. I guess my basis is try and get so real(ish) food in on the bike (ie not gels and bars with tonnes of crap added as I feel this can lead to stomach problems later). I eat as I feel and take water or gatorade at the aid stations again based on how I feel.

Throughout the first lap it was pretty lonely. The odd occassion have someone go by but for alot of the time I could have been out on a training ride on my own (except for everyone cheering me on!). Great sign on the course … something like “Go IronWoman, men don’t iron” … made me smile.

Second lap brought a head wind and lots more company as I started passing some of the back markers. My plan was to push on in the second lap if I felt good.. I didn’t and starting the second lap with the head wind I felt worse. Kept reminding myself that I was at the pace of the race (whatever that meant to me!) since very few people were passing me and those that did only moved away slowly. Reminding myself also of something I believe Mark Allen said – that you don’t have to feel good to be having a good race. With about 30 miles to go Brunold passed me. This is a local guy that has won my age group for the past several years. Not a good swimmer but normally cranks out a low 5 hour bike split followed by a low 3 hour run. I hadn’t realised he was racing again so this was hugely encouraging that it was this late in the race that he passed me. Also, he didn’t pull away too quickly. This may be because I just started to feel good. AT LAST ! I was now pushing bigs gears on the flat and rather than my legs screaming “ease off” they were screaming “yeh baby!” Fun at last. In the last 10 miles in to T2 I managed to pass two guys.

I started to focus on the run and reminding myself I didn’t want the mental meltdown of Germany that I was going to push it. I was encouraged that I was pushing hard on the bike at the end and felt good. I had energy in reserve and I now looked at my bike time and it was going to be good. Sub 5.20 which i knew was good on this course. Only issue was in the final 2 miles the inside of my left thigh started to cramp … luckily riding through it seemed to ease it.

I hurtled through  T2 in super quick time. Out on the run my legs felt great in the initial euphoria of finishing the bike and chuffed the cramp on the bike was non existent running. Then the bike legs hit but I knew it would go and I’d run well. Hit 2 miles in about 14 minutes so was very happy (it was downhill for a big bit!) and I was now running comfortably. Some girls with a “SWF Looking for Good Ironman” sign cheered me on. Said I was looking strong and asked how I felt. Got a big cheer when I said I felt great. Going by all the cafes on state street was awesome. There was no other athlete on there, I smiled as the cheers started and this only got  them going more, so I smiled more etc… had a shiver go down my spine and started to well up. This is what makes Ironman so awesome.

I was running well but I was suffering. Luckily each mile split was showing around the 7.30 mark so happy. There are a few out and back bits on each lap so I could see the competition behind. Happy to see most were going slower than me and everyone that went by was either in their 40s or 30-34. I was pretty sure I was in 3 or 4th in my age group and started to feel the Kona slot was now there for me to lose. This made me feel strong as each time I’ve had that thought it’s made me determined not to let it slip.

Second lap (of 2) and things started to get tough. I could feel my right calf twinge with cramp. From there on it periodically half cramped I did a sort of running hop / limp and it cleared. The odd occasion I yelped but each time it didn’t quite go. With so far to go this was getting a little concerning. It progressively got more frequent so I finally started resorting to gels and holding back the pace a little to nurse it home. Don’t think they helped at all. I think the hard surface (mostly concrete) we ran on made it very tough. I was looking forward to the uphills now as I was running more comfortably on them. I also tried to remove my mind from the thought of the distance and just focus on the moment. For short spells this worked really well. I passed the point I’d seen Jo on the first lap. Then I saw her – she looked really happy and was absolutely flying, for once I didn’t get to scream at her, instead she screamed “Looking good gorgeous” – just what I needed with about 3 miles to go.

2 miles to cramp. BANG. Calf cramps completely. Classic foot straight in line with my leg, stop dead, Really painful getting my toes down and slowly stretching it. Have to apologise to the crowd for my language. Get it sorted and tentatively start running again, it doesn’t go and I get back to pace. It almost feels better running faster.

Finally into the last half mile and tonnes of support. Enjoy this. Down the finishers shoot I’m all on my own, see the clock for the first time (I’d not started my watch until the run) and though I knew I’d be under 10 hours I was chuffed with how far. The crowd was great and as I relaxed the calf almost went again. I focussed and got across the line and immediately it cramped completely and I fell over over. Agony, especially as the first few helpers didn’t know what to do and they made it worse. I laid just beyond the finish line for about 5 minutes before they managed to get me to my feet. One of the helpers said “Well you certainly gave it your all”. I had and I was chuffed to buggery ;o)

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Ironman Wisconsin Pre Race

Posted on September 6, 2008 by lord_lordy

WisconsinPreRaceDay before the race and the usual nerves are hitting. Jo has given a great blog entry describing some of our time here and how it makes us feel. Have a read here. We’ve just racked our bikes and dropped off our transition bags. I feel alot more relaxed now abit like once you’ve checked in your bags at the airport.

Boy oh boy is this a transition area. From the swim you run up “The Helix” which is a 4 storey up ramp for the car park, then run in to the bag room then into the changing room, then through the bike racking (there’s gotta be about 4 blocks worth of racking) before mounting your bike just before going down the other Helix. Pretty much the same thing in reverse for T2. Fastest transition times last year were around 4 minutes. It’s not quick. But changing indoors in a carpeted room is going to be luxury.

Final preparations have gone quite well. Yesterday we did a loop of the swim before driving out and doing a 31 mile ride out on the loop of the bike course. It was a nice ride and I did some bursts of 5 – 10 minutes at race pace. Felt ok. Further hit home how tough a bike course this is. It’s pretty technical with some fast descents and corners but also there are so many undulations that riding sensible will be key. I’m running it through in my head and may try to hold back a little on the first lap and pick it up on the second if I’m feeling good.

We had breakfast / lunch at Mickies – a classic diner we found on Thursday. Awesome omelets and very friendly staff. Did a run in the afternoon for 35 minutes which felt pretty sharp for me of late. Took in the bit of the course we’d not done before and it’s the hilliest bit !

Had the ‘pasta’ party last night which we attended because the briefing was after. We arrived about an hour after the start and the queues weren’t too long for food, any later though and we wouldn’t have got any. Managed to get a low carb meal, though it did require fishing out the chunks of bread they tossed generously into the salad – whats that all about ! My sister, Jane, would have laughed – yet again there was a big standing ovation for something I didn’t feel deserved it. Good to see Jo agreed and stayed sat. It’s going the same way of a minutes silence – have you noticed that this has slowly crept up to 3 minutes… it won’t be long… no I’ll stop there thats for another day. Anyway – everyone stood up because there was a 79 year old entered. Now, I’m impressed he’s entered but don’t really feel it deserves a standing ovation – if he finishes then perhaps. So, they get him up on stage and interview him and he’s very open and states how he won’t be finishing as he only plans on doing the swim but he entered because he’s competed in every IM Wisconsin. I wonder how many people wanted to take their standing ovation back !

Briefing started early (hurrah) and was short, sweet and to the point (HURRAH) allowing Jo and I to head out and chill in our favourite coffee shop. Amazing how quickly you get settled in a place. We have our favourite diner where the staff already recognise us and our favourite coffee shop ! Already feel happy here. It’s a great place just to be. Relaxing and very friendly. People are just so welcoming and so pleased that we’d travel so far to visit their town.

This morning did another lap of the swim course. Swam it continuously and at a steady pace. This included the final leg out of the swim so was slightly more than half distance. Nice to complete it comfortably in 29 minutes.

We jogged over to Mickies for breakfast. What an experience, it’s just by Randall Field where the local University football team, The Beavers, play. Today was a big game and everyone was heading there. Great atmosphere. More or less everyone was in red ! The diner was packed but we got sat at the bar and soaked up the atmosphere. We chatted with the guy next to us. Turned out he owns a local cafe which we’d been so close to popping in to. He invited us over for dinner tonight on him! Very tempting but it would compromise our normal night before race routine so I think we will have to decline. Just another sign of the amazing friendliness here.

So… how do I feel ? At the moment I’m in the period between dropping off kit and going to bed where I feel totally relaxed. No nerves. But they have been building. I have periods of feeling envious of the slower people – back of the swim pack, cruising the bike course … though I don’t envy their run. Jo and I said it would be nice to do one just for fun one day ! But this is for fun. I keep reminding myself of this, enjoy it.

I get nervous about the swim start. Not the argie bargie anymore but doing myself justice. Ensuring I get in the water early enough and get into a good spot on the front line. I’m considering this race of not sprinting from the start but instead just doing enough to avoid the worst of the aggro. We will see. I guess I worry about the bike but really it’s nonsense. It seems I worry about too many people going by me but my logical side just says thats stupid … by that point it’s just do your own race. It’s irrelevant how many go by you as no matter what the best approach is to cycle the effort thats required to get my best performance.

The run. Who knows. If I have the guts and the mental strength to push the run I think I will be happy whatever the outcome.

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Wet Wisconsin

Posted on September 4, 2008 by lord_lordy

There has been a serious amount of rain here today. So much rain we knocked the planned ride on the head. We managed to swim the full course (2 laps) this morning. Pissing with rain and windy … didn’t notice the rain but the chop was bad and swimming back towards the finish was tough. The water was nice and it was certainly nicer in than out.

Next, find a decent diner for breakfast. It was quite a drive taking us 15 miles out of town before finding a great place about 2 miles from our hotel ! This wasn’t as mad as it sounded – we had the bikes in the car, the hope being to find a nice diner out of town and have breakfast whilst the weather decided to improve. It didn’t – wet all day. Enjoyed a well paced run at the end of the afternoon. Quite encouraging. For part of it I ran past a massive student band practising – very impressive.

Tonight met up with a load of friends of Andreas for some dinner. Really nice bunch and good fun to chat with some new people. They all tucked in to pizza whilst Jo and I stuck to salad which inevitably lead to questions about not eating carbs which are always so difficult to field in those circumstances.

Given the weather today we’re both pleased we rode the course yesterday. It is tough – very rolling. I used my full range of gears – from pedalling full pelt in my top gear through to out of the saddle grinding my lowest gear. This is a course that you could easily blow up on by hammering it early on. I think patience will be key here. The course is beautiful – through lovely rolling farmland and passing by picture perfect farms. Fingers crossed for nice weather so we can really enjoy it. We popped into a bike shop halfway round and the mechanic kindly fixed a niggle with my bike. We chatted for ages. He was the spitting image of my friend Mark – to the point I considered asking if he had a brother. I didn’t.

Our hotel has two big parties in it. The first being a Hanes Ironman Tour group of god knows how many germans. There are also loads of other triathletes here. There is also a weight watchers group ! How do I know this – there’s this notice board in reception giving details of meetings for each group. Anyway, it’s lead to an interesting game we can play – when in the lift and someone else gets in it’s guess which group they belong to. It’s not a very difficult game.

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Madison

Posted on September 3, 2008 by lord_lordy

Arrived safely in Madison. We’ve put out bikes together and everything appears ok will head for a ride shortly. Been looking forward to being able to blog from here and then discover that I’ve been an idiot and not brought the latest website on my laptop. I’d been updating from my Laptop at home so assumed I had but I’d been opening the site from my desktop. What a plonker ! Anyway – I’ve added back the entries into this version … so it may look like I’ve reposted 4 entries – sorry.

Flight over went pretty well other than BAs rather annoying ‘book online’ seat allocation resulting in Jo and I not sitting together. The girl next to Jo (travelling alone) wouldn’t switch seats ! This does not compute to me. I like to think people are generally nice and I tend to find that. But really – not moving purely because my seat ‘wasn’t as good”  ! Other than exit rows is there really a difference.

Drive up here was uneventful and Madison seems pretty quiet. Nice though. Found a cheap place for a cobb salad last night and it was lovely. This morning we ran a big chunk of the run course. Legs felt lifeless at the start but got better after about 20 minutes. Pretty undulating, alot on very hard surfaces. Can see why very few people get under 3 hours on this run. Reckon sub 3:30 will be very good going.

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Tapering Strikes

Posted on August 31, 2008 by lord_lordy

Trouble with blog – some issues with comments on my blog at the moment which is a little frustrating. I am seeing them but can’t seem to reply directly to them. So first thing here is to answer the comment on my previous blog. The measure of strain mentioned in the last entry would increase with repetitive training. I find that repetitive training is easier to get done, easier to fit into a schedule and less taxing mentally. It’s the idea of a basic week you can manage week in week out. The formula used to measure strain looks at the variation in volume daily through the week. So, both concepts work. Repeat your basic week, week in week out but within the week have varied days of volume – some high, some low etc… This happens naturally for most people as they can’t handle days and days of volume. Also work forces a daily variability in volume. For full time amateurs like me you can end up with monotony. The period at the start of this year where strain was highest saw me biking and running every day for weeks on end. Days and days of 6+ hours training. It served me pretty well for New Zealand but wonder whether it effectively burnt me out for the season since then. I’ve certainly found being full time and my main focus being Ironman very difficult since New Zealand … thats a topic for another day perhaps when the season is complete.

To the title of this entry. Bleedin tapers ! I’m useless at them. Should have stuck to my guns of not tapering till next week but after the advice I’d received about doing Wisconsin and Kona I felt a longer taper for Wisconsin was wise so this week I eased off. Time to kill, boredom, whatever, but my diet lapsed big time and I’ve gain quite few pounds. The psychological impact is probably greater than the physical but either way I need to work out methods of dealing with it and keeping on the straight and narrow in the final few weeks. I’m hoping I will learn from Jo, she seems to nail getting in great shape for an event. She is looking scarily lean at the moment and ready to do some damage. I can see me racing scared with my main motivation being Jo not catching me on the run !!

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Load And Strain

Posted on August 28, 2008 by lord_lordy

LoadAndStrain

This graph is something I’m planning to try out in my training diary next year. It’s the idea of measuring ‘Strain” a concept developed my Carl Foster. You have to measure your Rate Of Perceived Effort (RPE) for each session, that together with duration gives a measure of training load. You then get a measure of the monotony of your training by dividing the average daily load by the standard deviation of the daily load. Total load multiplied by monotony gives strain.

So the sort of things that give you a high strain are:

  1.       High duration
  2.       High intensity
  3.       Repetitive training

Foster developed this as a way of indicating over training. My plan next year is to track this and see what it gives me

Anyway, as an experiment I decided to plug in this years data. Of course I don’t have my RPE ratings but I felt that up until this summer I  pretty much trained at a constant level on the Borg scale of about 4 throughout the year other than at Epic Camp and during this last push phase. So for those I have a pretty good recollection of each days effort. So not perfect but the above makes reasonably interesting reading

The first spike is the build to New Zealand – major training strain due to the consistency and volume of my training. I went for several weeks where I ran and biked every day. The next major spike is Epic Camp – again consistently high volume but also some increased intensity. This all makes sense knowing how much training I did ! The past two months has seen me doing the most intense training sessions in quite a while but the volume has been less and the monotony very low since I’ve mixed up days each week of very high volume (and intensity) with low volume easy days. As a result the strain measure is very low.

The average daily load for the previous week is also plotted on the graph and makes for even more interesting reading. We see that Epic was the biggest load. Not unsurprising as it’s the only time I’ve really combined high volume with some decent intensity. Now looking at the period pre New Zealand we see a lower load than Epic but pretty high strain. Finally looking at the recent period we see that I’ve achieved almost as high a training load but on vastly reduced strain. Hopefully this indicates I’ve been getting some good work in and getting recovered. Be interesting to see how  I go at Wisconsin and more importantly Kona. I am going well currently but feel I’ll be much better prepared for Kona than Wisconsin. I must be sure to be mentally prepared for this to that whatever happens  at Wisconsin I am in the right state of mind to do the final preparations for Kona and race well.

The other interesting thing this raises is that the Maffetone Method seems to almost certainly imply higher strain since  I will be training at a similar RPE. The only way to relieve the monotony will be to vary the daily volume quite dramatically. Another thing to add into the mix for next year.

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Getting There

Posted on August 25, 2008 by lord_lordy

GettingThereWithin 2 weeks of IM Wisconsin. Funny, if this was New Zealand or Hawaii I’d probably be at the race venue now and the event would feel so close. From here it still feels like ages. Jo has ‘officially’ started her taper ( see a nice blog entry stating this fact here. ) Me, I’m pushing on ! This past week has certainly seen more rest than planned and today has been a complete break. My running has had a forced reduction as a couple of niggles (hamstring and groin) have made me hold back. However when I do run I feel good.

The push is continuing this week as I’m am really looking ahead to Kona. Thats the race I want to nail. Wisconsin will be done well rested but not fully tapered. Fingers crossed that will be enough to qualify, I feel it should be.

The weekend certainly made me feel it is starting to come together. Both days I rode over 100 miles and felt really good. The saturday was fast and slightly flatter (but it was still Somerset!) whereas Sunday was hilly. I ran off the bike on Saturday and was running fast and feeling light. It’s giving me mixed feelings – looking at what I’ve done since Germany this is LOW volume for me and that makes me feel uneasy, out of my comfort zone. However, when I’m out swimming, biking and now running as well I feel fast, comfortable and strong. I’m clinging to the latter and really starting to get some positive thoughts about Wisconsin. At the moment, for me, I think thats the most important thing. I need to feel the confidence to go for it on the run. Time will tell.

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Niggles

Posted on August 22, 2008 by lord_lordy

KonaSwimStart08I’m hoping with the way my swimming is going that come October 11th I’ll be on the front line of the above ! Been going well all week with swimming. Focussed on quality sessions by only doing the 3 coached sessions. On Monday morning we had a main set that could really test how my swimming is going. Started with a solid 1500m warm up which I did in 22 minutes. Main set was Pauls lovely ‘Accumulator’ set. The idea is you do 100m off a time of your best 400m pace plus 15 seconds. We do 400m time trials every few months so we use that. I’ve improved alot since my last time trial so I was confident I could hit my target of 1:20s going off 1:35. So… you start with 1 100 then do 50m easy. If u make that you do 2 x 200 then 50m easy. You keep going adding a 100 till you don’t make the time at which point you start over. We all keep doing this for 45 minutes. Well … I went 1, then 2, then 3, then 4, then 5, then 6, and got 4 of my 7 done before the 45 minutes was over. I was hitting them all between 1:16 and 1:19. 1:19 felt like cruising but to get 1:16 took significantly more work. I could so feel the water and just kept being able to pull it with all my might. A great feeling.

I’ve started to feel strong throughout the three disciplines but unfortunately a couple of niggles have arisen.

Firstly last week during my long run I felt my right groin get tight. This has progressed abit since then and though it eased off during my long run on Tuesday it felt bad enough when I ran off the bike for me to stop after 5 minutes. It felt to me like it would ease off with rest so I didn’t run on it Wednesday but getting to swimming I could feel it still so arranged for a massage Friday afternoon. On Thursday I could even feel it on the bike so I knocked my planned run for the day on the head. I jogged to the club run session and organised it but didn’t run myself. This proved to be the right decision as this morning it felt alot better running to and from swimming. With the massage this afternoon I held off any further running, even though I was sorely tempted, to try and ensure it had every opportunity to recover.

More worryingly is the ball of my left foot. I’ve been getting pain on and off there during cycling for quite a while now but not thought too much of it. Recently though it has been getting worse and I’m feeling it sometimes when running now. It’s becoming a little bit of a concern. Having done some searching on the web I think it’s to go with the two sesamoid bones under the metatarsal of the big toe – ie right under the ball of my foot. The concern is that this is chronic and will take alot to recover from. My thoughts are either I just need to adjust my cleats or I’m going to have to take a big break and let it recover. Fingers crossed it will keep ok through to Kona. The discomfort isn’t that bad and it’s still intermittent so I can handle it. You never know moving my cleats may sort it out.

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Backing It Up

Posted on August 17, 2008 by lord_lordy

Any regular readers out there I apologise for flooding this blog but it’s rather like therapy for me to write about how my training is going. Reminds me of the days when I used to keep a diary.

Last night my sleep was massively disrupted as my legs ached so much. To the point I don’t think I’d have ridden today if I hadn’t agreed to meet Jo. I’m glad I went. My plan was to just ride steady and do our training loop the opposite direction to Jo to keep an eye on her. After about 30 minutes I felt pretty good so when Jo started her 20 minutes pieces above IM pace I tagged along and just kept her within about 20m. This was about IM effort for me. I did two of these before we got to the start of the loop. I then got focussed on my average speed and was determined to get it to 16.7mph before I got to the little shop where I was going to grab breakfast. This resulted in a 55 minute push at above IM effort. Following some peanuts I met up with Jo and cycled with her back to Epping before continuing on. I then did a pyramid set of 1min fast / 5 recovery, 2 fast / 4, 3 / 3, 4/2, 5/1, 4/2, 3/3, 2/4, 1/5. Each fast bit was best effort for that time period. Went really well. Ended ride with 121 miles in 7 hours and managed to do a fast 20 minute run off the bike. Really pleased, been a long time since decent back to back long rides. Managed longer but don’t think I’ve managed to consecutive rides at that sort of intensity.

So despite it being a week of far less volume the quality of my training this week has been excellent.

People are so friendly towards cyclists. Often seems to be old fellas that used to cycle but now ‘just don’t have the time’ – it’s ashame they can’t get out. Today was top quality for chats. When I stopped first I got chatting to a guy who was keen on road racing. Then whilst fixing Jo’s puncture we got chatting with a guy that used to Time Trial. Finally when I had some lunch after my pyramid got chatting with guy that used to cycle lots round this area. Turns out he was a captain in the merchant navy. I could have chatted with him for ages. He seems pretty pleased when I said I always thought of that job as being really romantic. He said it was !

All in  all an excellent day.

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