JTT's Ironman Canada 2008 Blog

Kirkland Half Marathon pics

2008-05-21T23:06:00.000-07:00

"Chase your dreams" - Sappy Triathlon Video clip

2008-05-20T16:20:00.000-07:00

Ah pretty fluff clip but what the heck.

Week of 5/18

2008-05-19T16:56:00.000-07:00

Week of 5/18

Good, solid week.

Swim- 4
Bike-4
Run-4

Monday-

Indoor long spin on 200-210w. 1hr 15min

Tuesday-

Swim- lunchtime swim. 5x200

Bike-Z3 & Z4 intervals. example z4 4min then z3 8min, no stopping x2. 230-240 on z4, 195-210w on z3

Wednedsay-

Swim- lunchtime swim. Mainset 300,200,100x2 on 30sec rest. (4.45, 3.04, 1.27 & 4.40, 3.05, 1.28)

Track session-

(600,500,400), (600, 500,400,300) (600,500,400) w/100m float jogs. Still recovering a bit from Sunday’s Half Marathon. Workout was at L pace, ran in the L window, but was a touch slow on 400m (as compared to last week). About 5.40-ish pace for all, so about 1.22's through the 400 which should be a trot, and it basically wa.

Thursday-

Today was a bit odd, I tossed and turn most of the night. I have some unresolved planning around the season, and work, and the next few weeks all feature some hard training, traveling, and racing. I went to bed at a decent hour but it was just that really unrestful sleep I sometimes have and I was shot. I skipped a morning run and late afternoon bike.

Run- As you might guess it was really, really slow. The upside is that I felt much better afterwards. 60min plus.

Friday-

Run- wakeup run. 41min easy on BG, it was sunny!

Bike- 45 miles, 2hr 24min

Swim- Mainset- 3x300 (4.32, 4.37, 4.28)- whoops after running & biking the intent was just to get in the pool and take it easy, still it felt "easy" meaning somewhere around Z3. I was used to flogging myself all last year and that's what I thought swimming was all about, apparently not when you're busy trying to build endurance. :)

Saturday-

Bike- 85 miles z2 ride. 5hrs 40min

Sunday-

Swim- Mainset- 5x200 on 30sec rest, 3.01-3.04 felt pretty hard after yesterday

Swim- Went to Idyllwood Park to do a tiny bit of open water swim and test out the new suit, cold water, but good practice

Run- 61min steady/easy run on BG

Ripped from the headlines... Canadian men's eight..

2008-05-14T20:37:00.000-07:00

Great profile of the Canadian men's eight. That's rower-speak for an eight man sweep. There isn't much else I can add to the profile other than it is inspirational to see what belief and dedication to a program will do for an athlete.

http://www.thestar.com/Sports/Olympics/article/424199

Kirkland Half Marathon race report...

2008-05-13T20:22:00.000-07:00

Actually, not much to report, approached it as a long run time trial.

I had no idea the course was so hilly so a *really* fast run was out of the question. There was only a small portion of the course where I might have gained back some of the time I lost on hills.
Pretty happy with it as though, managed 5.45-6min a mile on the flats, looks like things are on track.

Might try to get some pics up when they are posted.

Escape from Alcatraz fast approaching, Tri Cal Video

2008-05-12T17:37:00.000-07:00

Almost a year ago I jumped into the frigid water of San Francisco Bay, I still can't believe the epic-ness of that swim, it is still fairly surreal thinking about the ferry taking us to Alcatraz Island, being so close to it..

The season is on.

Week of 5/11

2008-05-11T20:30:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Swim 4

Bike 4

Run 5

Monday

Run- 60min even on BG- warm enough to run sans shirt.

Swim- Session at Mercer Island Pool w/ECMT. Mostly drills, and some short rest 100s.

Tuesday-

Run- Easy 31min jog to RTC on BG.. Feeling fine.

Bike- Intervals. Longer Z3/2 blended intervals 220-230w, 6-8min and a handful of 1min Z5 intervals 330watts.. Good session. Longer stuff simulates a hard sustained half-iron pace, and the short Z5 simulate the sort of power and time you might use climbing a hill while still maintaining speed.

Wed-

Bike- early morning 30min spin the legs out ride.

Swim- lunchtime swim. 5x200 on 30 sec, 3.01-3.04

Track- 1 mile, 1200, 800, 400 (5.42, 4.12, 2.44, 72).. Felt so much better than last week, these felt crisp, legs felt fresh.

Thurs-

Bike- 46 miles, 2hr 48min. Z2 effort ride, low wattage.

Friday

Swim- lunchtime swim. 6x200 on 30 sec (2.58, 3.01, 3.04, 3.04, 3.04, 3.01)

Run- 45min jog after work on BG, felt good, kept it under control

Saturday

Bike- very easy 26mi, 1hr 30min, Z1/2 wattage, 134w; capped it at easy effort, couple of 2min/3min blow the rust out of legs spins but that was it.

Swim- mix of drills, some continous swim and paddle work.

Sun-

Run- Kirkland Half Marathon: 6.19's. 1.23-ish very hilly course, more later.

Good piece of strategic running

2008-05-08T17:08:00.000-07:00

Macca describes a nearly flawless run strategy to knock off a competitor, pretty much text book.

Kirkland Half Marathon this weekend...

2008-05-07T12:52:00.000-07:00

Doing it as a "knock off some more rust" event... I have no idea what the course is like, but have been told that it's moderately hilly.. Shooting for a low 6 min pace, and a finishing time commensurate with that.

As it is, I was moderately surprised w/my track session last week, while it felt fine, it was certainly slower than anything I'd done in Jan/Feb time-frame; clearly a result of much more cycling, and there isn't much I can do about that, I can't lose on bike power for a set of mildly snappier legs.

Ideally we'll see L pace come slowly down, hopefully more in line with 3hr marathon pace; I guess technically it is now, but I can't operate at those speeds for longer than 30k, so we'll work on really plumbing the system for efficiency.

Are Bejing Olympic Sponsorships a Waste?

2008-05-06T09:37:00.000-07:00

A friend forwarded an article (below), these are my off the cuff reactions:

What strikes me is that the Olympics, like the Superbowl certainly falls into the "silo" model of marketing, capture alot of eyeballs, but who knows whether you are getting to the consumers who are most likely to buy your product.

I don't know how sophisticated Chinese consumers are (and what metric you use to measure that), but I guess the counter-point would be that, although they may not know who the actual apparel sponsor is (Nike vs. Adidas) hopefully they'd poll consumers and find out during the games if the advertising was changing those impressions.

I guess part of that counter point is that the immediate impact/benefit what-have-you for Lenovo, Adidas, et al would be less important than, say, getting market pentration, brand recognition and hopefully for those western brands, reap benefits down the line?

Either way, it was a pretty provocative article. A less provocative argument might be "Low Roi on Advertising Dollars for Bejing Games sponsor" but I think it'd be easier to argue that.

Anyhoo, I've always thought the advertising dollars for Olympic Games & Superbowl were dangerous dollars spent.

If you are Coke or Pepsi it's not going to make or break you, but I think there is a history of interent startups spending almost their entire annual budget, then the Superbowl ad stunk- or maybe I'm dreaming that up !

http://www.forbes.com/opinions/2008/04/23/china-olympics-sponsors-oped-cx_sre_0424olympics.html

Week of 5/4

2008-05-05T10:36:00.000-07:00

Swim 4

Bike 5

Run 4

Monday-

Active recovery day.

Run- 32min

Tuesday-

Bike-

1hr 12min Intervals Mainset- 4x4min 200w, 4x3 @ 230-240w, 4x2 240-250w, 2x1min 330+w

Swim-

Mainset- 3x300 (easy to mod) 4.45, 4.50. Last 300 cut short as pool was closing, 200 in 3.08.

Wed-

Run- Mid afternoon out & back on the BG. 42min; legs a bit heavy from bike intervals yesterday

Bike- 55min of Carmichel bike intervals; L3-ish, 230-240w in aerobars.

Thurs-

Run- little jog in the morning 42min

Bike- Sunny ride on the BG, 1hr 32min

Friday-

Swim- Lunch time-Back in the pool, boiler plate workout but water was warm. Mainset-400,300,200,100 (6.20, 4.40, 3.05, 1.28)

Run- Track workout: 600, 800, 1000, 1000, 600, 800. L pace, aiming for 5.40mile pace. (2.02, 2.50, 3.38, 3.37, 2.03, 2.50). Suppose I felt o.k.; prolly a little slogged from previous work in the week.

Sat-

Swim- Mainset- 500 easy (no time on this as I was too stupes to look) 5x200 (3.02-3.05) on 20sec rest

Bike- 45 miles (?).. Don't have ride data in front of me. 2hr 30m; 170w avg; drizzly the whole ride, had rain cape on for the whole thing; Route was 1 lap of Lk Samm, then out and back to Bothell.

Sun-

Bike- A sunny, dry ride. 38miles, 2hr 14min, Carnation Valley, thinking 170w avg as well, not near the compu w/the ride data.

Swim- One hour between bike & swim, grabbed some food, recov beverage, hit the pool. Mainset- 2x500 (7.52, 8.02) 2x200 (3.05, 3.05)- pretty tired, but these were suppossed to be "slow" but more like, "o.k., I can do this all day" sort of pace.

What was this person thinking when they built this bike?

2008-05-04T17:55:00.000-07:00

Oh boy.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Electric-Bicycle-Carbon-Fiber_W0QQitemZ150242899223QQihZ005QQcategoryZ98084QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Shoutout to Movin Shoes and Clarence Z...

2008-05-01T09:45:00.000-07:00

If you're ever in San Diego and you need some great technical running apparel and/or running shoes you must stop in to one of the Movin Shoes stores.

Major props to Clarence Zachow for sourcing (and sending) some great technical shorts for me, he definitely made my season, and I will be running in them all the way through my training to Ironman Canada.

Here are those locations:

6105 Lake Murray Blvd
La Mesa, Ca 91942
619-466-1656

1892 Garnet Ave
San Diego, Ca 92109
858-373-2310

897 S. Coast Hwy 101
Encinintas, Ca 92024
760-634-2353

9975 Carmel Mt. Road
San Diego, Ca 92129
858-484-2183

Week of 4/27

2008-04-29T08:48:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Swim-4
Bike-5
Run-4

Monday

Bike- Weather cleared up (mildly)- Cold, but clear.

29 miles, 1hr 33min.

Swim- Late night punching the clock workout. Mainset- 3x300 on 30 sec rest. 4.45-4.50; Z2/3 blend.

Tuesday

Run- 30min lunch time jog

Bike- Intervals 3x5min hight Z4 260-270watts 5min rest between each. 5min rest; high Z3 2min, 2min, 2min, 2min, 2min. 230-240w; alternating higher rpm (95-100rpm) w/lower rpm (85-90)

Wed

Run- Moderate paced run, 62 minutes on good, old Burke-Gilliman. Legs were a bit flat from last nights effort.

Swim- Mainset- 5x200 on 30se rest. Suppossed to feel "easy"- for the most part they did: 3.02-3.05's

Thurs

Really had planned on riding in the late afternoon/early eve today, but felt completely warmed over, just slept friggin' awful. Worked from home in the afternoon, took an early evening nap, felt better.

Swim- late eve swim; no real mainset. Super long warmup. Then 500 w/the fancy Speedo paddles that make paddle work more challenging, 500 w/out paddles, easy pace (7.50)...

If I'm getting to the point where I can now do an "easy" 500 in 7.50 and do that 3-4x something must be clicking w/the form changes and fitness. I've relaxed a chunk of the stroke so I'm not always mauling the water like a cougar thrown into a lake, plus the "put in" when/how the hand enters has tipped my front quadrant a bit further fwd so I'm swimming "from the hips" better than I have in the past.

I'm actually most interested in throwing on my wetsuit and trying to replicate the pool stuff.

Friday

Bike- IM Pace test ride: 37 miles on Sauvie, 194w avg. Set out to ride at exactly 75% of FTP. So my window was 190-200.. In places where I had a headwind, false flat, I only ran up to 230w for moments before settling back in. All went well, it was not hard, and mostly took alot of concentration to not wander off goal watts.. Avg. speed of 20.5mph; most of the time sitting above that; had three quick stops to adjust rear der.. (I need to go back to Triumph Multisport, this was a bad bike build)

Run- Got into McMinn. unpacked, jogged up to the community track w/the kids.. 32min at a brisk pace.. Felt great, and weather was spot-on.

Saturday

Swim- Shock of shocks, had a good swim at the Mcminn aquatic center, lack of swimmers meant it wasn't pure chop again.

Mainset-(done Easy, Moderate, Fast- like the opening 100 of a race fighting for position)- 300,200,100 (2.45, 3.05, 1.28)50kick, 100 paddles, 300,200,100(2.50, 3.05, 1.28)

Bike- Afternoon bike. 42miles, 2hr 30min. 168w avg. This was a takin' 'er ride.

Rode to Deer Creek County park and past it waaay out in the coastal foothills in Yamhill county past Coleman winery; roads were totally vacant, weather was perfect, and I was just turning it over easy to moderate w/a nice light perdal stroke.

Sunday

Bike- Miid morning. Steady one hour ride to the Glacial Erratic and back. Mode on the flats, pushed the hills. Focus on seated power. About an hour, 180w avg.

Run- Late afternoon run, a touch over 30min

Is core work worthwhile for endurance athletes?

2008-04-27T22:06:00.000-07:00

I say "no".

These are my assertions:

1. Research (for the most part) doesn't support it. Run a quick search through PubMed and read the synopsis of a few of the most recent studies on whether core work leads to higher VO2 values, or higher watts at LT, or any meaningful value for an endurance athlete.

2. Untrained, moderately trained and semi-seasoned endurance athletes are still better off maximizing their time "imprinting" sport-specific functional strength by actively engaging in the sport.

The best example of this is swimming. Sure, you can do dry-land drills all day long, but you're best in the pool swimming and working on drills to improve neural connectivity between the brain and muscles.

3. Let's say you do "core work" once a week for an hour x48 weeks (assuming some time off in a year)... Your close competitors use that hour over the same period of time to focus on turning a weakness into a strength. I am curious to know how those core sessions will allow you to out kick, out bike or swim faster than your closest competitors..

4. Personal experience. I tried serious plyo drills in college along with a weight program, for a year. I was faster simply running more volume and running harder in the year following college sans the plyos and weights.

Sure it's opinion, and fortunately for me, it's a blog. I don't actually have to spend much time providing the facts, but, again if you are interested, shoot me a note and I will provide the peer-reviewed research.

Oh, and I found this highly entertaining too, it's core work related and hillarious:

http://www.drtri.com/

Good stuff on the Amanda Lovato blog..

2008-04-27T10:48:00.000-07:00

She has a nice, "tell it like it is from my pov" style.

Her description of the Tri scene in Boulder isn't drastically different than any other mountain town I've lived in.

But most importantly, she comes off as smart and funny. A breath of fresh air in a sea of really silly blogs in the Tri community.

You have two kinds of blogs, the Gordo wannbe's on the male side of the fence and the "I'm so girly I'm not even sure I'm doing a sport" blog on the female side.

Btw, I'm in no way connected to Amanda, just stumbled onto it:

http://amandalovato.blogspot.com/

Some new medicine for me

2008-04-23T18:50:00.001-07:00

Boise 70.3 - I'm in...

2008-04-23T12:57:00.000-07:00

Registered today... I'm excited and ready... About 6 weeks out and plenty of fun prep to do.

Plenty of folks racing in my age group at Boise will also be at Canada.

Either way, I'm going to take a slot to Clearwater 70.3 worlds if I can swing one, I will need to be firing on all cylinders to do that.

Word is the Boise course is very fast, and the water is going to be very, very cold, like low 50F.

Brrr. :)

Week of 4/20

2008-04-21T09:34:00.000-07:00

Week of 4/20

Summary:

Some rough weather up in Seattle kept me off the bike, plenty of run/swim instead.

Swim-4
Bike-3
Run-5

Monday

Run- 30min run on treadmill.. (Weather went from great to awful in a day)... 7.30-6.30 pace

Swim- Easy Swim; Legs a bit heavy from long rides over weekend; but nothing terrible. Mainset- 300,200,100. Form feeling good at the Half Iron swim pace

Tues

Bike- 65 min of Z3 & Z4 intervals

Mainset-5min @ 230-240w, directly into 10min @ 230w, directly into 5min @ 200w, 4x1min hard

Wed

Run- 61min Late afternoon steady run. Legs feeling from last weeks longer rides, never the less, plugged away.

Swim- Mainset- 5x200- 3.01-3.03 on 45sec rest; Z2/3

Thurs

Run- 47min steady on BG

Swim- Mainset= 300,200,100, 300,200,100 on 30sec rest. Easy, Medium, Fast. (4.45, 3.03, 1.27), (5.00, 3.08, 1.29).. Slowed down a bit second set, sharing a lane sometimes slows things up.

Fri

Bike- Z2 Intervals. Goal wattage of 75% of Functional Threshold Wattage; FTP 266. 75%= 199. Sitting on 190-205w, 4x5min 10x2min, short rest

Swim- Drill set, working low elbow recovery. Main set- 5x200 on 30sec rest; Z2/3- 3.02-3.05

Sat

Bike-55min Big Gear Strength intervals

Run- easy transition run, 56min

Sun

Run- Long Run 1hr 30min, slightly slower than Half Marathon pace. 7min pace ? :)

The Local Bike Shop, or LBS....Anytown, USA

2008-04-19T12:15:00.000-07:00

Oh man, it's definitely a rant.

Since I've taken up cycling five years ago most of what I've run into at the "LBS" as cyclists call their bike shops in where ever, USA is conflicting advice, strange attitudes, and not frequently enough, good service and great attitudes.

I have no idea why this is, the LBS charges labor rates that are pretty close to what an MBA charges Microsoft, or a high-end automobile shop charges to repair your Audi, BMW, or Benz.

I guess I figure there should be some proportionate quality of work/service/labor rate ratio that squares with the fact that we are paying alot for a pretty simple wrench job, even if we don't know how to fix the "simple" issue on our own.

Some things that I think lots of folks run into:

-LBS repair dude looks at a bike when you bring it in for service and proclaims that it's the wrong size for you. Hilarious. Did dude even consider it might not be your bike that you brought in, maybe it is the S.O.'s?

-LBS dude second guesses an equipment choice with your setup. It'd be all good if I hadn't been riding for a number of years, and pour over every detail of every equipment decision I make. I realize not everyone is like this, so LBS might be helping some folks out.

-LBS doodes like to justify their decision making with a remark about how fast they are. They will either casually drop that they are "Cat 1" cyclists or something. Shock of shock, but some of the results I've seen indicate otherwise.

-Bike service- You bring a bike for a service, simple or complex and the bike is "randomized" meaning weird shite happened. They left a part off, forgot to put it back on, didn't properly adjust something. Left cables hanging loose. Padded the bill much higher than the original promised price. All that's happened to me btw.

Ok, so rants don't usually include the good reviews.. Because I'm pretty cool, for the most part, I'll list some shops with excellent service:

-Rivercity Bikes in Portland: Have had lots of work done their on a variety of bikes. They fixed a pretty screwed up Cannondale Mtb for alot less than it could have cost, which is impressive because the parts are so proprietary and unique that it presents a massive pain for shops. Always really, really nice. Never any 'tude. And, duh, the people who work there love bikes and some of them probably race. I'd sort of expect that if you work in a bike shop you might be inclined to race a bike here and here, however casually or not.

-Citybikes in Portland- The best bike co-op west of Boulder. There is one in Boulder that's great too, I just can't remember the name. All sorts of strange older parts in there, nice people. They wanna help get you and your bike on the road and will do little repairs on the spot without an appt.

-Bike Gallery- Downtown Portland & 57th & Sandy- A couple of the original locations with long time employees who are, here we go again, really nice and helpful. Nobody clobbers you with 'tude about their athletic palmares. Sure they sell Trek and Orbea, but who cares? The nice thing about the shop is they publish their labor rates, so you always know what everything costs ahead of time.

Seattle-area bike shops...

Oooh, mix bag of experiences here...

I've been to three: Triumph Multisport, Sammamish Valley Cycle and Performance Bike in Redmond.

On balance the experiences in each have half good, half not so good.

It's a service excellence issue. Sometimes I've been really impressed, other times shocked at bizarre statements or confused analysis of mechanical issues.

I'd love to recommend a shop. I want to, but honestly, it's a "go in with your eyes wide open" scenario.

Net, really what we want as athletes is a place with zero 'tude, good service, people who are super passionate about the sport and put us first as customers.

Mid April Weather, bizarre..

2008-04-18T19:43:00.000-07:00

It actually snowed today in the Seattle-area.

After spending last winter here I should be used to this but I'm not. It never ceases to amaze me, and the forecast is calling for snow again Saturday and Sunday.

I'm tempted to go XC skate if it's awful, I've only been once this winter and the gear is new. We'll see, otherwise I'm trapped riding my bike indoors.

I'm down in Oregon next weekend to visit my kids and hoping the weather clears here soon.

Crowie Motorpacing Video clip

2008-04-16T18:09:00.001-07:00

Unfortunately I can't embed this one.

The wattage figures mentioned in the clip are probably standard fare for someone at Mr. Alexander's level.

(I also really like the music. Ah, not really.)

Anyhoo, with regard to Lactate Threshold work, it's interesting that Carmichel says doing that much (3hrs) LT work on your is nearly impossible.

I guess I've never tried to do more than a couple hours of it, and the truth is that the I wound up below my LT wattage values for a good chunk.

What's the running equivalent?

Hitting Leif Ericson for a long, hard 20 miler a tad bit slower than marathon race pace, of course!

http://www.trainright.com/cctv.asp?url=/uploads/craigalexandermotorpacing.flv

Season Planning- Update

2008-04-15T11:14:00.000-07:00

Aside from IMC here's what is on the schedule:

May-

Kirkland Half Marathon- moderately hilly half marathon 5 minutes from Redmond.

June-

Boise 70.3 (a half iron distance triathlon)- allegedly fast. It's the biggest race in early June I can find.

PineHollow Tri-maybe

Pac Crest Olympic- maybe

July-

Hagg Lake Sprint/Olympic-maybe

Lake Stevens 70.3- sorta of a maybe. It's not far from Seattle, but it's also not a great course for me.

Federal Escape Olympic Distance- flat, fast, crit like course. -maybe

August-

Mountain Man Olympic (McCall, ID)- maybe

Troika Half Ironman (Spokane/Couer d'Alene)- maybe

MidSummer Tri at Blue Lake- maybe

Beaver Lake Tri (Sammamish)-maybe

Hulaman- It's two weeks from Canada, so it is a huge maybe. Next year?

Ironman Canada

September-

USAT Aquathlon Nationals- Would be potentially easier on me in recovery mode, also a maybe

October-

Xterra Nats- might do the Xterra trail run on a visit

Ironman Hawaii- Dependent on whether I can swing a slot

November-

70.3 World Championships- Dependent on whether I can secure a slot

December-

Las Vegas Half Marathon- maybe

Week of 4/13

2008-04-14T09:15:00.000-07:00

Summary

Big bike/run week

Swim-3
Bike-5
Run-5

Monday-

Tired from a solid weekend of training. Monday is becoming the defacto active recovery day

Run- 40min steady run on the BG; prolly cooking along at a touch over Half Iron race pace

Tuesday-

Swim- Mid-day break from work. Decided after my pretty effortless 500 on Saturday that I'd start doing the 500 as the bread and butter of my long repeats

Mainset- 3x500.. Using the pool timing so times are a bit muddled, but 8.05-ish, 8.10-ish and 8.10-ish... Rolled through the 200 in 3.10 so I may have been off a bit on final times.

Bike- Zone 2/3 intervals, 55 min 5min & 2min repeats holding 190-200w. Still a bit tired either from the swim or past weekends riding.

Wednesday-

Run- Evening run.. Very easy jog 53min, recovery pace 8.45s at best

Swim- Arms feeling sloggy, but punching the clock.. Mainset- 5x200 on short rest. 3.07-3.08... Last week the pace was easily an L4/L5 effort workout, I felt like lost the ease to go fast in the water with little effort, and it came back over the weekend.. I felt like I could just keeping going and going on that effort, so suffice it to say, encouraging.

Thurs-

Bike- 26 miles easy on BG, just turning it over 174w avg.

Run- 30 min. Short break then transition run on treadmill; 7.20-8min pace

Fri

Run- Run to pick up car from oil change: 25min easy pace

Bike- 27 miles very easy on the BG, 1hr 41min

Saturday

Long Day:

Swim- Morning swim. Mainset- 300,200,100,300.. Not bad just plugging away. As per the usual, lower back is tight and speed is way off compared with evening sessions

Bike- Carnation. Hilly.. 38.5 miles, 174watts. Felt good but very warm for this time of year 70+F

Run- Immediately into transition run 30 min run.

Sunday

Bike- 62.5 miles- 3h 45min.

Location: Orting, Eatonville, Buckley. Towns in the shadows of Mt. Rainier.

Terrain: Rolling, road surface was heavy chip-seal, e.g. slow.

Long ride went as follows: First 2hr45min easy w/group, 40miles. Solo'd last 20miles, focus on holding HIM watts (200-250) 180w avg; 19mph avg. Last twenty were just as hilly as the first 40miles, so not fun holding that power.

Punching the clock & Over-thinking the sport

2008-04-09T14:15:00.000-07:00

I've always advised folks who ask about programs, regardless of the actual details (because those vary from athlete to athlete) that they should follow a program that allows them to tick the boxes so to speak week in, week out.

Basically you need maintenance mileage, yards, time in the saddle; some higher intensity pace work and over-distance sessions.

Those are non-negotiable for anyone, in any program. I really don't understand why folks over think it.

Of course the key is to figure out the right balance of volume and intensity to keep an athlete punching the clock, and have them respond to the work load/type of work with some desired result.

And then people get confused about "periodizing" .. Oh boy.. You mean, reducing the training load before a big race while still keeping the muscles sync'd w/the feel for the activity?

Anyway, Coach Paulo tells it like it is:

http://thetriathlonbook.blogspot.com/