Week ending 12/15/13

It's cold here in SE Michigan :(

No outdoor training this week at all mainly cuz I'm a cold weather weenie.

Swim:  In the pool 3 days this week with the last one being cut short.  Our normal pool wasn't open on Saturday so we swam in the small warm pool.  I could take about 40 minutes of that then I got out.  Good sessions on Monday and Wednesday while Saturday was not so good.

Bike:  I did not ride at all this week but did work on my mountain bike fork. I found out why there was no dampening in it, the seal was bad on the bottom of the dampening tube and all of the oil leaked out and into the lower.  I need to find a new seal and that may be difficult with such a cheap fork.  I've been looking for a new fork and have found that I can get a Fox Float for around $400.  My origional budget was $300 but I can get so much more for that extra $100.  I'm looking around to make sure I can find rebuild kits for the forks I'm interested in.  If and when I can find that I'll probably make a purchase in late January or into February.

Run:  I ran 7 days this week which were all indoors.  4 days on the treadmill and 3 on the indoor track.  I was getting bored on the treadmill so I did a faster workout on Wednesday where I took a Q2 workout from Daniels Marathon A program and adjusted the speed down just a little.  I may do that this week too just to get past the boredom.

Plans for this week:  Swim 3 to 4 days again.  Get on the bike 2 times at whatever pace I feel like doing.  Run 7 days again, maybe double on one of the days if I'm free.  The 100/100 challenge started again on Slowtwitch so I'll be logging my stuff there too.

2013 in review

I started of the year with a large running block.  I was running 50+ miles per week until late January when I started riding seriously again.  Unlike previous years I did not take any time off after my last race in 2012, I got right back to work after LCN in Oklahoma.

That running block had me running 8 times a week with key workouts on Wednesday and Sunday.  Wednesday was normally faster intervals, sometimes threshold, sometimes faster.  Sunday was a long run in the morning then a 4 mile run later in the day.  The second run really wasn't that hard to do but when monday came I was normally pretty tired.  All other days I was running easy, normally just half hour runs.

Schedule went like this:
Mon 6 miles
Tue 4 miles
Wed 8 miles
Thu 4 miles
Fri 6 miles
Sat 4 miles
Sun 14+4 miles
(I'm writing this from memory so I may have goofed a little)

In early March I made a trip to Georgia to ride in the mountains with my late friend Shawn Tyrrell.  We did the 3 Gaps out of Helen one day, a flat ride the next and 3 Gaps out of Dahlonega on the last day.  Riding was fun but visiting with friends was better.  It was colder than usual there, I expected 45+ degrees but wound up with low 30's :(  Still I got my riding in.

After a few more weeks of riding I made another trip to Georgia again only this time I was riding with the HFP guys.  During that week we rode about 320 miles, ran 5 days (1 long, all others short) and swam 4 days.  It was a pretty epic week.

It took about 10 days to recover from that week of training and it really helped me.  Unlike last year I was much stronger compared to the same group of people, instead of getting dropped by the second group I stayed with them.  When I got home it was apparent that I gained a lot of fitness from that week by comparing myself to my training partners.

A few weeks went by and I went down to Portsmouth OH during the Triple T since Karen was racing the AB and I already had the cabin.  We stayed the weekend so I could do some more hill training, I felt strong and just put in miles.  It was nice to be there and be able to ride the courses comfortably.

In a couple more weeks it was time for Long Course Worlds, I'd never been to Europe before.  I had a good time, I'll write a report about it.  In short I did about as good as I expected to do.  Since the swim was canceled it was turned into a duathlon so I was put at a disadvantage since I'm a better swimmer than a runner.  Karen and I spent 5 more days in Switzerland and had a good time.

After a few weeks of recovery I was ready for racing.  I did the Sprint race at Maumee Bay, a race that I've done the Olympic distance 3 times.  The swim went OK, the bike was fairly fast but my run was better than expected.  I think I ran a 20:30 which is faster than I've ever gone before, I was pleasantly surprised.

The next race was the Half at Caseville.  It was a smaller race so I expected to do OK, the swim went OK, the bike was pretty fast then the run was slower than normal but there was 7 miles of running on sand so a 1:48 was OK with me.  We got to spend some time with JD and Noah in Tawas so it was another fun weekend.

In August I did the Sprint in Sylvania, it was another race that I have done before.  I have done the Olympic several times and the Sprint once.  In fact the sprint race was my third race I'd ever done back in 2003.  Again I was happy with the result, I had a strong swim, a very fast bike ride at 25.4 mph and a fairly strong run for me at 21:07

In September I was at Rev3 Cedar Point, this was supposed to be my "A" race of the year and trained exclusively for it.  Swim was really rough on the NE side of the Point so they moved it to the SW side.  We swam through the harbor then outside of the breakwall.  Swim went well, Bike went according to plan then the run was within my expectations.  Finished a 4:53 and 3rd in AG (33 OA), that was the best I have done at a bigger event.

I origionally planned to go to Rev3 Anderson but the people I was going with bailed on me and I was looking for another race.  I decided to go to Rev3 Florida instead.

That turned out to be a very good choice.  First we had mild weather in October that allowed me to train on the bike.  Next we have friends that have a house down there that they allowed us to stay in for free.  Third the weather was really nice there for the race as well as the short vacation, and lastly, the race was put on really well.

As for the race, I did better than expected since this really couldn't be called an "A" race, the best I could catagorize it would be a "BB".  The swim was really smooth on race morning and I came out of the water in pretty good shape, 33 min is a decent swim for me.  The bike was really smooth and flat, it was the fastest 56 mile ride I've ever done (2:21).  The run was OK, a little slower than expected but it was fairly warm and this was a "BB" race.  Still 1:50 is OK for me and a 4:48 HIM, 2nd in AG, is my best result in a few years.

So it was really a pretty good season with Long Course Worlds, 2 sprints and 3 HIM's (70.3).  I didn't die at any of the races, I had good training and didn't get hurt.  I felt that the season progressed well with short races to work on skills and enough time between the big races to do well at them.

Now it's time to start getting back to work for next season.  It's been 4 weeks of doing whatever I wanted to do and I need get going again.  I've got 17 weeks until HFP training camp and 23 weeks until Triple T.  That gives me a little more than three training cycles before camp and four cycles before Triple T.

Week ending 12/8/13

Got a little behind on the running this week.

Ran 5 days for about 30 minutes at a time.  All of it was easy, a couple days outside but the rest inside on the treadmill.  Next week starts the 100/100 challenge on ST so I'll be up for that when the time comes.

Goals for next week is 7 runs with one being about an hour long.

I was in the pool 3 days this week but all pretty decent swims.  Monday 2X200 SKIPS (Swim,Kick,IM,Pull,Swim) so 2000 yds.  Wednesday masters 2800 yds, Friday masters 4300 yds

I was on the bike twice this week, once on the road and once on the Computrainer.  It was my first real workout on the Computrainer, it was OK, I was only on it for an hour.

I think I have the road bike fitting better, I found a stem that is a 120 -17°.  The bars are up slightly higher and out front a little better.  I moved the hoods a little higher after the ride on Wednesday and they feel better.  I think that's the last adjustment for a while.  Now all I need is a new seat, I'm actively looking for a Fizik Arione on Ebay, when the deal comes in the color I like I'll take it.

Week ending 12/1/13

Gotten to part of my goal:
Ran 6 days and swam 4 days, it was the most swimming I've done in quite a while.

Just a half hour for all the runs except for today where I ran an hour.  With the exception of the Turkey Trot on Thursday I ran easy for all of them.

At the Turkey Trot I ran a 21:00 for the 5K.  I'm pretty happy with that right now since I haven't been running much.  It's short of what I ran last summer but it was expected.  With that time I have some paces to work with
Easy 8:39
Marathon 7:41
Threshold 7:12
10K 7:03
5K 6:46
Interval 6:36
Repetition 6:11

I haven't done any testing in swimming yet, I may do a swim meet soon but not in the next few weeks.  I still know what I can do in practice and will use that as a guide for now.

No biking yet cuz I really don't want to.  I did some work on my road bike and mountain bike recently.  I replaced the bars on my road bike to something shallower, I need to find a different stem to raise them just a little bit.  I have a 120mm -30° and want to go to a 120mm -18°.

On the Mountain bike I replaced the rear shifter (right) with one I got on Ebay.  I didn't like the way the original one shifted so I found a M770 shifter (Deore XT 3X9).  This one has a little shorter throw to make a shift.  When I get it on the trail I'll see how it works.  I also removed the top headset spacer and mounted the stem right on top of the bearing.  I'm going to have someone at work make me a new one that is much smaller.