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The Ironman Commeth.....slowly
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Thursday / Friday
Nothing.
Saturday
TriAthy OD - 1,500m / 40kms / 10km (+7 km)
Sunday
Nothing
Week 22 Totals
Swim 1,500m
Bike 70kms
Run 25 miles
What can I say. The worst week of training so far. This week I just felt sick of it all - sick of thinking about, talking about and training for triathlons (not just IM). Had to drag myself out of the bed to do Athy as this had been a B goal for me this year of breaking 2.30hrs. The tougher than last year swim and the increase in run distance put pay to that but then so did my lack of recent training. Its crunch time now. I've got 5 weeks before my taper starts and I'm gonna have to put some work in, otherwise there's no point. I dont want to go to IM and struggle the whole way around knowing that I could be a lot better. One of the lads in the club asked me on Saturday did I regret starting the IM thing, you know I couldn't answer him. My wife remains unwavering in her support though, she says if I dont do the thing after spending approx. €1k on entry, travel and acomadation she'll kill me herself.
Triathy OD
With little enthusiasm I dragged myself the long way from home to Athy for the race (eeehhhh, 25 minute drive). At least the weather was good and this made the long wait until wave 9 easier (as did the site of a female competitor stripping off to put on her trisuit in the middle of the park we were waiting in). I had hoped to do a sub 2.30hrs with approx. 30 minute swim / 70 minute bike / 45 minute run (bearing in mind that the run was short last year) with a generous 5 minutes left for transitions if needed. This would compare to my 31.23 / 78.06 / 50.10 / T1+2 5.08 - Total 2.44.50 of 2009.
Into the warm murky water of the river for a warm up. I was intent on getting close to two club mates who are much faster swimmers and drafting off them for as long as possible. Didn't quite work out that way as I lost them immediately after hooter went off in the melee. It was probably the roughest swim start I've ever been in - I got kicked and punched a few times. I tried to stick close to the bank where the current should be less but after a face full of weeds I gave up and moved out mid channel. I found myself drifting off course continiously despite regular sighting. I also kept allowing myself to get boxed in by other swimmers. After the turnaround I swum straight into the back of a 'swimmer' who was walking down the middle of the channel adjacent to the rope - I nearly broke my finger stroking into his back. Again sighting was an issue on the downward leg and I was more than happy to get out in a poor 31.35. My lack of swimming in the last few weeks really came back to haunt me and I felt like I struggelled over the entire 1,500m.
T1 took 2.22
Dont know where the time went as I thought I'd gone through pretty quickly. The sub 2.30hr was looking over all ready.
Onto the bike and head down and push. Not as much drafting as last year on lap 1 but by lap 2 it had begun to get congested and there was some drafting - but no sign of the peletons that were present last year. I had one guy on his first lap overtake me when I was on my second and beckon for me to come through with his elbow - kn*bhead. He was intent on getting a train going. We swapped places a few times over the last 15kms or so and trying to get away from him helped my speed I think. Other than him and a guy on a very new looking TT bike no one else drafted me. The winner passed me at one stage and I swear I've never seen anyone travelling that fast on a bike (he averaged over 40kph:eek:). Coming into T2 I could see that my bike time was over my hoped for 70 minutes, ending up at 72.17. Definitely no 2.30hrs now so wanted to concentrate on doing a solid run.
T2 took 2.36:eek: There must be some sort of black hole in Athy that targets only me making my transitions so slow. Again it didn't feel that slow.
Out onto the run and I just maintained a steady pace. I passed quite a few and concentrated on trying to overtake the person in front of me every time. Run surface was poor enough (I would not liked to have run that course on a very wet day) but having done this race last year I was expecting this. Probably the best part of the run was that I felt comfortable the whole way round on the run, unlike last year when I was pretty much crying for the finish line after 1km. Completed the run in 48.48 for a total time just under 2.38.
I was way way off my hoped for 2.30hrs. Its hard to find any high points. My swim was the same time as last year but this year was a tougher course I think. My bike came down by 6 minutes but that could be due to having a TT bike this year as opposed to a basic road bike last year (I really wanted to do a sub 70 minute having gone close in London last year). My run came down by almost a minute and a half so given the longer course this year and how comformatble I felt this is some sort of a plus. Grasping at straws really, I should have been faster.
Within 10 minutes of the end of the race I did another 7kms run to give 17kms for the day. I had hoped to do another 10kms but I boinked in a big way - Ironman me arse
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I've been experimenting with flapjacks and jam&brownbread sangers for the last two weeks. After a while of trying before hand, I came to the conclusion that there was no way I was going to survive on just gels and isotonic stuff alone. The flap jacks have worked pretty well. I'll try bringing three or four on the Wicklow 200 and if they work well, they're into the plan for Switzerland.
Grandma's old FlapJack recipe: http://www.flapjackrecipe.com/healthy/index.html .
I seem to be ok at lasting up to 6 hrs on gels and liquids alone thus far. I have to be really careful if eating solids on the bike or run, I find it hard to swallow anything when training and have to chew for ages before it'll go down. I had a near miss a few weeks ago with an errant peanut from a power bar on the bike 0 -
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Week 26
Monday
Swim 1,000m - my first club session this year. It was short enough due to space constraints in the pool but was a nice mix of drills and sprints. Enjoyed it and had a good chat with the instructor afterwards about my technique and she gave me a couple of tips, especially on how poor my catch is.
Tuesday
Run 5 miles (x 8.30 miles). I was absolutely dead on this run, I had no energy whatsoever. Dont know why.
Wednesday
Run 10 miles / 90 mins (@ 1hr insert 12 mins Z4)
Thursday
Swim 3,100m - 1,000 wu / 100 x 5 off 2.10 / 200 x 3 off 2.30 / 1,000 cd
Delighted with this session, to be doing 100m repeats off 2.10 is a first for me. I did the first 3 repeats in 1.53-55. I incorporated the tips from the instructor from Monday and my technique felt better and I felt faster. Now that said I wore tri shorts in the pool for the first time as opposed to the baggy shorts I had been wearing up to now, so the increase in 'speed' could be due to this rather than any change in my technique:D
Friday
Swim 3,000 straight swim - 1.05hrs. Again concentrated on technique (and wore the tri shorts). Did my first 400m in sub 8 minutes; 1,000 in 20.30 and averaged 2.10 per 100m over the 3,000m. I couldn't do the full 3,800m due to time pressure but I'll be delighted if I can hold that pace come race day.
Saturday
Run 18.5 miles / 2hrs45mins / average 82% HR. A long long time to be on your feet. Felt surprisingly good. Had a gel at 10 and 15 miles and drank some Hi5 4:1 during the run. I'm testing it out as I might use it at IM (I like the idea of being able to mix my own drinks rather than depending on the organises to mix drinks for me at aid stations). Started off with my patented 9 min / mile IM shuffle and held it for the entire time. Had some minor GI issues that I managed to overcome (not a day to be gamblilng on the fart lottery) -not sure if it was due to Hi5 drink or the take away from the night before. Delighted anyway to do a run this long.
Sunday
Those paying close attention will notice that there was no bike this week. No injuries, no mech issues - I just never got the chance to get out on the bike. I had planned to do my long ride today but when I got up it was lashing rain and blowing a gale (not the weather for deep rim wheels). I decided to postpone the ride until later and took the kids to the cinema instead (they haven't seen their Dad on a sunday morning for a long time). By the time we got home from cinema, had lunch, watched TDF, the day was gone. Ok I should have headed out for at least a couple of hours but the wind was still brutal and having watched a local road race on the way home from the cinema where lads who are much fitter than me were crawling along I took the easy route and persuaded myself it would be too dangerous to go out on a TT bike with deep rims. To have a 0 cycling week 5 weeks out from IM is probablay not a good idea - oh well, need to make up for it this week.
Week 26
Swim 7,100m - much better than the last few weeks. Very happy with this.
Bike 0km - sub 6hr IM bike here I come
Run 33.5 miles - I had hoped to break 40 miles this week but still happy with the 18+ miles long run.
I've only one more week of proper training to do before the three week taper. Fink has this week down as a 20hr week and I intend to get as close to that as I can. I'm hoping to try and get close to the full 180kms with my long ride which Fink has down for 6 hrs and to hit 20 miles on my long run. The fear is beginning.......0 -
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Dark moments....what dark moments......it'll just be like a long training session (keep repeating).Good to see you are building the run...knowing you have done those sorts of distances will be a big help in the dark moments!
Week 27
This is the last week of proper training before a 3 week taper. 3 weeks sounds a little long so I might push on a bit into next week and leave a 2.5 week taper, we'll see how it goes.
Monday
Swim 1,000m - second session of the year in the pool with the club and the coach. She gave me a hard time about dropping my shoulders and thus my elbows on the catch and pull phase. A mix of sprints and drills. Its amazing to see guys who were drowning after 20m last year swimming with near perfect form having never had the chance to develop bad habits due to continious coaching for the last year - I hate them:P
Tuesday
Swim 3,800m - 1.21.07:eek: . My 1,000 splits were 20.10 / 21.10 / 21.40 / 18 mins last 800m. Thats 8 minutes faster than my fastest ever 3,800m. I'm in shock. I concentrated on keeping my shoulders up as per the coaches advice the previous night and on trying to ensure a good catch and pull as per last week's tips. I'm assumng the improvement is not all down to wearing tight shorts and an improvement in technique has something to do with it? I averaged 2.01 / 100m for the first 1,000m - for me thats unreal. I looked at my watch at 100m and it said 1.48 - something has clicked. It'll be interesting to see if I can repeat that time in the pool and more importantly in IM.
Wednesday
Run 7 miles / 1 hr (@10 mins insert 6 min Z4 / 2 min jog x (3)0 -
Well done on the swim. Timing those improvements nicley too You have lots of work done on the bike and run so it looks good so far, the big ride this week will settle your mind on that. You seem to be in good shape so best of luck with a 20hr week :eek: nearly there.... 0
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