Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Me Against The World...
Options
Comments
-
-
-
-
shotgunmcos wrote: »Really solid racing at the weekend BTH and a deserved hat full of points indeed. I saw you on the bank chasing down DC, he had pain etched on his face and I knew you had him! Nice scalp, well done :cool:
In poor DCs defense he should never have raced as he had been sick for the 4 days leading up to the race. Not that anyone else in the club is letting him off on that one! I'll need to beat him next time as well just to make sure!!Well done BTH, good to meet you too. I was wrecked Sunday night, falling asleep before 9 so god only knows how you felt!!!
Good to meet you again too Eddie. You were probably having a come down off the caffeine on Sunday eve, hence the early night. I did need a power nap before the feed of pints!El Director wrote: »Well done to you BTH on what had to be a mentally and physically demanding weekend of racing. You set out your goal to maximise the NS points gained as much as possible and by doing both races and finishing so high up in both...mission accomplished.
Turns out you were right re your cadence being 100+, your coach said ye might target a smaller event just to experiment with a lower cadence, any advance on that? I was also wondering if you will target a race, make it an A race ie turn up fresh and sharp and give it a good lash?
Mentally it wasn't that bad. After Saturdays race I knew I had to do it again so I was doing all I could to make sure I wasn't seizing up. you just get on with it and I was actually buzzing on Sunday morning. Adrenaline is more than enough to get you through a sprint. As DC says, sure ya can bluff a sprint!! Physically it wasnt too bad either. Being a spinner on the bike probably helped (its not all bad!) and I kept myself just under the real pain barrier on the Oly run. Looking forward to doing a "Fresh" sprint on Saturday week and really seeing how I can suffer.
RE the cadence I mentioned to my coach that I might do the Lanesboro tri the week before BotE but he said that was too close to the Beast to try something like that and he'd like much more recovery. Might even be on hold until a duathlon or something in early 2013. I think the Beast will be one that we can really go well, I always go well on the hills. I was 27th last year and with the improvements I've made since I definitely think a top ten is achievable.Well done BTH. That's one busy weekend. Fair play on being able to race 2 days in a row like that.
Congrats to Michelle too on her 10k.
Cheer Paul. I think Michelle is more delighted with her result! 54:32 chip time in the end so pretty good going for her first 10k.Savage weekend for you BTH - fantastic job you did!!
Thanks DD. So thats it settled for you? You'll race both in Luray??0 -
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
littlemsfickle wrote: »I am indeed:) Looking forward to it - was probably one of my favourite races of last year. The hill at the start of the run is a bit of a killer though.
Never done it but I've heard about that hill. Hoping to do a fair amount of damage up that!
Wednesday
Went out to howth for the club bike session which was repeats on St Fintans road. I ended up eating much later than I normally would before a session because of work. Therefore I was running late so had to hammer out the coast road. Then I took off on the first rep and hammered that too. The 4th (of a planned 8) was 20second slower than the first (950m long) and that food nearly made a re-appearance at the end of it so I called it a day at that. Spun easier home but the tail wind had me cruising along nicely anyway.
Thursday Morn
Morning swim. After a 300wu & 6*50 kicking I took off into 6*100 pull on 1:45. Just like on the bike the previous evening I took off too hard. However I was feeling really good in the water. Brought them all in on 1:30. Paid for it then. Plan was for 6*200 on 3:30 afterwards, I hit 3:16 or so for the first but by the 4th I was barely making the repeat times. Matches burnt, I quit after number 5.
Midday
I had brought in the running gear for a jog at lunch time, but looking out the window it didn't seem to appealing. Until I read about Oryx and her 3hour run at 5am in the lashing rain yesterday morning. Figured I have no excuses not to do my lowly 40minute. Did a few 60m or so strides just keep the feel for that speed. held 4:49 pace for very little effort.
Friday Morn
Back into the pool to make up for Thursday morning.
300wu then 8*25 kick hard.
3*(5*100). No repeat times, just 10sec or so between reps. Made sure not to go beyond 1:40 swim time. Mostly around 1:37/38. Just wanted to get some consistent times over some reasonable distance. Extra minute or so between the blocks, if for nothing else but to help keep count! 4*50 hard on 70sec after, in on 40sec & 50cd. Similar distance covered as Thursday but no bursting out of the blocks and no major fall off in times. Better 0 -
Right, where were we, Friday? Ok....
Saturday
Had to drop the bike over to hospital in Athlone Saturday morning. Not sure if I'll have it back in time for this weekend so might be racing on the road bike. Not ideal to say the least.
Headed up to Portrunny to watch the Lough Ree Monster Tri as it was close by. Lovely day for it which my pink forehead will backup. Local uber swimmer David Sheridan took the win. I beat him by over two minutes in the Athy Oly. Maybe I should have raced :rolleyes:!! Watching himself and Brian Harris (lead swimmer in Valentia this year) battle it out in the water was great to watch. Two completely different styles. Harris looked to be doing twice as much work. David has this ridiculously slow turnover. ElD, also met your mate Peter there again. He seems to have caught the bug big time.
Eventually got out for my run. Plan was 60min with 20min@ 10k pace. 3 hours standing in the sun, a bit dehydrated, hungry, first bit of speed in my now 5 weeks old New Balance 1080 resulting in bad blistering in the heat, two tough drags early in the hard work, (excuses excuses
) I only managed 15min at pace. Managed 4k in that 15min. Not bad but not where I should be.
Sunday
Out on the bike plan was for 3*20min @Z3. 40min wu out the road before getting started. These went quite well. The last one I deliberately lowered the cadence down to a sluggish 88-92. Others averaged 100 or thereabouts. Average speeds for the pace work was 31.5 (hilly section) 35.1 & 34.3.
As I was missing the Interested led ow swim at the bull wall I hopped into the local lake for a quick dip. Covered maybe 750. I still seem to switch off and stop sighting as regularly as I need to. Don't like how it interrupts my rhythm.
Monday
After my coaches trip to the Blenheim at the weekend he eventually updated my schedule for the week. I had a hard run and the club swim scheduled for yesterday but only found out after I got to work yesterday. So no choice but to do the run after swimming.
The swim session was 4*100 drills on 2:00, then 6*400 on 7:00. Brought these all in 6:30-35. Nice and consistent, relatively comfortable, although my arms/shoulder know about it today. Quick dash home and upload the run workout to the watch.
This was 45 min with 20min @ 3:40 pace :eek:. After almost 3k in the pool. During the warm up jog I could feel my ankles were a little stiff/tired from kicking off the wall. Eased into it and managed to hold on to 3:39 pace for the 20minutes. Reverted to the Kinvaras for this run, but the blister damage had already been done on Saturday. In a bad way now. Vaseline will be my friend for the rest of the week
. Average cadence of 92 for the 20minutes so nice to see that holding up after the swim session. 0 -
Tuesday
1 hour run as 30min easy and 20min @155HR. As my HRM is boll*x I set out to do 4:10-4:15 pace for the steady work. Actually held 4:07 handy enough. 13.3km for the hour
Wednesday
Hard bike session with the club. 8*3min hard with 2min recoveries out by the airport. Avg speed west bound were 40.7/39.4/38.6/37.6 and east bound a more consistent 36.8/35.7/35.7/35.4. Hard hard work. Including the spin out 48km in 1:45.
Thursday
Morning Swim. 500wu then 4*(4*100 descending on 1:45). These were a slog. Still wrecked from the bike session but got through it anyway. Struggled to hit easy pace times, and was working really hard for 1:35s.
Easy hour on the turbo in the evening, with 6*15sec hard, 45 recovery stuck in the middle.
Bike
Damn bike. Going to be racing this weekend on my entry level training bike which I bought second hand for €300, stock wheels and groupset with over 6,000km on it since I bought it and god knows what before that. Weights a ton and creaks badly, but at least I'll take off the mudguard for the race :rolleyes:. Problem with the seatpost clamp on the TT bike, which seems to be a design flaw and is causing a lot of cracked frames. Planet X have redesigned the whole thing for this year and it sounds like I'll be getting one of the new frames under warranty. But while they sort out the red-tape with the UK company and the suppliers beyond that, my bike is in Athlone and unsafe to race. Ashford duathlon was shifting problems, Burnfoot was freewheel problems, Athy was broken chain, now this. Bloody bike has been a bit of a nightmare this year.
0 -
-
NeedsTraining wrote: »Bad news on the bike, but at least its covered under warranty.
Now, must put my thinking cap on and come up with an excuse for your bike split still being quicker than mine.
Those two young children are probably the only excuse you'll need. You travelling down tomorrow with the support army? Michelle might need the company!!
Oh, and can I borrow your wheels!?0 -
BetterThanHoyte wrote: »Those two young children are probably the only excuse you'll need. You travelling down tomorrow with the support army? Michelle might need the company!!
Oh, and can I borrow your wheels!?
That excuse will do nicely
Travelling down this evening with the troops. Brother lives down there so hitting two birds with the one stone.
Weather dependent tomorrow, which is not looking great, all will be out cheering.
Michelle has some patience 0 -
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
So, down to Dunmore East on Saturday morning, and travelling solo as Michelle didn't fancy standing in the rain all day. I'd received reports of a strong swell in the water on Thursday and Friday which could have resulted in a duathlon. Not what I wanted to hear with Haggis McCloud travelling down.
Plenty of rain, but some sunny spells for the drive down. But the water was dead calm so that was a relief. Registered and headed down to transition, bike and run wu before the heavens opened and transition turned into a river. By the time that stopped I was shivering and not really looking forward to this at all. Joked with the people beside me in transition that I wouldn't need suncream today....... :rolleyes:
Down to the water and we were let in for a WU before being taken back out again so the safety boat showed up the course. The water felt very cold. Back in again, and we're off. Strange how I don't feel the coldness of the water once the race starts. A much wider spread of swimmers for the start so not as much bumping and pushing. Still managed to get my goggles knocked off again :mad:! Very quick fix this time though. Eventually started to close in on the first buoy and I could see that while there wasn't a huge crowd around there was a group of 6 or so around me and probably more just behind. Felt I was swimming well, and after the second buoy I upped the pace a little again and managed to pass a few more. One poor guy to my right at this point was wearing his goggles as a necklace around his neck, and still trying to sight. Looked bloody painful. Anyway, just before hitting the beach I managed to take on a massive gulp of water. This meant on the long run up to transition, up a massive hill, I had all this salt water sloshing around my stomach. Nice :rolleyes:. Hit the top and John Connolly was on my shoulder. He beat me out of the water in Joey Hannan and the Athy Sprint (although only by 6 seconds) so I knew I'd had a pretty good swim. 13:41 and 40th fastesr split of 378 so just outside the top 10%. Not bad
T1 1:19 and again 40th fastest. A little delay with the wetsuit over the ankles but clean enough.
Bike. Flying mount which was followed by shouts of "nice mount" from a spectating Fazz. What he didn't see was by left shoe elastic snap and it taking me until the bottom of the hill to get my shoe on. A long string of riders in front of me now (including Mr. Connolly who had pipped me in T1) and usually I'd have hammered past them quite comfortably. So I was out of the saddle hammering up the slight drag but making much slower progress that usual. And so was the story of my bike. Lots of effort and hard work but not the progress I'm used to. Felt I was wrestling with it a bit. Damn thing doesn't shift gear cleanly at all either so I didn't changing gear as much as I normally would, instead hitting the drags out of the saddle to fight up them. Hoped I wouldn't pay for this later. At the turn around I could see Haggis McCloud was very close behind, and knowing how good a runner he is I knew I was under pressure. Then I met the horses. Two of them, loose and running down the centre of the road with bike passing on either side. Absolute lunacy. Anyway, into T2 in 35:06 with an average speed of 35.3 for the 20.66km per my watch. 37th Fastest split, but I've never done a race with so many people overtaking me on the bike. Its a fast enough bike course and one I think I could have done very well on. Wrestling with the bike only yielded an average cadence of 89 :eek:. Thats not like me at all. I have noticed recently that I definitely spin a much higher cadence on the TT bike. Not sure what that could be down to if anyone had any ideas? Position, chainring size, crank length??
T2 0:57 43rd fastest. Legs feeling the effort on the bike a little, but a clean tranisition.
Run. Down a steep hill, hard right, and up a long steep hill. Legs really feeling the effort now, but I see I'm closing in on a few of those bikers who went past me. Proper short baby steps going up here, but a good high cadence and I was making good progress. First km gone in 4:09 but that included the down hill too. Trying to manage the effort as there were still some uphill drags after this steep hill. Second km and I'm still catching and passing people up the hill. This one down in 4:19. Over the top and I catch a Naas tri guy whos moving fairly well. Ran with him a bit. He wanted to have a chat!! I don't think I could have talked much anyway! Pushed past him and he upped it too to keep with me. Was really getting into my stride now, passing another 2 before hitting the main road. KM3 was 3:46. Glance over the shoulder as I hit the main road and I could see Haggis less than 150m behind me. This could be close. Tail wind now with some ups and downs. km4&5 are 3:41 & 3:42. Didn't catch anyone else, but some of the second wave bikers went past with one clubmate warning me that Sean was behind. I know, I know.... KM6 was 3:26 which surely must have been mostly downhill, but I knew he'd struggle to catch me at this pace. Went past STL along here too. Last drag up through the village and I allow myself a glance over the shoulder with 200m to go. Only the Naas tri guy to be seen clearly at about 100m behind (others in the distance) so I know I'm safe. km 7 was 3:28 and 3:47 pace for the final 100m for a 26:55 run and 3:47 pace for the 7.1km, 19th fastest run. Very happy with my run. 3:47 pace aint going to set the world alight, but with the massive hill, and the extra effort on the bike I'll take that. My run has progressed nicely since the debacle in Limerick, and blowing up in Tri an Mhi. Another two weeks and I'll be really hoping to smash the sprint in Athlone, especially if I have a real bike to race!!
Haggis outsplit me on the bike, T2 and the run but I managed to hold him off by 22 seconds. Bit of a relief. The grief I'd have got in the club if I'd have handed over my "clubs fastest man" mantle after only one race would have been unbearable. He's flying though, and a good winter working on his swim and I'll be in real trouble (don't worry about your swim Sean, you'll be fine!!)
Its a really nice race. Great road surface as it uses the main Dunmore East Waterford road, a tough challenging run and a lovely setting once the sun comes out which it did eventually. So much so that my shoulders are now glowing pink and pretty sore :rolleyes:. Pneumonia and sunburn in the one day :rolleyes:.
Edit: Oh, I finished 20th!!!0 -
Sunday Morning
Long negative split run. out at 8am for this and I knew i'd struggle a little after the race but it went ok. Plan was 50min @145hr and 30min @160. I had to guess the effort though, but think I was close enough. 4:33 pace for the 50min and 4:09 for the 30min, 2min cd, 18.5km. cadence 90
Off out to the bull wall for 10am ow swim with interested and a few others from the club. Took it relatively easy for this, but I was getting very tired by the end. Covered about 1km with little to no kicking. Good mornings work..
To add to the race report my run cadence was 90. So for the first time ever my average run cadence was higher than my bike cadence. 0 -
-
-
-
haggis_mccloud wrote: »Cheers BTH, and well done.
Was actually surprised when I saw that you weren’t far away as I climbed the hill in the run as I missed you at the bike turnaround/T2 and presumed you were an uncatchable distance away. I was hopeful then of at least getting close enough for a sprint finish but you hang on well in the last few k in fairness. And sure you would have been further ahead if you weren’t on the road bike.
My big chance missed. But gave it a good shot so no complaints. I'm sure you will be flying for Athlone with the TT bike back.
Enjoyed the day too – super setting and well organised race.
Oh, and I thought I was working hard on my swimming this winter. That’s the problem!
Well keep doing what you're doing and stay behind me then:rolleyes:Nice going BTH, a good tough race isn't it?
Cheers. Yeah, I definitely like that course alright. I'll be back some day hopefully.El Director wrote: »Well done BTH, a great result considering your bike woes. I hope you get sorted for Athlone.
Cheers ElD. Just got offered the led of a P2C from a clubmate until I get sorted too which is cool. He said he'll not need it again until the end of July. Maybe I'd be better racing that in Athlone anyway! 0 -
-
-
Advertisement
-
Best of luck tomorrow!! We want a "glowing" report from you!!
:)You're glowing, as always BTH. Well done you!!
I've just noticed this. Are you psychic DD???
Monday Eve
Club swim session again. Dropped down a lane to lead out. Seems the boss wanted me to work on my right arm entry as it comes across my body too much. Anyway no WU, straight in 7 * 200 on 3:45. First one in on 3:15 before being told to slow it down some more and focus on that right arm. 3:25s or thereabouts after that. 100 easy before getting into 6*100 on 1:45. Held 4 @ 1:35 before a 1:30, then traffic for the last had me back out at 1:35. 50 easy then the real fun started. 4*50m max on 2:00. 36/37 for all of these. 36 is my PB so I've gotta be happy with that. They hurt, hurt bad, and I was really struggling and fading a little for the last 5/10m of each one. 100cd
Tuesday Eve
Similar to the end of Monday swim I had 6*1min max efforts on the bike in the Howth hills. Done on the final section from the barrier at the turn off onto Thormanby road up past the carpark. Again, these hurt. Average speed ranged from 29.9-31.3kmph, with long recoveries 6:30+. Spin out and back had me at 45km for just under two hours.0
Advertisement