IMCHOO Build 8 recap

So this was taper. Mostly it still felt like work, but thankfully not like my real job since I wasn't smart anymore and couldn't hold a thought in my head.

I worried a little that I wasn't feeling bad enough, after listening to friends complain, but if my body wants to combat fatigue with stupidity instead of with failing to meet exercise goals, I guess that's what I'm stuck with.

Mini-goal assessment

• Focus on nutrition, really this time - At least the eating was more controlled than the previous 3 weeks, but it was not easy to control food-wants when tired, so I know I caved in to some unnecessary eating.
• Do at least 2 2.4 mile straight swims - Un-success. I had good yardage at the 90 minute swim practices, but only did 1 long straight swim, and that probably came in around 2 miles (forgot Garmin, see stupid taper brain above)
• Finish packing checklists - Success! Thank goodness I worked on this. I am packing bags and car tonight and tomorrow and am so thankful for these lists that I have been putting together.

Review of last three weeks

• 1 Monday bootcamp
• 1 Weds bootcamp
• Swam
• at 6 90 minute swim practices
• 1 time at the outdoor 50m pool
• 1 time at a warm lake, in full wetsuit. Great practice in staying steady to avoid overheating.
• Ran
• 3 Monday night run lead
• 3 track practices
• 6 mi at long run - should have been 16
• 12 mi long run on "light weekend"
• 6 mi long run on last weekend
• Biked
• 3 flat workouts
• 1 hills workout - got the 5x hill
• 44 Skyline miles
• 50 mi on "light weekend" - complete with bike "fall down"
• 30 mi on the trainer on last weekend
• 14 assorted commute miles

Goals for race

• Swim relaxed
• Stay in Z2 for the bike
• Stay focused on the run
• Cheer for others
• Experience the day

Race day is next Sunday. I'll be printing out the athlete guide, the TeamZ Cheer Guide, my race plan, and stashing them together in a binder, and hopefully, that plus all this training, will get me through the day!

Taper continues

I'm getting things checked off my to-do list during taper, including some things I wasn't expecting to do

Biking to-do's

1. Get bike tune-up - Check! My store looked it over and we replaced my tires, chain and cassette. I knew the chain would be due soon, so I'm glad to get that done now
2. 50 mile taper ride - Check! Took my freshly tuned up bike out into fall drizzle and had my lowest-energy ride of recent history. It's ok, I don't have to feel good for practice.
3. Bike crash - Check! Got that out of the way. It was super minor, and more like a bike-fall-down, but some rail tracks grabbed my front wheel and I fell down. My elbow is a little scraped and my hip is trying to bruise, but it's ok. Good reminder to really be cautious on rail tracks.

   

   Showing off the scrape

   

   Amazing bandage

   
   
4. Get bike checked again - in process. After the crash, there were some slightly bad noises coming from the bike, so I want to make sure the derailleur isn't going to suicide itself into my rear wheel or something terrible like that.
5. Re-pack saddle bag - Check! Since I had to take it off to leave my bike at the store, I decided to figure out how to fit two tubes, two CO2 cartridges, levers and multitool into my saddle bag. Pleased to report success, though if I have to unpack it, it may never all fit again.

Running to-do's

1. Get new shoes - Check! They are a different color than usual, but I think they fit the same as my regular ones.
2. Break in new shoes - In process. They carried me around for a nice 12 miler with no new blisters.
3. Recalibrate footpod - Check! Oh, the responsibilities of being a data-junky are never ending.

Swimming to-do's

1. Pack OWS stuff together - Check! Wetsuit, gloves, and two pair of new goggles are bundled together in the wetsuit bag and ready for pre-race brick.
2. 90 minute swims - In process. I've made it to 4 of 6, with 2 more this week. Getting it done.

Other things that remain to do include buying many sizes of ziploc bags for all of my ziploc needs, buying unscented trashbags to make throw-away warmups to leave in T1/T2 & special needs bags in case of a rainy/cold day, and buying more bars for my bike nutrition since I ate my last one this weekend!

It's coming together well and except for being tired and stupid, I am super proud of how I am holding up to the taper crazies.

Goodbye boom-er-ang hill, see you next year!

At the beginning of this season, I faced down the trippple hill with a little fear, and came away with a PR result that I haven't beaten since.

However, I have improved in a lot of ways on that hill.

1. The repeats have gone up - Last night, I rode 5 strong repeats, which is the most I have ever done ever. 
2. My consistency has gone up - The first time I did 4 repeats, the times sort of got faster (which is a good thing), but the time between slowest and fastest was ~45 seconds. Yesterday, for 5 repeats, I was able to keep the gap to ~10 seconds.
3. My pacing has gotten better - I have been trying to descend across the repeats. It's nowhere near as good as my swim-pacing, but, if I exclude the third loop, I descended super steadily for the other 4.

Next year, when we come back to the hills, I think I want to focus on being less scared of how bad it feels to really work hard. I know I am stronger than I was when I set my PR in April, but that repeat hurt! I probably won't be facing down 4 or 5 repeats in my training plan next year, so I should work on making them each hurt a little more.

I also want to continue to get more confident in my bike handling. Over this season, I think I have improved in my descending but I should be able to U-turn in a wide street or in a cul-de-sac without unclipping my inside foot, so I'll work on that next year.

IMCHOO Build 7 recap

Time moves forward, so I have known all summer that eventually, I'd be checking off the longest long-workouts of this training season, but it's pretty amazing to be on the other side of them.

The mental reprieve that came from my camping vacation has continued. I'm not nearly as peaceful as I was while taking a week off, but I am also not nearly as cranky as I was before the vacation.

The left hip aches have continued, but continue to disappear within a few days. I have a massage scheduled tonight, so hopefully that will help reset my muscles for the last push of training.

Mini-goal assessment

• Focus on nutrition - Absolutely an un-success. While not lashing out at the world with a cranky brain, I have been giving into every eating desire I have had. This includes lowlights of a Slurpee and 3 Musketeers for dinner one night and Panda Express + Haagen Daaz another.
• Leave the cranky-pants at home for 20 mile peak run - Success! There were a lot of ways I could have complained about the 20 mile run, but I tried really hard not to focus on them, and ended up having a lovely run where I met my goals.

Review of last three weeks

• 2 Monday bootcamp
• 2 Weds bootcamp
• 2 Yoga
• Swam
• at 6 swim practices
• 2 times at the outdoor 50m pool
• 1 time at 20m outdoor pool. Tiny pool means super fast!
• Ran
• 3 Monday night run lead
• 2 track practices
• 6 mi at long brick
• 14 mi long run on "light weekend"
• 20 mi peak run
• Biked
• 1 flat workouts - skipped one with tummy ache
• 1 hills workout - thunder canceled the week where I was going to go for 5x hill
• 58 mi at long brick
• 80 mi on "light weekend" - wonderful to repeat Monocacy 80
• 118 mi peak bike
• 14 assorted commute miles

Mini-goals for next build cycle

• Focus on nutrition, really this time 
• Do at least 2 2.4 mile straight swims
• Finish packing checklists

Peak weekend

This peak weekend was pretty awesome. I have watched many waves of IM-trainees struggle through the 120 mile bike and the 20 mile run to various degrees and, while I was hoping for some good days, I also knew there was a chance for meltdown, as I'd seen many other athletes end up in that condition.

We continued to have the luckiest summer weather ever. For the 7AM bike start, I was happy to have arm warmers, which bodes for a perfect day.

Bike

My riding partner and I had agreed to experience our own days, so she started earlier, and I was sort of on my own. I certainly took advantage of friends riding the same direction for some wonderful drafting, but I didn't try to adjust my pace to keep up with or hold back for anyone. This meant I also got to deploy my primary triathlon super-power of "not messing around" and was able to bike for 8:05 hours and be moving for 7:45 of them.

That means I had 2.5 minutes of stopping time per hour, counting traffic lights, refuels and a bathroom break!

Next year, I would like to ride a little more assertively sometimes, and on the completely opposite side of that coin, would also like to ride a little more socially, which would mean stopping with others. But for this weekend, a result like that was an amazing training result for me.

I had a nutrition plan that would have been good for 9 hours, and ate all of the Gu's and bars, but fell behind on liquids a bit. One of my take-aways was that my backup run nutrition plan needs to have an option to rely less on liquid calories because there is a chance I will be tired of drinking after the bike portion.

The random musical selection continued. The biking song of the week was "76 Trombones," which proved remarkably adaptable. "One hundred and 10 miles I have biked today, with 8 more miles to go...." or "70.1 miles and I will turn, turn turn turn turn right". There were short intervals of "3 blind mice" but the trombones were with me on & off for about 3 hours.

Run

Then Sunday came around and it was time for a 20 mile run in a moderately hilly neighborhood. I was super lucky to have run company for the 2nd hour, and then company again for the last 4 miles. As rough as my hip and foot started to feel, for that workout, the hardest part was finding a reason to keep going. If I had walked the last mile, I would have made my time goal, but it sure felt good to run it in, so I need to feed the loud mental voice that says "keep going!" instead of the one that says "good enough", especially on race day.

This run 4 loops, so I had 3 chances to refuel, and I got to use my super power again, with 5 minutes difference between total time and moving time, or less than 90 seconds per hour. While I'm proud of that, I also need to remember that it is like running 15 seconds per mile slower, at the speeds I would like to be going. Any stopping is not forward progress, but less stopping is better than more.

I'd been feeling a little stalled in my running progress this summer, but when I looked at some numbers for runs over 15 miles, and this weekend's run fit really well in there

Three of these dots are from Spring marathon training and three are from Ironman training, and I am super pleased to see them melding well together. Next weekend, I hope to add another point to the data set with a 16 mile run, then taper should start to actually kick in

Better than Christmas?

Biking gives you a lot of time to think, which can lead to a lot of time to stew, or grouse, or whine, or on a glorious day like Sunday can lead to a lot of time to imagine and laugh.

I present the result of a collaborative effort from Saturday's ride

10 Things of Monocacy (to the tune of 12 days of Christmas)

On a sunny summer Saturday, we went riding together, with

10 ounces of milk
9 llamas looking
8 scoops of Skratch

7-ty-plus Z'ers riding

6teen hundred calories
5 covered bridges
4 15 crossings
3 descents on Blacks Mill
2 cue sheets
and a 1 hour drive to start


I love being at a point in my training where an 80 miler on a nice day can be so achievable that it leaves energy for creativity like this.

Nutrition practice

The long rides have been a great chance for me to practice and refine my nutrition plan and my method of displaying and remembering the plan.

From working with a nutritionist, I aim for 60-90 grams of carb per hour of exercise (after the first hour, since I can coast off breakfast for a while). Usually I aim for the low side end and feel fine. I also have an awesome stomach that will eat anything, and only got sort of cranky at me when I drank 20 oz of improperly diluted Gatorade Endurance during a hot ride (like possibly not diluted at all when it was supposed to be 1 part concentrate to 5 parts water).

So, for example, this was my plan for a ride that should take between 5-6 hours

The section on the left in the black box is what I taped to my handlebars. For each hour (row), at each 15 minute increment (column) what am I planning to eat?

I always plan to take a drink every 15 minute interval. For this ride, I started with two half-strength bottles since it was going to be hotter and I wanted to get more liquid in me, so my first two hours have 80 calories of Skratch.

Then I started eating 1 gu per hour and half a bar on the half hour. This ended up calculating to be at the high side of my nutrition goals, but it was a long ride early in the season, and I didn't want to feel hungry and I was just starting to work out my plan.

The plan has been refined, and a recent Gran Fondo gave me a chance to try out my IM plan, which hopefully will not also feature poorly diluted Gatorade Endurance

I used the aid stations to refill liquids, filling up with Gatorade Endurance once I had emptied a Skratch bottle, and then mixing two bottles of Skratch up about half way through the day.

Since that early ride, I've learned that I can delay starting the bars until I've finished two hours of riding without feeling hungry or tired later. This is nice because it gives me something to start looking forward to when the day gets longer without getting sick of the snacks early.

For that particular Gran Fondo, I was excited to substitute an Oatmeal Creme Pie for one of my packed bars, even though it meant carrying the bar around with me all day long :)

Looking forward to Ironman, I think I'm going to go with a plan remarkably similar to this, with two refill Skratch bottles waiting for me in special needs, and one Gatorade Endurance bottle from an aid station in each half of the ride.

If it's a hotter day, I'll drink water in between these calorie drinks, but I'm not a heavy sweater and don't get super thirsty, so I don't expect that to be a significant factor in the day.


For my longest training bike ride, it will have three loops and one thing I've discovered is that I love Gu's even more when they are cold, so I'll be mixing up the order of bars and Gu's to make it so I can eat two fresh-from-the-cooler Gu's when I come back around to refuel in the middle of the ride. :)

I also predict that there will be team mates with snacks out on the course, especially for the third loop, so I might replace the Gu or bar calories with surprise snacks -- maybe Cheetos!