Ahhh, you’ve got to do something on a 9hr flight across the Atlantic. So you might as well blog, or at least write something for later.
We’re finally on our way to PCB for Ironman Florida, somewhere just South of Iceland having been royally screwed out of almost £140 ($200) by Delta for the carriage of my bike box, that’s just one way!!! Still, it’s done now and by the time you read this we’ll be safely cooped up in Panama City Beach, moaning about the heat and less than 6 days from the big day.
So, how’s taper gone so far? Well, I don’t call myself the Lazy Ass Triathlete for nothing and with some of my main training weeks only resembling a lot of Ironman Athletes taper weeks my taper seems to have dissolved into almost nothing. I’ve managed a total of 3hrs training in this last week and if it wasn’t for a bike/run/bike session in the hotel gym last night I wouldn’t have sat on a saddle for over 7 days.
I haven’t been helped by the beautiful British weather though which has done its level best to blow and or wash away half of Devon over the last 7 days meaning I cancelled my Monday night track visit and my planned Thursday assault on my local 20mile TT leg tester where I was confident I could push for a new pb had the conditions been favourable. Still, they say it’s better to be undertrained than overtrained - so I should be ok then.
It’s not all bad though, the three sessions I have done all went well and I put solid shifts in for all of them so there was no slouching around for a change and I’ve even had my pre race shaving so there will be less drag while I’m out there……….. ahhhh, hold on! I mean Shelly has buzzed my head with the clippers on a grade 4 and the unsightly growth that all too often sprouts around my face has gone. If you were expecting tales of leg/chest or even ‘back, sack and crack’ waxing then I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed.
---------- There seems to be a lot of coughing going around on this plane!! Bad Times -----------------
The bad weather and lack of training did mean though that I had plenty of time (which I need) to get my bike dismantled and packed on Thursday and it seems to have been one of my better efforts, although I’ll know more when I unpack it of course. My suitcase packing too almost seemed too leisurely and comfortable so I’ll no doubt report back later when I work out what I’ve forgotten.
Even this weekend’s travel seems to have been relatively hassle free, especially after our booking error where somehow we managed to be leaving from and returning too totally different airports. It didn’t start too well with us leaving home a little late and then getting caught in all the holiday traffic with people heading home after their kids half term breaks. That meant we were over an hour later than we originally planned to meet my parents for lunch at The Bowl Inn, Almondsbury after which they took Rosie pup off for her holiday at their house (yes Shelly cried!!!). We then chugged our way along the M4 to Heathrow where we stopped the night at The Renaissance which was nice (good gym). We’re leaving the car with them for the duration of our trip! This morning we had an early 3am wake-up call (helped by the extra hour due to the clocks changing) so that we could be ready at 4am to meet the Taxi which was taking us the 45miles to Gatwick Airport. Now there is just the hassle of US Immigration and the baggage claim/drop at Atlanta to deal with and fingers crossed we’ll soon be settled in PCB – I’m sure this paragraph will get altered before it’s posted if anything goes drastically wrong.
The week ahead could be a busy and interesting one. It appears that we’ll have a lodger up until the race as an old clubmate of mine should be appearing. His race preparation and organisation makes anything we’ve done look like it’s been executed to the ultimate though so I’ll only be certain he’s coming when he gets here.
-----------Oooops, that was close. The woman in front of me just reclined her seat and nearly broke my laptop screen in half------------
Thanks to the joys of social media there should be a few meet ups too. It’ll be nice to meet in person people I only know as a name on Twitter. It’ll also be nice to look out for some faces while I’m out on the course (especially the run) next Saturday, rather than it just being a procession of unknown blank and painful bodies staggering along the road. It’ll be good if it gives Shelly a few more faces to shout too rather than just seeing me appear every hour or five.
-------------- Ahhhh, we’re here ----------------------------------
Phew, here I am typing from PCB the morning after a 20hr+ day of travelling yesterday. I’m knackered and my back aches like hell but we’re here and that’s the main thing. This blog is a bit random, there’s no pretty pics or anything, but hopefully I’ll get a bit more regular (how many times do I say that??) over the course of the holiday. There’s no direct internet access in the apartment but it’s just a stroll down to reception before I can sit down and post random rubbish – expect bulk Twitter overload!!
Right, now I’ve got bags to unpack and a bike to build so I’m going to post this rot, hope it makes some sense and it isn’t just a random bundle of words. Next time I’ll try to post in the same day with words that fit together
Monday, 31 October 2011
Thursday, 20 October 2011
Almost there!
Race Number 1826 reporting for duty
Somehow time seems to have flown and race day is just over two weeks away - how did that happen? We're now in the period where apparently I can't really do anything to make myself faster or stronger, I can now only do things that will keep me where I am or mess things up. It seems that it's time to taper, or in my case ......... go back to normal!
I've never had or understood the whole taper thing. This buzz people get, they get irritable because they're itching to train, straining at the lease raring to go, race day can't come soon enough! Really? Can't say that I've ever noticed. I'm just glad that I haven't got to force myself out on 80-100mile bike rides any more.
Maybe it's because my training has no structure to it, maybe it's because the start of my week always resembles a taper anyway I don't know, but I always seem to sit here wondering what all the fuss is about when people talk about 'Taper Madness'.
My weeks have been pretty normal and at their un-predictive best in recent weeks. The two weeks when I expect most people racing Florida were putting in their biggest weeks I failed to break 10hrs and then last week I almost broke 15, which is a huge amount for me! Included in that was 11h30m of cycling where I'd only spent 9hrs in the saddle over the previous two weeks combined.
Well, it kind of happens naturally, there's no big plan. I'll hopefully do a good few hours this weekend, no idea what though. As always I'll just make it up as I go along, then the two weeks leading up to race day will naturally turn into taper weeks because I simply won't have the time to train much.
Mon-Wed I never get a lot of training done.
Thursday on my day off I'll be busy packing, unpacking, repacking and swearing at my bike while I try to fit it in my bike box. Then if I've any time left I might try to pack some clothes.
Friday I'll try to swim as normal but that will mostly depend on Thursdays packing success/failure.
Saturday we'll be loading up and embarking on the first part of the journey to PCB.
Sunday will mostly be spent on planes and in airports.
Then before I know it I'll be into race week, trying to get over jet lag and acclimatise to the Florida heat while bike building, unpacking, registering, exploring, meeting folks, eating cheesesteak and trying very hard not to buy stuff that I really can't afford from the race village etc etc etc. Training? What training? I'm sure I'll get some in. Tues-Thurs on race week I'll probably get some small bike/run sessions in and I'll hopefully make a few of the morning swim sessions too. I'll play it all by ear though, I can't believe for a second anything I do will have a great effect on race day performance unless I do too much.
Does that lot make any sense? Really? It doesn't to me!
Somehow time seems to have flown and race day is just over two weeks away - how did that happen? We're now in the period where apparently I can't really do anything to make myself faster or stronger, I can now only do things that will keep me where I am or mess things up. It seems that it's time to taper, or in my case ......... go back to normal!
I've never had or understood the whole taper thing. This buzz people get, they get irritable because they're itching to train, straining at the lease raring to go, race day can't come soon enough! Really? Can't say that I've ever noticed. I'm just glad that I haven't got to force myself out on 80-100mile bike rides any more.
Maybe it's because my training has no structure to it, maybe it's because the start of my week always resembles a taper anyway I don't know, but I always seem to sit here wondering what all the fuss is about when people talk about 'Taper Madness'.
My weeks have been pretty normal and at their un-predictive best in recent weeks. The two weeks when I expect most people racing Florida were putting in their biggest weeks I failed to break 10hrs and then last week I almost broke 15, which is a huge amount for me! Included in that was 11h30m of cycling where I'd only spent 9hrs in the saddle over the previous two weeks combined.
Love this pic - makes the bike course look hilly! Erm, no it's not!!
So what will 'taper' involve for me?Well, it kind of happens naturally, there's no big plan. I'll hopefully do a good few hours this weekend, no idea what though. As always I'll just make it up as I go along, then the two weeks leading up to race day will naturally turn into taper weeks because I simply won't have the time to train much.
Mon-Wed I never get a lot of training done.
Thursday on my day off I'll be busy packing, unpacking, repacking and swearing at my bike while I try to fit it in my bike box. Then if I've any time left I might try to pack some clothes.
Friday I'll try to swim as normal but that will mostly depend on Thursdays packing success/failure.
Saturday we'll be loading up and embarking on the first part of the journey to PCB.
Sunday will mostly be spent on planes and in airports.
Then before I know it I'll be into race week, trying to get over jet lag and acclimatise to the Florida heat while bike building, unpacking, registering, exploring, meeting folks, eating cheesesteak and trying very hard not to buy stuff that I really can't afford from the race village etc etc etc. Training? What training? I'm sure I'll get some in. Tues-Thurs on race week I'll probably get some small bike/run sessions in and I'll hopefully make a few of the morning swim sessions too. I'll play it all by ear though, I can't believe for a second anything I do will have a great effect on race day performance unless I do too much.
Does that lot make any sense? Really? It doesn't to me!
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
Bad week, Solid weekend
Wow, I'm glad that week is over. Everything very nearly went pear shaped.
As is quite often the case my week started in a half hearted fashion. My Monday night track session wasn't anything exciting and then there was my regular Tuesday off from training which was probably needed after the previous long training weekend. Then it all started to go very wrong when I kept waking up during the night with an ache in my jaw. By the time I finished work on Wednesday evening I looked like the elephant man.
Now I had a good news/bad news situation. As luck would have it I'd got Thursday off and had got a dentist appointment booked for 8:30am, to be followed by a long training session. Hmmmm, well the dentist happened but by the time I left there it was clear that no training was happening after having one of my teeth ripped out that had got a hulking great abscess underneath it. Damn, what a waste of day off. At least it didn't happen in race week though, I'll count my blessings!!
So with just my regular Friday swim session ahead I started the weekend with just 2h50m of training done in 5 days, at a time when most people training for Florida will have been putting their biggest weeks in. For once this year my saviour came with the weather and the all too short burst of good weather we had.
Saturday was a beautiful day so I loaded my bike up and set out for my 2nd consecutive Saturday Century ride. We'll ignore the fact that I hadn't sat on my bike at all between the two!! In a near repeat of the previous weeks ride I biked to Copplestone and back, then my my clubmate Phill & rode Puffin Billy and back, all as aero as possible to get used to the position but without putting in a huge effort and wrecking myself ahead of Sunday's race ............. Oh yeah, I'd got a race to do on Sunday :-)
The original plan had been to finish my bike ride and then run to Bideford and help Shelly with the Saturday registration for Sunday's Sprint Tri. With only 1h50m to get changed and run the 13miles out there on an unseasonably hot day I wimped out though. Sure it gave me plenty of time, but had I suffered in the heat, or had any post ride issues then Shelly wouldn't be at home to rescue me and if I did end up with a long walk she'd be worrying where I was rather than focussing on the job in hand concerning the race. As it turned out I could have jogged up their in my leisure because Shelly had everything under control and my services were hardly needed except for a few Q&A sessions off some non-local and novice competitors.
We finished off a looong day by calling in for a Chinese takeaway on the way home that hit the spot nicely.
Bideford Sprint Triathlon
The day started with an early wake up as Shelly was organising the morning registration. I had the option of biking up to the race later, but as is normally the case I took the easy option and helped out dishing out timing chips while giving random nuggets of info to competitors. Soon it was race time though and I got everything prepared, ready to roll.
The Swim
We all set off in waves of 20 on the swim to ensure there were no issues when we swam under the arches on Bideford Bridge where huge crowds had gathered to watch the race (apparently forcing traffic to stop). The first 3 waves we people who'd put the slowest swim times down, then the next 4 waves included the quickest swimmers (I was in wave 4). We had a 4-5ft jump into the water then lined up for a deep water start, it wasn't long before we were on our way though and after an initial bit of jostling I was in clear water on my own. Apparently I took the slower route through the arches (I've no idea, I just swam), then we had right turns at two buoys before returning through another set of arches and heading back to transition. It was only 600m so nothing too exciting although the line of white caps from the previous waves of slower swimmers helped my useless navigation skills a little.
T1
I hit T1 happy to see one of my squad swim pals still in there. I knew at least two people who would destroy me in the water, I wanted/needed to keep them within a minute, especially as one of them was on the British Triathlon Olympic Talent Squad last year. I'd held them to 45secs in the water but then I lost another 13secs in T1 battling with my wetsuit.
The Bike
The Bideford bike course is a real ride of two halves. The first half is along good width country lanes which rise and fall constantly, hardly ever letting you settle into a rhythm. The 2nd half would be a real TT'ers delight if it wasn't for the almost constant headwinds that greet you every time you ride it, it's very fast and with very few climbs to force you off your Tri-Bars. Thankfully the recent burst of hot weather had also reversed the normal wind direction, so what tiny bit of wind there was would actually be behind us. Bonus!!
I knew the two speedy swimmers ahead of me were both on road bikes, so if I could keep them at a sensible distance over the climbs I should be able to make time up on the fast return section. I never for a second expected to have caught and passed them within the first couple of miles, but I did!!
I was now leading on the road and for the 2nd race on the trot I had the company of a lead motorcycle all the way to T2. I've no idea how fast I was going on the 2nd section because I didn't wear my Garmin, I wish I had of now though.
T2
No messing, just in and out. My clubmate Phill who rode with my on Saturday had punctured in T1 :-(. His bike was racked and his wife shouted at me that he was a minute ahead of me as I ran out. Cheeky :-D.
The Run
Strangely I hadn't felt any ill effects at all on the bike from Saturdays century ride, as soon as I hit the run though my legs were protesting, they really did not want to run at all. I remembered my recent race at Burnham Standard Distance Tri when my legs felt tired but the Garmin was still giving my good figures and I pushed on. I had to really, I knew there were some good fast runners behind me and I had no idea how far behind they were.
The run was 'awkward'. Lots of twists and turns around Bideford back roads with no chance to settle into a groove, there were also two real stinging hills that my legs cried out to me to walk up, but I couldn't, not while I was first on the road. I kept looking over my shoulder for somebody chasing the pace felt sooo slow, but there was never anybody there.
Finally after what felt like forever I ran alongside the park in Bideford and knew I was on the final stretch. I cruised into and around the park until I crossed the finish line and then I waited 1, 2, 3, 4 minutes before anybody else came home. Damn, I could have eased off!
I spent the next hour chatting with various friends and clubmates as they all crossed the line while waiting to see how the other waves times had compared to mine. When it was all over I'd managed to hang on to my lead and win in a time of 1:07:57, exactly 3mins ahead of 2nd place.
So the week ended well although I'll admit I'd rather have finished further down the field and not had the tooth issue/missed training from earlier in the week. I totalled less than 9hrs training which is pretty pathetic with just 5 weeks to the race...... BUT I'd ended on a high with a solid Saturday ride and a very solid Sunday race. Now I just need to knuckle down and get on with things for a few more weeks. Here's hoping!
BIDEFORD SPRINT TRIATHLON - 1st overall - 8:31 (0:52) 38:22 (0:20) 19:52 = 1:07:57
So with just my regular Friday swim session ahead I started the weekend with just 2h50m of training done in 5 days, at a time when most people training for Florida will have been putting their biggest weeks in. For once this year my saviour came with the weather and the all too short burst of good weather we had.
Saturday was a beautiful day so I loaded my bike up and set out for my 2nd consecutive Saturday Century ride. We'll ignore the fact that I hadn't sat on my bike at all between the two!! In a near repeat of the previous weeks ride I biked to Copplestone and back, then my my clubmate Phill & rode Puffin Billy and back, all as aero as possible to get used to the position but without putting in a huge effort and wrecking myself ahead of Sunday's race ............. Oh yeah, I'd got a race to do on Sunday :-)
We finished off a looong day by calling in for a Chinese takeaway on the way home that hit the spot nicely.
Bideford Sprint Triathlon
The day started with an early wake up as Shelly was organising the morning registration. I had the option of biking up to the race later, but as is normally the case I took the easy option and helped out dishing out timing chips while giving random nuggets of info to competitors. Soon it was race time though and I got everything prepared, ready to roll.
The Swim
We all set off in waves of 20 on the swim to ensure there were no issues when we swam under the arches on Bideford Bridge where huge crowds had gathered to watch the race (apparently forcing traffic to stop). The first 3 waves we people who'd put the slowest swim times down, then the next 4 waves included the quickest swimmers (I was in wave 4). We had a 4-5ft jump into the water then lined up for a deep water start, it wasn't long before we were on our way though and after an initial bit of jostling I was in clear water on my own. Apparently I took the slower route through the arches (I've no idea, I just swam), then we had right turns at two buoys before returning through another set of arches and heading back to transition. It was only 600m so nothing too exciting although the line of white caps from the previous waves of slower swimmers helped my useless navigation skills a little.
T1
I hit T1 happy to see one of my squad swim pals still in there. I knew at least two people who would destroy me in the water, I wanted/needed to keep them within a minute, especially as one of them was on the British Triathlon Olympic Talent Squad last year. I'd held them to 45secs in the water but then I lost another 13secs in T1 battling with my wetsuit.
The Bike
The Bideford bike course is a real ride of two halves. The first half is along good width country lanes which rise and fall constantly, hardly ever letting you settle into a rhythm. The 2nd half would be a real TT'ers delight if it wasn't for the almost constant headwinds that greet you every time you ride it, it's very fast and with very few climbs to force you off your Tri-Bars. Thankfully the recent burst of hot weather had also reversed the normal wind direction, so what tiny bit of wind there was would actually be behind us. Bonus!!
I knew the two speedy swimmers ahead of me were both on road bikes, so if I could keep them at a sensible distance over the climbs I should be able to make time up on the fast return section. I never for a second expected to have caught and passed them within the first couple of miles, but I did!!
I was now leading on the road and for the 2nd race on the trot I had the company of a lead motorcycle all the way to T2. I've no idea how fast I was going on the 2nd section because I didn't wear my Garmin, I wish I had of now though.
No messing, just in and out. My clubmate Phill who rode with my on Saturday had punctured in T1 :-(. His bike was racked and his wife shouted at me that he was a minute ahead of me as I ran out. Cheeky :-D.
Strangely I hadn't felt any ill effects at all on the bike from Saturdays century ride, as soon as I hit the run though my legs were protesting, they really did not want to run at all. I remembered my recent race at Burnham Standard Distance Tri when my legs felt tired but the Garmin was still giving my good figures and I pushed on. I had to really, I knew there were some good fast runners behind me and I had no idea how far behind they were.
I spent the next hour chatting with various friends and clubmates as they all crossed the line while waiting to see how the other waves times had compared to mine. When it was all over I'd managed to hang on to my lead and win in a time of 1:07:57, exactly 3mins ahead of 2nd place.
So the week ended well although I'll admit I'd rather have finished further down the field and not had the tooth issue/missed training from earlier in the week. I totalled less than 9hrs training which is pretty pathetic with just 5 weeks to the race...... BUT I'd ended on a high with a solid Saturday ride and a very solid Sunday race. Now I just need to knuckle down and get on with things for a few more weeks. Here's hoping!
BIDEFORD SPRINT TRIATHLON - 1st overall - 8:31 (0:52) 38:22 (0:20) 19:52 = 1:07:57
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