WEEK 9 & 10 Just Dance

                                               After a hard week ...Just Dance

Post ride rest

Another big Block of training done. The week started out with the usual hard ergo session and I have found these over the last few weeks the toughest session. I has a 1 hour block with 10 minutes warm up and then 5mins at close to 200watts as I could get with a 3 minute recovery done 5 times and at the end I was pretty much done.

Tuesday I ran in King's park for an hour at as close to race pace which at the moment is about 6.16 minutes per kilometer.  The legs were tired from the ergo session but finished comfortably. In the evening cross fit with dead lifts and push ups increasing the reps starting with 2 up to 12 reps in a 10 minute period using 40 and 60kg weight and then push press with a 35kg weight for 40 minute.

Wednesday , swimming on my own at Beatty Park , straight out swim for 2km .

Thursday , bike session at Kings Park with a ride round the outside of the Park and up mount street then practicing turns at sprint speed and then threshold efforts around the Park and repeating it .Rode for nearly 2 hours and it was a hard session.

In the evening , run training with Katey at Yokine. Warm up was 3 km and then we did 2km at threshold pace and then 2 x 1km at slightly harder pace and finally 2 x 500m all out. I managed the first 2km at 5.03 pace and then 5.20 pace and the two 1km runs were at 4.56 and 4.58 pace and the 500m were at 2.15 and 2.20 pace. We then did a cool down finishing the session running just under 10kms.

Friday , just a swim session in the evening with the following :

200m free 100m kick x 2
200m slow to fast x 4
25 fast kick 25m slow kick x 2
100m free
25fast kick 25m slow kick x 2
100x 5 slow to fast
total2.2km

Saturday's WOD

Claremont Jetty Saturday afternoon swim

Saturday , the legs were just tired so I skipped my long ride and did a run 2 hours with 17kms The first 30 minutes easy and then 1 hour at a harder pace , for me about 6 minute pace and then the last 25 minutes were easy . Then a swim at the swan River at Claremont on my own. I did go to cross fit and had a good work out :

7 exercise
7 pushups
7 pullups
burpees
deadlifts 50kg
thrusters 25kg
kettlebells 16kgs
knees to elbow rises on bar
 x 5 rounds

Sunday was suppose to be the long ride but I decided to just rest as the legs and body were feeling pretty sore and tired.

Irondog with the TT Bike

Week 10 Monday.Back to the ergo trainer and another really hard session . I felt a lot better with the rest on Sunday and managed the session without getting close to passing out or coughing up a lung.

Tuesday . I ran in the evening a 1 hour session keeping a good pace and managing 10km with a 6.02 minutes per km with the average Heart rate at 128 bpm. I missed cross fit .

Wednesday , I swam in the evening and did my own cross fit session in the gym :

7 rounds
10 push ups
20 squats
20 sit ups
15 triceps squats
10 thruster's with 20kg weight

Thursday ; The usual bike ride at Kings park. this time we headed out to Christchurch in Nedlands practicing rolling of the front in a group and then threshold efforts in kings park circuit and finally one climb up Mount street before heading off for coffee. Pretty hard effort of 1.40hr. In the evening ran with Katey and did a 3km warm up then 8 x 500m , all pretty consistent at 2.24 to 2.09 minutes . Then a slow cool down finishing with about 9km.

Friday . I swam at the pool with Exceed :
200m free warm up
100 x 2 with PB and band
100 free
300m fast
200 easy
2 x 150 fast
200 easy
100 x 3
50 m x 2 fast
100 recovery

 After the swim , I did a long bike ride instead of Saturday .Rode down the freeway bike path to Mandurah and then to Pinjarra Road and back to Deep water point .Finished with about 147km in 5.30 including the break at the Caltex Station for coke and water. I had about 4 bidons with 600 calories of Tailwind Nutrition , a 1.25 litre coke and several dates. Got swooped by a magpie after leaving the station and stung by a bee which causes a reaction on my arm that was still itching 4 days later. the ride out was pretty windy and I had a few mechanicals with the back wheel squeaking for all 5 plus hours .But managed the session with 5 x 20 minutes at threshold effort .Got to about 135 to 143 HR . Had a bit of cramp on the left foot but otherwise felt comfortable .I ran off the bike for 15 minutes or 2.7km.

 

Saturday's WOD 

Saturday , still sore and tired but ran for 1.45 with 30 minutes easy and then 1 hour at a harder pace for me about 6.09 to 6.30 minutes per km pace and then 15 minutes cool down finishing with 15 plus km. In the afternoon , cross fit with :

5 rounds of
1min box jump
1 min wall balls
1 min dumb bell rowing
1 min overhead squats
1 min KB behind the neck triceps lifts
20 secs between and 2 minute recovery between rounds

I slept pretty soundly after Friday and Saturday's session. On Sunday i had my first ocean swim with just a very slow swim in Sorrento . I had some difficulty with the first couple of minutes but the last two laps between the groyne felt a lot better . just need to get more swims in the ocean before Busselton.

Week 9 turned out to be a less than comprehensive week with 12 plus hours and week 10 was about 16.5 hours. An easy week ahead and then a final solid block before tapering for the race.

Week 8

Irondog Having Fun

After the easy week , it was straight back into a solid build of training for the next 8 weeks before the Ironman at Busselton. The long rides get way longer and the sessions just a  little harder.

Monday I missed the swim session but in the evening knuckled down to my wind-trainer session. Easy 10 minute warm up then 5 x 5minutes at about 200 watts with a 2 minute recovery. This was hard for me and I stayed at about 190-200 watts and nearly passed out . A short cool down and the hour was done .

Tuesday , I ran at lunch time just doing a 50 minute run with some tempo running thrown in keeping a 5.30-5.40 pace for most of the 8kms .In the evening cross fit fortunately was more core work with 10 rounds of Turkish burpees and cleans with a dumbbell .

Wednesday , A swim on my own at the Ballajura Aquatic Centre ( a 25 m pool) so lots of laps and managed to get 2kms done. then off to a massage with Adele Richards at Essential Sports Recovery which was painful but good for me.

The group at Thursday's ride

Thursday . A long day with a session at Kings park cycling with the Hall group and we did rolling in a group riding from kings park to Steve's in Nedlands and then back to Kings park where we rode in teams of 3 up Lovekin and finished off with some sprints.All up 35kms.In the evening, run training with Renee baker as Katy is away and in Kona . A 2 km warm up with some drill sand then I did a 24 minute run at about 80%  of max HR rate .I was pretty pleased and kept a fairly consistent pace of between 5.03 and 5.23 minutes per km for the 4.8kms I ran .We then did a cool down and stretches. It is always helpful having good tips and guidance at these runs from Renee . As there was only 3 of us there was lots of one to one help.Total run 9km.


Friday .
I struggled this morning and I was just tired .So I swam in the evening .I started a  little earlier and did a 200m free with 200m with paddles , then 400m in fins. The drills were 450m made up of 3 x 150m with 50m finger drag, salute and free followed by 4 x 50 m sprinting. The main set was an 800m medium pace swim and then 400m fast . I did not do a cool down .Total 2.6km

Saturday WOD

Saturday. I had a slightly late start leaving home after 6.15am and headed North for a change . I rode to two Rocks actually got pass the Gravity Centre on the Indian Ocean Road and rode a further 10km before turning around and headed back. I had a good run down but on the return I started to lose energy and despite 3 stops for coke and a sausage , I started to cramp a lot and the last 20kms were slow. I finished with 158km in 6 hours and 30 minutes of resting. Will be taking more tailwind nutrition and salt for next long ride.


In the afternoon despite the sore legs and cramping I managed the cross fit session a little slow with 2 and a bit rounds in 40 minutes of 25 deadlifts , clean n jerks , jumping squats , and sit-ups.

Sunday. the good thing about the training is I slept without waking for 7 hours straight. This morning I was suppose to do a 1.40 run with an hour at tempo pace but headed to the hills at Bickley to run on the trails.It was slow and there was a lot of hiking but I think it put the legs under a fair bit of stress and held up. Just did under 10kms .

Bickley Reservoir Sunday run in the hills

Sunday run/walk

The lessons learnt are being consistent , getting the nutrition right, following the programme  and staying positive.

Kona 2015

Picture from Oakley sunglasses webpage

It comes round again and my Facebook page is awash with friends and pros posting pictures .there is the usual banter about who will win, the many lottery winners and legacy winners and the celebrity invites .Ultimately I tend not to buy into these issues . It is about the individual experience and the friends who are racing there. The many sacrifices made to get there which I can appreciate. It isn't golf .

Also this year is the first race with the new owners of WTC , Wanda , the big Chinese Conglomerate. There was  an interesting piece by Brett Sutton ( Prediction for Kona  ) There is the campaign for equal places for men and women pros and the issue of the starts. It is the ultimate race and the race that started all others. In its simplicity of how the race came about , it has now become a juggernaut of sports business. Good or bad , the one issue that sadly has not been addressed as Brett  alludes to is how poorly the professionals are paid in prize money . There is no organized voice although the new professionals association is a reincarnation of earlier such groups. Will the new owners possibly have deeper pockets and not be so motivated to squeeze every ounce of profit out of the sport .Hopefully they will see the wisdom in a group of professionals earning a decent living in the sport and being the core of the value of Ironman racing .

Whilst the age groupers race for the challenge and the elite few for a spot , it is the professionals who are at the pointy end  , pushing the human body and mind and create those enduring visions of what we as a human race can do when we put our minds to it .It is the metaphor of how we all want to live our lives , thats what attracts me to push myself because I know I if I can do it , then  in life I know I can put my mind to anything . I missed the early years when the sport was a peripheral crazy persons activity but the core of Ironman racing was pure. It is not so clear today , there is more show and less of the turn up and race and enjoy yourself .

Whoever wins there will be great stories . As I complete another week of training , I know what I started nearly 9 years ago which was to finish an Ironman .That was the dream. Then getting a lottery spot and now a legacy spot . The desire waxes and wains after many campaigns. The body tires and there is a little of the magic that is lost in the modern day Ironman race . Yes everything is run to clockwork and the atmosphere is great .  It just misses a little of that small town atmosphere money just can't buy anymore.

Easy Week Singapore

Riding around Singapore ...Mount Faber Not much of a view with the haze

After the week with the flu , I had an easy week and a week in Singapore. Unfortunately with the haze it was an interesting week of training even though it did not have any noticeable effect on me, it was hard just not seeing the sun for a week . I arrived on the Saturday and the next morning ran .I was suppose to do a 1 hour easy run but ended running nearly 2 hours and covering about 15km.The rest of the day was just relaxing with a birthday dinner at Fort canning with friends. I had a rest day on Monday but did do a swim of 1.5km in the 25m pool and on Tuesday not quite following the plan ( I was suppose to ride and run ) I did a 30km ride with lots of traffic in the latter half of the ride and then ran off the bike for about 7km and swam as well for about 40minutes in a 25m pool covering about 1km but doing a lot of work with paddles.

On Wednesday I did a ride on the gym bike covering 22km in about 50 minutes and going at an easy pace and then swam at the lagoon in Sentosa called Tanjong Beach . managed 1.6km despite the low tide the haze and the eerie nature with again the haze just merging the horizon and making everything look like it was covered in a fog.

Thursday , I rode again for about 1.5hrs in the big chain ring and up Mount Faber .the traffic was pretty heavy as it was morning rush hour and pretty scary . Probably in hindsight not a good idea. I then did a 9km run in the afternoon .

Friday , instead of a ride I ran on a treadmill  and swam in the pool . Saturday before flying back it was a 1.5hr ride up to Mt Faber and back, there was less traffic in the morning on a Saturday so had a better ride.

It was a good relaxing week and did about 10hours of training and felt a lot better after the flu ridden week. The change of environment and the tropical hazy weather definitely made me work harder  but after a no training week the week before it was nice to be back just riding , running and swimming.

Week 4-6

Words to train by

View of the Beach after run on 20 September 2015

A bit of a hiccup in training with a slow start but in the past week no training as I came down with the flu.

Whilst I was hoping for an illness free build it has yet to happen.I won't regurgitate the training programme accept that in week 4 I had a good build with a wind trainer session , a group training ride and I did skip the long ride, 3 runs and a brick session off my long ride and 2 swim sessions. The next week I again had the same 3 bike sessions and did a long ride , 3 runs and 2 swims , the first in the morning.Began feeling more comfortable in the pool as well. I still managed the cross fit sessions as well despite being pretty tired on the Saturday. The long ride was pretty hard with a head wind and struggled at times but felt good at the end and tried the nutrition  which is Tailwind all in liquid and with caffeine . On the Sunday I ran with Nimal along the coast and every street going up a short climb on each turn in from the coast road.I ran about 13.5km in 1.45 hr . Slow but got the heart rate up .It was a cold morning and unfortunately the next day I came down with a cold and then the flu.Nothing really bad but sufficient to get me coughing and feeling week.That put an end to any training for the week.

In years past I would fret about the lack of training but fortuitously it was supposed to be my easy week but I got it switched as I was planning on taking the week of 28 to 4 October as my easy week. As it is I will try and do a bit more this week to make up for the enforced rest week .

But over the few weeks of training i have seen some slight improvement even though my pace on the bike and run are still slow, I can feel the HR not escalating as much . I just have to remain consistent and the training is getting tougher.

Today I finished the week surviving the flu with a slow 14.5km run and swim with paddles .

Week 3

Inside this Body Is

AN ELITE TRIATHLETE 

trying to get out

 Thats how I feel this week. Really slow and trying to get back into a faster mode. Slowly getting into a routine. Monday I missed the swim session in the morning but did my wind trainer session in the evening with a standard 10 minute warm up and then 2 minutes at around 215 watts and 2 minutes recovery , repeated 10 times. it is a hard session when going all out. I watched a You Tube video of the Col du Glandon and Alpe D'huez climb whilst listening to Frank Sinatra's greatest hits and heaving and trying to get enough oxygen . Molly slept through the whole session .


 

 Tuesday , I missed cross fit and did my run along the river trying to get a tempo pace up but really just keeping it at a slow 6.30 pace . The HR was still a little high but I was not struggling. It was still getting dark pretty early in the evening and so part of the run was in the dark.

Wednesday I swam in the evening .My first swim session in 8 months other than the Alpe D'huez triathlon. It was in the evening with a 500m warm up with 200m medley and then 4 x 300m with 150 free, 100medley and 50 free at fast pace. I just swam at a steady pace trying to get in the distance.Long way to go to get swim fit. Then 4 x 50m fast and 100m cool down for 2km.

Thursday was and is usually a long day with a ride session in the morning.Today it was all out high cadence on Forrest Road Kings Park done 5 times just trying to get the cadence up and improve the cardiovascular/aerobic levels. it was a hard session with a recovery going down Lovekin.We then did 3 climbs on Forrest trying to stand for a minute or more as we climbed. Then back to the car park and on to West Perth for coffee.

In the evening ,it was run training taken by Rene Baker  , a Pro triathlete .It was at Perry lakes and there was just the 4 of us with 3 girls and myself all of them lots younger and faster. Started the warm up at a 5.30 minute per km pace which was hard and then after some drills and stretches we did 4 x 1.2 km at supposed 80% pace but i think for me was pretty much above threshold. i I managed to hold the pace at 4.30 minutes per km for the first 1.2km and then after a 2 minute recovery ran the other 1.2kms at 4.42 , 4.57 and 4.52 pace. We did a cool down and I was pretty stuffed.

Friday , fortunately just a swim session in the evening with another 2km set made up of 300m warm up and then 200m x 8 and a 100m cool down.

Saturday , a long ride on my own.Started late at 7.30 am and rode from home down to the city with lots of stops and then on the Freeway bike path turning around about 52.5kms .I did 10 minute threshold efforts along the way with a 5 minute recovery and managed about 3 to the end and then one more on the way back before just keeping a consistent pace . I did get wet with a short shower at the end. I did not see to many cyclist about.Got home and ran off the bike . The legs were totally sore. rode 105 km with a 3km run .

In the afternoon it was cross fit with a pretty hard session.I did all the weights bar the last managing 10 repetitions of the clean n jerks at 35kgs. I slept pretty early that night as I was pretty much done.

Saturday Cross Fit WOD 5 September 2015

Sunday.It was a 1.30 run at steady pace. I maintained a consistent 6.50 to 7 minute per km pace for the whole run with the Hr staying at about 125 to 135 for most of the run completing 13kms .  In the evening I did my ergo session instead of Monday because of a commitment so it turned out to be a full week. 

Week 2

Like Ironman training it's hard work looking this cute

A full week of training minus the swim sessions sums up the week. I haven't yet ventured back to the pool but will have to soon as the clock ticks down. It has been a gradual start and not too time intensive . It has also been pretty good on the body .  I have had no real completely sore moments yet.

I have also done a VO2 test to work out my threshold and in comparison to last year I have had a bit of a slide possibly from the lack of specific work on the wind trainer and threshold efforts or higher so it is in the programme now . We will see if it makes a difference.

The week started with an ergo session and just an easy warm up and then 2minutes @85% effort or in my case staying between 200 and 230 watts , then 2 minutes recovery and doing it 10 times. Lots of sweat and panting with Molly lying under the computer table as I struggled through the session.

On Tuesday morning Instead of the usual bike ride I ran for an 1hour trying to keep a tempo pace for 50 minutes . Again very slow at about 6.30 pace doing just under 10kms.  In the evening I had cross fit with a  session on clean and jerks skills session .

Wednesday ended up being a rest day as I didn't swim again.

Thursday was a long day with a session at Kings Park at 6 am doing hill repeats on Lovekin five times at 60 rpm and in the big chain ring and then high cadence on Forrest drive for 20 seconds with 40 seconds recovery , three times on each climb and repeating that 3 times before a final 1  minute standing climb up Forrest Drive. Then coffee at West Perth with a 1.30 hr session and about 35km of riding. In the evening I ran with 4 x 5minutes at threshold and the rest of the hour at just above easy pace. Again did about 9.5 km . Friday no training and Saturday I skipped my ride as I thought it was going to rain and did a 3 hour wind trainer session with 10 minutes at threshold , three times with a 5 minute recovery between. I really managed 2.50 and then stopped as the legs were pretty much spent after the first 2 hours and especially after the threshold efforts. I then ran off the bike with Molly but it ended up being a pretty slow run and it rained as well .Managed 3 plus km in 25 minutes .Really felt tired after the session . Had cross fit in the afternoon and thankfully it was a skill session on the snatch .I managed a good 30 minutes before deciding to just rest the sore tired legs and use the foam roller to roll out the knots in the muscles.

I slept pretty well that night as I was dead tired. On Sunday with the City to Surf run on in Perth I got to Georges at City Beach at 8am despite the closed roads and ran from there for about 8km before meeting Nimal and Michele running from Sorento . I then ran back with them .Michele turning back near Hale Road . We went on to Georges and I managed to run 16kms with the legs feeling pretty tired. It was a slow 7 minutes per km but at times I was running 6minute kms. Slow but a start.

Pretty happy with the training so far .It has been slow but hopefully with the speed work and strength work there will be some slow improvements. Just need to start back in the pool.