Hi, everyone! Not a whole lot to update. I've been tapering my training for IMoo since last week and don't have much to say. Most of the taper work has been easy runs, easy rides, and easy swims. Lately, I've quit running entirely after I strained my left calf muscle Tuesday morning on an easy jog. I figure if I'm not ready to run now, no amount of taper training is gonna fix that and it's better to avoid injury. So, for the past few days, I've been doing mostly 25-mile bike rides at an easy pace of 20 mph or so. Low to mid effort, trying to stay aerobic.
Oh . . . to anyone interested, my bib number for the race is 982. Steve's is 967.
It's now 9 days until race day. I plan to leave for Wisconsin this Sunday and stay over a few days in St. Louis with Mason. I plan to arrive in Madison on Thursday and just soak up the atmosphere for a while.
For those of you (family and friends) going to Madison to spectate, I can't wait to see you! It should be a fun week and a long, hard day on Sunday! Pray for cool weather!
Friday, August 31, 2007
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Training Update for the last two weeks.
Not much to tell for the last couple of weeks. Training has been haphazard at best, due to work-related interruptions. I have managed to do long rides and runs each weekend, but my week-day training has been relegated to short runs in the mornings (when I can do it) and my Texas Iron workouts.
After the long run on July 30 was Texas Iron swim day. The workout was fairly routine and were good maintenance. I got a short ride (15 miles) in on Wednesday before the swim workout. On Thursday the 2nd I didn't get a workout in. I had planned to do the Texas Iron bike time trial workout, but it rained most of the afternoon and the workout got canceled. I probably could have found time to run for half an hour or so, but I just didn't get it done. On Friday, I ran about 45 minutes in the morning, but didn't do anything else.
Saturday, August 4 was a VERY disappointing workout. I had planned to ride 90 miles as part of my bike build before taper weeks. It started out bad when I slept later than I'd planned and ended up starting the ride at 8:30 instead of 7:00 like I'd planned. To make matters worse, the summer had finally kicked in and it was upper 90's in temperature and God-awful humidity.
I started the ride from home in Leander. The plan was to go out to Parmer Lane and ride it all the way to Hwy 290. That wasn't too hard. From the Parmer and 290 intersection, I then headed west on 290 to Buckner Road, turned south and took that to 51st Street. West on 51st to Lamar, and then south on Lamar to Barton Springs Road, where I stopped at Jack & Adam's to buy a few extra Gu's and to refill water bottles. By then, I'd gone about 45 miles and was feeling okay. Unfortunately, I had 45 more to go and the hard stuff was coming up.
After leaving Jack & Adam's, I generally followed the Dam Loop route taking Barton Springs out to MoPac and then heading south to Southwest Parkway, up to Hwy 71, and over to Ranch Road 620 through Lakeway. The route was tiring, but I was doing fine until I hit Lakeway. By then, the heat had really kicked in. I hadn't been drinking as much as I should and I was definitely getting dehydrated. Also, I forgot to bring salt tabs, so my legs were getting a little bit crampy.
Once I got across Mansfield Dam, I knew I wasn't going to make the full 90 miles. I got as far as the Walgreen's at FM 2222 and 620 and decided to call Lisa to come pick me up. Although I was dejected and pissed because I didn't get the full 90 in, I think it was the right call. I had planned to turn at Bullick Hollow (right there at 2222) and go through the the area over to Lime Creek Road. Lime Creek has a series of hills called the Three Sisters (or the Three Bitches!), and I just didn't have the legs to do those hills. I could've hurt myself trying to do them.
So, I bagged the ride after 72 miles. Not bad, but I was really worried that I was still 40 miles short of the Ironman distance, and I was so beat. I called Steve to complain and he reminded me that heat and humidity play a huge role in how you feel. Since Madison is not likely to be as hot or as humid, I should do much better there, especially if I watch my hydration and nutrition, and don't overdo my effort on the bike.
Sunday, August 5th was as encouraging as the previous day's ride had been discouraging. I got up early on Sunday and went for a long run. I was worried since I'd been wiped out the day before, but I ended up having a great run. The goal was to run straight for 1 hour 30 minutes at a moderate rate. I managed to do that quite well, but when I got home and plugged in my route to check the mileage, I was astounded to learn that I'd run 10 miles in that hour and a half! I didn't feel like I was going THAT fast. So . . . I was very encouraged by those results. Even more encouraging was the fact that I didn't have any real knee pain! So . . . maybe my running is finally coming around a bit! Let's just see what I can do immediately after a 112 mile bike, though!
The next day, I ran for 45 minutes down at the Town Lake trail. It was a lower intensity recovery run. I had some knee pain, but I noticed that when I focused on form, the pain went away, so I think I'm learning how to manage the IT Band stuff.
Tuesday, August 7th was a Texas Iron running day. I and 3 others who will be doing Ironmans in the next few months got to run "mile repeats," while everyone else worked on shorter distances with speed. My workout was to run a half mile at 5k or 10k pace, rest for 90 seconds, then run another, rest for 90 seconds, then run a mile at half-iron pace. I then had to repeat that two more times. Needless to say, I ran a little faster than I should have. My miles were pretty constant at 7:15-7:20 each. That's a little faster than my desired HIM pace. In the two actual HIM's I've done, my pace was closer to 9:30 or 10:00, but that was due to lots of walking from the knee problems. A good HIM pace for me right now is probably about 8:15 to 8:45. Anyway, the workout went smoothely and I didn't have any pain!
On Wednesday, August 8th, I had an ART appointment with Dr. Z. I reported my good running news and we worked on my achilles tendons and my left knee some. He told me not to overdo it and to just maintain through IMoo. That evening, Texas Iron had an open water swim at Lake Travis near Mansfield Dam. It was a good workout concentrating mostly on short distances and the mass swim start. I'm beginning to realize that I won't have a great swim time, but if I can just get through the swim and the first Transition in an hour and a half, I'll be fine.
Thursday, August 9th was the Texas Iron bike time trial workout. It had been delayed twice by rain, but we had clear skies and hot weather this Thursday. So, I went out to do the time trial and see where I am in my short distance, hard intensity biking. Mad props to Lisa for taking time out of her day to bring my bike shoes and my aero helmet down to the office for me when I found that I'd left them at home!
At the time trial, I had the Sharkboy wheel cover and Steve's Zipp 404 front wheel running for optimal speed. The time trial always brings out tons of casual Texas Iron folks because they love to see how fast they can go. The record-holder for the time trial is a guy named Jake North, who used to be a bike racer and now does triathlons. I finished 2nd to Jake in the age group (non-professional) division of the Rookie Triathlon earlier this summer, and 2nd to him in the last Texas Iron time trial. Jake was there, but he's been hurt, so he didn't have his aero stuff and did the time trial on his road bike instead.
As people arrived for the time trial, Jamie and Andrea had us warm up. I did a half of the 8-mile loop as warm up and then headed to the start line with everyone else. Jamie kept time and Andrea started us off. Usually, Jamie tries to seed the riders by expected finish, but that's resulted in a lot of people crossing the finish at the same time, so this time, he put us in random order. I went 6th. We started 10 seconds apart with Andrea hold our bikes up and us clipped in and ready to go.
The route starts on MoPac, just barely south of Lacrosse Ave., the turn off for the Veloway and the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center. We ride down MoPac to the very end, and then turn around and come back on the north-bound side to finish just before Lacrosse. It took me until almost 500 meters before the turnaround to catch the lead rider. I passed him, hit the turnaround, and then sprinted back to the finish. My time was 18 minutes, 25 seconds, good for fastest time of the day. (Despite being hurt, Jake finished second at 18:55!) My time was 25 seconds better than my last time, so I was pleased!
I did not work out on Friday, August 10.
Yesterday (August 11) was my next long ride. I planned to do 90 miles yesterday since I hadn't made it 90 the week before. This time, however, I decided to do the route in reverse. Instead of heading to Parmer from home, I went west and headed down Lakeline Blvd to 1431, and then over to Lime Creek. This way, I got the hills out of the way early on! Anyway, from Lime Creek, I hit 620 at Anderson Mill Road, and then headed west on 620 to 2222, down to Hwy 360, across the bridge, and down to MoPac. From there, I did the Jack Brown Cleaner's Loop up Southwest Parkway to 71, to Bee Caves Road, and down again to 360 to MoPac. Then, I headed north on MoPac to Barton Springs and rolled into Jack & Adam's for a refill and a short rest. By then, I'd gone 72 miles, and I knew I'd be able to finish up. The only problem was that from Jack & Adam's, I was at least 27 miles from home, so it looked like I'd be doing closer to 100 miles than 90. No problem!!
After I left Jack & Adam's, I headed up Lamar all the way to Parmer Lane, turned west/north on Parmer, crossed MoPac, and headed up toward home. I rolled into the driveway just before Lisa was headed out the door to run a few errands for the day! My odometer read 100.08 miles! My first century! I felt tired, but pretty good. I had thought about running a couple of miles for a brick workout, but my old running shoes were wet and my new ones aren't well broken in yet. I figured I'd wait and do some short ride, short run bricks when I can this week instead!
Today, I plan to run long, but it'll have to be later in the day. I have work to do preparing for trial tomorrow!
More to come later!
After the long run on July 30 was Texas Iron swim day. The workout was fairly routine and were good maintenance. I got a short ride (15 miles) in on Wednesday before the swim workout. On Thursday the 2nd I didn't get a workout in. I had planned to do the Texas Iron bike time trial workout, but it rained most of the afternoon and the workout got canceled. I probably could have found time to run for half an hour or so, but I just didn't get it done. On Friday, I ran about 45 minutes in the morning, but didn't do anything else.
Saturday, August 4 was a VERY disappointing workout. I had planned to ride 90 miles as part of my bike build before taper weeks. It started out bad when I slept later than I'd planned and ended up starting the ride at 8:30 instead of 7:00 like I'd planned. To make matters worse, the summer had finally kicked in and it was upper 90's in temperature and God-awful humidity.
I started the ride from home in Leander. The plan was to go out to Parmer Lane and ride it all the way to Hwy 290. That wasn't too hard. From the Parmer and 290 intersection, I then headed west on 290 to Buckner Road, turned south and took that to 51st Street. West on 51st to Lamar, and then south on Lamar to Barton Springs Road, where I stopped at Jack & Adam's to buy a few extra Gu's and to refill water bottles. By then, I'd gone about 45 miles and was feeling okay. Unfortunately, I had 45 more to go and the hard stuff was coming up.
After leaving Jack & Adam's, I generally followed the Dam Loop route taking Barton Springs out to MoPac and then heading south to Southwest Parkway, up to Hwy 71, and over to Ranch Road 620 through Lakeway. The route was tiring, but I was doing fine until I hit Lakeway. By then, the heat had really kicked in. I hadn't been drinking as much as I should and I was definitely getting dehydrated. Also, I forgot to bring salt tabs, so my legs were getting a little bit crampy.
Once I got across Mansfield Dam, I knew I wasn't going to make the full 90 miles. I got as far as the Walgreen's at FM 2222 and 620 and decided to call Lisa to come pick me up. Although I was dejected and pissed because I didn't get the full 90 in, I think it was the right call. I had planned to turn at Bullick Hollow (right there at 2222) and go through the the area over to Lime Creek Road. Lime Creek has a series of hills called the Three Sisters (or the Three Bitches!), and I just didn't have the legs to do those hills. I could've hurt myself trying to do them.
So, I bagged the ride after 72 miles. Not bad, but I was really worried that I was still 40 miles short of the Ironman distance, and I was so beat. I called Steve to complain and he reminded me that heat and humidity play a huge role in how you feel. Since Madison is not likely to be as hot or as humid, I should do much better there, especially if I watch my hydration and nutrition, and don't overdo my effort on the bike.
Sunday, August 5th was as encouraging as the previous day's ride had been discouraging. I got up early on Sunday and went for a long run. I was worried since I'd been wiped out the day before, but I ended up having a great run. The goal was to run straight for 1 hour 30 minutes at a moderate rate. I managed to do that quite well, but when I got home and plugged in my route to check the mileage, I was astounded to learn that I'd run 10 miles in that hour and a half! I didn't feel like I was going THAT fast. So . . . I was very encouraged by those results. Even more encouraging was the fact that I didn't have any real knee pain! So . . . maybe my running is finally coming around a bit! Let's just see what I can do immediately after a 112 mile bike, though!
The next day, I ran for 45 minutes down at the Town Lake trail. It was a lower intensity recovery run. I had some knee pain, but I noticed that when I focused on form, the pain went away, so I think I'm learning how to manage the IT Band stuff.
Tuesday, August 7th was a Texas Iron running day. I and 3 others who will be doing Ironmans in the next few months got to run "mile repeats," while everyone else worked on shorter distances with speed. My workout was to run a half mile at 5k or 10k pace, rest for 90 seconds, then run another, rest for 90 seconds, then run a mile at half-iron pace. I then had to repeat that two more times. Needless to say, I ran a little faster than I should have. My miles were pretty constant at 7:15-7:20 each. That's a little faster than my desired HIM pace. In the two actual HIM's I've done, my pace was closer to 9:30 or 10:00, but that was due to lots of walking from the knee problems. A good HIM pace for me right now is probably about 8:15 to 8:45. Anyway, the workout went smoothely and I didn't have any pain!
On Wednesday, August 8th, I had an ART appointment with Dr. Z. I reported my good running news and we worked on my achilles tendons and my left knee some. He told me not to overdo it and to just maintain through IMoo. That evening, Texas Iron had an open water swim at Lake Travis near Mansfield Dam. It was a good workout concentrating mostly on short distances and the mass swim start. I'm beginning to realize that I won't have a great swim time, but if I can just get through the swim and the first Transition in an hour and a half, I'll be fine.
Thursday, August 9th was the Texas Iron bike time trial workout. It had been delayed twice by rain, but we had clear skies and hot weather this Thursday. So, I went out to do the time trial and see where I am in my short distance, hard intensity biking. Mad props to Lisa for taking time out of her day to bring my bike shoes and my aero helmet down to the office for me when I found that I'd left them at home!
At the time trial, I had the Sharkboy wheel cover and Steve's Zipp 404 front wheel running for optimal speed. The time trial always brings out tons of casual Texas Iron folks because they love to see how fast they can go. The record-holder for the time trial is a guy named Jake North, who used to be a bike racer and now does triathlons. I finished 2nd to Jake in the age group (non-professional) division of the Rookie Triathlon earlier this summer, and 2nd to him in the last Texas Iron time trial. Jake was there, but he's been hurt, so he didn't have his aero stuff and did the time trial on his road bike instead.
As people arrived for the time trial, Jamie and Andrea had us warm up. I did a half of the 8-mile loop as warm up and then headed to the start line with everyone else. Jamie kept time and Andrea started us off. Usually, Jamie tries to seed the riders by expected finish, but that's resulted in a lot of people crossing the finish at the same time, so this time, he put us in random order. I went 6th. We started 10 seconds apart with Andrea hold our bikes up and us clipped in and ready to go.
The route starts on MoPac, just barely south of Lacrosse Ave., the turn off for the Veloway and the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center. We ride down MoPac to the very end, and then turn around and come back on the north-bound side to finish just before Lacrosse. It took me until almost 500 meters before the turnaround to catch the lead rider. I passed him, hit the turnaround, and then sprinted back to the finish. My time was 18 minutes, 25 seconds, good for fastest time of the day. (Despite being hurt, Jake finished second at 18:55!) My time was 25 seconds better than my last time, so I was pleased!
I did not work out on Friday, August 10.
Yesterday (August 11) was my next long ride. I planned to do 90 miles yesterday since I hadn't made it 90 the week before. This time, however, I decided to do the route in reverse. Instead of heading to Parmer from home, I went west and headed down Lakeline Blvd to 1431, and then over to Lime Creek. This way, I got the hills out of the way early on! Anyway, from Lime Creek, I hit 620 at Anderson Mill Road, and then headed west on 620 to 2222, down to Hwy 360, across the bridge, and down to MoPac. From there, I did the Jack Brown Cleaner's Loop up Southwest Parkway to 71, to Bee Caves Road, and down again to 360 to MoPac. Then, I headed north on MoPac to Barton Springs and rolled into Jack & Adam's for a refill and a short rest. By then, I'd gone 72 miles, and I knew I'd be able to finish up. The only problem was that from Jack & Adam's, I was at least 27 miles from home, so it looked like I'd be doing closer to 100 miles than 90. No problem!!
After I left Jack & Adam's, I headed up Lamar all the way to Parmer Lane, turned west/north on Parmer, crossed MoPac, and headed up toward home. I rolled into the driveway just before Lisa was headed out the door to run a few errands for the day! My odometer read 100.08 miles! My first century! I felt tired, but pretty good. I had thought about running a couple of miles for a brick workout, but my old running shoes were wet and my new ones aren't well broken in yet. I figured I'd wait and do some short ride, short run bricks when I can this week instead!
Today, I plan to run long, but it'll have to be later in the day. I have work to do preparing for trial tomorrow!
More to come later!
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