Scott's Mentor Group-Closed (Page 12)

Morning, fellow trainers. 

My post crash morning is going okay. My right thigh feels like I got hip checked by an elephant. I have crashed on mopeds, scooters, rollerblades, mountain bikes, and now my road bike. No time to rest, must train! I was wearing pants so I believe that prevented some road rash. I have two nickel sized strawberries on my knee. A pool won't hurt that. My wife the MD said I could get in the pool.

What does everyone have planned today? I will see how I feel at 4:30 to see what I do- swim or run.

Train smart and stay upright today! Beware of train tracks, water, and rubber tires!!! 

Ashley,

I’m glad things are looking brighter this morning.  Your dedication is an inspiration.  Well done!

For me, today is my medium run (38 minutes).  Goal for today is to make the 38 minutes at a sub 11 m/m.

I wish everybody a great hump day of training.

C

Hope you had a great birthday Scott!

Tuesday I set out for an hour bike in the 40 degree weather and 15 minutes in the sky opened up so I raced home freezing and wet ... I will say the ride home was MUCH faster than the ride out - thankfully I did not wipe out (sorry to hear one of our group did - I'll share my eating it on the bike story another time).  Did P90x chest and back since my ride was ruined so not a total loss yesterday.

Today I did Bikram Yoga - I love doing this in the offseason and try to go every Wednesday - for the first time since Saturday my knee feels good (I tweaked it on Saturday's run) so I will attribute the looseness off the joint to today's yoga.

Sleep - I do not get enough - I get up for work at 1am - have a 40 minute commute and need to be there by 2am ... I usually lay down at 8pm and take a half hour or so to fall asleep.  On my two days off I usually knock out for a good 9-10 hours ... not good at all but I function.  Just some days I am wiped before starting my daily workout.

Off to bed - will be a late day at work for me tomorrow - monthly status meeting at 11am will mean a good 12 hour day.  Have a 5 mile run and an arms workout planned but all will be contingent on my getting home by 1:00 ... worst case scenerio I get home with under an hour to spare before having to pick up my boys from school - I can bang out the run in 45 minutes if I have to and looks like it will be cold so a fast paced run will be happening regardless.

Hope everyone has a great Thursday ... I am one step closer to a road bike thanks to a BT guy that got in touch ... hope to have his ride after I get my tax return

I guarantee you that people in your AG that want to qualify for nationals are out training.  What are you going to do?  Can't wait to hear how the run went.  

I was slack today as well. I tried to run but my hammie was a little irritated. I decided to give my leg the day off. I did an upper body weight lifting session tonight at the gym. I really wanted to run, bike, or swim!! The pool was crowded with a swim meet so I couldn't do that. 

I was bummed not to be doing something that got my heart going! I'm hoping a day of rest will help my leg so I can get back to it tomorrow. You know what they say, a bad day of training is better than a good day at work!

What did everyone do today? I will train vicariously through you! 

.It's very disappointing as I was actually enjoy the running for the first time ever and seeing positive results. It's been my main focus for my upcoming races since I've only completed 10k twice in my life. I hope I can lick this soon. I still need to up my endurance by 50% by mid march to make the Supper Seal Oly in San Diego.

I think I should be ok to train in the pool and on the bike.

 C

The group is having a rough injury week! Injuries, slumps, cold weather- we must pull through!! One one part of the body needs rest, focus on something else. 

I told you all my wife and I are expecting second child in August. We went to the doctor yesterday and had a sonogram. Check it out!

Whoops! Here is the pic! We're having twins!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Twins!.jpg)

Ha! That's the kick in the pants I need. As it turns out, I was going to bed last night and my daughter said, as I was heading up the stairs ... "you're driving me to school tomorrow right? Early."

Huh?

Evidently that was the plan so my other daughter could take the car. I just hadn't been informed. I wasn't ready for a 3:30 wake up, so another day without running is in the books. It'll be pool only again today. Tomorrow, though ... I'm doing some consulting work that frees up big blocks of my day. It'll be a run/bike day. I promise.

Love the Baby Pic!!! 

Congrats on the twins, Ashley!!

My week is going as planned so far. don't want to jinx it, though...

Wow.  Twins!  Congratulations.  You are indeed going to have your hands full.  

Injuries:  Some of the aches and pains of training are, of course, to be expected.  There are different ways we can approach them.  Ice and Epsom Salts bath are good.  Combining heat and ice are ways that I have dealt with a lot of these.  When we start to get into the area of injury, we really need to listen to our body and allow it to heal.  Have a good team of people that are familiar with sports injuries.  PT, Chiro, acupuncturist, etc.  This is something that I learned this year with my own injury.  

Everyone is doing great work.  You all are inspirational.  Keep it up.  

Thanks for all the love on the twins. My training might end as fast as it started!!! lol I better get some sprints in before those kids come? 

I went to the pool and did a 700 yard workout. I find when I really concentrate on keeping my arms straight, hands cupped, and keep kicking- I can move in the water. When I don't focus on those things, my breathing gets messed up and I need air. I can make it one length (25 yards) of the pool on one breath in the beginning and the end but not in the middle. If I take a 1 minute rest in between 200yd sets, I can do a length in one breath again. I definitely need to read up on swimming technique and good habits to practice. I am happy with the endurance I am gaining. 

I was also happy my hammie did not really slow down my swimming. Its still a little sore from my crash. I think I landed funny or tried to catch myself.  I probably nursed it a little on my swim but thats okay. I would like to try to get back to a run tomorrow and a bike ride Saturday. Some days I want to do two activities and others just one. If I'm at the gym and do one activity, I do some weight lifting. I want to try and do weights 3-4 days a week. 

It'd been a quiet day on the board, what did everyone do today?

Ashley,  The way I'm reading this is that you are trying to swim the entire length on one breath.  I've read quite a bit on swimming technique and breathing on this forum and other resources, and they all say the same thing:  "Breath when you need to."  Every 3 (bilateral breathing) or every 2 strokes to start out.  There is also debate about whether hypoxic swimming is of benefit.  There is a breathing thread that I linked to earlier.  If you haven't read it yet, I would give it a good read over.  

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=235402&start=1

Good luck.  And post any questions that you have.  

In order to bring oxygen in and get rid of carbon dioxide it is very important that we breath continually.  Exhale continually while your face is in the water, then roll to take a breath.  Repeat as much as needed.  

Agreed ... you need to breathe regularly. It took me a couple of months to have breathing feel natural in the pool ... and it's a different feeling than how I regulate my breathing while running or biking. There is definitely a rhythm to it that coordinates with your body roll.

I would break that habit of holding your breath ASAP ... priority #1, as far as I see it. The good thing is that while you're learning to breathe, you're also learning to roll through your strokes from the hips and core ... that's a significant force in moving forward.

*************************

Okay ... I broke the run funk. But I got banged up along the way. I took my normal course that takes me about 2 miles along a bike path that I thought was going to be in pretty good shape. As it turns out, there was plenty of glare ice remaining under the dusting of snow we got last night and I took two pretty hard falls which required me to slow the pace way down. Nothing serious, but I'm a little sore in the elbow and the neck. After the second fall on a city sidewalk, I decided to cut the run from 8 to 6 in order to take some walkways I knew would be dry and plowed. Final mile in 7:29.

I've got a date with the bike trainer this afternoon.

This is so funny! I had a similiar experience at the "Y". There was this guy who would shower and then stand there drying himself by using the paper towels by the sink. It was the automated type so he would stand there incessantly waving his hand in front of the auto feed spitting out paper towels and drying with them one by one. Used to drive me crazy! What a complete waste!! Good on you for saying something. I didn't have the guts to do the same with my situation. 

Troy - As far as the flip turns go I would keep practicing with them. You and I seem to have a lot of similarities. I have the same problem with motion sickness. When I tried flip turns prior to working with my coach I was so dizzy I decided to just stick to open turns. During my last session with my coach he got in the water with me and made me learn how to do them. He told me that the dizziness will go away and sure enough it did! I have been practicing with them and have been really quite spastic but they seem to be getting better with time. I think the key is repetition. I would try learning them when you are not doing such a difficult set at a harder effort. Maybe try them out when you are doing sets of 50 or 100. 

Ashley- When I first started swimming I made the mistake of not exhaling while my face was in the water as Scott has described. I think if you try exhaling you will absolutely benefit from that and find your swimming will come so much easier. A good analogy to think about is imagine what it would be like to go for a 100 yard run without exhaling. Pretty hard to imagine right? Same thing when you get in the water. 

Hello team. Sorry I was off the grid for the last day or so. I had a sick child and a ton of work. Ashley, congratulations on the twins. You know they say you can’t store up sleep but it couldn’t hurt  

Went to the doc today to have the calf checked out, and I did pull a gastroc. The doc did three different types of treatment and I’ll go back next week for more. He gave me the green light for cycling and swimming. He also took one look at my running shoes and sent me directly to get a professional fitting for some new ones. Took care of that this morning.

As I mentioned, yesterday was too busy to make it out on the road bike. However, I did manage to get an hour in on the trainer. It was my first time with the sufferfest video that Troy recommended and I felt like I got a much better work out because of it.  Thanks Troy.

Swimming question: I’ve seen some talk about flip turns and kicking off the wall. If I’m training for a tri with an open water swim, do I need to be concerned with flip turns and kicking off the wall?

Happy Friday.