Cav's Group - Closed (Page 14)

    When I was in the Army this is a technique we used on group runs. It's a good morale booster too!!

Chris, you must be frustrated! I can feel your pain.

Tammie, congrats for your first half-marathon. Looks like it has been an educational experience

Erik, my choice would be to pass the pool. I feel like the problem would be bigger when I am wet and potentially cold. But that is just me.

Just to avoid being the gross guy at the pool I decided to pass on swimming with the badly running nose...I did get out for a night time run (I have really grown to love running outside- I live in a rural/Menonite farmland area).  I do run with a red blinking light on my back pocket and a small but powerful led headlight.  I ran with my neighbor as well.  it was nice to run with someone else, but the pace didn't challenge me (1.97mi in 17.42).  But with the stomach virus going around like wildfire through our neighborhood and the cold I have, that's a good thing.  He will push me with plyometric strength training and running hills (he's doing the Tough Mudder with me in May)!!

I just figured out that this is how you are SUPPOSED to respond in this format..SILLY ME!

I recently had a conversation with another BT friend and we agreed that once you start running outside, the thought of going back to the treadmill isn't very thrilling. I found that I love to run at sunrise and in the rain! The drivers are usually pretty cool and move over a bit.

Glad you skipped the pool! YUCK!!

~Tammy

Yep..educational it was!! Have my appt. tomorrow with the doc to get orthotics made and will hit my next HM on 4/11/10 with new feet!! Now that I have my bike too this will add another dimension to my training and make the run a bit faster!! I'd say, realistically I can probably cut at least 15 minutes from my finish and come in under 2 hours. That will be my goal at least!

~Tammy

This morning I got myself taped for a 100 m swim. Currently I am trying to upload it to youtube. When it is done I will share the link here.

Very cool! Let us know when it's up.

Sorry for the delay. The video file was too large for upload purposes it seems. After much hassle I made it smaller (and somewhat lossy) and uploaded it but did not have the chance to post here since I was away for the weekend for our 10K race (I will post another message about it shortly). Here is the link:

RogerWilco swimming

This was just when I entered the pool, without a warm-up. It is not a speed effort, just a pace I use for long distances. The pool is 25 meter. So I am doing a 100 m at 1:40 time at this video. I can do 2 maybe 3 more at this time but I cannot keep it up for the whole 1500 meter distance. My current PB at 1500 meters is 30:18 which corresponds to more than 2:00 per 100 m. I am not doing flip turns, and I do not push too much from the walls, to simulate open water.

So what are your comments? What am I doing wrong, what am I doing right? I am open to all kinds of comments, I really need it.

A short description of our 10K race. Here is the English version of the race's web page

We started at the very back of field with my wife. It was my wife's first running race (and first ever race of any kind) and my first race with so many participants.The masses started to move and I kissed my wife good-bye, to see her at the finish line, and started to run. Or I should say tried to run, since there were too many people moving slowly at the start line. After some struggling I jumped on the pavement and started to pass people. Marathon and 10K runners started together, so it explains why there were many relatively slow running people at the start. I have decided against using any HR data before the race since I did not expect any serious race time and I was treating the race as a tempo training. I was going to use my watch's lap feature, hitting the lap button at every km mark. So I did at 1 km mark at which point I was able to get back on the road again.

I ran comfortably hard and passed people right and left (nobody passed me till the end, I guess that is a bonus you gain when you start at th back of the field) but could not see 2 km mark. I thought they did not put it but later learned that I  missed it because of the crowd. In fact I did not see any km marks till 5 km. So there I was running completely by feel. I did not check again with my watch till the end again and ran as best I could, pushing myself some more at the last 2 kms or so. And finished. After some stretches I decided to check my time. My watch showed 41:35. I could not believe it and checked with race officials. My official time was 41:38. A PR!! And when I expected it least.

I changed and waited for my wife, camera ready. She was expecting to finish at 1:30 but actually finished at 1:18 and she was very happy with herself.

The organization was good and we were happy to do the race. The traveling part was tedious (Antalya is about 600 km to where I live) but it was worth it. We still do not know how many people participated, what are our ranks in age groups, etc. I guess the web site will be updated with the results today, maybe tomorrow.

Edited by RogerWilco 2010-03-08 2:03 AM

Congrats on the PR! I guess the atmosphere of the race helps us to push a bit harder without realising it!

Congrats on the HM Tammie!

That is most certainly true. Although there were other factors for me I think:
1) This was my only second 10K race. And at the first one I could not pace myself. I started out too fast to follow a 48 year old guy who turned out to be much faster than me (finished at 34:12). Pacing and race experience is really important.
2) Lately I have been upping my running volume. I think it helped too. Even though I did not do any intervals, hills, etc. the volume helped me run faster I guess. When I throw one weekly interval, and some hills in the mix I guess I will realize my goal of sub 40 10K by the end of May.

Burak- Tell your video guy that he did a good job!  That's a clear video at a good angle.  The biggest thing I see is that you're too "busy" in the water.  What I mean is that you're not gliding and I think that comes from two places.  First, your elbows are kind of low on the entry into the water.  Think of pointing up to the sky with the elbow.  Yours are kind of flat.  Next, on the pull, you're not getting the full power from the stroke.  At the bottom of the stroke, you're bending the elbow a bit and bringing the arm up instead of fully back.  One drill I do for that is to make sure my thumb brushes across my thigh at the bottom of the stroke.  I'm sure there's something I didn't explain well.  I'm in a rush now, but I'll be back in a while. 

Overall excellent form, in my less than expert opinion. Basically you are good and anything I say will be nit-picking.

Good extension, plenty of glide in my opinion (no need to sit and kick when you could be pulling). As for high elbows, frankly that is such a matter of personal taste I don't harp on it but if you ever have shoulder problems it could be because you aren't relaxing enough during the recovery portion of the stroke, you power through the recovery phase a little bit it seems.

You seem to be going with a six beat kick. Do you kick that much during triathlons? I used to, and when I switched to a two beat kick my swim time was basically the same, but I had tons more energy left for the bike.

Early vertical forearm looks good, just hold it longer it's almost like you are doing half a pull. Should be two parts to a pull: pull in toward the body, and then past the belly button it's like pushing back with the hand/vertical forearm until my hand is about hip-level then I exit the water (without pushing up of course). Using the wall-climbing analogy: first put hand and forearm on top of wall and pull, then once hands hit belly button time to push down with the same hand/vert forearm on the wall. Or, speaking literally, the arm/forearm paddle initially come in toward the midline of the body, and then the second phase of the pull is the push backwards and out. Great description of this with pics in the book 'Swimming Fastest' by Maglischo he calls these the 'insweep' and 'upsweep' (or outsweep) phases of the pull.

So, overall good but perhaps you could get a little more time under the water getting propulsion, it seems you might pull out a tad too soon, are missing out on the upsweep. It's not a matter of literally pushing perpendicularly up with the hand as the hand passes the thigh (that would be really bad form and waste energy as it would mean we're pushing you down rather than back). Rather, I think you could keep the hand/forearm in the vertical position a little bit longer, and get quite a bit more propulsion out of the upsweep.

I think this may be what the commenter above was saying too.

Please take everything I say with a grain of salt. You are obviously a better swimmer than me, and anything I might suggest is just to see if you might find it helpful.

Edited by neuronet 2010-03-08 1:47 PM

Pattie, thanks for the comments. I chose the lane and told him to shoot my legs, arms, body motions. Looks like he did a good job indeed.

High elbow pull is what I have been concentrating since our little chat here with Eric. I need more work since sometimes I find myself dropping my elbow. You are also correct in pointing that I'm not pushing fully back with my stroke. I posted my stroke also to "Triathlon Talk" and somebody caught that there. I will concentrate on it. This bad form must have made its way to my stroke during my "high elbow" pull drills.

When I watched myself I found myself working too much. I know just what you mean when you say I'm too busy. It may be that I'm not reaching forward enough or maybe dropping the elbow causes it, I'm not sure.

I'm looking forward to more comments from you (you said you were in a rush, so this post really counts as only a summary, right ). I'll definitely do the "thumb brush" thing. Looks like a good idea.

Eric, thanks for the comments. As I said in my answer to Pattie, I've become aware of my pull has become a little "short". I will concentrate on pulling (or should I say pushing) longer.

High elbow pull really makes a difference but my form degrades after some time. I have to stay concentrated on high elbow pulling, mainly early vertical forearm. It is one of the problems I have, and I'm working on. We have chatted with you about this subject a while ago, but if you have any new drills or suggestions, I'm all ears.

As for kicking, I really do not count my kicks. It does not deprive me of energy, or so I feel. At my only triathlon (not plural mind you ) I kicked like this and I had enough energy for bike and run. So, I do not plan to switch to two-beat kick now. After correcting my other problems and getting faster I may experiment with it but not now.

I'm planning on doing some swimming golf every workout from now on. I learned about it from this site and I think that will help me reach farther with my arm and do the pull efficiently.

In fact, after reading the comments from my thread in Triathlon Talk. I concentrated on reaching farther, high-elbow pull, and push the water till the arm cannot push anymore I did better times this morning. I was doing 15x100 meters at 2:05, 10 seconds rest included last week. This morning after drills, golf and concentrating on the suggested parts I was able to do a 8x100 at 2:00, 10 seconds rest included (I did not have time for 15x100). It will get better with some more practice I think.

Partly to Roger, but this is also more general---

Useful stuff on kicking for triathletes:
http://www.swimsmooth.com/kick.html

They contradict me in one sense. Yes, they say very little propulsion comes from the kick (the propulsion to energy-used ratio is very low with kicking so it is really bad strategy to try to use the kick for serious propulsion).

However,they say this doesn't necessarily mean go to a two or four beat kick. They suggest stick with kicking cadence you feel comfortable with, but just don't push too hard, don't waste a lot of energy because it basically isn't going to help you much anyway (especially if you are a triathlete).

I basically use the kick to stay balanced and keep in good form, not for propulsion. They heartily agree with that, but disagree that this means don't use six beats. I'll have to toy around with this in my swims. I am comfortable with two-beat or six-beat. Maybe I'll do some TTs with both, in each case very low-energy expenditure type kicks. My hunch is I'll be a little faster with six, but the energy is so much greater I'll end up sticking with two as in the tri's I want to save my hips/butt for the run/bike.

Also, in terms of high elbow I meant in the recovery phase, not the high-elbow under water (which you seem to have down pretty well). When your arm is out of water you seem to be powering forward a bit rather than relaxed (e.g., this is the kind of thing you get with the finger drag drill). This is one of those things 3/4 would say is important, but in practice it seems not to matter (just look at some of the world class swimmers technically "ugly" recoveries) unless injury strikes the rotator cuff.

I'll try to convince my wife to tape me swimming so you guys can have a go at me I think there will be plenty to critique.


Edited by neuronet 2010-03-09 10:40 AM

Eric, thanks for the tips. I've also read and am a fan of swimsmooth and I agree with what they say about kicking. That is just what I do. I kick for form and balance, not for propulsion. I really do not know how many beats I use for kicking. It may be more of a flutter kick than a six-beat.

I agree with you about the recovery phase of of the arm. I do not think it is of much importance. I saw and watched lots of good swimmers with different kinds of recoveries. It really does not seem to matter much.

But unfortunately, you are not correct when you say I'm doing pretty good high-elbow pull under water   I'm still working on it. This morning there was a new guy at the next lane. I was doing 1:50-1:55 100 meters and he was lapping me comfortably (his tempo was about 1:40). He was able to cover more distance with each stroke.

Alright...for the virtual 5k for anyone interested, how about next weekend?  Any day either Sat or Sun the 20th or 21st of March (or before or after if need be).  The list I have so far is:

Rowdypaint (Pattie)
RogerWilco (Burak)
Sicone (Stav)
Wax_On (Chris)
me (ferretracer-Erik)
TTucker (Tammy)

I'll be doing mine on the 21st.  i have a 6k, but am going to note my 5k time and use that.  I did a 5k a couple weeks ago and a 6.6k a couple days ago and they were at about the same pace.  I guess to note times, copy and past the list above and put your time next to it!  If you want to join in and aren't on the list, copy and paste it and then add yourself to the list!  Good luck!

Count me in! I'll probably do 3.4 miles, but close enough for government work. I'll probably do Zone 2 (i.e., aerobic) light workout, so expect a time like 36 minutes from me

Did I ever mention running is my least favorite of the three? I'm trying to get past that psych block.

I'm looking forward to this run!  Since I lost my weight, I have learned to enjoy running again.  I think since it's the easiest (time wise) of the three for me to do I have relearned to love it.  With the DST, I should be able to get out during the week to ride.  I've only been able to get out on the occasional weekend since the fall and I can only swim at 9 at night.  With running, I can just go as soon as the kids are in bed and the time of day/night does not matter.  I did another 5k yesterday in 34min 24 sec with my neighbor but that time included a side trek into a farm field and 10 muddy hill sprints and then the long slow last 1k as a cool down.  The hills were quite fun!

I'm planning to do the 5k run on Friday lunch break run. I will try to measure a 5k using Google Earth and run it as my LT run of the week.

Wooo-hooo! a sub 30 1500m swim at last. 500, 1000, 1500 m splits were:
8:41
10:03
10:07

Total time: 28:52

I suspect, I miscounted one lap during first 500, but it may be that I went faster since I was fresh. Anyway, even if I missed a lap, my 1500 m would still be under 30 minutes. I still got a long way to go but the training works. Thank you for your inputs about my swimming style, I plan to redo a recording about 2 months later and check my progress (if any!).

AWESOME!!!  Congrats on the goal!!!
Tonight I decided to do a hard run on a usual 2 mile loop.  I was hoping for under 15:00.  After leaving the town area and heading out to the farm fields I felt myself faltering (felt the cold wind, plus gradual up hill for about .7 miles) and was worried I wouldn't make it.  So, after heading back to a main road (and the gradual downhill portion) I booked it.  I even missed a branch in the road that I stepped right on, but luckily didn't hit the ground.  I kept pounding hard and hit the split right at the 2 mile point.  I made myself wait until I got inside after a cool down quarter mile to look at it in case I hit the wrong button.  When I finally did, I saw my time for the 2 mile run: 14:02!!!  I couldn't believe it!  So, I think in the next 6 to 8 weeks I should be able to reach my goal of doing a 5k in under 24 minutes!