Ironman Lake Placid : Official Thread (Page 14)

1) Definitely get drunk! The healing powers of gin (especially Hendrick's) is well documented.

2) It is too early in the season for bricks. A short little run-off here and there, but no bricks.

3) Get off the pavement and concrete as much as possible. Soft surfaces: trails, grass, etc.4) Ice baths after your long runs - I have found they do wonders for the knees, ankles and feet!

Rusty, I agree with everything but the alcohol part.  Alcohol is poison and destroys lives, but that's just my experience. 

Major BC, do you have a training plan?  I would ice the knees and take a NASAID. 

I am psyched to start the Iron-Fit 30-week Journey on Monday.

LET THE JOURNEY TO Lake Placid Oval CENTER, BEGIN!!

Sorry DC - I though the inferred pink font would read through - my HTML is no longer good enough to do it from a stupid iPhone!

I would actually even go easy on the NSAIDs, at least the ibuprofin variety (Advil, Motin, Nuprin, etc). It gets tossed around here enough that they can be a little hard on the kidneys, but my larger concern is that there was a really good study given to me by one of my sports docs that showed that ibuprofin actually impedes tendon and ligament healing and recovery. No proof they actually cause damage though. It was from a few years ago, but if anyone is interested in that sort of thing I can try and dig it up...

I do a good number of ice baths, but supposedly a cold shower works just as well for muscular recovery. In my own experience I have found the bath to work much better on the joints.

Safe travels everyone!

I just got my training schedule written up and ready to go! 

I'm following Don Fink's Be Iron Fit 30 week Competitive plan this year.  My official training begins tomorrow.  I've been battling plantar fasciosis in one foot and heel bursitis in the other, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I will have better luck with those ailments this training season.

Look forward to getting to know everyone this year.

Happy Training!!

Happy Holidays IronPeeps!

I started the Iron Fit 30 wk plan today!

I'm trying to fit in strength training in the base phase.  Does anyone have any suggestions on what days to do strength training and how you fit it into your schedule?

I keep saying and genuinely wanting to include strength training, but the truth is (for me) swimming, biking and running is exhausting enough.   My guess would be to fit in some 20 minute light sessions mid-week after a swim or run. 

I've read that some of the most effective strength training ofr triathletes is core training.  Our core is what stabilizes us and a strong core allows us to hold our form better when we are fatigued, thus making us faster.  I do plan to get some planks in and ball work to specifically work on my core. 

Hey SEADOCHA, I have been on a steady diet of 4+ hour rides for six or seven weeks (with a pretty fast ramp-up before that). All of these rides are in high Z1/low Z2, measured by heart rate, but referenced against power. These rides are what many have called "stupid slow." on these rides I don't pay attention to distance or speed (I actually turn those fields off on my head unit) but instead I watch time, HR, power, and cadence. At this effort a four hour ride seems to be getting me 70~75 miles depending on terrain. January will add in harder efforts on our long rides. If the weather permits this weekend for example, we will do our ride in the mountains where we will have several climbs that are about 7 miles long and have a duration of about 50 minutes each from top to bottom. Our climbing efforts will be in mid zone 3 (basically tempo effort on the bike) with recovery on the descents. Right now our harder efforts are reserved for trainer intervals. As for the weather,I prefer it to be 40+, but we will go on our long rides if it is 30+ (I know - we are wimps!) colder than that and we will shift the ride to another day or go on a shorter trainer ride at the same effort. If we have a 4 hour ride scheduled we would probably do 2.5~3 hours on the trainer instead.

My avg rides are 50 minutes on the trainer (strength) and 90 mins to 120 mins outside on the mountain bike (again strength).  Don't worry about long or endurance until the Spring.  Our ability to go long reaches a peak and is not sustainable for a long period of time.  Work on strength and skills right now.  40 miles is long enough for sure at this point. 

yep, I agree - everyone talks about how much core strength helps on the run, but core work for me has really paid off on the long bikes especially. I did one ~ two sessions per week (20 minutes to an hour each) from October - December. All core/Pilates work. As the S/B/R starts getting tougher in January though, I will most likely cut these back to once a week, but add in some plyometrics to augment them.

I too am still doing the Jorge Plan.  It's real simple.  Run and Swim as per Iron-Fit.  Bike as per Jorge Plan.  Once the Jorge Plan is done, switch over bike workouts to Iron-Fit. 

If your Max HR is 183, then 146 is your sweet-spot for Z2.  You can plus or minus 5% and still be in Z2.  

According to Fink (for example: Max HR of 185)

Z4 - 90-95% of 185 = 166 BPM to 175

Z3 - 86-89% = 159 to 165

Z2 - 75 to 85% = 139 to 158

Z1 - 65-74% = 120 to 138

For the Bike, lower your Max HR by 5% and recalculate.  80% is the sweet spot for your Z2. 

Hi mdfahy -

I used the Be Iron Fit competitive program for IMLP last year and followed most of his recommended strength training. Since it is not included as part of any plans, I had to improvise to fit the sessions in where I could.

During the base phase I did two-a-days on Wednesdays and Fridays. On Wednesday I did the Brick session in the morning and the strength training session in the afternoon/evening. On Fridays I did the run in the morning and strength in the evening.

The problem came during the "build" phase in week 11 when you have to add in a 3rd swim session on Friday which makes that day have both a swim and a run. So, initially I tried to continue doing the full strength training session on Wednesday and rather than doing one on Friday, I split it up and did a little bit on both Tues and Thurs after the swim. By week 15, I couldn't keep up with it anymore so I just cancelled the Tues/Thurs smaller session and went with one strength training session per week for the rest of the program.

This year I am following the intermediate program for IM St George and trying a little different approach. I'm using my recovery day on Monday to do some upper body strength training and lots of stretching and then also doing the full strength training day on Wednesday after the BRICK. It is working really well so far.

Hope that helps!

Ryan

Hey Klassman - I found that there was little direction for most of the rides in Iron-Fit. I went to a formalized spin class on the trainer for 10 weeks at the beginning of the program that was monstly interval, endurance, and strength training (probably similar to what Jorge's plan is) which also gave specific workouts to do during the weeks. I found it really helpful for my cycling to do this in the build phase so I think it would be a good idea to blend the two programs.

Ryan

Dream Chaser - 2011-12-27 10:13 AM
P.S. Rusty is on an Advanced Plan  He is a beast!!

Ha ha! DC - that is too funny - this from the guy that crushed my dreams at Lake Placid last year. We all know who the REAL beast is!

DC - I am interested in your perspective on this, as I have not found this to be my personal experience. Of course "going long" is a relative term, but if you are planning on riding 5.5~7.5 hours in late July, I think building from 3.0~5.5 Z1/2 rides September through Decemberish/Januaryish are key. If on the other hand you are saying that January is not the right time to be ramping up volume significantly, even if you missed the earlier volume block, then I completely agree. For a July race we are now entering the strength and LT phase. I do think too many folks skip the easy stuff, and subsequently can't do the hard stuff hard enough. Just way too much "gray zone" training. What is it that Coach Troy says? Something like "we go too hard on our easy days and too easy on our hard days..."

I readily admit that we are all different in how we respond to training loads. I do respond very well to volume on the bike and swim. The run not so much. Figuring out what works for us individually is the real key.

TankBoy - 2011-12-28 10:32 AM

Dream Chaser - 2011-12-27 10:13 AM
P.S. Rusty is on an Advanced Plan  He is a beast!!

Ha ha! DC - that is too funny - this from the guy that crushed my dreams at Lake Placid last year. We all know who the REAL beast is!

Dream Chaser - 2011-12-27
Our ability to go long reaches a peak and is not sustainable for a long period of time

DC - I am interested in your perspective on this, as I have not found this to be my personal experience. Of course "going long" is a relative term, but if you are planning on riding 5.5~7.5 hours in late July, I think building from 3.0~5.5 Z1/2 rides September through Decemberish/Januaryish are key. If on the other hand you are saying that January is not the right time to be ramping up volume significantly, even if you missed the earlier volume block, then I completely agree. For a July race we are now entering the strength and LT phase. I do think too many folks skip the easy stuff, and subsequently can't do the hard stuff hard enough. Just way too much "gray zone" training. What is it that Coach Troy says? Something like "we go too hard on our easy days and too easy on our hard days..."

I readily admit that we are all different in how we respond to training loads. I do respond very well to volume on the bike and swim. The run not so much. Figuring out what works for us individually is the real key.

Hi Rusty.  You pretty much summed up everything, and I agree with you.  Like Coach Troy, Pete Pfitzinger says the same thing about runners: too much grey zone training; running easy runs to hard, and hard runs not hard enough, recovery workouts should be at a true recovery effort, etc...

Correct in that I mean overall volume.  And this is just from what I've heard coaches and pro triathletes remark; as well as even pro cycling athletes and coaches and pro runners and coaches, and yes swimming alike.  Many elite personel from SBR comment early in the season that they don't want to be at their 'peak' yet and you can only come into form and hold that form for a set amount of time.  You can't carry peak form and fitness throughout an entire year.  This according to pro athletes and coaches mind you, not an original thought from me.   

Ah - got it - yes, I agree on that . High Duration + High Intensity for a long amount of time is sustainable for only a finite amount of time. I assumed based on the time of year (maybe incorrectly?) that SEADOCHA was asking about what a long base-zone ride might look like this time of the year. All of the pro's and low-cats that I get to ride with around here are doing looooong, easy-peasy rides this time of the year. In fact this is the one time of the year that I get to train with such folks in that they are going so easy. Again, stupid-easy - low intensity, 4~5 hours at all day pace. And I really do mean the pace you can go all day, which is tough to go that easy. I find myself in my small chainring quite a bit just to keep my cadence up at the slow speeds. If you subscribe to the idea of Z1/low Z2 riding (and understandably not everyone does), a two hour ride is just not a long ride this time of the year. And if you are coming back shelled from this ride you are going WAY too hard. That is simply a different kind of ride. Not invaluable, mind you. Just different. Like always, this is what works for me, YMMV, etc, etc.

Hope everyone's training is coming along - here comes the new year - and it will be exciting!

Looking for some accommodations for IMLP, and of course, Lake Placid is all but full (unless you've got a decent sized fortune).  Does anyone out there have some familiarity with Saranac Lake as an alternative?  Looks to be about 15-20 minutes from downtown LP

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Michael