Eriq's Mentor Group - CLOSED (Page 15)

it's great to hear that you made some progress on the swim. care to share what you did to make the gains? if i remember correctly, you were really struggling with it so interested to know what has made the difference.

jana - good to hear about your toe. hopefully it holds up and everything gets better.

as for me, today was much better. got some rest and kicked on my bike today. i might have to do a power test as i feel ive made some pretty good gains on the bike. i'm interested to see what kind of power i can put out for a threshold test.

Hi all,

So I broke down and hired a coach.  Fun to hear stories and map out a plan.  Have not met in person but have a very detailed plan.  Doing Tarzan and finger drags as part of swim work out and time sessions , 200, 75, and 25 sprints today.  I was resting as long as I felt in the past and now it is all mapped out and it is helping.

2 hour side tomorrow -

May tri is in sights and I am much stronger than a year ago........goal is to crush some dreams!!!

Have a great weekend.

Jeff

The things that have helped me become a faster and more efficient swimmer.....More time in the pool. 3-4 times a week. working hard on good form and learning the proper body rotation. Also gliding and taking a long smooth pulls. Eliminating a vertical "head bob" while breathing. I have worked hard since I started and am happy with the progress. We will find out June 2 after the first Tri.

I will be swimming less as I prepare for the half marathon but feel comfortable with my muscle memory and will be getting in the pool/lake more after the half.

I also have hit the trainer pretty hard this winter and feel more powerful and have more endurance. Anxiously awaiting all the snow to melt!

Yay! I am officially a triathlete!!! Did my first tri today! I sat watching YouTube videos last night on how to put my number on my bike, how to set up my transition area, etc. It was very helpful, and along with this forum, really helped me to feel ready for the day!

It was at a beautiful gated, golf-course neighborhood with community pool. The swim was only 300m, but that was a perfect distance for me start out with. We lined up according to projected pace, and it quickly became clear some of us have no idea how fast (or slow) we swim. I lined up towards the back for the wave start (one at a time in the pool every 10 seconds) around the 9:30 pace. I swam over about 6 people and managed a time of 7:36, which is not fast at all, but I was happy with it in that I felt strong the entire time and didn't get winded or panic at all. I was tired and working hard, but it was very manageable.

After the swim we had to run around a long gate to get to the transition area, and it did take me a few extra seconds to find my bike, since after I left it someone put his stuff next to mine and I didn't recognize the area! I wasn't sure what to wear, since the temps were in the upper 50s/low 60s when we started. I was afraid I'd be too cold to just swim in my tri stuff, so I wore my swim suit and put my tri shorts over. I probably didn't need an extra top (just my swim suit) but was afraid I'd get chilled, so I spent at least a minute wrestling with a pull-over tri top instead of going with the short-sleeve bike top I had brought,  or just swim suit. So I won't make that mistake again! T1 time ended up being over 3 minutes (with no wet suit!!). Headed out on the bike, which was 3 loops of a rolling roads through the golf-course community. Very few cars, so it was great not having to worry about that. (Much better than Eriq's experience!) I was passed by only one other woman, but I passed at least a dozen ladies. The men had started half an hour after the woman's start, and I was at the back of the woman's group, so I did get passed by quite a few really speedy guys. But it was inspiring to see/hear them go flying by on their tri bikes. I had thought the bike was only 12 miles, but it ended up being 16:5, and much hillier too. Average pace was around 18mph.

Made it through T2 much more quickly, and headed out on the run, which was on a combination of sidewalk/trails which were quite rolling, including down in the two tunnels/path underpasses and then back up to street level again. I started out feeling good, but a little nervous that I had gone too hard on the bike hills. I didn't even want to look at my watch for my pace, and just went by how I felt. Didn't get passed by anyone on the run, but managed to pass about 6-8 women.  I was ecstatic to see I managed to average 7:08 pace for the 3.16 miles. I had enough to pick it up for the last quarter mile, so that felt good! Total time 1:29:07. Best part: took 1st in my age group!! (Actually, first woman was 3rd overall, so she got pulled from age group category.) Overall, it was a lot of fun. Don't think I'll say "just" a sprint for awhile, but I am looking forward to my next one in a few weeks (4/14) and my first Olympic in May!!

Gender: 16/68   Age group: 1/8         

Swim 52/68    7:36    

Bike 24/68   58:57     

Run 5/68   22:34  

 Now for an afternoon of rest!

Hi all, 

Felt really good to ride the bike outside today!  Spring has finally arrived in New England.  Looking forward to the season opener, though I opted to do the Duathlon.  May is still a little to early to get in the water for my liking!

Happy training all!

Congrats - that's a great report!  Yes, rest is definitely in order....and perhaps a drink or two in celebration...

Glad to hear everyone is doing well.

As for me, I was doing well, then it was Easter at the in-laws.  The in-laws portion wasn't so bad, but our logistics got all messed up "thanks" to the NJ Turnpike and that threw a fairly large monkey wrench in my training plans.  Last night's drive back to NY took almost 50% more time than usual "thanks" to the NJ Turnpike. I can't imagine anyone defending the heck-hole that is the NJ turnpike...the never-ending construction, the bad drivers and that smell.  Yuck.  <rant over> So long story short, I did a decent 30 minute treadmill run on Friday at the hotel, but didn't get to anything over the weekend.  

Hope to get back to 'normal' training this week.

Thomas - great to hear your progress on the swim. Thanks for sharing with the group.

Danelle - AWESOME! great to hear you enjoyed your first race and just amazing to take the AG win. looks like you definitely learned some lessons out there. and yes, sprints are hard in a whole different way.

Allie - good to hear the weather is turning around. 

Jana - nice that you are recovering and the toe is feeling better. hopefully you will be 100% soon.

As for me, i missed all my workouts from fri-sun due to a mixed bag of emotions and just not in the mood to train. fri i learned that my brother in law's grandfather AND my godmother's brother passed so i spent the entire weekend with my family. it's been tough but life just happens and you need to prioritize.

RULE #1 IMHO - make triathlon fit into your life, don't fit life in triathlon. i dont have any kids so it's a bit easier, but i always make time for my wife and try to fit triathlon in afterwards. things will happen and sometimes it's best to skip on a training day. triathlon will always be there, but those you love may not always be. 

i'm doing well and thanks in advance for your condolences, thoughts, and prayers. hoping to get back on track this week and looking forward to some fitness tests a few weeks from now to see how much improvement i've made during this "offseason." 

take care!

Sorry to hear about your family circumstances, Eriq. You are so right: life (and part of that is death) does happen. Wishes for peace and comfort being sent your way.

On a lighter note, I do not miss Midwest (Chicago) traffic at all, and I can't even image dealing with the East Coast traffic. Very frustrating, but again, it seems we get to practice rolling with whatever life throws at us! My husband's job search is not going very well, so we are down to one (measly!) income for right now, but at least it's something. Not that I am a fan of the song, but I do believe whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger, in athletics and life

Hope the toe continues to heal, Jana!

My training notes: I biked my longest ride to date yesterday on a very hilly route, 46 miles at a moderate pace. I tend to get pain in my right knee after 20 miles or so (I've had my bike fit adjusted, inserts in my shoes, and tried rolling my IT band, but no improvement) and it was really bothering me from my race on Saturday, but was able to ride through it. Decided to fit in a short 30 min. swim after work, and did my longest continuous repeats (2x500) in 29 minutes, with a 3 minute rest between sets. I have not been able to go that long in one stretch before, so it was more of a mental workout than anything. Still slow, but happy with the endurance and mental training I've been doing. 

Here's to a week of whatever life and training throw at us-peace to everyone

Danelle

Hey all.  Just wanted to drop-in and see how folks are doing.  Hopefully everybody's training is going well.

All good here.  My legs are really tired today, so I'll probably goto the pool tonight.  Hard to gauge where I am today versus the same time last year, but I feel as if I'm ahead.  But that said, I'm still working hard.

Hey party people. I feel like I've been a horrible mentor as of late so sorry! Hope your training has been going well. I've had a decent week and at least starting to see some consistency again. But I was reminded of proper fueling this past Tues and wanted to share with you.

So for the average person who's been eating/hydrating well will have on average glycogen stores worth about 90 mins of endurance work (endurance being 80% of threshold). So for endurance/recovery work less than 90 mins, you should be just fine fueling with just water during your workouts. 

On Tuesday, I had a 90 min endurance ride with 3x12mins of steady state, so 95-100% of threshold. I used had water and totally bonked about 6 mins into my last interval. I was just spent and couldn't push the watts anymore.

So 90 mins with some higher intensity work, I totally should have had something more than just water. Electrolytes would be a nice addition, like a electrolyte tablet, usually about 10 calories would be enough. If there were more or longer intervals, I'd probably go to a higher calorie electrolyte drink, maybe something like 100 calories per hour.

If you're having trouble making it through some of your higher intensity workouts, make sure you are fueling properly! =) 

Thanks for posting Eriq.

Any tips or drills or specific intervals I can do to reduce my 5k time?

ok, training is going well.

January tempo runs at 40 minutes with 8 minute runs and 4 min walk to a 70 minute run today...non stock.  Also did a another 2 mile sub 16.....things are going well.  next goal - 2 mile sub 15.

Tomorrow is a 70 min ride.

Cheers all, good training!!!!

Hi All,

Hope everyone's training is progressing! I think I found my threshold this week! I had my first sprint last Saturday, then did my longest ride to date on Sunday (48 miles), then did my longest swim to date (just a measly 1900 in an hour, but still progress for me) on Tuesday, and swam 2 other times for my most yardage per week to date (4700). Oh, and my easy Wednesday evening run with a friend turned into 9.5 miles with a mile of fast pick-ups. Add in a spin class and 7.5 mile tempo run session, and no days off in 12 days=I felt like I crashed and burned by yesterday. I slept in and missed my running group trail run (prepping for our Grand Canyon rim-to-rim-to-rim double crossing in June). I still wanted to blow off my group ride today and sleep in, but forced myself to get up. Having several nights with only 4-5 hours of sleep played a part as well. I guess I am learning my limits. In addition, I did a free open water swim clinic this afternoon. We got to try one of their demo wetsuits as well, which was great since I'd never worn one before. Lots of great tips and practice: sighting, drafting, turning around buoys, and dealing with the "washing machine". I think I was still tired from my 38 mile hilly ride and 3.1 run (dropped to 7:06 for last mile-woohoo!) this morning and not properly fueled for the swim.  I had a hard time getting back to the beach after an hour of doing drills and treading water while the coach was talking. The same group is doing another clinic in May, so I will do that one as well to get more experience. I definitely had issues breathing and panicing some whenever I would get bopped. Lots of practice needed! I really liked to wetsuit I tried (Orca 3.8, sells new for $700). 

Have a great week!

Jeff and Danelle - sounds like you two are making good progress. Solid goal of getting to sub-15 2 miler. and looks like Danelle learned some good stuff from her open water clinic.

if you've never been in open water, i'd suggest getting in at least twice before your race if it is indeed in open water. there's no way a pool can prep you for not being able to see the bottom and sighting.

Thomas - to work on 5k speed i think is a bit tricky. you'll have to work on top end but it is long enough where endurnace still plays a key role so threshold type speed is also important. you can always do track work, like 400 or 800 sprints. or hill sprints for 30-60sec at 5k to sub-5k pace with recovery down the hill, the incline will provide added stimulus to mimic speed work. threshold type intervals 10-20mins of RPE 7-8 with 5-8mins of easy jogging for recovery.

as for me, my weekend was a bit tough. had to cut my sat brick short due to work and lack of sleep.

sat was planned for 2hr ride w 60mins of tempo work then 30 min endurance run. I did get the 60 mins of tempo work in. was about Olympic distance race effort so that was a bit challenging but very doable. but only got about 90 mins of biking in and then skipped the run all together.

sun i killed my run. 4x15mins of steady state with 8 mins easy jogging in between. after about a mile of warmup, i knocked out the intervals at 7:24, 7:22, 7:19, then 7:12/mi pace. i did the same out and back 4 times and was able to go a bit further each interval. and each out and back has about 180-190 ft of climbing so i was actually running a bit faster if you look at NGP.

i have one more week of this "build" block and then a recovery/test week.

anyone racing soon?!

Eriq-nice to have the reminder that it's ok to adjust a planned workout! Sounds like your shortened brick paid off with a great steady state run! Nice negative splits!

I have read several articles lately (Runner's World was one source; can't remember the other) about the benefit of short intervals, like 30-60 bursts with equal recovery. My marathon training plan from Greg McMillan I used last year had quite a few of those sessions, which gets the cardio and fast turn-over benefit without completely tiring out the body. I would think that would be great training to include in a 5k plan. 

I have another sprint coming up this weekend, Marquee, at Tempe Town Lake. Much larger than my first two weeks ago, so this should be a good progression to figuring this whole thing out. Plus I have a few friends that are doing this one too, so I won't be all by myself trying to get everything set up.

Off to get some quality sleep-my focus for this week!

Hey all.

Last week was a pretty good training week for me.  Took Sunday off as a rest day as my body needed the downtime.  Did an uphill sprint interval training session last night - and that was really tough, but good.  Each uphill interval took ~20 seconds.  Sprint uphill, walk down, repeat.  Ouch.  I did 12 intervals, which isn't much but given the intensity, it was a good workout.

The weather is FANTASTIC here in the NY metro area.  The weather has finally changed, yay!  Look forward to a long run tomorrow as today is a bike or swim day.

ERIQ - In terms of early season racing, I don't have a race until July, so I'm still working on building my base.  That said, I've soft-circled a HIM in June that I might register for depending on how my training goes.

That's about it from here. Hope everyone is well.

Great 25 mile ride with 7 4-5 min intervals at 21.5 - 22 mph......feeling stronger.

BUT - then POP, my first flat tire.....a cop came along and asked if I needed help......No thanks and got it changed and blown back up.....kinda slow but I was pumped and flew home with a 14 min 21 mph interval.

run tomorrow........the real test.

Sounds like everyone is getting their training dialed up and tuned in for race season.

I signed up last minute for an indoor tri this morning. I did it to give me a feel for what it will be like come outdoor season. There is still snow here! it was a 10 min swim 30 min bike and 20 min run. I swam 18 lengths in 10 mins (25 meter pool) I have been working hard on the swim and I felt like I did well. I could feel fatigue setting in about 6 mins in. I tried to keep my form but the swim is still a challenge, even though I have progressed a lot. The bike was on a spin bike and basically counted a "distance" based on how many times your wheel spun. So it was a cadence race. I used this more as a training exercise because I was not willing to attempt 120 rpm for 30 min. I got in my groove and averaged a cadence of 90 and adjusted the tension to mock climbing or descending. Some people had no tension and just spinning as fast as they could. I saw no benefit to that other than to achieve the highest score, which was not my goal. The run was 20 min on the treadmill and this was my strong suit especially since I have been adding mileage in preparation for a half marathon. I did 2.7 miles and felt great.

It will be interesting when the results are in to see where I fall, especially considering the wide variety of participants. It gave me the fever to do more and I am anxiously awaiting my first outdoor event (June 2)! That is if the lakes thaw by then!

Hey folks.  Last week was a decent training week for me.  I pushed myself last Wednesday and ran 10 miles...it felt pretty good.  I also started incorporating some hill sprint repeats in my training.  It's 20 second sprinting uphill, walk down, repeat.  These hill sprints are really tough, but they're good too.  Today I ran 5.5ish miles and then did a few hill sprints right afterwards for good measure.  That was really tough.  

Overall, training is going well.  Just need to keep building and get faster/stronger.

Hi Everyone-hope you are all getting some spring weather and enjoying some fresh air while training.

Had my first "big" sprint today at Tempe Town Lake, where IMAZ and several other tris are held throughout the year. This was the Marquee sprint/olympic and Leadman tri today. I didn't get in the water until 9:15 (which here in AZ, the day is practically done by then; we're used to getting up at 4am to run!). I started sighting the wrong buoy and ended up way off course. I am still feeling like I can't breathe in OWS with a wet suit, so I did a lot of side and breast stroke to get back on course and finish the stupid 750m! I had gone to my gym on Thursday and had swum outside (heated but still chilly) 750m straight and felt fine, but guess I just need a lot more OWS practice. Good thing there are several clinics coming up in the next month that I can take advantage of.

Anyway, made it out of the lake in 22 min, took a little too long in transition (around 3) and headed up on the bike. Course was a little crowded and I had to pay close attention to directions since each distance had a little bit different course. I kept panicking, thinking I was going too hard on the bike and I wanted to have some in the tank for the run, so I rode conservatively (average just under 20mph for 22.5k) and ended up with 46:22. Better T2 time and got out on the run-finally! Passed a lot of people and settled into a nice pace, even though it was getting hot (70s). Slowed a little bit on a big hill and even walked about 15 seconds to get a drink and get my breath. Ended up with a 7:23 average and 23:08 split time. Overall stats: 124/277 total, 37/110 females, 6/16 AG (45-49) finish time 136:30. 

I'm learning that having a lot of tri races on the calendar isn't like running races-I'm getting tired! I have my first olympic on the calendar (same location) for 5 weeks. Hoping I can recover enough to then crank on the swim and bike training to see what I can do before summer and the racing calendar dries up and heads north (or west to CA). Still considering olympic in Sept and HIM in October, but right now I can't even picture making it 1000 m in the lake! 

Keep those training posts coming-they help keep me motivated

Danelle,

Congrats on the race!  I would bet that most of us have some issues with OWS too.  I know that I can swim fairly well, but when it comes to OWS my sighting is only ok (though its getting better as I get more OWS experience), so that part holds me back from doing better.  Pool swimming and OWS are quite different.  So, long story short, don't get down on yourself about the OWS...it takes practice.  (BTW, good idea on the OWS clinics...let us know they go.)

And yes, tri races are different than running races, so be careful not to jam up your race schedule too much.  The recovery time is greater for a tri than for a running race, at least in my experience.  You should be fine with the Olympic in 5 weeks.  Just make sure to increase you saddle time between now and then.

Good luck, and again congratulations!