1 year, 1000 miles (Page 15)

Kansas, we still have all year, plenty of time.  Sorry Feb. was not good for you.  Good Luck the rest of the year!

Speed, good luck and let us know.

I'm calling today a DNF.  :-(

I had planned on doing an Olympic distance brick.  I did some pre workout yoga to get limber, then hit the bike with a vengence.

I always set the bike's program to "random" so that it mimics riding hills as well as flats.  Today was no different, and I managed to demolish 25 miles in just 1:02:09 for a new PR. 

Because it was pretty friggin' cold out this morning, and I wasn't feeling up to dealing with the cold, I decided to do the run on the dreadmill.  Sadly, at about the 2.8 mile point, I felt like I was on borrowed time.  I simply had to shut the damned machine off at the 3.27 mile point.  I didn't even PR a 5K during that run, with 3.27 coming in 33:02.  Between letting it all go on the bike and the fact that dreadmills seem to sap energy out of me, I just had no gas. 

Ultimately, I learned that I can blast out 25 miles at 24+MPH, but perhaps I shouldn't.  I'll just have to keep doing bricks as often as I can to get to a point where I can do a 1hr/1hr brick.

Still going. Gained a few miles on the bunny... only down 21.

Big props to those in the positive!

But it's still early folks, we have a lot of time still to go. I have just been happy maintaining my ~20 a week with all the weather. It's been cool just having the weekly goal getting me out of the house. My fitness is coming back and Spring is coming. It was 60 here today. Woo Hoo!

Nice job on the progress!!!!  and way to smoke the stationary bike.  You need to get your Transition fixed and get outside though.  My experience is gym stationary bikes and your own bike don't really compare.  You can build fitness but the "speeds" are not the same.

Are your logs up to date? It looks like you only biked once in Feb. Is that right? I'd focus less on bricks and Pr'ing and more on zone 2 training in both running and biking.

Building distance 10% per week. When I focus on speed too much I almost always end up injured. 

They sure are.  My Specioalized Transition is currently sans pedals due to bearing failure, probably the result of being ridden for literally thousands of miles by a 230+ pound guy. 
I'm in an odd position.  The failed pedals are SPDs.  They were purchased for the road bike because I already had SPDs on the mountain bike I had at the time.  At that juncture of my life, I never intended to race, so using the same clunky trail shoes for both bikes made fiscal sense.  Now, I'm into racing.  I could spend about $35-$40 to just replace the SPDs, but I want to "upgrade" to a more race worthy shoe (stiffer sole for more power transfer... the trail shoes are more like hiking shoes with cleats; they flex a lot to support walking).  I've been looking at SPD-SL pedals, but I'm currently in a fiscal position which doesn't afford me the opportunity to spend $40+ on the new pedals and another $80+ on new shoes. 
The other option has been the exercise bike at the base gym.  The downside is that, given my work schedule, I normally only get to utilize the gym after a Friday or Saturday duty day, which means Saturday or Sunday morning.
I've logged lots of run time because I can do that pretty much any time.  :-)

As for my training focus, I've really been more focused on endurance.  I'm not purposely going for speed; it's just happening.  I'm not even really going for distance yet.

EDIT:  I'm also not sure how to do ZOne 2 training.  Except when I'm on the exercise bike, I have no way of knowing my heart rate unless I take my pulse.  I don't own a HRM.

I have a HRM but I don't really use it. Zone 2 refers to training with a pretty slow pace. You should be able to talk during the workout, and experience very little recovery time. 

I only expressed concern because of your mention of pr'ing your training runs, which gave me the impression that you might be going out "hard" on each workout. Your running logs look fantastic!

Thanks for the posting 

I will echo that here

Happy Birthday PinkSocks !!!  may it be a great day and a fabulous year (for both of you)

Getting back in shape ain't easy.....But so much reconfort!

Happy Birthday PinkSocks!

Here's where I stand on being able to talk during my training runs... it doesn't feel right at all.  Where I don't think I'm going 100% full throttle every time, I feel lacking when I don't go as hard as I do.  I also find it hard to test my ability to talk... I run solo. 
I think I'll remodify my latest efforts to cut back on output for the sake of distance.  Any suggestions?

Thanks for the compliment!

Does anybody run on an indoor track? Mine is 9 laps for a miles. 

If so, do you feel like people are always trying to race? Annoying!

Thank you so much for all of the BD wishes!  You are all so sweet!

Btrent, I don't have an indoor track.  I bet it can get rough.  Music and watching the other people is all I can think of to help.

Speed, I usually run alone so the talk test was hard for me too.  I started singing to myself and of course many people now think I'm nuts.  Also I tired to just run blind without looking at the clock, the mileage, the pace, whatever.  Like I said, as soon as I learned to run easy, my aches left me and oddly, I got faster.

All, our friend BigDH ran a great 50K on President's Day but is now dealing with recovering from injuries.  I read his blog earlier today and his re-analysis of his goals definitely touch a chord with me.  He also posted an article on TT that he found in RW and it is awesome!  You may all enjoy reading both.

The TT article is http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=479863&posts=11&start=1

Great article.

It helps put things in perspective for me.  Me.  A 6' tall, 230lb, lower-middle-class white guy who feels as though a Zone 2 training run isn't enough effort.
Enlightening, if you will. 
You see, I sometimes feel as if I don't belong in this triathlon world of ours.  My swim is horrendous, and nothing I do seems to improve it.  I don't ride a tri-specific bike, so I feel as if I'm on the fringe of being accepted as a real triathlete.  I have goals of doing a sub 30 minute 5K and a sub 1hr 10K, meanwhile, I'm reading an article written by a goal with seemingly the same mindset, yet he's laying down 1.5hr HMs as opposed to my 1.5hr 10 milers. 
I feel like I have a lot to learn.  I feel like I'm amongst some decent company to do it.

With that, I must point out that I haven't run since Sunday.  Work and Life and Mother Nature have conspired against it.  I'm ok with it, though.  And even with all this enlightenment going on, I still want to try to podium finish the Clyde division of my next triathlon, a sprint. 

So... who wants to help keep me in this mindframe and to help me learn to swim fast?  :-)

Speed, I understand what you are saying.  We are a lot alike.  I probably have you beat on being a worse swimmer (I'm horrible).  I read in IronWars that the times in Kona Ironman have not really come down since the early 90's even with the advancement of bikes and all, running shoes etc.  Back then according to the pics, they were riding steel frame road bikes.

BTW, my wife is Pinksocks and she FINALLY got it partway thru my head (I'm not very smart) about running.  I always thought more is better, interval, hard long runs, hill repeats, and if I wasn't sore the next day I felt I didn't go hard enough...guess what, I was ALWAYS injured.  She (pinksocks) finally got it thru my head, since you are running every day or at least 5 days per week to make my runs easier. (you wouldn't do squats til you puked 5 days in a row would you).

Try running at least 5 - 6 days per week even if it is just 1 mile at a slow pace and see how you feel.  I go out on a limb and challenge you to do it for a month and see how you feel, no real long runs but constant runs.

Good Luck

karl

As a clyde(coming from someone who got "kicked out" of the category this year when they moved it up to 220), you can overcome a mediocre swim.  But it can be tough to podium with it if there are a lot of guys in the category.  

Being where you are, I don't know if they would be wetsuit legal races, but looking back, that made a big difference in my times.  So I would venture to say Work on your balance, keep you hips high (wish I knew how to do that without the suit).

My first tri - I came out gassed even though I was only doing 2:47's over a 400 m course.  After that, I tried to follow the Total Immersion - while my times didn't plummet (did 2:14's the next couple of races then dropped down to 1:50's)  - I was coming out of the water comfortable and ready to get to work on the bike - using the mentality that the swim was just a warm up. 

Get your time in the water, tell yourself you can swim - long and smooth as someone once told me.  When you get out of the water, put your swim behind you, focus on the moment.  Go comfortably hard on the bike but not too hard (see your "brick" from last weekend), if you go too easy, you can use it on the run.  Don't forget to practice transitions - that can be "free time" and remember the adage "Slow is smooth and smooth is Fast".  Slow down, accomplish the task cleanly instead of trying to rush through things and fumbling  around or doing silly things.

YOU CAN DO IT