MJEWEN Summer 2013 Mentor Group - OPEN (Page 15)

Race report

Today was the Cornhusker State Games Sprint Triathlon. Saw Ken there helping with pancakes. A lot of fast people at this race and I knew 3 of them were in my division (2 are my friends). Seriously that Female 35-39 age division is tough! One day I'd like to make top 3, but need to get my running up to speed to do that. Maybe in year 2 of racing???

I thought the weather could not have been more perfect! It was in the upper 50's when we arrived and never got out of the 60's during the race and no wind. LOVED IT! Seriously doubt I will see weather so nice (for a late July race) again.

I posted my race report. I have no idea how I did in each sport overall. I would have to spend some time figuring that out and I just don't care how I stack up against the men, so I'm just not going to figure it out.

I took my hydration pack to wear on the bike leg to circumvent the bottle/cage. Thought it would be helpful...that is assuming I didn't forget to put it on and do the whole bike leg w/o it! I only took Cytomax with me in the pack, so once again I had no nutrition/fluids on the bike and no nutrition at all during the race. One of these days I will have a race go perfect. :-)

Despite not having anything, luckily the weather was cool which really helped in the fluid category and it was faster than my last race (3 miles shorter bike leg) so knowing I did OK on the last race w/o fluid/nutrition, I should be able to manage through this race as well.

Swim: 500 M
Time: 10:40 (swim 10 minutes, slow jog to TA 40 seconds)
Age Group: 3/11
Sex: 18/62
Highlight: Woo-hoo - shaved a minute off my last swim 2 weeks ago!!

TA1 (yes I ranked my Transitions because it shows me where I need to speed up)
Time: 1:25
Age Group: 4/11
Sex: 14/62

Bike:
12.5 miles
Time: 40:38
Age Group: 4/11
Sex: 9/62
Highlight: Probably my best sport of the 3, got to use aero bars during the race. Really thought they helped on the downhill sections. Hilly course with one turn every mile (~4 mile square loop x 3).

TA2:
Time: 1:07
Age Group: 6/11
Sex: 36/62
Highlight: Got a little confused on my bike location because someone had a nearly identical towel to me about 20' before my actual set up location. Could have ran a little faster through here - not a good overall time for TA2.

Run:
Distance: 5k
Time: 26:42
Age Group: 9/11
Sex: 32/62
Highlight: This run actually felt so much better than my 29+ minute run from 2 weeks prior. Still need to get faster as is evident from my age group and sex placements. Really need to do more running focusing on speed work. I know I can run faster - just need to get my mind to agree to that when I'm feeling tired.

Finish: 1:20:32
Age Group: 5/11
Sex place: 16/62
Highlight: Really happy with my final time. I was hoping I could hit 1:20 for the race so I was pretty happy that I did. Overall a great race for me. Next on the agenda - speed work!

I'll attach a photo of my husband and my friend (who was second overall women & in my age division) with me before the race start.





Attachments
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Cornhusker State Games 2013 Trish Don Crystal.jpg (82KB - 12 downloads)

Knocked a minute of your 5k time? Awesome!!! Super Awesome!! Sounds like a very nice couple days. I had to look up Presque Isle. I really miss not being near the ocean. I'm a little jealous of all of you who live with in driving distance of the ocean. Pretty land locked here in Nebraska!

Ok, last post of the day.

Denise - the ankle/foot thing doesn't sound fun. Hope it goes away with some rest. Does biking bother it, or is it more running?

Melissa - a 12 mile run - good job. I haven't ran that far in one sitting since first part of May. Kiddos to you.

Emile - fabulous on the swim! Were you focused on trying to swim more streamlined the whole way? I have to stay really focused while swimming - I'm wondering if you find it the same way.

Ken - forgot to ask how your marathon training was going when I saw you this morning. When is Boston? I can't remember.

Terry - sorry about your cold. There is a cold going around here that sound like what you have - just not a nice cold. Rest, rest, rest. And can't wait to hear what you come up with for next year in regards to training and racing.

Tom - How was your Chisago race this weekend? Can't wait to hear about it!

We aten't actually on the ocean. Presque Isle is a peninsula jutting out into lake Erie. Yes it is wonderful being close to the water. That is where I work out the most.

Great race and nice improvement on the swim.

Here is my RR from the past weekend.

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/RaceLog/races-view-container.asp?...

Tom - enjoyed reading your race report. Couldn't you put your watch on before the swim and wear it the whole race, or is your Garmin not waterproof? I put mine on before the race started as I learned at my previous race you lose time putting it on in transition. Perhaps that's what allowed me to knock a minute off the swim time; it's like using a paddle in the water because it's so big! Next time I'll wear one on each wrist!

Were you able to drink all 16 oz on the bike? My goal is to be able to one day drink on the bike!!

Good job on the dismount. I think we need a video of the new and improved dismount!

good photo of you on the run. I like it!

16 ounces was just right on a 22 mile ride as it took me 1:03 to finish. I needed to force myself to drink though. I have a forerunner 210 that is not waterproof. I can go without it on the bike but I really like to have it on my runs.

Tom, nice job at Chisago! I enjoyed your race report. I wear an aero helmet during races. I see Terry provided some links. I do know they help for most people but not everyone. I saw one wind tunnel study where a guy was better w/o the aero helmet. That will be the exception though. To get maximum benefit you do have stay aero (down in the aero bars) as much as possible. There's some funny pictures floating around on the internet, remember the pointy end goes in the back.

Terry, good luck on your IM journey. Based on my limited one IM experience focus on the bike. Ride, ride lot's, then ride more.

Crissy, I liked your race report, too. I always rank myself within my AG on my transition times. Getting good at transitions is free time. It takes some practice and thought but seconds saved in transition definitely can make a difference.

Melissa, way to gut out the 800s in the heat.

Don, good job on your night time 5k. It's always rewarding to see those times drop.

Ken, you a running machine!

Denise & Crissy, rollers vs trainers. I have a Cyclops Fluid trainer. Very quiet. I have 2 friends who use rollers, both are excellent bikers. To be honest, they just look too hard for me. I'll stick with my trainer, much safer. I've had it for 4-5 years and no issues at all.

I have 2 race reports, one from my local tri back on 6/23 that I wrote up but never made public. The second one is from the same race Tom did but I did the HIM distance. Both have some pics included.

Rochesterfest Olympic - http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp...

Chisago HIM - http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp...

Hi Mike,

Are you still accepting members in your mentor group? I have just signed up for my first Triathlon ( sprint) on October 19th. I am a couch to tri subject and have signed up for my plan and downloaded it to my training log. I do have questions as I train and would love to have a mentor.


STORY: I am a 48 yr old SAHM who loves her job. Prior to being a mother, I was a fit active person and always considered myself athletic( basketball, track, swimming). Over the course of raising my children, I have become a spectator and no longer the athlete I once was. Putting my family first, I forgot to take care of myself. I have slowly started working on my fitness level this spring, but after attending a friends tri in June, I decided I HAD to do one. I have always wanted to try a triathlon and I am finally ready. I have been following a training plan for 2 weeks but just switched plans since I think I need some strength training in addition to swimming, running, biking


FAMILY STATUS: Married, 2 kids 16 yr girl and 12 yr boy. 2 dogs

CURRENT TRAINING: Was using active.com tri plan but just changed to the Couch to Tri plan here at BT
THIS YEAR'S RACES: Registered for Seal Beach, CA Tri October 19




WEIGHTLOSS: Would like to take about 10 lbs off. I am more interested in fitness level than my weight since I am starting to lose inches but gain muscle

We're glad to have you Tara! Welcome to the group. Just be aware that triathlons can be addictive, after you do one, you'll want to do more.

Hi Tara! Oh, I second that these Triathlon's are very addicting. Is your triathlon in the ocean? One day I would like to do a tri in an ocean.

Keep us up to date on your training and racing!

Hi Tara, it's nice to have you with us.

hey, Tara.... I say, ditto, ditto ditto. welcome.....

OK... here's the planned/registered events until next summer.

August 3 – Loggerhead Sprint Tri – Jupiter*
August 10 – Boca Sugarcane Loop 210k ( 131 miles ) – RUSA event*
August 31 – Pompano Beach 1500 mtr open water event – Pompano*
September 29 – Escape to Miami Tri -Sprint Distance – Miami*
October 19 - Great Floridian Triathlon -Aqua Bike 2.4 mile swim – 112 mile bike – Clermont*
November 2 - RAAM Series –200 mile bike ride – Daytona (17 hours to finish)*
November 16 – Horrible Hundred 100 mile bike ride – Clermont*
December 8 – Space Coast Marathon 26.2 – Cocoa Beach*
December 15 -- Lake Okeechobee Paved Levee Loop ride 115 miles – Clewiston*
December – Courage Games 5k 25lb Rucksack Run
2014
January – Annual Fort Lauderdale Rough Water Swim 1 mile open water – Fort Lauderdale
January 11 – HITS Full Distance triathlon – 140.6*
March– Great Clermont Int’l Triathlon - Clermont
April 19 – Swim Miami 5k open water swim
May 17 -- Ironman Texas

((Planning on a Sprint relay Triathlon with wife and son maybe in October-December))
Marjorie will do the running portion, she also signed up with team in training for the ING Miami half marathon in February.- woot woot

I began running this week after a few weeks off and had a nice swim last night.
I'm all packed up and ready to leave later this afternoon for tomorrow's Sprint distance event.

Terry,

When you said you were planning to do a full next year, I didn't think you meant at the very start of the year!

Yeah, Ken, ..... it's coming up pretty quick. I took some time off because I needed the rest. I had time to reevaluate my whole concept of training and training plans and what I specifically need to do to become competitive. I started my marathon training this week..... I'll be spending the next two months doing nothing but aerobic runs rides and swims and probably begin tempo/interval work in mid November. I'll begin the strength training next week.....

I played two hours of beach volleyball last weekend (forgetting how old I was for most of the effort) and when I woke up the next day I became acutely aware of the many several muscles tendons and ligaments I had not previously used in a very long time.... ....

Good luck to everyone who is racing this weekend, and if' you're not racing, then enjoy your long training days and remember to hydrate....

Terry,

*Gulp* that's a lot of races! And people think I'm race crazy doing around 12 races/year! I'll admit, I am a bit jealous you can race so often. I'd do one every weekend if I could get away with it. :-)

You are lucky to live in an area where can do races October - April. Is that a peak time for racing in the south since it's cooler? Seems to me that would be the ideal race time instead of May - September when it's really hot & humid.

That really is a lot of races. I too would love to be in a race every weekend. Wow! Did I really just say that?

I am just starting to get back into the swing of things and I'm leaving for the weekend to go to camp again. At least construction work is almost like cross training. Almost!

Next week is the final week of my workout plan. I have been sleeping because I haven't decided on a new one yet. I am thinking that after next week I'll change things up a bit. I'll start running in the sand. I'll run a mile then do five minutes calisthenics. I'm not sure how many sets I'll start with but the goal is to work up to 16. In four weeks. Maybe I don't need to do the full 16. Maybe I can get by with ten. That is actually what a friend recomended. The only reason I'm willing to accept that advice at this point is because the challange is so close. I still have yet to go on a run with the rest of my team. I'm a little disapointed in our team captain. We should have had some trining runs as a group. We have to support each other and we barely know on another. This might be my last tough muddder type event. I think I like the triathlons better.

Enough ranting.

Have fun out there and be safe.

Don

How was everyone's weekend? Did anyone have a race?

After my HIM last Sun I was as sore as I've ever been after a tri. Took Mon off, short, easy run on Tue and then I got sick. Started with a sore throat then turned into a summer cold. I golfed on Wed but then started to feel pretty bad. Spent most of Thu in bed resting/sleeping. A swim & bike on Fri but worked at the bike shop all day on Sat and took another day off.

Sun I was feeling pretty much back to normal and with USAT Nationals coming up on Sat, I pulled an "Emile" and did all 3 disciplines in one day. It ended up to be a reverse tri. Started out at 8:30 with a 7.8 mile run at 7:58 pace. Then a nice breakfast. About 1230 I did a 38 mile bike ride at 19.6 mph. Took a popcorn break, watched some TV and mowed the lawn. To cap it off at 6:30 I went for an 1800 yd swim. Steaks on the grill for supper with a great homemade peach pie for dessert. A great Sunday and I'm now feeling somewhat ready for Nationals next week.

Terry, when I first looked at your upcoming schedule, I thought wow, what is he trying to do, race himself to death? But upon review there are a lot of long supported bike rides in there which is great way to get in the miles. The one race I would seriously urge you to reconsider is the marathon only 5 weeks out from the HITS IM. Your body takes so much more pounding on the run than on the bike or swim, I think 26.2 miles is too much that close to your IM. My longest 2 training runs before my IM were 17.3 and 18.1 with the 18.1 5 weeks out. I was consistently running 25-35 miles a week during my peak training but kept the long runs in the 10-12 mile range. I was able to run the whole marathon other than following my plan of walking thru the aid stations. Needing to walk extended portions of the marathon will greatly reduce your overall time. For a race as long as an IM, it's better to be a little undertrained than overtrained. Whatever you decide, I wish you the best of luck. Tackling a full IM is a huge challenge, doing 2 in a matter of months is truly "Ironman" worthy.

Mike, steak on the grill sounds fantastic. I just got over my summer cold/flu I took about two weeks off of training.

Yes, Completed Loggerhead tri..
http://www.altavistasports.com/results/2013results/logger08032013.h...

from my Garmin:
swim 8/21
16m 16s
932.29 yards
01m 45s /100 yards

Bike 17/21
45m 06s
12.85 miles
17.09 Mi/hr

Run 17/21
31m 43s
3.04 miles
10m 25s /Mi

364 overall (approx 700)
17/21 ag

water was really good, light chop felt good throughout. Bike ride was 2 loops, headwind north and tailwind coming back. Run had some little hills about half way through. Felt pretty good overall..... didn't really push it, just cruised all the way through. The day was overcast and cloudy, it rained lightly on and off until the halfway through the run.

Mike, thanks for the thoughts about the Marathon... I've been having the same ones the past few days.

The sugar cane loop will be changed. The group leader has suggested that their group averages 19-21 mph for the course. He suggested I do the Simple Century on 8/18 as a lead up to the loop course otherwise I'll be left very much behind .. . .. . SO, I'll do the 115 mile loop around Lake Okeechobee instead. and a simple 100 the following week.

I'll be carrying all my fluids with me on the Lake Okeechobee loop and attempt to not stop during the rides.

As for the Marathon.... I may take a rain check on it.....I'll keep you posted or maybe just do the half as my final long run before Naples.

Ken (or anyone else who can assist) .... I'm reading Pfitzinger's Advanced marathoning..... he talks about carb loading.... I'm about two weeks back into my paleo/ketogenic diet ... how does that modify what Pfitzinger talks about fuelling? and do you have any experience or thoughts about proper fueling on marathon?

Terry,

I think Pfitz's training plan will work well regardless of which fueling philosophy you go with. After reading the book and the emphasis on carbs as well as other information sources, I was trying to take in a high percentage of my calories as complex carbs. However, recently I've really started doubting this approach. One reason is that the same experts that talk about glycogen stores, etc also will talk about teaching your body to burn fat efficiently. However, they usually leave people with the impression that they should be "carbed up" all the time.

I've been tuning in Ben Greenfield's podcast quite a bit and its really interesting how he approaches nutrition and fueling. Sometimes he seems pretty extreme, but on the balance his advice seems to be based on good evidence and facts and not on a particular agenda or sponsor.

I really get a kick out of people who follow paleo, not because of the science or evidence supporting it, but because its how people used to eat. It seems arbitrary to pick a period of time and declare it the best to mimic. I'm not saying that is the real basis for the paleo diet/lifestyle thing but its sometimes how its marketed or understood.

The way I see it, if you're training with a high percent of carbs in your diet then the long runs and frequent training will help you build up your body's ability to store glycogen. The long runs will still help your body to learn to burn fat after your glycogen is depleted. However, if you train without an emphasis on carb intake then it seems pretty likely your body will still learn to try to store glycogen as much as it possibly can and probably get even better at using fat as a fuel source.

I did a 19 mile long run on Sunday with no fuel during the run and only one waffle before the run. It sucked and I was slow... legs like lead. I tell myself that my body learned a valuable lesson about how to use fat as a fuel. At least I hope so.

Anyways, I think you can disregard Pfitz's nutritional advice and still get a lot out of his training plan.

For marathon fueling, I followed the advice in the following link pretty religiously for the Lincoln marathon. It was really, really difficult to eat that many carbs even though I generally love eating carbs. It literally felt like a chore. http://camilleherron.com/2012/04/02/fueling-and-hydration-for-the-m... I felt very fresh at the end of the race, better than I've ever felt (except for the head-wound).

Love reading everyone's posts. This has lead me to:

Question #1: do most of you try to follow a diet plan? I don't have one and wonder how beneficial one would be to performance. If you do follow one, how long have you followed it, and did you see an improvement from following it?

Question #2: BT Membership. I noticed a few of you have a membership (Bronze, Silver, eg). What do you like most about it? How long have you had the membership?

Question #3: Unfortunately the Midwest doesn't have much for triathlons once fall rolls around, so what do you do in the off-season for training? I think I will start boot camp up again and reduce my swimming/biking. Didn't know if this would be a sound plan for the off season or not.

Crissy
(Next triathlon is a super sprint August 11th)

Crissy to answer your questions:

#1 No diet plan for me. Training allows me to eat/drink basically whatever I want. I eat a lot ice cream and drink a fair amount of good beer (ie, non-light) in the summer. I do eat intelligently but I also don't feel the need to deprive myself of food/drink I like when I am training 10+ hours per week. Weight has never really been an issue for me.

#2 - BT membership - I've been a Bronze member for 4-5 years. Used to be needed to upload workouts from Garmin into training log, that feature may be free now. I have looked at the plans but never followed any plan. I read some of the member articles. I used to follow the forums much closer when I was working and had dead periods but now I'm retired I just don't find the time. BT is a great community with a lot to offer and I felt it was good to get a membership and give something back. BT runs specials on the memberships where they give you like 15 months for the 12 month rate, that's usually when I renew.

#3Off season - I continue to s/b/r basically year round. I've got a trainer and have used Jorge's trainer programs in the past but last year switched to TrainerRoad.com. I feel TrainerRoad is much better, tougher and more focused. TR uses speed numbers from various trainers and have developed power (watts) based on your trainer. It may not be true power but if you keep your trainer tension/set up the same you are at least comparing apples to apples. I swim 2-3 a week and run outside up here in MN as much as possible. I worked hard on the bike last winter and I saw great results early in the spring. Swim/run is typically lower intensity but there some winter runs, 5k to half marathons. I've done some weight training in the off season but have a hard time sticking with it. I know it has potential benefits but I'd rather focus on s/b/r while I'm competing in tris.

Rock the super sprint next weekend!