Work your Weakness aka "Hey, Mike, STFU!" Challenge (Page 16)

No, since they didn't really let you keep much stuff in transition the night before. Also, the bike was racked so no riding. But that would be the good news if I came, auto-sherpa for all!

FFS!  How could I forget about the day before racking?  Duh.

Salty the Sherpa has a very nice ring to it :)

Hey y'all.  Is it too late to get in on this?  I thought about getting in at the beginning, but wasn't really ready to get back on my bike, which is my weakness.  But now I think I have another I would like to work on, which is doing all those little things that help keep me healthy.

Icing sore bits

Hip/achilles exercises

Core work

So, whats the deal-e-o?  Do y'all come over and break my knee caps if I don't do 'em?

Originally posted by Asalzwed

Originally posted by bcraht

Hey y'all.  Is it too late to get in on this?  I thought about getting in at the beginning, but wasn't really ready to get back on my bike, which is my weakness.  But now I think I have another I would like to work on, which is doing all those little things that help keep me healthy.

Icing sore bits

Hip/achilles exercises

Core work

So, whats the deal-e-o?  Do y'all come over and break my knee caps if I don't do 'em?

No. And yes to the knee caps

I'm currently icing my shins...

Sure was...my team just had me run up and down the field chasing the ball.  I had ZERO soccer talent. 

Bingo...that's what I'm aiming for.  There's a pancake flat course on May 31st about an hour from here.  I probably need to go sub-2:40 which should doable if 1) I can get my swimming at least acceptable, and 2) I stop eating lunch during transitions.

Didn't get to do my track workout yesterday, so I'll try to make it up tonight.  My GF had a pipe going to her refrigerator spring a leak at some point yesterday, so I spent about 5 hours shop vac'ing water out of her house and drying carpet.

Thaaaaat sucked.

Kirsten!  Yay!

So far we've kept it to just general haranguing and peer pressure, but I wouldn't rule out the coming over part:)

Gretchen, I love going out in bad weather precisely to channel that hard core feeling.  I don't always manage to do it, but when I do I sometimes find myself strutting around my kitchen feeling pretty damn virtuous, lol. Strong work today!

HAHAHA, if I saw this workout before practice I think I would go cry and hide.  You're so freakin badazz.  Nice job, Salty.

Take care of yourself and that cold:) Do you ever sit in the sauna?  I don't know if it's totally psychological or what, but when I'm stuffed up, that seems to help.

I'm sorry you missed your track workout, but I'm sure your GF really appreciated the help:)

I realized when I clicked submit that I left a few doors open there.  

here's the swim set Stacey shared with me:

StaceyK Switch here's a swim set for you (brought to you by swim smooth) Warmup - 400 steady Kick - 8x 50 with fins no more than 75% effort. Rotating each 50 between left side, right side, front and back NO BOARD Main - 4x (4x 100 at CCS pace) first set + 30s recovery, second set +20s recovery, third set + 10s recovery, forth set + 5s recovery. NO EXTRA RECOVERY BETWEEN SETS. Cool down - 300 very easy Have fun :)

OK so the swim set yesterday was part win/part fail. 

Warm up was good. 

I didn't have fins with me, so I did a different and shorter kick set-- 25 dolphin 25 flutter x 4

When I started the main set, I was having trouble hitting my CSS.  I was 4-5 seconds faster than I should have been.  What was weird about it was that I felt something in the water during maybe the first 8 100s that I hadn't felt before, so it was like I was having a breakthrough in that set, and that kept me going faster than I actually thought I was.  I don't know if that makes sense.  The breakthrough was the "part win". 

As it turns out, it wasn't that much of a breakthrough because  I couldn't sustain that feeling once I got fatigued and my timing with my breath/kick got out a whack.  So in the set with the 10 sec RI I missed two and I only did one on a 5 sec RI and then I bailed, and swam a couple of slowish 200s and then cooled down. 

I would like to try this set again in a couple of weeks and try to pace myself better.

The breakthrough was REALLY cool though.  Last year at a swim clinic the instructor spoke about "sneaking up on the water".  I was trying to just not drown in the water, so "sneaking up" was beyond me.  Yesterday, for the first time, I felt what she meant about "sneaking up" and it was awesome!  It is totally dependent on my timing being perfect, but when it works, I felt like I was flying or gliding or something.  I had my first glimpse of what fast could possibly feel like.  I couldn't sustain it for more than half a length or a few strokes at a time, but it was a HUGE "feel for the water" breakthrough for me :)

What race is that in May?  I'd travel for something like this.

USAT doesn't publish their full list until early next year...here was last year's:

2013 USA Triathlon Regional Championships
Florida: St. Anthony’s Triathlon (April 28, St. Petersburg, Fla.)
Mid-Atlantic: New Jersey State Triathlon (July 21, West Windsor, N.J.)
Mideast: Epic Races (June 30, Grass Lake, Mich.)
Midwest: Omaha Triathlon (July 21, Omaha, Neb.)
Northeast: Mass State Triathlon (July 14, Winchendon, Mass.)
Pacific Northwest: Portland Triathlon (Sept. 22, Portland, Ore.) – Qualifier for 2014 Nationals
Rocky Mountain: Boulder Peak Triathlon (July 14, Boulder, Colo.)
South Midwest: Route 66 Olympic-Distance Triathlon (June 2, El Reno, Okla.)
Southeast: Memphis in May Triathlon (May 19, Memphis, Tenn.)
Southwest: California International Triathlon (June 30, Pleasanton, Calif.)

2013 USA Triathlon Special Qualifiers
Mid-Atlantic: Rock Hall Triathlon (June 1, Rock Hall, Md.)
Mideast: Leon’s Triathlon (June 2, Hammond, Ind.)
Rocky Mountain: Echo Triathlon (Date TBD, Coalville, Utah)
South Midwest: TriWaco Olympic-Distance (July 28, Waco, Texas)

I've checked the web site for Rock Hall and the event date is May 31st:

http://www.setupevents.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=event_detail&eventID=2312

Thanks Mike.  I was just looking at the Rock Hall event site and based on the last three years results I'd have to be at 2:30 which is doable but it all depends on who shows up that day as to whether that's good enough.  It is too bad that the Pacific NW special qualifier for 2014 already took place in September.  I think I'll try to get a few of these races on the schedule and then keep my fingers crossed.   It's also kind of hard to project too much from previous times without knowing the course but a flat bike works to my benefit as I am not a terribly strong rider.

So we get our workouts posted before practice but I don't look until JUST before so I don't have time to get anxious. This was harder than it sounds, actually. 6 minutes feels like an eternity.