Racing Manatees - Better Together in 2022 (Page 17)

Originally posted by jmkizer

Well, for those who want to take a look before weighing in

https://www.strava.com/clubs/Team-Teddy-Zoe (request to join)

Originally posted by JBacarella Some Things By Jim I'm good with either set up, but most of us do other things outside of S/B/R. I edge toward the multisport option. Curtis: Great runs and one of the coolest trophies I've seen. Thank you for the IM Texas recon. Hopefully, we have an opportunity to meet. let me know where you are volunteering, I will try to find you. I will have a green and white Michigan State Jersey on. There probably won't be a lot of those in Texas. I had to give up the Hoka's. They are still shredding my feet. I started to panic about the thought of going 26.2 miles in them. Zoot is selling shoes again, so I picked up a pair of Zoot TT's. Aggressive low fat, low cholesterol, avoid gout diet is going well. No dairy, pork, beef, or fish has not been bad. Protein coming from Nuts, black beans and chicken. I did lose 8 pounds with the change. I hit race weight a month early. I might actually race light this time. The changes in nutrition during exercise have been going well. Tomorrow and next week will be the big test. I'm using Honey Stinger gels in a flask and add about 1 oz of water so it drinks easier. I've been taking about a marble size drink of it every 5-10 minutes with a zip of water. My stomach is clearing, so I have not been getting nauseous. I also supplement with Jelly Belly sport beans and bits of banana. The real test will be the next two weekends. I have a 5 hour ride and 7.5 hour rides scheduled. I am making an attempt at a Knight of Sufferlandria next Saturday. My plan called for a 6 hour ride and I figured what's another hour and a half. Taper starts the next week, and it's a great confidence builder going into Texas. We are really excited about the vacation attached to the race. It will be nice to spend a week with D#1 and get a look at her new life. Michigan's High School swim season ended this week. I will actually get pool time in starting next week. Has anyone used Tribike Transport? Taking a vacation after the race, we don't want to tote my bike around for a week, plus D#1's car won't have room for it.

Originally posted by alaskatri It is good to catch up reading on what everyone has been up to. We got back from Kona the middle of last week, and then spent a couple days skiing. Walked in to work Monday morning to start a trial, so it’s been a busy return. Hawaii was AMAZING. We did a lot of snorkeling, and saw tons of reef fish and turtles. My daughter and I went out on a night snorkeling tour that was pretty phenomenal as well. We basically laid vertical in the water while holding onto a paddle board that is rigged with blue lights and PVC all around it. The lights attract plankton, which in turn attracts fish and manta rays. We had several huge manta rays come up within feet of us feeding. There were 10 people to each paddle board, with two boards connected together. It was such a great time. Before the sun set, they let us get off the boat and just snorkel around the area. This gave me a chance to do some open water swimming a ways out from the boat and back. We also toured a coffee farm. Alaska has a huge coffee culture and there are drive through coffee stands here on just about every other corner. I was pretty surprised of the lack of coffee culture in Hawaii given the importance of “Kona coffee.” We found a couple good coffee shops though after some diligent searching. My daughter and I also did a fishing trip one day and we landed a 130 lb. blue marlin. My daughter got to sit in the seat and do the heavy lifting. I participated in the reeling, and then when her legs ran out of gas, I stood behind her and worked the seat to assist her, while the deckhand did the reeling. It is definitely a lifetime memory for her. My son and I played three rounds of golf while there as well. Two of the rounds were really fun and had amazing scenery right on the water. One of them was on the Hilo side of the island, and it rained a little during the round, which we were fine with. One of our rounds was north of Kona in an area called Waikiloa. When you see the Kona Ironman race, this is the area of the black lava fields that they bike up into. The announcers during the race routinely describe this area as windy and hot, which is such an understatement. Having now been in the area, it can only be described as “holy hell it’s hot here.” I would describe golf as a very “proper” sport, there are a lot of rules about etiquette and even proper clothing. This is the area where my son and I struggle, as we just want to play for fun and not worry about the uppity aspect of it. Well in Waikiloa, we threw all that out the window. They had a few sprinklers going to water the course. We would play 2-3 holes, and then find a sprinkler and go stand in it, put our heads and hats in it, and then play the next few holes. Wash, rinse, repeat. This experience raised my level of respect for the IM competitors tenfold. Those guys and gals ride 112 miles in that nonsense, and then follow it with a marathon for fun, while my son and I were ready to jump in the ocean just from swinging golf clubs and riding around in the golf cart (we didn’t even walk the course!!!). 90+ degrees there is magnified so much by the surrounding black lava. I can’t imagine trying to survive 112 miles of biking and then a marathon through it. With that said, we absolutely loved the island. Maybe it’s because we are right in the middle of the point of the year where we constantly gripe about how long the winter has been this year, but I’ve already started trying to figure out how I could get into an investment property there that at least breaks even financially, so I can visit more often. And as insane as the IM appears, the do have what they call the Lavaman triathlon there every year, which is an Olympic distance tri along the same course. A lot of Alaskans participate in it every year, and a guy from Anchorage won it at least once in the last few years. I know a couple of middle-of-the-pack attorneys here that run it every year as well. So I am strongly considering this for next year…. Aloha!!!

Originally posted by amd723

Lots of good things by Jim here! I'm happy Zoot is making shoes again - especially happy for your feet! I will be interested to hear how your nutrition worked for the race as I am still in the process of figuring what combo of things I want to use for IM Choo. Thankfully, I still have time to figure that out. I hope.  

Good luck on your quest to become a Knight of Sufferlandria! I cannot imagine 7.5 hrs on a trainer. That's hardcore!

I've never used Tribike Transport, so no insight for you there, but hope you enjoy the post-race well-deserved vacation!

Originally posted by JBacarella A friend's mom passed away and the funeral is Saturday. It looks like I'm going downstate instead of the KoS. I have a long brick scheduled the next Saturday, so I might move it to that day. I feel like I could use the bike time more that a long brick day. I have a road bike, in a historical sense. I have a 1989 Raleigh Technium the first aluminum bike and the winning bike of the 1989 Tour de France ( not my bike specifically, the make and model). A client gave it to me when I first got into triathlon after he found out I was riding a Montgomery Ward bike that I bought at a garage sale for $10.00.

Originally posted by jmkizer

OK, folks, Strava now offers an option for a "multisport" club which appears to include more than just the SBR that the triathlon club counts.  It looks like it includes strength, etc.  I was thinking that this might be a good change for the Manatee Strava group.  What say you?

This is what the multisport leader board looks like

 

And this is the Triathlon one

On the one hand, the multisport one better reflects that total activity that is being completed.  I really like that it captures the cross training (yoga, strength, BeachBody, etc.) that everyone is doing.  On the other hand, it's sort of nice to see, oh, Jim did a lot of running last week, didn't he?  I do feel like we can get that detail form BT itself though.

How would you feel about swapping to the Multisport club type? Are there any objections?

 

Originally posted by BlueBoy26

Ya...I have noticed that a lot of people are only recording activities in 1-2 categories, especially since Covid Started two years ago. So I get the desire to move away from a three discipline metric when you are taking a zero in one of them every week.  I personally would be taking a zero in elevation every week since I can do a 20-mile in any direction from where I am at and record less than 40 feet of elevation.  The total distance metric has some value, but if I am swimming 10 hours a week the total distance in going to 20 times less than if I am cycling 10 hours a week so I feel that total distance is hiding what is really going on and prefer to see where my hours are logged by discipline.   There won't be any distance or elevation for strength training.  I guess you get it marked as an additional activity, but I see the Multisport Leaderboard as a step in the wrong direction.  :-(

No, there isn't any downside to having both groups.  It is super easy to join multiple groups (I am a member of the local running club, local tri club, tri coaching group, run coaching group, BT mentor group, Embassordor race team etc).  Some groups I am a better match to and I try hard to pace my training with people in those groups.  Others are not a good fit and I just check on those leader boards once in a while to see if I have dropped out of the top 100 yet and to see how people that do 20+ hours week-in and week-out do things.

Originally posted by amd723

Sorry to read about your friend's mom and postponement/cancelation of KoS.  I have come to believe that you can never have enough bike time when it comes to 70.3 and 140.6 races, so I agree with your plan to move your workouts around. I'm sure that makes you feel better about your plan.

Originally posted by jmkizer

Agreed. To a large extent, I think that more biking is more better. Also, your run volume has been good.  The swim course looks pretty straightforward so at the very least, you shouldn't be inadvertently adding any distance to it. We'll all be thinking wet suit legal thoughts for you.  That leaves the bike.  Some additional volume could help and there is enough time before your event that you should be able to recover from it and reap the benefits.

Originally posted by alaskatri

It is good to catch up reading on what everyone has been up to. We got back from Kona the middle of last week, and then spent a couple days skiing. Walked in to work Monday morning to start a trial, so it’s been a busy return.

Hawaii was AMAZING. We did a lot of snorkeling, and saw tons of reef fish and turtles. My daughter and I went out on a night snorkeling tour that was pretty phenomenal as well. We basically laid vertical in the water while holding onto a paddle board that is rigged with blue lights and PVC all around it. The lights attract plankton, which in turn attracts fish and manta rays. We had several huge manta rays come up within feet of us feeding. There were 10 people to each paddle board, with two boards connected together. It was such a great time. Before the sun set, they let us get off the boat and just snorkel around the area. This gave me a chance to do some open water swimming a ways out from the boat and back.

We also toured a coffee farm. Alaska has a huge coffee culture and there are drive through coffee stands here on just about every other corner. I was pretty surprised of the lack of coffee culture in Hawaii given the importance of “Kona coffee.” We found a couple good coffee shops though after some diligent searching. My daughter and I also did a fishing trip one day and we landed a 130 lb. blue marlin. My daughter got to sit in the seat and do the heavy lifting. I participated in the reeling, and then when her legs ran out of gas, I stood behind her and worked the seat to assist her, while the deckhand did the reeling. It is definitely a lifetime memory for her.

My son and I played three rounds of golf while there as well. Two of the rounds were really fun and had amazing scenery right on the water. One of them was on the Hilo side of the island, and it rained a little during the round, which we were fine with. One of our rounds was north of Kona in an area called Waikiloa. When you see the Kona Ironman race, this is the area of the black lava fields that they bike up into. The announcers during the race routinely describe this area as windy and hot, which is such an understatement. Having now been in the area, it can only be described as “holy hell it’s hot here.” I would describe golf as a very “proper” sport, there are a lot of rules about etiquette and even proper clothing. This is the area where my son and I struggle, as we just want to play for fun and not worry about the uppity aspect of it. Well in Waikiloa, we threw all that out the window. They had a few sprinklers going to water the course. We would play 2-3 holes, and then find a sprinkler and go stand in it, put our heads and hats in it, and then play the next few holes. Wash, rinse, repeat.

This experience raised my level of respect for the IM competitors tenfold. Those guys and gals ride 112 miles in that nonsense, and then follow it with a marathon for fun, while my son and I were ready to jump in the ocean just from swinging golf clubs and riding around in the golf cart (we didn’t even walk the course!!!). 90+ degrees there is magnified so much by the surrounding black lava. I can’t imagine trying to survive 112 miles of biking and then a marathon through it.

With that said, we absolutely loved the island. Maybe it’s because we are right in the middle of the point of the year where we constantly gripe about how long the winter has been this year, but I’ve already started trying to figure out how I could get into an investment property there that at least breaks even financially, so I can visit more often. And as insane as the IM appears, the do have what they call the Lavaman triathlon there every year, which is an Olympic distance tri along the same course. A lot of Alaskans participate in it every year, and a guy from Anchorage won it at least once in the last few years. I know a couple of middle-of-the-pack attorneys here that run it every year as well. So I am strongly considering this for next year….

Aloha!!!

Originally posted by juniperjen

Good morning Manatees - how's it going everyone?? 

I thought this little podcast episode is very applicable to us endurance athletes who are very motivated by 'finish lines' but also know that achieving a finish line does not mean that you'll always keep going. 

https://gretchenrubin.com/podcast-episode/little-happier-finish-lines 

Originally posted by juniperjen

Good morning Manatees - how's it going everyone?? 

I thought this little podcast episode is very applicable to us endurance athletes who are very motivated by 'finish lines' but also know that achieving a finish line does not mean that you'll always keep going. 

https://gretchenrubin.com/podcast-episode/little-happier-finish-lines 

Originally posted by jmkizer

Racing Manatees!!!

March 26-27
No racers that I know of -— but we do have some athletes that are tapering for events next weekend so stay tuned!

Is anyone racing or doing anything else fun this weekend?

Have we come to any decisions about the Strava group(s)? Multisport? Triathlon?

Originally posted by jmkizer

Racing Manatees!!!

March 26-27
No racers that I know of -— but we do have some athletes that are tapering for events next weekend so stay tuned!

Is anyone racing or doing anything else fun this weekend?

Have we come to any decisions about the Strava group(s)? Multisport? Triathlon?

Originally posted by ceilidh I did a virtual sprint tri today. super duper slow, but not bad for during recovery.

Originally posted by Hot Runner

I hear you. I think for the past three years I have been stuck in day-to-day survival mode--first injury and endless PT, then looking for a job and moving, then the pandemic, etc. I just can't motivate myself to really "train" for an event or make long-range plans. To be honest, it all seems ridiculous and kind of trivial. What really motivated me (qualifying for 70.3 Worlds) no longer does, since I don't feel comfortable doing extensive travel in the near future, and it is always very early in our school year. Even if I did manage to qualify, unless the event is in the US (which makes qualifying more difficult), it's not doable with my current job. Not judging others who can manage to focus on training, set goals, and compete; I just don't have it in me right now.

I'd actually planned to enter a few Oregon events (it's our spring break, and I had time to think about it) but yesterday discovered someone has hacked my credit card (I suspect a chatty youth at our local coffee drive-through) and has been racking up orders on Amazon with it. So I had to shut it down and can't enter anything anyway till I get a new card!

I can't imagine what Europe is like right now. My grandparents were from a small town right on the German/Polish border (in eastern Germany) and we still have relatives there as well as elsewhere in Germany and in France. I don't know what the situation is there right now. It is right where the Russian gas pipeline enters Germany.

Mom also has a good friend here who is Ukrainian and she has not heard from her relatives there. It is amazing how people are helping the refugees but long-term...... I hope a peaceful solution can be found.

Originally posted by jmkizer

I'd kind of prefer to have one Manatee group to manage but if the consensus is two groups, we can make it happen