Cav's Group - Closed (Page 2)

Hi Tammy, wow 7 children how do you manage, awesome and massive respect to you! From your post I detect a determined and lively lady, fantastic. It looks like you have a good base fitness there already and training well, especially on the running front. I totally agree with you, and glad you’ve recognised that you need to increase the endurance work to hit the half marathon and you’ll find that it will support your sprint ambitions too. I’ve done a lot of half marathons and typically had one long run a week building up to about 15 miles or so a couple of weeks before. Don’t switch off your sprint work completely either as this will help, just swap one for a longer run and build up the distance. I found not running miles but times helped too. We’ll have a think about the swim too

Hi Cav, I learnt about that site from another thread here about 3 weeks ago. I was amazed at the quality of their animation. The site is also full of helpful articles and videos. I also use http://www.goswim.tv/ for drills. I had my wife record my swimming 1-2 weeks ago, and now I know some of my flaws (at least, the ones that can be seen from outside of the pool ). I am focusing on those, namely body rotation, hand entry, NOT holding my breath. I have been an open water swimmer for years and I always swim bilaterally but after reading the articles in swimsmooth I realized that I was holding my breath for one stroke, release it on second one and breath on third stroke. Now I am constantly exhaling.

Sorry for the long winded reply. I thought there might be others who may benefit from my example.

When I crossed the finish line it was probably one of the most exciting things in my life, it was that much better when my daughter put the medal around my neck at the end.  Currently I have signed up for a 5 mile and 5k on the same day for February.  I can do the crawl my shoulders will let me, They will just get fatigued quickly.  If you recommend I do those to strengthen my shoulders I would do it, and just work my way up.  Thanks for the advice.

Hey no apology required its important that we all support each other on here, we need to be a self help community. Without doubt if you can crack the breathing and body rotation elements of the swim then life becomes so much easier, I'm working hard on body rotation and know how hard it can be, if anybody has any tips or advice for the group then lets hear it folks!

Wow you're making my eyes fill with tears here buddy what a lovely story, its great to have the family involved and I bet she was so proud of her daddy when she hung that medal round your neck! Ok re the shoulders sounds good if you can crawl ok then thats great news, doing some strength work on them is a good idea, just be careful you don't damage them, also work on your lats too as this helps in the pool. Here's a useful website that has a strength training programme in as well as a lot of other information too. http://swimming.about.com/od/swimworkouts/u/swim_workouts_swim_training.htm

Morning gang how are we all? Well today saw winter kick in over in my part of the world, freezing cold, icey strong wind and snow showers, wow didn't see that coming! However the most exciting news of the day is I actually managed to run again....yyiippeee! Four weeks of no exercise has been a nightmare so I wrapped up warm and shot out and boy did it feel great. Well it did for the first mile which when I checked my plan to take it easy had been blown away as I ran it on just over 7 mins, stupid stupid stupid, will I ever learn! Anyway I only did about 4 miles, the last 2 of which were into the wind and I felt 50% dreadful and 50% elated as so far no back reaction, keep your fingers crossed.

I'll update my training log shortly and that is golden rule number one for the group lets keep these up to date and encourage eachother to do so, please feel free to give me a kick if I slack here!

For those of you facebook junkies here's a link to my page, feel free to add me.

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/profile.php?ref=profile&id=553377741

Have a crazy day

Cav x

G'morning!  I made it to the pool today.  I haven't done any swim training since August (my last tri) and it's so hard to get that swim fitness back.  I think my endurance is back, now I need to put together some real workouts to regain the little bit of speed I used to have.  It's so cold here that riding outside is not going to happen.  My bike won't roll outside until at least the end of March, provided we have a warm spring.  Running is a bit chilly, but it's possible.  I actually have a 5k on New Year's Day.  It's really more of a fun run than an actual race.  We just do it for bragging points.  Year before last it was 1* F for the race. 

Hi Cav, I am glad you are back to training again. I can feel your joy to be running again.

Pattie, how about some indoor cycling? Spinning sessions, trainer, roller? Mind you, I do not enjoy any of these, but for cold weather situations they may be of use.

For me, I did a Personal Best today. I did 9 pull-ups. I never thought that I can do such a thing. But, I have not done this kind of weights before. So workouts are paying off. I will pipe down the weights in the second half of January, decreasing the weights and increasing the repetitions. Maybe I can switch to body weight exercises (calisthenics). I will not quit pull-ups though, they make me feel better .

Cav (and group), for body rotation in swimming I use these two drills as my main set:
1) Fingertip drag (http://www.goswim.tv/entries/5058/freestyle---fingertip-drag.html): This was somewhat hard at first, but now I got the hang of it. I am getting better at it.
2) Single arm drill (http://www.mvm.org/workouts-drills.php): This is really hard. I feel that when I start doing it comfortably my body rotation will be good. Currently I am struggling with this but I will not give up.

Hi All, really, really cold when I went for my run this morning, the ice was that thick that I was slipping all over the place when I was warming up. Fortunately the trail that I run on was ice free.
  I am following a six week 5k prog and am currently on "run 2 mins, walk 4 mins (x5)" and despite having chesty cold added1/10 of a mile to my time so that was OK. My goal is a 30 min 5k.
    My main aid for motivation is to better my time or distance every session, I love training logs and comparing my stats to see how things are going.
  Two scheduled rest days now, good job as my aching knees need rest !

Edited by Wax_On 2009-12-17 10:02 AM

Hi all. Had an interesting cycle last night in the rain, discovered if you change down too many gears too fast and pedal backwards (to get the pedals in the right place to start moving again) the chain comes of the crank!

And this morning's lesson was that the shiny bits of pavement are not wet, they are iced.

Well done on sussing that one out Stav, it really helps when you're racing! Icy here too now, indoor cycling for me for a bit I think!

Looks like things are going nicely in the right direction Chris, glad to see you are following the plan, don't get carried away and do too much too soon, you'll nail your target I'm sure.

Hi Tammy, I know what you say regarding the pool, I hate the cold water. When I open water swim in the summer even in a wetsuit I shake for a while afterwards, pretty embarrasing when the guys have got the coffees in and I just spill mine. The last race I did i was so cold after the swim I had to get somebody to help me out the wetsuit!

Ok open water racing can be pretty daunting but if you follow a few simple tips you'll be ok:

1 - Accept that it will be pretty chaotic at first ie get mentally prepared
2 - You'll find it difficult to breathe at first with all the chaos around you and the adrenaline thats pumping through your body, soon goes away.
3 - Hang around at the back or the side of the pack to stay out of the rough stuff
4 - I always spend the first couple of mins on breaststroke, calms me down, gets the breathing sorted and allows me to find a spot to get my rythmn going.
5 - Relax and enjoy it, you'll soon settle into your stroke and don't be scared to breastroke when you need to

Re the swim times, difficult to say but here's a gauge for 400m. The last sprint I did was my club event in October (pool based). The quickest was 5m130s, the slowest was over 20 mins. The average was around 10 mins so I would say anything below 8 mins for 400m is a good speed. (I wont declare my time, my goggles filled with water on length one and I had to empty them at the end of each lap, nightmare!

Know what you mean regarding the bike, spin sessions here I come! Have you a swim plan to build up the speed, swimming short sharp (eg 50m) then resting 15 secs each time helps to sharpen up. Hmmm 5k on New years day, might see if I can find one around here somewhere........!

Tammy: the adrenaline will be pumping, it is quite an amazing high sitting there at the edge of the lake with a bunch of other people waiting. The nerves are palpable (in a good way). I've got a few pieces of advice.

1.Much better to start out too slow than to start out too fast.
I second Cav's advice to start really slowly, in fact much more slowly than you think you should during the race.
Adrenaline tends to make us underestimate how hard we are working, and once that wears off at the first buoy I have had a couple of races where I was like "Oh crap I overdid it."  As Cav suggested, don't be embarrassed to use the breast stroke. Heck, I saw people pass me doing breast stroke while I was exhausted from the crawl because I started out too fast!

2. Nobody wants to jostle with you
There will be some jostling for position, but note that nobody wants to be running into anyone. Everyone would like to have a smooth swim. When you run into someone (and you will), or vice versa (and they will), you will both coordinate and adjust to minimize the contact time. This realization helped me a lot, enough so that in my fourth open water swim I went right to the middle of the pack with a good line for the first buoy, and it worked out fine.

On the other hand, if you don't want to deal with this at all, just hang to the back/side of the pack and there will be very little action from other people to worry about. I did this my first three open water tris.

3. Work on sighting.
Pretty much 100% of first-time open-water swimmers end up alone way off course looking at all the swimmers going tightly around the buoys. I know I did. This adds tons of time and effort and mental frustration to what should be a fun event. Going in a straight line is basically impossible without frequently looking up to make sure you are headed in the right direction. Unless you are a homing pigeon, I recommend every swim workout do some work on sighting. I sight every five strokes (give or take two, depending on conditions). I also do a few open water swims in a local lake, which is the best way to practice sighting. While you might think it adds too much time to your swim, it is worth it compared to the time and energy required to get back on the right track once you end up in Kansas.

Just 2 cents from a back of packer

Edited by neuronet 2009-12-17 2:51 PM

One thing that can help with getting the chain back on while moving is to shift in the opposite direction the chain fell off and pedal slowly.  If you need to, just reach down and flick it back on the rest of the way while still going. 

My sciatic pain has been gone for about 2 weeks and I am chomping at the bit to do something!  I did start the 100 push-up challenge, but stopped after week 4 because of a deep bruise in my wrist/ back of hand (uh, my hand slipped off the crank arm extractor when I was taking off my old crank arms and slapped hard against the pedal-who knew it would hurt for so long!).  I was able to do 50 in a row about 3 weeks ago, but still had a lot of pain. I did 20 last night pain free (but with a lot more difficulty!).  I have also been hitting the pull-up bar.  I did get to 8 the other night!  I have definitely noticed more definition and strength in my upper body and core muscles from doing both.  I fyou don't like weights (like me) try out the push-up challenge.  Even if you don't get to 100, it is worth while!

Yep, I'm all about the spin bike and trainer in the winter.  Have to be here in the frozen northland.  I haven't put my bike on the trainer yet, but have started back to spin classes.  I'm really lucky as the instructors at my gym are real cyclists.  Our tri club is also going to start group trainer rides next month. 

NICE JOB on the pull ups.  I don't think I could even do one. 

Here's my FB link.  I have my BT log/Twitter/FB connected so that's why workout stuff shows up there.  Add me as a friend if you wish. 
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?ref=profile&id=553377741#/rowdypaint?ref=profile

I'm one of those strange people who actually likes open water swims.  The more contact, the better.  Bring it!  Do you regularly swim with a friend or training partner?  If so, ask them to every once in a while to run into you, hit you (gently) or something like that.  My husband and I do this and it does help.  It makes you not care about the bumps and recover from them quicker.  At least it works for us. 

Hi all,
Tammy, others had good and sound advice. Your first open water group swimming will be a little difficult, but nothing that you cannot cope with. Just relax and do the breast stroke. Swimming at the back or side of the group is also excellent advice for your first swim. I like open water swimming best. You can look all around for under and above water scenery (though not much at triathlons). If you have the chance try some open water swimming before any races, you may come to like it. It is not like pool swimming where you look and look at the bottom line, if it were not for the time or drill challenge I would be bored out of my skull.

Erik, you are right, I also do not like weights. But I enjoy calisthenics, I can do them anywhere and they are low-risk. So, I am curious about the 100 push-up challenge, I searched about it and found this: http://hundredpushups.com/. Is this what you follow?

Yes, that is the hundred pushup challenge that we have been doing (there is a thread on the Challenge Me section of the forums). It's surprising how well it works as I managed to go from 35 to the full 100 in 6 weeks (started on week 3 but had to repeat week 6 twice).

The question I have is, the final week of the couch to 5k run plan has me running for 25mins twice then 30mins on the final day and the first week of the sprint plan is 12/16/20mins. Is it ok to do the first 12min run at a higher pace to try to improve my time and slow back down on the longer runs or should I stick to my current pace to give myself a little rest?

Thanks for pointing me to "Challenge Me" section. Lots of fun threads there. Up till today I have not looked at that section.

I will definitely try the 100 pushup challenge starting in mid January.