JohnnyKay and Fred Doucette's HIM/IM focused Mentor group-CLOSED (Page 20)

I have a question and I apologize if it ends up being long.

My A race is the Muskoka 70.3 in Sept., which is 20 weeks from now (from this past Sunday actually).  My work schedule is 4 days on, 5 days off with an odd day thrown in every 3rd or 4th cycle.  Training plans based on 7 day weeks don't work well for me.  When I work day shift (7am to 7pm) I have to do any training after work, so it is usually a short run. I could do a bike if I brought my bike with me but won't swim after work.  I only work 2 days in a row, then work 2 nights.  On the day between my night shifts I usually run in the morning after work, but sometimes I'm too tired and just go home to bed.  I then have 5 days off with no training restrictions.

I have just started my training plan last week.  Basically I took a 16 week plan and stretched the 'weeks' out to 9 day cycles by adding a couple short run days and rearranging the workouts withing the 'week' to best fit my schedule.  So the 16 week plan became a 20 week plan.  As I was loading the plan into my planned training log tonight I realized the original plan has a 3 week build/1 week recovery pattern which I haven't accounted for and I now have several 9 day recovery blocks which I'm sure is much more than I need since I pretty much have 4 easy days (on the days I work) in each 9 day cycle anyway.  Considering my built in 'easy' days do I even need to schedule recovery 'weeks'?  And is it going to work to have a plan stretched out like this - I have lots of long bikes and long runs but they are spaced out a bit more than on a traditional plan ie. long bikes 9 days apart instead of 7 days and the same for long runs. 

My plan is basically set up like this where days 1 - 4 are the days that I work, and 5 - 9 are my days off:

Day 1 - short run
day 2 - off or short run/bike
day 3 - swim, bike
day 4 - run
day 5 - swim, bike
day 6 - run
day 7 - swim, bike
day 8 - long run
day 9 - swim, bike

That's pretty much it.  I don't have the opportunity to do a lot of 100mi rides at IM intensity.  So I tend to do longer intervals at, or slightly above, HIM intensity during my long rides.  I can create a roughly equivalent training stress in a 3-4 hour ride as I do in an IM.  And 3-4 hour rides create less stress at home than 4-6 hour rides.

But all this fits into the way I train consistently.  It's fine to take a look at what others are doing, but don' t try to 'cherry pick' elements of others' training at random.  Unless you train like them, they may not be appropriate for you.  Similarly, the fact that one person has had success when they did x long rides (or runs or whatever) does not mean that is what you should aim for.  As we've talked about, it's the body of work that you do consistently, over time that dictates what kind of sucess you will have on race day.

The problem is I never stop thinking.  My head gets me into way too much trouble.

Cathy - this won't really answer your full question, since I have questions about the plan.
1)  Where do you have your long bike scheduled?  Do you always have to bike on swim/run days, or are those other activities just "possible" on the bike day - or vice versa.
2)  Being familiar with the Muskoka course, I think you have a good mix of bike days, but I do think you need just 1 day where you only ride, and as much as possible you incorporate hill training in the ride.  Especially in the second half given the last 30km of the race route.
3)  No, I doubt that you need 9 day recovery blocks.  As you said, you've got 4 lighter days which coincide with your work schedule.  That should be sufficient, or if you find you need a little more time then just adjust the remaining 5 days accordingly.
4)  Be willing to adjust as you go along.  Keep the plan flexible and just adapt as you need week in and week out.

Hopefully others in the group will chime in and provide other (better) suggestions.

My right knee is sometimes a problem when I am getting up there in weekly mileage (for me that is 25-30+).  It also sometimes bothers me when I do a lot of climbing or low cadence work on the bike.  However, ice & ibu normally keep it under control.

Since training for the marathon last fall, I have had a chronic pain in my right rear hip/buttocks area that was initially diagnosed as bursitis.  I went a few weeks ago to an orthopedic surgeon and he gave me a short course of steroids.  It didn't help at all (I suspect it was a bit of a placebo move on his part).  I am now debating on whether to go back to him and try something else.  It is a weird injury, hard to describe.  It doesn't seem to be getting worse, just not going away.

My achilles/calves get sore when I start running again after a break, but a week or two wearing those compression sleeves seem to get rid of that. 

And I used to have right shoulder pain from swimming, but after doing P90x this winter, it seems to be completely cured!  All the strength exercises with those bands I think...great for the small muscles around the joints.  Either that, or I just don't swim quite as ridiculously as I used to.

And despite the novel, I am not that injury prone...just sensitive to the aches I do have.

WTF?!?!

Just got an email for IMTX:

"Athlete check-in hours for Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas athletes are Wednesday, May 18 from 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. and Thursday, May 19 from 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. If you do not check-in during the designated athlete check-in hours you will not be able to race."

Am I the only one who didn't know this was standard for an Ironman??? Sure would have been helpful to know that before I booked a late Thursday flight. I guess I'm already DQ'd? Worse...they won't even let me race? Seriously...they need a whole extra day to get people checked in? You can't just take care of that on Friday while you're also checking in your bike and other gear? This blows...

Maybe I should have known, or known to ask...it just seems way too easy for them to put something on their website prior to 3.5 weeks out that hints at Wed/Thurs mandatory check-in. My buddies are worse off than I am too - they don't even have hotel rooms for Thursday night and everything is likely booked solid now.

Sorry - I'm almost done...the earliest I can get into Houston on Thursday is 1:45...I have to get through the airport, pick up my rental car, and drive 50+ minutes to The Woodlands to get checked in by 4PM...which is cutting it pretty close. Hopefully there's no flight delays or traffic otherwise I won't be able to race. How cool is that?

pfffffftttt...

IMTX is on a Saturday, right?  I always thought of Friday as last day to check in too...but maybe that's for Sunday events.  I just pulled up their PDF schedule of events and it is kind of confusing, but it does not show Friday as an athlete check in day (just bike check in).  Sucks though, I hope you can work it out.  Fingers crossed.

Yikes! Talk about stress, I'd be freaking out. Fingers crossed that it will all work out for!

I could write a novel about this topic. Just lots of inflammation when you break it down but I don't seem to fight off inflammation very easily. Lots of trouble with my feet: I've had PF in both, a neuroma, and metatarsalgia in both feet. I have trouble with rolling my ankles and have had a torn tendon from years of doing that, and my lower back flares up every now and then but the chiropractor can fix that up pretty easily. Oh yeah, and patella tendonitis in my knees.

Other than that I'm great LOL

I've been trying really hard not to take NASIDS as I started reading more about them being hard on your kidneys, masked the pain etc. I used to take some ibuprofen before every run even if nothing was bothering me. Kind of became a crutch for me. I'm learning I don't need it as often as I think but I'm pretty sure my feet will be screaming at me in the morning! I've started turning more to ice, compression, and working out the tight spots on my foam roller. And ART for my feet a couple of times a month.

Definitely resonable, but completely unresonable if this wasn't clearly outlined on the website months and months before the race.

I totally understand this. Every day I think I'm going to call the doctor and see if he can refill my script from last summer but so far I've held off. It's a real mental battle for me. May is peak hours for my training so we'll see how I do.

True.  I'm doing my first WTC race this June, and to my knowledge, the athlete's guide was not sent to me, nor do I remember there being any instruction for me to download it from the race website.  I downloaded it anyway...it's 23 pages...and I can see how someone who is used to doing smaller/local races that have 1-2 page athlete guides included in your packet may overlook an athlete guide for a bigger race that has much more important information.

Not an "injury" but I deal with paroxysmal A-fib.  My heart rate will suddenly shoot to 180-220 and then I feel queezy and short of breath.  Fortunately it happens only about once every few weeks.  It has lasted an entire day but usually goes away quickly if it occurs during exercise, as if I can override it with training.  The only time I had to drop out of an event because of it was at IM Moo in 2004.  I couldn't swim even 200 yards due to severe shortness of breath and I'm pretty sure I was the first one to be declared a DNF that day.  A very frustrating and humbling experience.

I have little aches and pains as a result of my time in the military but it usually does not limit me.  Just take a motrin every now and then, and a little helping of HTFU.