Prof40's Group -- Technically full but ... (Page 23)

Watch the Welsh digs, there, Mark--my grandpa was a Morgan, and all Welsh (he was, of course, a poet, musician, gardener and DRUNK! in High Welsh fashion). Can't imagine what it would be like to have a slacker job, a second house in France and stables! I'm happy for you, I just can't really imagine how that all would feel! Congrats on kicking the tobacco habit--well done!!

So, have you noticed a pattern here? Mark gave up smoking, Malph gave up boozing, Prof and Cmckee gave up girl scout cookies, BGT gave up extra food, and I gave up men! (actually I'm just taking a break--those men look AWFULLY GOOD to me yet, so I must not be dead). I guess it is Lent, right? Hello, I'm Phoenix and I'm a triathlon addict!

a tri 12 step meeting. I never thought'd I need one BUT My name is Quiana I am food, sugar and workout addict. I have been abstient from overeating for 33 days (really!) and after a 4 day couch binge, I have one day of exersise under my belt.

After a 4 day break I am finally back in the swing, I think. I swam laps and taught. My strokes were stronger and flowed better. My body is saying thanks for the rest. I might even go for a bike ride alter today. My weekedn goals: run 3.1 miles and bike 13. I can do it. BGT

OMG !!! Too many posts to reply to. I hope you all wrote them on your laptop while spinning away on your trainers... Except for BGT, sounds like she finally got some much needed rest. I found out about training too much the hard way when my body said enough was enough and shut things down for a week with the flu. Ughhh...

SUPPLEMENTS -

Extended release multi-vitamin, B-Complex, Magnesium, Calcium, Zinc, Vitamin C (general health)
Glucosamine, Chrondointin, MSM (joint health)
Glutamine (excellent for immune system and muscle recovery)
Creatine Ethyl Esther (for muscle recovery)

Which all makes for some very expensive pee.

Plus, at least an apple or two a day, one or two bananas, and whatever other fruit is laying around. My company provides free fruit in the break rooms along with the coffee. Very cool.

REASON FOR TRI'ING -
Primarily wanted to get into shape and I needed a goal. But now, I'm hooked.

MY ADDICTIONS -
Yes, hello, my name is Sean and I'm now addicted to training. There, I said it and I feel much better. Unlike the AA steps though, I'm not going to stop and I won't be showing up at anyone's door to apologize.

Diet Coke. Mmmmmm... I have quit for the the most part though. Primarily because I didn't want the caffeine screwing up my metabolism which I'm trying my damnedest (sp?) to crank up and keep up. Also, as an added benefit, when I do have some, it is super effective.

TRAINING THIS WEEK -
I've been lifting and running and mostly training for my belt test coming up tonight.

SWIMMING -
I've really been sucking at this. Other than my love fest in the bay, I haven't swam at all. My plan is to situate myself near the front of the pack, grab onto whomever I can, and vigorously float.

Well, I'm off to take my second round of supplements of the day.

Hope you all have a great weekend !!!

Sean

mmm ice cream for breakfast (yes its noon here and I am just eating breakfast). Next stop is me on a wheaties box.


My 5k run went very well last night. Hit it at 32mins and actually felt like I could have gone farther, but then started to recall all the posts and articles I had read about injuries and thought I should slow her down. This is officially the farthest I have run in my life! 3 months ago I could barely run 2km.


And, please don't tell my boss, but I called in 'sick' today. I looked outside and the sun was shining, its a warm 50F out, and I thought, NOOO way I am going to work today! Going to hop on the bike instead and cruise around town for awhile.

OK. Challenge time.

As most of you have worked out by now, training is largely dull. We all seem to break it up with mini competitions, indoor tri's and shopping for tri gear!

For this week I think that we will go back to one of the earliest challenges and have a brick week.

Pick your favourite exercise (run, bike, swim, weights, trampoline etc) and then do a different exercise immediately after. Bike to run is the favourite. Make sure you make the transition quickly (no popping off for coffee and pastries in between) and try and get the second element long enough to get through the wobbly legs syndrome that bricks will give you.

Oh yes, if your normal routine is to bike for 45 mins and run for 30, don't try and do a 45 min bike and then add on a 30 min run for a brick session. Instead push yourself for 15 mins on the bike and then immediately push yourself for 15 mins running. If you still have strength after that, go get a coffee and pat yourself on the back.

The wrinkle to this weeks challenge. One day this week get hold of your loved one/significant other/someone who you can tolerate for a couple of hours and go and do something completely non tri related. Get to the movies, take your dog for breakfast, go to the park with the kids, whatever. Forget about it for a day and kick back within your family or with your friends. Whilst fitness is a huge part of being a good athlete, you have to enjoy the journey and keep it in perspective.

I am now going on holiday for a week so I look forward to seeing what happened over the week. Have a good one my friends.

WEEK IN REVIEW: MARCH 24

Well, definitely a busy week. Lots of encouragement was sent, and tips shared, and now MARK has posted a two-component challenge which sounds achievable and fun. Share your thoughts after you complete your brick and tell us how you spent your off-day.

PHOENIX completed her spin-a-thon and posted pics as evidence. Good job. And then she fell off her bike in front of her children. My first fall was in private, and I wouldn't have had it any other way!

ROBB discovered that goggles are a necessity for a good swim and hit what he calls his "short-term" goal weight. Feels good looking down at the scale on those days, doesn't it?

I can't recall who said it, but the saying goes something like this: "Eating this (insert tasty treat name here) is not going to taste as good as being thin feels." Of course, I still stumble -- as if my recorded weights on my log are not proof enough of my weaknesses -- but I do so enjoy seeing my numbers drop down as the summer progresses.

WATERGIRL continued her recovery. She's starting a 12-week training plan this weekend for her first race of the season. And we share a fondness for caffeine. I'd be lost without it.

SEAN vowed that he would never be caught in a Speedo with shaved legs unless he was appearing in a magazine. Although he didn't say WHAT magazine. I wouldn't be surprised if we found a market for that photo!

CMCKEE joined us, and after a week, is still hanging about. Good to see she's not going to continue forcing her daughter to wear knee/elbow pads when she rides her bike. And thanks for the vitamin advice.

MARK told us why/how he did his first triathlon, which led to some discussions as to how we all started down this path.

MIKE HALL enjoyed 2 days off. Bet they felt great! Keep us posted on your Sandy's Challenge race, and if it's a go for this summer.

BGT also experienced the benefits of a few days off. Sometimes the body just needs the cool down, and when it's ready to get back to work, you'll know it. I always look forward to my first work-out after a few off days. It just feels good to get moving again.

MALPHH aka "THE ROCK" did something I do when preparing for a race. He pulled up last year's times and saw how he would have placed. And like me, he's now exhaling a breath of relief knowing that his current state of fitness would have served him well. Of course, after I see that I would have finished within the cut off times, and would not have finished last, I then see who won my age group. And start figuring out if I can train enough to beat that time.

KANDERS is itching to get her bike out on the open road. Me, too. If it ever stops raining, I might go for a quick spin today, and try to get mine into the shop for a spring tune-up this week.

HELENR is getting sabotaged by family commitments. Okay, sabotage is the wrong word, but it feels like that sometimes, doesn't it? Hang in there. Once it gets warm, you can head out the door, make a left turn instead of the usual right, and they'll never find you during your few hours of solace! By the way, how'd your ride with the clips go?

Well, that's it from my area of the world. Dawn is on the horizon, and I have work to do. With some luck, I'll get a few hours of good solid effort in today, and I'll be in a happy state for the rest of the weekend.

Have a great day.

Okay back from ride, did 9 miles. my husband got tired, I was just getting warm. I will have to plan 2 rides a week on with him and one without.

Yesterday was one of the hardest days for me. The tri stuff was fine but I got two bad haircuts. The women who cut my hair did not know how to cut black peoples hair, she cave me a high top fade, let me be clear: a Kid & Play- HOUSE PARTY high top fad. I told her No not feeling it. Then she cut it agian, shorter and more Ed Love Yo MTV Raps high top. Just short of going to the barber shop for buzz and a line (which I have done and do look good in), another girl stepped in and cut it ROUND and let me leave with some dignity. I have spend the day falling in love with my new hair do!
As India Arie signs, I am not my hair, I am not your expectations.
Torrorow I will bike and run and post my new plan for the week. I need to make some changes cause I am in Chicago next weekend. BGT

Okay BGT--Post a new pic with your new do! Sometimes change is good--glad to see you are rolling with it. (Kali--I'm telling you! Must be you are close to something big, too!)

Liz (watergirl)--I think you should take the chi running seminar to help with the piriformis syndrome, or the sore butt, or whatever you want to call it! It was a very helpful seminar, and I can't even begin to describe it, but I think you've been running SO much for so long now, and if you change your form, the bike will feel great to you. You might just want to check out the website and start with the book/DVD. It's all about relaxing into the run and letting it flow and is supposed to be just like total immersion swimming, but for the run. There was a fellow there who teaches the TI in Milwaukee, and he was all for the chi run.

So, everyone--yes, I would take the seminar again. (even though it took three babysitters to watch my kids the 12 hours as no one person could do the whole shift and I was up half the night trying to get my house clean enough to let someone in to watch them!) It will be quite the change to get used to the form, but if I can learn to swim properly at 40, running properly should be attainable also There was a fellow there that had read the book and watched the DVD and recommended chi running to several friends and had been practicing for a long time. The point is that the lights were going off for him during the seminar--"Oh, that's what they mean!". So, if you can at all get to a seminar, that's the best way. Once the form is there, then endurance happens and then speed. Just like the swim! That's my infomercial for today!

Heres my Weekly totals

Bike : 95km or 60 miles
run : 10.6km or 6.6 miles
swim : 486m


Only got out to swim once this week which kind of sucks but it was mostly due to the nicer weather and the fact that I didn't want to be stuck in a gym :P Going to focus more on it next week though.

1 week left in march to round it out! Good luck people!

Group Newbie...I'm 42 and did my first two sprints a couple of years ago but injured my foot that season and am only now coming back to racing. The foot mostly is cooperative, but it complains and begs for rest every time I start to feel like I can really push it running. My goal is to do some sprints and maybe an Oly by summer's end. I got a heart rate monitor and am tackling the learning curve of finding my limits and training in zones.

Howdy, everyone!

WEEKLY TOTALS:

Last week, our team numbers were:

S 51,195 yards
B 1,335.33 miles
R 277.38 miles


Adding Robb's numbers, and mine, here we are:

S 61,976 yards
B 1,516.39 miles
R 290.48 miles

Add yours to ours and post the new distances!

B:1529.5 miles
R:298.34 miles
S 64976 yards

after i added my totals

Welcome Monkeyboy! I just took a Chi Running seminar yesterday and the first thing we covered was feet and footwear. You start with loosening up your laces so that you can just slip your shoes on and off and then you practice "the stance", which is a Tai Chi stance and your feet are parallel and shoulder length apart and you stand on the middle of your feet. I stand on the outsides of my feet due to weak adductor muscles (apparently) and have worn shoes with too much "support". When you stand correctly, you don't need to support your feet so much and the insoles feel "wrong". I whipped mine out and my feet felt SOOOO much better. The others in the class whipped theirs out, too. Actually forgot them there completely! The instructor said when you run correctly, you don't need anything other than a covering for your feet to protect them--some folks run with a rubber thingy only on their feet, or barefoot! It will take awhile to get used to standing and moving correctly and more efficiently, and certain muscles are too tight in my body, I realized. And certain muscles are weak. They give you loosening exercises that will really help, too. Very circular and tai chi like to loosen all the joints--ankles, knees, hips, spine, shoulders. AND--here's the real deal--you learn to run SOFTLY on your feet. I needed special assistance with this one. It's all about relaxing into the run and there is a neat way to run to use your hamstring muscles better by sort of kicking the heels up behind you without bringing your knees forward at all. You keep your ankles very loose and do a 85 beat cadence and use your ARMS 50%, which was a totally new concept for me! The cadence never changes, just your stride length and leaning forward more to go faster. Okay, guess I did better than I thought at describing all of it, but my point to you, is that you need to take the seminar!! Just do it


I'll post my totals after today, because I go Monday to Sunday, or I have been.......WOW with the totals so far! Just look at those numbers grow from week to week! Someone better at math and geography than me figure out where we went so far and where we are headed!

I've been learning how to use my heart rate monitor and am figuring out my zones. According to Sherrick's article at http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=... we should train mostly at 70-75% of our Max heart rate. When I do my zones according the Max heart rate formula in the BT training log area, it says the corresponding Zone 2 should be 60-70% of the Max heart rate. I'd prefer the higher heart rate as I can train a little faster, but my purpose in getting the dang thing was to keep from pushing really hard every time out. Which advice is best to follow? Who has HRM experience and can offer some advice?

Also, I see you've been keeping mileage totals. How would I calculate the time put in on the bike trainer?

I'll leave the heart rate Q to someone else that uses one more. But, I'm doing an indoor ironman challenge at the Y and according to them, group cycling counts this way: 45 minutes = 11 miles, 30 minutes = 9 miles, and every other 15 minutes put in counts as 3 miles. Now, with spinning and a group, I personally think you push harder with a lot of standing and jumps and adding resistance. On your own, one tends to just sit there and veg and watch TV or whatever. But, it wouldn't hurt to use those values for our purposes Just pat yourself on the back for doing indoor training!

SEAN--I've been pondering your supplement recommendations. I'm still struggling with this GD sinus infection, and it's getting really old! You mentioned glutamine for immune system (and muscles) and I remember my secretary reading me something about it, but I lost the article she handed me.....how much do you take mg wise and how often, and do you take it before or after exercise? Also, I've heard about the creatine, but again, how much and do you take it only on workout days, or every day and before or after? Usually when I hear something more than once, it is important enough to follow through with! And by the way, I like your idea of just hanging on to someone with the swim If my endurance doesn't get there, I'll be doing the same thing! Right now I plow through the water just to get to the other side and stop and take some really big gulps of air before plowing through to the other side again! That won't work in the lake, I realize, but I'm still not much of a fish and dislike the breathing in the water yet. I know this will come, but it hasn't so far

I looked at the total immersion site again, and may have to go with that, but I'm going to give Carlos a shot because he's so convenient, affordable and available right now. When he passes me, I'll have to try the TI. This is going to be a long process for me, I can tell. The more I do this stuff, the more I realize "I know Nothing!". But anyway, my original point here, was that they were talking about the 2 beat kick, which is sort of like cross crawl for the swim (opposite leg than arm). There is this youtube bit on their site that shows the women's 400 in Greece, and there is a 6 beat kicker next to a 2 beat kicker. I think I've been doing the faster kicks and wearing myself out, and I never even considered which leg kicked with which arm........but I'm going to try the 2bk today! So, what do the swimmers here think about that? Ya'll can advise me with any and all aspects of swimming. I need it! Oh, just another thought. There was a fellow yesterday at the running seminar talking about a tri in saltwater and how he kept getting it in his throat and had to stop because of the saltwater burn! Yikes! Hadn't even thought about saltwater! Anyone have any experience with that? I'll probably just swallow a minnow or a bug in the lakes I'm signed up for, but eventually, it would be cool to swim in the ocean.............

New totals with mine:

S 68176

B 1534.5

R 309.09

Carlos pushed me with the swim, which is good. He's got me doing butterfly kicks to strengthen those adductors, because he noticed my walking on the outsides of my feet. (Told you he's good!)

I only did 3.25 miles run today, but it was all in proper form to get my adductors going, and it was outside with one heck of a wind. Truthfully, I walked a lot of it, but all in proper chi form. It's very hard right now to run in form all the time, so I'm allowing myself to walk more. I feel like I'm learning to walk all over again--very frustrating because I want all this to be perfect YESTERDAY.

I have a long way to go this week to make my ironman in two weeks goal. I need to do 49 miles bike, 10.75 miles run and a whopping 9472 yards swim. I'll have to go Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday to get the swim all in. And both bikes are off the trainer, to get me outside more. I'm going to allow myself to use my mountain bike, too, just because I like it and I'm so weirded out with those clips. Luckily, I don't think it is possible to do chi running on a treadmill (or at least I don't get it on one), so that will get me outside with the run, too. Have to get used to those headwinds! We have a high elevation here, so there's gonna be wind!

New totals with mine:
Bike - 68,236
Run - 315
Swim - 69,176

I was freaking about how much swim I needed to complete, but I think the people who printed the ironman flyer screwed up here! They said 2.4 miles was 12,672 yards, and the pool at the Y is 25 yards so we needed to do 169 lengths or 84.5 laps. I was counting laps before, and figured I was pretty close, then today I subtracted from their yard number and freaked. Well, which is it? Because the math doesn't add up! I need to do 20.5 laps unless their yard number is correct?

Maybe I do need to go to a movie or something. It's pretty SAD when a number almost ruins your day!!!

New totals with mine:
Bike - 68,236
Run - 339
Swim - 70,976 yards

Well guys- can't say I fell off the bike b/c I did not get on the bike!!!
However got my long run in (18 miles) YEH!!! Was long and slow- actually felt ok. Maybe I can do the marathon??!!!

this week hopefully things will bck to normal ( well relatively speaking!!) with my training.

Cheers gang,

Helen

18 miles is awesome! A marathon is generally only 42km, which is about 26miles. A half mari is only 13 miles, so you cleared that no problem. How long did it take you?


Well its almost midnight here, so you know what that means. Late night work outs! lol. Going for a run outside. No pedometer though so I will just have to guess at my distance, but no big deal.

Ok so a little update after that workout.

This was my first run outdoors, in well, many years. I have been on the treadmill as of late and I must say, outdoors is a lot harder lol. Theres wind, the ground isn't flat, and its hard to keep a constant pace. I actually ended up running slightly faster than I like to, but still enjoyed it much more than the gym.


Also, I am still having trouble getting the speed I want on the bike. This goes for outdoor and on the indoor bikes. I would LIKE to be up around a constant 30km/h average, but I seem to only be able to hit that speed on very smooth, very flat or downhill roads, with not much headwind. I would say I am around 22-25km/h average when I don't have to stop/turn alot

Now I am on a mountain bike yes, and I do weigh over 200lbs, and I have only been biking for about 4 months, but I am just looking for the best tips to improve. Ive already switched to semi-slicks, and would reeeeally love to finish this race on my muddy bike lol.

So what kind of exercises do you guys recommend for improving over all speed? Hill climbs? long distance? Sprints with rest in between?

thanks for any input people! Love you all!

Doesn't it seem like you're almost walking some days when you're trying to stay within the zones? And then when I get on the bike, I can't get my heart rate up unless I'm doing hills. So I guess I'm both out of shape, and in shape.

I tossed my HRM into a cabinet and pull it out every now and then for the novelty. I know, I know, not very scientific of me. I just can't be bothered with the numbers when all I want to do is go for a run. Some days I run hard, and some days I go easy. (But lately, I haven't run at all. It's the combination of killing my treadmill and hard rain. I hear that clear skies are on the horizon.)

So long answer to your serious question about HRM training: I don't know.

As for the bike trainer, splurge on a $10 dollar speedometer at WalMart and attach it to your rear wheel. If the cord isn't long enough, you might have to tape the display to the bar instead of the handlebars, but it's worth it. I like seeing speed and distance -- it keeps me motivated to ride indoors. Now, don't get me wrong, you can spend $50 if you want. But personally, I like my cheap Spongebob model, and the more features something has -- like room temperature, suggested maintenance warning, etc. -- the easier it is for me to screw it all up.

And welcome to the group!

Okay, there's something wrong up there with that bike total!

1 mile = 1,800 yards. So you need to do 4,320 yards.

Yes, yes and yes. Time, training, and patience, young grasshopper.