Ironman St. George - Utah : Official Thread (Page 25)

Quick question for those of you who know what you are doing. Cause I dont!
training was going great until last monday when I ended up having emergancy intestinal surgery. (Tubes got twisted and blocked) Random..  Anyway, I was in bed all last week, that was supposed to be my biggest volume week, but did get in 19 hours the week before leading up to it.  I think I will be able to start swimming by the end of this week, Bike by the weekend, and running later next week.  Should I try to ramp up the volume for a week? long hours, or follow a normal taper since it will be two weeks away from the race?  
thanks
Monte 

I personally think ramping it up isn't going to help much and signifigantly increase risk of injury.

FWIW, my two cents is taper.  IMO, a lot of people don't taper sufficiently.  The gains in fitness vs. the amount of recovery needed becomes pretty unfavorable when you try to go long in the last three weeks.  And are you really recovered enough from abdominal surgery last week to do a peak distance ride?  Seems like a really bad idea...esp. if you've already put in a 19 hour week.

Good luck!

The most important thing for you is to be healthy come race day...You have 3.5 weeks...normal taper is on order...taper includes a few higher intensity workouts, give them a try but only if you are healed.

I really hate running right now...Just finished my last long run. 18 miles of which the last 2 were a real suck-fest. Hot and windy today and I was behind on my hydration and my calves let me know about it. Decided to basically pull the plug around mile 16 and walked more than I ran. No injuries which was my only real goal for today so I call it a good, but painful day. One more long ride and a long swim and time for taper.

The only dreaded thing left is to take my new wetsuit to the gym and do a bit of swimming in it. Should be big fun...

I think I am going to brew a batch of beer this weekend to celebrate taper. Any homebrewers out there?

Used to be...until I quit drinking...

I have a Bock that should be good to go the day I get back.  I can't wait!

15 miles tonight, 5k yards tomorrow, then 100+ miles Sat.

THEN I'm done with the long stuff...  Downhill from there.

Swim taper on!

Did 4300 yds nonstop in the pool tonight.  Longest single swim and biggest swim volume week:  Done.

Last week was peak volume for run and bike and my last long run.  Only have a planned 112.5 mile ride on Saturday left before full on taper.

Hurray!  Athlete Guide!

And hurray...athlete shuttle from T2/finish on race morning!

Ok...so what is the Athletes Guide, and were to do you find it?

Right here.

They sent the link in an e-newsletter yesterday, but it can be found on the "Race Essentials" tab on the ironmanstgeorge.com homepage.

(Mandatory reading...tells you things like your "special needs bags will not always be returned"...whatever that means, really...)

I am positive that in the FAQ it previously said Gatorade Endurance. (Now FAQ reflects athlete guide.) Thirst Quencher most definiteyl does not equal Endurance formula, correct? That changes my nutrition plan all around!

I've emailed them to have them verify the lack of sodium content in the Gatorade available.

Edited by robin314159 2010-04-09 2:00 PM

This doesn't inspire confidence. I asked if the Gatorade Thirst Quencher being provided was different from the high-sodium Gatorade Endurance formula. This is the response:

Hello Robin-
Thank you for your email. We will be providing Gatorade Thirst Quencher on the course. I was told that there wasn't much of a difference but I am not completely sure. Please be sure to attend the mandatory Athlete Meeting Thursday, April 29th.

tcovert:

I was also surprised to learn that neoprene booties would be allowed in the swim. That was news to me.

I saw that and I may go buy some this week. 

What about ear plugs for the swim? Does anyone use these?  I did an open water swim last week with the water temp at 60 and everything was fine until my swim cap started letting water into my ear.  30 min of that and I had to stop, it was very painful.

How should you feel at this point?  This is my last big week and I have only made two workouts this week.  I am tired and every joint below the waist is sore and stiff.  So much so I feeling like I am on the edge of pushing to hard to recover in three weeks.  Do I try and do the 3hr run and 120 mile bike or just start a taper?

Edited by Sully_Joe 2010-04-09 2:40 PM

Yeah, I wondered about that recently...I wanted to verify the nutritionals on GE and didn't see it on their site anywhere.

Honestly, I train with G2, which has basically the same electrolytes as regular Gatorade, so this switch works fine for me.  Regular Gatrorade has higher calories than G2, but I factor that into my race nutrition plan.

You don't need them.  I race there this time of the year all the time and it's not bad at all.

I am please to report:  Last long ride, DONE!!!!  115 mile today in 6:30...  Just a run and swim left over the weekend!

I hope like heck the water temperature gets up to at least 55 degrees for the race. I was talking to one of the pros (he shall remain nameless but he helped with the original race announcement and now lives in Austin) and he says there is a POSSIBLITY they'd consider cancelling the swim if the water does not get above 55. At that temperature if you're in the water longer than 1:20 it's very possible for hypothermia to set in.

I know they've done early races in St George in the past and I would have to believe Escape from Alcatraz also has very cold water temps so I just hope the water warms up a little.

In any case, nothing we can do to control it. Water will be cold for everyone.

Sounds like I need to make an effort to get down to the beach for a swim sooner rather than later, before the water warms up anymore (already 60F or higher at the local beaches).

Looks like Sand Hollow is still in the low 50s.  I've done a couple half mile swims in 56F water (one of them without a wetsuit, actually) and it's definitely not what I'd call a rockin' good time...15 minutes in that water was plenty.  I'm sure I could have managed the additional 55-60 minutes it'd have taken to finish the iron distance, but the challenge would be to not rush to try to get out of the water sooner and have the swim blow up entirely.

Well, it has 3 weeks to warm up. I looked at the weather for the next 10 days, and it says it's gonna be in the 70s up there. If it remains in the mid-70s/low-80s, then perhaps it will warm up enough so we all don't go numb in the water. Phoenix has been in the 70s and 80s for a while, and the lake I was in on Thursday is in the low 60s, I believe. Perhaps I'm just being optimistic to get rid of my nerves.

I need some advice.

I have been struggling with my training. In November, I sprained my left ankle. I think that I started back training too soon because I almost immediately ended up with peroneal tendonitis in my right ankle in January. That has healed and I was nervous about my low training volume and so was going to hit things pretty hard in March and the first part of April and had managed to get to about 60 miles on the bike and 14 miles on the run when 10 days ago I fell down the stairs and re-sprained my left ankle.

The doctor says that my ankle will likely be almost 100% by race day. If I had been at full training, I don't think that this would be a problem. I would just count it as an extra long taper and struggle through the race.

So, here's the question. Do I still race? I have been gearing upfor this since I signed up the day that registration opened. Everything has been focused on May 1, 2010. Do you think that with this low amount of training, I could still get through this race? Maybe I should just do a half later in the summer?

Thoughts? I am really agonizing over this. I have NEVER quit a race.