Jeffrey Parr's Group - CLOSED (Page 3)

You sound like you swim about my pace.  I'm a 1:45/100yd swimmer.  I use to be liek you and start in the back and on the outside and every other place I could think of.  Then I finally decided I was going to start were I thought I shoud, which was closer to the front.  And here is my reason.  I am a very good average swimmer.   Not super fast like some, but not slow and can get through an entire swim with little problems.  I would start more towards the front.  Depending on how big your wave is, within the first couple rows.  Figure the first couple rows are probably all good swimmers who are going to go out hard and be fast the entire time.  Then you are going to get your overachievers who will go out hard and die quickly.  You want to be in front of those people.  Then you have your people in the back who know they are going to be slow.

So my strategy is to start up front, try to draft off faster swimmers and avoid the washing machine.  The better swimmers are more awear of there surrounding and don't want to kick you anymore then you want to be kicked.  Plus you can avoid passing all the people who go out to hard and die.  In olympic distance races you don't want to be stuck in a slow pack of your own wave and start to come along slower people in the wave ahead of you.

As for drafting, practice this in a pool.  I still have problems doing this in a race.  I can never find anyone who is my speed or slightly faster.

Lets start off first with the training question.  The best way to train is preiodization.  This is dividing your season into blocks.  Here is an article that talks about it really well.  http://www.d3multisport.com/articles/periodization.html
For day to day training it depends on a couple things, 1. How much time do you have to train. 2. What are your goals for racing/triathlon. 3. What is your current fitness level.
I personally will train a lot of days, twice a day.  I always take at least one day per week as a rest or very very little work.  Example.  Today is rest, but my rest will include 20mins of core work and some stretching. Yesterday was an easy swim and hard bike intervals.  Tomorrow will be swim intervals and a long bike.  Friday will be a shorter bike and swim practice with the TriGators.  Sat a long bike.  you kind of get the idea.  I may do 2 workouts/day, but one is always easy or short.  And since I am in my base phase right now, the goal is increasing duration with moderate intesity.

HR is a very difficult thing.  I never use HR as a stand alone measure of exercise.  Most charts that you see use you age predicted max, which is 220-age.  Your max HR is more based on your fitness rather then your age.  While 198 is extremely high, it would not be uncommon for a girl your age if you are working at an all out effort.  And I've never liked the term "training HR." What is training.  Well it goes back to the periodization.  What are you training.  If you are looking to increase your base endurance, then you should have a HR around 60-65% max HR, looking to increase lactate threshold around 75%.  Get the point.  For a spinning class, you should probably be at least 70% of your max.  If you max HR is 200 based on the 220-age theory, going between 70-90%, your HR should be between 140-180.  And yes, you will get a lot of interference from other HRMs.

Hopefully this was more helpful then confusing.

Hi Jeff and group!!!  

- question regarding bike maintenannce and the dreaded 'changing a bike tire". Are others as in-ept as I am when it come to general bike maintance and changing a tire. I'm probably jinxing myself -however have not had to change a tire (ever) especially during a race. I've made it one of my goals to learn how to do this. Trying to convince the local bike store to run a clinic for dummies like me. How about the rest of you guys?

-Helen

Well Helen, before I was ever interested in triathlons, I build bikes.  So changing a tire was pretty easy for me.  Also, when I got my first road bike, the tire were not very strong and I got a flat 5mins into my first ride on the bike.  Then had another 5 flats over about 8-10 weeks, so I got pretty good at changing a tire.  Clinics are great, but you can't always get bike shops to put one on.  Most places will at least do a one-on-one training.  Plus you should always feel confident about doing it by yourself at home.

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=1223

Here is a link to a video for changing bike tires.  A BTer did it on there back pouch.  May be a little helpful.  And I think they say it in the video, but the most important thing about changing a tire is having the right equipment.

Maybe you need to define mising things up for me?  You seem to do a lot of spin class and I would assume that they make you "mix things up" and that you are not always going one speed.  For the swim, I could easyly sent you a workout that would make you work harder.  As for the run, thats easy, when running add in 5x30" strides (run as hard/fast as you can) with 30" rest.  If you are using a treadmill, do a 15' warm-up, then 400m at 5k pace, 400m easy.  Do that like 4 times.  Cool down 10' and you've gone about 6K. 

Good luck with you triathlong program, they should also help you change things up and it will be nice to have people to train with.  As for weights.  I am a big fan and would like to see you getting in about an hour workouts 2-3 times/wk depending on where you are in the season.  But if all you can do and will do is 15mins I would suggest doing a bout of core/abs.  Strengthing your core will help prevent injuries and make all other disciplines easier.

Being able to do a hill workout or something different is great.  But I live in Florida and don't have access to hills.  Don't worry about training a specific kind of workout, just go out and have fun.  If you start worrying to much about, I have to do a hill workouts, I have to do some sprints.  You are going to dread going out to do your workout.  If you are on the trainer, just say "I'm going to drop it down a couple gears and see how long I can hold a high rpm."  Make little challenges and games out of workouts.

For the swim workouts you would just have to let me know what kinds of things you want to work on with swimming and I could post a workout or two.

In Florida, I hate both lake and ocean swims.  Alligators vs sharks.  Oceans can be kind of rough if its windy, but the current can also help you as well.  Lake swims are usually easier, but if you have a big enough lake and some winds, you can get some currents.  Swim times in the ocean and lake should be faster because the salt water makes you more bounent(spelling).  Now if you swim in a fresh water lake, its just like a pool.  Current and just the number of people around you can slow you down in both lakes and oceans.  I recommend practicing both if you get a chance.

Something that has come up here before and I just saw in a group members blog, WEIGHT TRAINING.

I am a huge fan of weight training, and now that i'm off crutches, you will see that I am getting back to the gym more often.  I use weight training as a mode of injury prevention.  We place a lot of stress on our bodies through all the cardio we do, so we need to have strong muscles and joints to protect us.  What frequency I recommend to my athletes for weight training is completely dependent on where they are in there season and what there goals are.  During offseason I will have them lifting between 3-5 days per week.  During preseason, about 3 times a week.  During season twice a week and then I never have them lift for 2wks before a big race.  Most of my workouts are strength specific to triathlon.  I do a lot of legs and lower body and focus upper body on strength specific to swimming.

Probably the most important part of strength training is training the abs/core.  This can be done everyday in a 15-20 minute routine.  Core strength helps your entire body to work together and allows power transfer to the run or bike.

With all this being said, strength training does have a downside.  You need to make sure you keep up your flexibility when strength training. So STRETCH, STRETCH, STRETCH.  It is best to stretch after a workout when your body is at its warmest point.  This is when you will make the most improvements flexibility.

MYTHS: I'm a girl, so I don't want to get big muscles.  Females don't produce enough testosterone to get bukly like males.  So unless you are taking steriods you have no worries. 

Heh gang- sorry about the lack of posts- busy with work/ training, work and life!! 

-I have a 30 km race end March- Around The Bay- the oldest race in apparently North America (older than Boston) It's a tough course (darn hills- and dont have any hills here in SW Ontario-henceforth any grade anywhere kills me (however -  do ok with wind???!!)-anyway- its been tough staying motivated- I think especially since its  cold and miserable out. I think the only thing right now keeping me motivated is the race coming up. Wish I had some motivaion for the dieting part- becasue that is truly lacking!!!

-Helen

-

Dana,

Here is my suggestions.  And this kind of depends on how your other workouts are structured.  But with 2-3 runs/week I would make one of them a long run.  I wouldn't do any "speed" work during your long run.  The purpose of a long run is to build endurance.  I would do one workout of "speed."  Preferablly if you can get to a track and do this workout, otherwise you can do it during your normal routes.  Instead of using distance use time.  And if you can get in a 3rd run I would just use it as a recovery run.  Maybe after a hard bike or swim day.  Or even after the hard run day.  Here are 2 examples I would give clients of run workouts.  This is assuming your long run is 6 miles

At the track:
1 mile warm-up run
stretch anything that feels tight
3x400 with RI of 200 easy jogs (400's should be at around an 8:30min/mile pace)
Jog an EZ 800 with strides at the beginning and at 400 mark. (strides last for 30"
Cool-down 800
Stretch

3-mile route
10' warm-up
5x1' at 80% with 1' rest interval
10' cool-down
Stretch
This should take about 30mins and get you about 3miles.

For the speed workouts you really need to push yourself hard.  For the long run you need to concentrate on form/hydration and pacing.  Don't go fast out, then slow down, then pick it up, then slow down.  Get into a comfortable pace and hold it the entire run.