Newbz' Spring mentor group- FULL!!!! (Page 3)

Question -

As I have mentioned, I am working towards my first tri on Memorial Day.  My struggle (BIG TIME) is the swim.  Since this is my first race i don't have any big dreams of astonishing times.... I just want to finish feeling good.  My question is when you are doing an open water swim, what is the best way to take a breather if you need to... catch your breath and regroup?

being comfortable will do more than anything in helping to calm down/take a rest, and may even get you to the point where you wont need to.

that said, moving to breast stroke or simply treading water would be my guess as to the easiest way.

the more you swim the more you will be ok in the water and this alone will do more than anyhting to help with nerves on race day.

when you get enough training under your belt that racing feels like training, you get into a race and all you have to do is press play.

I can see that... I guess I'm just worried about how comfortable I am going to be able to get over the next 6 weeks.  I'm in the pool 3 days per week but 6 weeks is not long for someone as new to "real swimming" as I am.

what do those swims look like right now?

I just today started the 0-1650 in six weeks plan - http://ruthkazez.com/ZeroTo1mile.html/>
I figured it would be a good workout to push myself with... I started updating my training log last week.  I'm not sure if it is public or not - I'm still figuring things out.

The plan calls for 4x100, 4x50, 4x25 with very short rests for three workouts this week.  Today I was only able to do 2x100, 4x50, 4x25 and I am really hoping to complete it as written on workout #2 this week.

This program is for 1650 in six weeks and my sprint is 750... so my thinking is if I struggle with the workout I should be okay with my distance come race day.  But, that is just "newbie think."

Right now I do a short interval day, med interval day, and a long constant swim (i still can't swim for very long). 
For example last weeks swims:

Wed - 1 x 400, 4 x 100, 4 x 50, 4 x 25
Fri - 5 x 200
Sun - 800

I also try to add in drills after each workout.

i also have curiosities about HR.  I have a Polar F6 and partly because the strap never stays up (not too loose) and i'm not really sure how to maximize the effectiveness of utilizing training zones (or setting them up for that matter).  I've just resorted to using RPE for the time being.

Did you consider a rope, buoy, or boat?  Maybe some of the experienced guys can comment if they've seen this.  Per USAT rules.

4.2 Bottom Contact and Resting.

 

 

A participant may stand on the bottom or rest by holding an inanimate object

such as a buoy, boat, rope or floating object. Excluding the bottom, a participant shall not use any inanimate object

to gain forward progress.

i'll try to hit everyones questions here.

Swimming:
on the swimming front, any and all help you can get with your form will do wonders for you, even if its only from a friend that is a swimmer, the highshcool swimmer there, etc.
yes you can hang onto/stop/stand anywhere during the swim, walk even, you just can pull yourself forward or get help.


HR training:
on the HR front. i tend to shy away from HR for a number of reasons. the first and largest reason is that for me at least it varies WAY too much to be exact. time of day, heat/cold, your mood, caffiene, what you had to eat, cadence, and a host of other things can all effect HR. to me that is simply too much to rely on. with that said, i know a lot of epople that do use them, and do well. in the times i have used them for training the most useful area for me was longer/easy runs in helping me not go too hard.

I tend to all my running by preceived effort, swimming is done with the pace clock, for me cycling is done with a power meter (baring that i am back to preceived effort, not HR). I am fairly comfortable with what my body is doing and the paces i am hitting, so this is not too much of an issue. If you do use HR, remember that it is a tool and not set in stone, and learn its limits and when to break them. if you follow it 100% you will find yourself overdoing it at times, and at others it will hold you back.


trainging levels/intensity:
This answer is not going to be totally what you are looking for, but, it depends.....
there are a number of things that will effect this, such as your total training load, fitness levels, race goals, and recovery time.

if you want to sum it up in short, your training goals would look like this- you want to do as much work with the least amount of stress to your body, so you can repeat as often as possible. in other words, you are much better served by constant, day to day training then by super hard/big workouts that leave you wrecked for a few days. if you train a bit less/less intensity but can do it daily, you will in the long run come out ahead of someone hammering out each workout.
that said, there are times to push it, and at diff levels.
before i go on with this, a quick note about the sports.

in swimming you can/should be going hard in pretty much every workout, no impact, much less injury risk

in biking you can/should be going hard in just over half your rides

running you should not be going hard all that much, and very little if at all if you are running under 20miles a week.

i try to work about 1/3rd of my riding at tempo pace(3 hour race pace) or 80-85%max), and 1 day a week with about 20-40 min of threshold pace work (1 hour race pace or 90-95%max)
the rest is zone 2/cruising all day pace.

running i have 1 tempo run, and one harder run a week, the rest easy.

i prefer tempo work for my harder work because it on its own is not a hard pace to hold, it simply becomes hard over a longer period of time. because of this it does not beat up the body as much, and you can thus spend a lot more time here (much more cycling than running due to impact).


you want to pick levels that will allow you to get the most out of each workout without beating you up, and this means a crusing pace most of the time for the bike/run.

running wise that means most of my runs are done approx 1:35-2:00 min per mile slower than 5k pace, and the easier riding i am doing is signifigantly slower than race pace.

There is a lot information all together but very useful.
I agree with you David about HR I was trying to train with the zones but I notice that my HR is changing every short period of time.Some days I'm running to slow pace and I have my HR so high.Also depending on my daily nutrition or work.
I was almost out off training last week just I did 2 days workout.My swimming pool was closed last week and this week until wendsday.My right knee is killing me every time that I'm running in the last 2 weeks.I decide to take it easy,I don't have any race comming soon. Problably when when I start training again after the recovery the HR be better.

sometimes your body and/or life forces some time off. i just had three unplanned days in a row off (for me this is unheard of during season), then another day with very short workouts, but in the end i now feel better training and things are going well into the first race of the year.

good luck with the knee, ice and proper shoes do wonders!

Yep.  Sometimes both at the same time....  I was unable to do my long bike on Sunday because my son busted his face up.  I was literally 5 miles from one of the great climbs on the east coast (Mt Mitchell), sitting in an emergency room for hours...  Also managed to hurt my shoulder last week swimming.  I probably won't swim again until my race (Oly) this weekend.  Oh well.

As for HR training, I'll offer a slightly different persepctive.  I've been working on learning how to do it over the past several months.  I agree that HR varies due to several factors.  Hence one definitely doesn't want to be a slave to the numbers.  But staying focused on it for several months, I've learned a lot about what factors affect my HR, and by how much, and this has put me in pretty good touch with how I'm doing physically at any given time, just because I've been forcing myself to examine every factor that could be affecting HR.  Anyway, HR is just another fact to take into account, but one that I've found useful for many types of workout, most especially long runs.

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As for HR training, I'll offer a slightly different persepctive.  I've been working on learning how to do it over the past several months.  I agree that HR varies due to several factors.  Hence one definitely doesn't want to be a slave to the numbers.  But staying focused on it for several months, I've learned a lot about what factors affect my HR, and by how much, and this has put me in pretty good touch with how I'm doing physically at any given time, just because I've been forcing myself to examine every factor that could be affecting HR.  Anyway, HR is just another fact to take into account, but one that I've found useful for many types of workout, most especially long runs.

I have really come to love my HR monitor.  I ran with a polar for a long time and just recently switched to garmin.  Knowing my goal pace and distance while monitoring my heart gets me there.  For example, this morning I did a 6 mile run and I knew that in order to push myself and finish the distance I needed to stay below 170 and ideally stay closer to 160.

Also, the HRM challenges me when I am running and mentally I'm feeling unmotivated and slowing but I can look at the HRM and see it is all in my head.

My two cents...

I just started using a HRM about 2 months ago.  Before that I would run quite a bit all on how I felt only.  I have to say that using the HRM has been a great help in just gauging where you are physically during the exercise.  At least for someone like me that tends to push it all the time.  I agree with Dave about using the HRM in order to keep a level tempo pace, it seems to work best for that occasion.  I agree that the reading can be skewed with different factors and the HRM only provide s a semi accurate reading, with in a few heart beats fluctuation.  

I am not sure if I want to use it during my race though...I see many people do and I fell like I should too, but I am afraid of the mental hold up  it may put on my mind.  Any thoughts about that would be helpful.  



 

Personally I race with my HRM but just to check my times in each event and see my final number in the review. When you are racing you forget about everything around you. The less important in that moment is your HR is "HIGH ALL THE TIME" from the moment that you arrive to the place of your race.

Good stuff...I am really tempted to just go with out it and use the "Force".  Terrible, I know...another question, I am aware of the rules regarding swimming set forth by the USAT.  How are the rules different for the pool events.  The sprint this weekend is a pool swim, so I am not sure about the differences if any...

I hope all is well with everyone...stay healthy and be safe.

I'm not sure why I am putting this up here but I thought I should.

I registered yesterday for my first race.  I had been putting it off... maybe because subconciously I was unsure or wanted to be able to back out... anxiety maybe?  Well, I took the plunge and registered for my first tri yesterday, the Capital of Texas Triathlon.  I chose the "first tri" distance (400/6/3.1) which took some humbling but I thought I would enough to think about at my first event and first open water swim and going for this "first tri" division seemed wise.  So, now just need to keep motivation high in training for the Memorial Day event!

I'm on a similar path.  I had the same thoughts as well.  
My first tri will be a sprint in July, then an Olympic in September. 

Question about swim wave starts.

Are they typically by Age?  I assume elites would be first off.
Being 49, I'm guessing I'll be in one of the last waves.

So how do we link up everyone for friends and the logs and such for this training??

I still haven't figured that out... I made mine "public" I think but I don't know anything about this "friends" business.