Newbz' group is FULL (Page 3)

Edit:
Turns out I hit the reply button just barely too late! Had a whole profile written out and everything. Apparently I'm a super slow typer. Huge bummer.

David, if there's still room for one more, I'd love to join, but I understand if you don't want to spread yourself too thin. So if you're done accepting new people, let me know if someone drops since I really like your style.

Thanks!
Kasia


Edited by augeremt 2009-12-19 2:39 AM

I'm originally from Ohio and familiar with Dayton.  I also spent a 4 year enlistment in the Air Force, mostly in Alaska.  Honoring your Marine family members at a race will definitely make it more rewarding for you.  Will you be trying to Boston qualify?

BTW:  For swim drills I like Swim Workouts in a Binder for Triathletes

http://www.amazon.com/Workouts-Binder-Swim-Triathletes/dp/1931382204


Edited by maria40nc 2009-12-19 10:53 AM

kasia, if you check back here you're welcome to join.

nutrition wise, your goals will dictate how you approach this somewhat.

lets say like a lot of us, your goal is to start the season at your race weight (or at a certain given weight). you start training sometime in mid-winter.
when you start losing weight, your workouts will suffer a bit (how much will depend on how much of a calorie deficiet you are in, and how much weight you have to really lose, the lower your BF % goes the more this will impact your workouts). because of this, its a smart idea to try and get some of your weight loss for the year out of the way before your base starts, and through the base phase when harder workouts and quick recovery are not the focus. this is not to say that you cant keep losing weight later down the road, but it effects this more the harder you are training as you will need food to keep your body working well. and cutting it out when you need it most is never a good idea. as the season and your training phases progress, the weightloss slows a bit. Its not really a smart idea to be doing any weightloss in the few weeks leading up to bigger/longer races, as you want your body fully recovered and ready to go.

as far as the food/calorie intake. If you can the first thing to do is find your BMI (basal metobolic rate) or the amount of cal your body needs just to maintain life/weight. this does not take into account working out, etc. this gives you the base to work from. now you factor in your exercise the best you can.
some rough guidelines you can use are
running is almost ALWAYS very very close to 100 cal per mile. very big or vey small people will differ a bit here.

biking at a conversational/steady pace for someone in the 150 weight range is approx 450-550 an hour

swimming assuming you have decent form is around 250 per 1000yards.

now, first, these are rough number (the running is by far the most accuarete, but the bike/swim are very close and assuming you take into account your body size are good enough to work from.

once you have those numbers, and a goal (gain, lose, maintain) weight, you can plan from there.
if you goal is to lose and keep training well, most people recomend being 300-600 cal down per day. this will allow for approx a pound or so of weightloss per week, and still let you workout well. again bigger people can go further, smaller should stay on the lower end. much past that balance and your body starts using your own muscles for fuel and your training will suffer horribly/you may get sick, etc.

i'll write a bit more on the actual food side in a few min. need to find some food first!!

FOOD!!mmmmmm

I'm not crazy about my food, i eat well, but i will get pizza or something if i feel like it. I do however do all of my own cooking, so i know what and in what amount things are going in my food.

As far as splitting my cal sources up through the year. my yearly cycle looks like this. season ends in late sept for the most part, and i take a month or so and train not at all. recover, relax, enjoy some of the things i missed. put on a decent amount of weight here. slowly start training again and working the weight off in nov, and keep that up till the season gets closer in march

During the winter, when i am not training as much, its easy for me to just cut back how much i am eating, if i need to lose something, or just maintain if not. i'm not training a ton, so its not a problem.

as the training load goes up more and more, i start focusing on getting more high quality protien for dinner (almost all chicken and fish for me, i like it better and its cheaper ost of the timewhere i am)

once things hit full time training again, i up the veggie intake a lot, as it fills me up without adding a lot of extra cal. (for those looking to lose weight and feeling like you are always hungry, this is a good method to use).

knowing how you react to diff ratios of food will also help to fine tune things a bit, and how you eat as well. i know a lot of epople that do the small meals through the day, i tried this a few times and just felt hungry all the time. others that only eat certain foods at certain times.
i think as long as you are smart about what you are eating, and aware of what is in the food, you should be well on your way to getting that healthy.

BTW, a typical day for me would look something like this:

breakfast (assuming i eat it) could be cereal, fruit, PB&J, or more commonly i dont eat then (just dont like eating in the morning).

lunch is normally a sandwich, leftovers, or a big salad with chicken on it.

dinner is normally white rice, chicken and some sort of stir fry, or rice, chicken dipped in flour and browned, and some sort of veggi.

snack or two of fruit during the day/night.

that said, i grew up in a family of chefs and love to cook, so when i have other stuff around i'll cook anything under the sun, thats just a fairly normal day.

Thanks for the nutrition info that was very helpful!

I'm thinking about using this training program in January, what do you think of it?http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=45

I was talking to a friend and she recommending doing more brick workouts earlier than recommended in the program.

Also it seems a little weird that the program is all by time rather than distance.  What do you think of that?

I live in Canada, so we have long winters.  So most of my biking will be indoors until around May.  What resistance/level do you recommend for indoor biking?  Or should I do a hill program?  Our actual course for the race is supposed to be really flat.

Thanks so much for doing this.  This site is really helpfull for newbies, I'm over at the Oxygen womens forums allot and they don't have anything that compares to this for newbies.

I'm originally from Ohio and familiar with Dayton. I also spent a 4 year enlistment in the Air Force, mostly in Alaska. Honoring your Marine family members at a race will definitely make it more rewarding for you. Will you be trying to Boston qualify?

as far as the training goes, i actually do everything but my swimming by time, because your course for a given day and so many other things affect speed and thus how long a workout will take. or in other words, 50 miles in the mountains, and 50 miles in kansas will result in wildly diff workout times.

swimming because its such a set distance and little to change the times, lends its self very well to interval training.

as far as bricks go, you may want/need to include some now due to time/weather restrictions, but the more rest you get between workouts the better each will be and the faster you will improve (at this point there is absolutely no science to show doing bricks make you run faster off the bike, and in fact most athletes have their fastest mile off the bike and then fade.

i do include more of them in the winter simply due to time constraints.


i'm from columbus, went to school at denison university and actually almost went to U of M, and hate OSU, so you're all good!

David - Thank you for the nutritional info! 

I'm still experimenting with this because I prefer a low carb diet.  I eat a lot of meat, eggs, green veggies, and smaller amounts of fruit depending on my training.  I eat four to five times.... usually very heavy after my morning workout, then taper down as the day progesses with a light evening meal.

I'm grew up in Warren OH (just south of Cleveland).  Then I moved to Columbus to attend DeVry Institute of Tech.  From there I joined the Air Forc and was sent to Alaska for 4 years, then Kokomo IN, then here!

Scooby - I'm about to start a BT program also and thought the same thing about time rather than distance.  I'm kind of funny about that and tend to prefer even distances.  I pretty much know what I can do with each of the times and will likely adjust them to a distance as I go.  Some people follow plans exactly (I know, trust the plan!); others tweak.  I'm the latter.

Chris - I recently read Joe Friel's Paleo Diet for Athletes, and that's pretty close to what I've been practicing for the past 4 months.  I feel awesome and my energy level has been great, but I'm still making adjustments to diet.  I know low carb isn't for everyone and is controversial for endurance athletes; but I like to read many different sources then make an informed decision.

i had a few friends that grew up in warren!!

hope anyone that is on the east coast made it through the snow storms ok, my car looks like a giant iceberg right now!

My brother is a lineman and is in Charleston W. Va. working right now.  This will be his 4th Christmas in a row he has been gone working to restore power to customers from Ohio, W. Va, Indiana and Michigan.  Last year at this time he and I both were working to restore power to our own area in NE Indiana.  I am a line crew supervisor with a different group that works transmission voltages (substation to substation) and our stuff is built heavier and we usually have less damage.

I feel for everyone that's "lights out" right now, but don't forget the guy working in horrible conditions to get it back on.

No snow here.  It stayed just north and west of Fayetteville.  Was a lovely day for a bike ride. 

Got to try out my new aerobars!  But the ride was difficult due to high winds and I could not stay in the aerobars much due to the hills.  I think we'll get a chance to head up to Raleigh and ride the Oly route next weekend.  Then next time head to White Lake to ride the HIM route, which should be nice and flat (for a change!).

How is eveyone doing with biking for the winter?  I assume most is on trainer?  I've not used my trainer much but I just bought two of the Spinervals; Tough Love and Aerobase. 

What's everyone doing on trainers for winter workouts?

Edited by maria40nc 2009-12-20 7:41 PM

tough love is a nasty workout!!

been outside thus far, mountain bike only till after nw years/roads re clear again.

mainly just running right now working on getting the milage up over 50mpw, biking 2 days a week right now, and adding swimming in starting this week

David -- thanks for the swim training info.

We got enough snow here (Lex, KY) to build our first snowman of the year.  I grew up in WI and UP of MI, so miss the big snow this time of year.  But not so much come April!

philly where i am, and DC ended up getting hit the worst, around 15 in or so. in ohio what was never too bad but i guess in an effort to cut costs philly is now only salting and now plowing roads, its a mess.

I feel left out. I live in Florida and we didn't get snow at all. It did dip into the 40's though and that qualifies as a cold snap for us. It was pretty rough, I had to turn on the heat to take the chill out of the house.  Just kidding around. I feel for those who lost power. I was out for weeks when we had all those hurricanes and it does suck, especially for those with kids.  
_______________________________________________________________________________

I did this today in 11:10 for a 2:14 min/yard pace.  (sigh)  I'd be happy if I could just get under 2 min.  My new training plan started today, so I'll be more focused with drills.  I'll time it again in a month.  It is what it is, and it can only get better...

Question:  How important is kicking?  I've heard that kicking is not so important and to save the legs for the bike and run.  But another triathlete here on BT has really emphasized the importance of kicking because he says "it's your motor".

I seem to only have front wheel drive and barely move with the kickboard.  How much importance should I place on this?

kicking can if used/practiced be a big help.
something to know about it though, roughly 20% of your forward movement comes from kicking if done well, but roughly 80% of your oxygen needs come from kicking/the legs.

because of this, regardless of how you are going to kick on race day, i think its good to practice often in training, so that even if you only use it a little for balance in the water, it wont tire you out much. and if you can kick more in races without it killing you, you will go faster.

so with that said, a good 2 to 4 beat kick (2, 3, or 4 leg kicks per stroke cycle) will help with distance swimming a lot in both speed and body position in the water.

Thanks for letting me in the group pretty late. It's great reading these threads. My profile is below.

I have a question regarding hill workouts. I'll be doing my first Olympic triathlon in mid-April and the course is pretty hilly (only found that out after I registered...I should've thought ahead). So I was wondering in which phase of training do you start incorporating hill workouts into your training runs and rides?


A bit delayed due to travel and holiday family time, but here's my profile:

NAME: augeremt/Kasia

STORY: I've been pretty athletic most of my life, playing soccer through high school, picking up rugby in college and continuing that ever since (I'm 25 now). My shoulder's have been really bugging me lately so I've stopped with the rugby and looked for something else to get me fit. Since I'm not a huge fan of running and I need something to work towards, I figured I'd try tris, since I'm pretty good at swimming and like biking, so two out of three ain't bad.

FAMILY STATUS: Single, no kids, no dogs. Sadness about the dogs part. I move too much to have one quite yet.

CURRENT TRAINING: Been running and swimming a couple times a week, but am starting a formal 20-week Olympic training plan next week.

2010 RACES: So far, I'm only signed up for an Oly in Vegas on April 17th, but I'm thinking that if I like the training and the sport enough then I may do another one in Colorado in mid-June and possibly a third in August. But that all depends.

WEIGHTLOSS: Even with all these sports, I've always had a problem with my weight, which is another motivation for doing triathlons since it'll keep my fitness up while working towards a goal. So I'm looking to lose some weight while also having fun.

WHY I'D LIKE TO JOIN: I'm a super newbie to triathlons and would love mentoring in tri-specific areas. That, and I'd like the companionship of others through winter training.


Edited by augeremt 2009-12-21 3:07 PM

I can really tell a difference myself when I don't kick and I can tell a bigger difference if I kick from the hip or at the knees.  I feel like I get more power from the hips and allows for quicker sets. 

Question: Are you supposed to kick from the hips (makes sense to me) or from the knees.  I do have trouble as I get tired because I drift back to the "knee" kick.

Side note: I watched my daughters swim meet today and saw a kid with fairly bad form (windmill) swimming the 200 free in about the same time as me.  Kinda made me feel like an ungifted, untalented -un-athlete.  I had to laugh to myself.

Sorry for the late replies, i have been driving for the past 10 hours or so. gag.

Kasia welcome,

Dirk, the kick should come from the hip and be a fluid movement, not a bit knee bend. think of your leg like a whip.
I know what you mean about some people and the windmill out of the water, but frankly what your arm does out of the water is a very small part of the picture. whats going on under matters a lot more. there was a dutch woman a few years back whose arms didnt bend at all out of the water, was crazy to watch!

KC, if you dont come from a swim background you can deff make improvments on 3 swims a week. how much will depend on how much work you want to put into it, but 3 solid swims a week will get you headed in the right direction. for what its worth my first season or two i ave prob 2-3 swims in the winter and 2 a week over the summer and was fine and got faster. down the road though it became nessisary to start swimming more in order to keep dropping time (this was a big goal of mine though so i wanted to work on that).

OA place/name swim T1 Bike T2 Run OA Time

1 David Savoie 10:10 0:43 33:43 0:29 20:24 1:04:58


2 Scott Goertemiller 10:04 1:08 33:43 0:49 20:20 1:05:14


just wanted to put this up in here, its up in the main forum but thought it would be something worth thinking about. this is from a sprint race this spring on a HILLY course. i raced it as a taper before a half ironman. anyway the point of this is to show how transitions from swim to bike and bike to run are part of the race, and can help or hurt your overall time (assuming time is a goal vs just finishing).
so on some of those days where the weather is nasty, or you are looking for something to practice but dont feel like working out, here is something to play around with!