Athena/ Clydesdale Official Mentor Group (Page 30)

SO JEALOUS!

You live within 20 minutes of ALL of your races!?  Man, I have to travel at least two and a half hours to get to any race I want, 5 hours for Hunter Mtn, and 10 hours for White Lake.

Merry belated Christmas to all.  Did everyone go out and play with their new tri-toys yet?  My wife totally caught me off guard and got me some great new running shoes, Saucony Guide 5's.  Very skeptical after not trying them on first or anything but she went to the local running store and the guy pointed her in that direction saying that it's a great all around shoe for people of my size.  Went for a quick 2 mile jaunt yesterday and they felt amazing.  My old Nike Dual Fusion's were just that, old.  Also gave the new Timex Global Trainer a try, so much fun to decipher all the new data to see how I'm training.  Tonight, trip to the YMCA to check out the pool and hopefully sign up.

Jon,  that's great about the new kicks and the Timex global trainer! Jon,  hope you like what you see at the Y. Keep in mind this time of year is usually very busy with the new year's resolution people joining.  Give it a month and then you will see a drop in people there.  As a regular at my Y,  I hate this time of year because it usually messes with my routine/schedule.

I got some new gear and bought some for my DH too.  I got a new bottle bracket and cages for my bike.   I have two cages on the frame already and usually finish both bottles on a short ride in the heat so I knew that I needed to add bottles for the olympic distance ride. My amazing husband found a cool bracket that attaches to the back of my seat and then the two cages attach to it.  Best part is that he found cages that match my bike!  Now, just have to get a small bag to fit on top bar by my stem that can hold my cell phone, gels and sports beans.  Bought my DH a new helmet and aero bracket and bottle system.

I also got a waterproof mp3 but the ear phones that came with it keep falling out when I swim so I am waiting for the new set I ordered to arrive hopefully tomorrow and hopefully will be more successful. It is really sort of strange swimming with music playing in my ear but makes the drills so much less boring.  I did a long swim on Monday morning - 1800 yards nonstop and made sure to do it without music since I won't have it during the aquavelo - train like you race so they say.

Lastly,  I got a Body Media LINK armband which monitors my calorie burn and activity level. I did get it right after Thanksgiving and have been wearing it for a month now.   This is like the armbands they use on Biggest Loser.  It has been an eye opener for me since I have been trying for years now to lose weight with little success despite doing just about everything right - exercise, weighing food, eliminating unhealthy foods, having my RMR checked, met with nutritionist, thyroid medication,etc, etc, etc.  It has been a long struggle that even weight watchers could not fix.  I have learned through wearing the armband that I am actually burning a lot more calories each day than I thought and had put my body into starvation mode by eating 1450 calories per day.  The numbers show I should be eating closer to 1900. Totally staying away from the scale for the next couple of weeks and keeping up my usual routine of healthy eating and exercise.

Off to the basement for my trainer ride - going to be a rough one - low RPM, hard gear = grinding away pretending to be going up hills!

DB what do you have for equipment and what are you looking for in terms of an app/program?  Do you want to measure speed/cadence, power, distance, any of those or all of those?  Most common answer is a speed/cadence sensor (Garmin GSC) and an ANT+ stick for your laptop, then get TrainerRoad and go from there.  That's what I've been doing for the last month or so and it's pretty awesome.  Great for tracking your progress and tons of options for rides and relatively cheap compared to a an actual power meter that goes on the bike.  If you have a watch (Garmin 310/910, Timex Global Trainer, Polar, etc) then you can just get the speed/cadence sensor and the watch will give you some good outputs and then you don't have to spend the extra money.

I finally joined the YMCA the other day and did my first swim this morning.  Wow, no joke.  I did 1000 yards total and was beat.  I want to just get in the water a bit more then I fully intend on taking some lessons because there's no way I'm efficient in the water right now.  Between all the starting and stopping I was around 2:10/100y but I wasn't going any further than 100y at a time.  I plan on being a fish the next few months to improve this big time.

You can't leave it hanging like that!  What did you get?  Pics?  Why did you go that way instead of a tri bike?  (Personally, I think a road bike is a better choice, unless you expect to be on the podium on a regular basis.)

Very much my thinking, motor over money I mean.  My background is a little different.  I used to marshal/referee USA Cycling races; including races like the Tour de Georgia, Tour of Missouri, Green Mountain Stage Race, and the Tour of Battenkill.  UCI/USAC rules don't allow aeros except for time trials, so I didn't see a lot of those.  But I have worked many races that were centuries or bigger and watched those guys average speeds I only dream of, 22, 23, even 25 mph AVERAGE!  So to my way of thinking a road bike is certainly capable of turning better times than I am capable of.

I am considering a Cannnondale Synapse with a 105 groupo for this year, just don't know if I want to drop the money or stick it out with "Big Red, my current Bianchi.  My LBS says this bike is "as good a fit as we're going to get with this frame" but says the Synapse would be a much better fit for me.  If I was only looking at Olys and Sprints this year I'd probably put off buying the C'dale.  But I'm planning that HIM in September and I want to be riding 75 mile training rides before then.  Somehow it just seems to me that I'd be much more comfortable on a frame designed for endurance.

Swim - 900 yds - 21m of actual effort, give or take

Not a blistering pace, but after not having done any regular swimming since, oh September or so, I am satisfied with it. (can you even set a "blistering pace" in the water?)

DBG, I do not have the luxury of much of a choice.  There are four bike shops within a 90 minute drive of me.  Farthest away has the best selection, but I can't see myself doing 70 miles each way for service.

The closest is the rat b*****d that I bought the Bianchi from.  Not impressed that they set me up with a bike that didn't fit right (and can't be adjusted to within my range).  Not satisfied with the five minute fit they did when I brought it back the next day.  Will NEVER go back there again!  Not even for a tube.

The other two both sell Trek, but the shop I usually frequent also sells Cannondale, Scott, and Giant.  And Marty''s has fantastic service!  It just seems right to buy the shop from the same fellas who will be servicing it.  (Which is why I won't buy it online.)  In fact, I was there today.  I am fixated on a Synapse 5 with a full 105 groupo.  The fitter and the shop owner have me convinced to go for a set of custom built wheels, but it's not going to cost me much of anything.  They're going to spec out the wheels that come with the bike and credit me for that on the new set.  I'll end up with a $600-$800 set of wheels for about $100-$200.  Just waiting for this year's tax return.

I know what you mean.  I'm also doing the Z1650 and the C25k, but beyond that I have NO idea what I will do.  My "in-my-head" plan is to get through those and then in April I'll upgrade to a Gold membership and maybe start using the BT online coaching after that to develop for my Oly and HIM.

When I first joined BT several years ago,  I signed up for online coaching and for someone who knew nothing about triathlons,  it worked for me.  I had lots of questions and they were fairly quick to respond to my posts.  They did ask lots of questions to get a feel for what I was trying to accomplish.  I don' think it would replace having a coach in person to be able to watch your swim stroke, or assess your performance on the bike or run but they did a good job analyzing data and making recommendations or answering my questions.  I have always either been silver or gold on BT and have only ever used their training plans, with the exception of the zero to 1650 swim which I inputted into my training blog on BT.  I am currently using a mix of two different plans right now for my swim and bike workouts but since I am only training for the aquabike I don't have run workouts.  But if I did, I would probably have imported the couch to 5k run for that.   

If you are feeling lost with your training,  definitely check out the plans on here and know that you can take parts of each to make them work for your levels on each discipline.

Swim - 900 yds - 19:30 total time - 2:10 per 100 yds avg

Felt pretty good.  Pushed myself just a little harder and shaved 5 seconds off each of my intervals.  Drastically reduced my rest time between.  In the past I have rested 30s between 25's, 50-55s between 50's, and something like 1m 15 secs between 100's, 2 full mins before doing my 200 in the middle.  But today I cut ALL of my rests to only 15s between every set.  WOW!  Talk about breathing hard.  Too bad my HRM won't accurately record my HR in the water.

Followed that up with 10 mins in the hot tub (my back, just below the shoulder blades, is pretty sore from new use) followed by 15 mins in the sauna.  Came home to slow cooker full homemade chili for supper.  Life is good.

Treadmill - C25k - W1D1

I should have known better than to go back to the couch after my October race.  Barely worked out at all, and I seriously doubt I did even one workout at the intensity and duration of what I was doing before the race.  So I suppose I can't complain about today.  In fact, I'd have to admit that I really missed getting a good sweat on.  It felt fantastic after I was finished.  And the promise of being able to actually run the 5k portion of White Lake is sure to drive me.  So I've got my Z1650 and my C25k both working.

Now I just need to spring a hundred bucks from my "new bike" fund to get Big Red set up with an ANT+ so I can start using TrainerRoad.  Unfortunately my debit card got compromised last week and I am still waiting for the new one, so no online shopping for now.

94 days to White Lake.

DBG, which one did you download?  I was going to get C25k Pro yesterday, before I went to the gym.  Then remembered that I don't have a working debit card yet.  Bumming!

My 50's are currently taking around 60-65 seconds, so to push myself I cut my rests to only 15 seconds.  Obviously, I'm not as fast as I used to be.  I remember back in college turning 100's in under a minute.  I think eventually I'll want to see my times down around 45-50 seconds for 50's nowadays.

hey everyone, back after a long break (not sure if anyone remembers me), time to get serious about getting ready for IMLP (I'm in WAY over my head, but I'm still going to give it my best shot. I got a bike at the fall toronto bike show and got a trainer for christmas, so slowly getting the equipment together. I move at the end of February to a condo that has a gym, indoor track and a 25m pool, so I think that will make a huge difference (With cold and snow right now running outside is sort of out of the question for me).

Hope everyone is doing well and meeting their goals!