Asphalt Junkies Spring 2013 - Closed (Page 39)

I decided to put the NYC Marathon off for another year. I had until Friday to decide but I figured it would be better to do it in 2014. The more I thought about it the more I really wanted to do more than just try and finish. I want to hit my goal time and not just finish. I think with the IM this year I just don't feel like I'd be able to focus on training for it with the goals I have in mind. I also figured I am spending enough money on Wisconsin and Syracuse already it is probably best to wait. I can train properly for it and do more than just finish. 

Jeff, I hope you are feeling better today.  Also thanks for the suggestions about recovering.  It is amazing what heals 1 person hurts another.  Also when you run in your new shoes, let us know what you think.

David, yea I did a very light stretch and very light roller today, thanks.

Tony, yea it is hard getting up for 3 "A" races, this will give you something to look forward to...wait...are you going to sign up the next day for the IM 2014...lol

Well today I went for about 5 miles and it was so INCREDIBLY slow but I made it.  At about 1.5 miles it was hurting and I turned around to go home, then I turned back around and said I've got to either run thru it or withdraw from the HM so i kept running.  I was feeling sorry for myself and was just ticked and started talking to Jesus and was wondering why I 'm having such a hard time running.  Then it came to me...I've had an extremely good life, no major sickness, no cancer, no heart problems, I've been very healthy.  If I can't run to my desired level, so what.  I will run for fun instead of trying to push myself to my limit. I have my health, family and friends and yes our dog.  I am a lucky guy!

x2, Karl that's exactly how I feel. I'm just happy doing the best I can and taking what each day gives me. I feel I'm pretty lucky to have what I have and to be able to do what I am doing. Nice job on just running through it and having fun.

BTW, no IM for me in 2014. I am thinking about that already. Probably a couple of Marathon's, lot's of short stuff with the Tri's and probably one HIM and hopefully the HIM will be one I can do with some of the Junkies.

My thoughts about the Lance Armstrong debacle.

I know many people are already fatigued by the subject, so am I.  I've been fatigued by the whole question of whether or not he has doped for years now.  I'm one of those that has always known that he did but didn't care to make an issue of it.
Why? Well, I knew how the sport of cycling is done and have known that PED use is rampant.  Furthermore, it's not been possible to be the world's best cyclist (or even win any of the MAJOR races) without PED use for a good 20 years now.

I just finished watching the 2nd installment of Oprah's interview with Lance and have a few thoughts rattling around in my head.

First off, was he clean in 2009,2010?  I don't think so, but can't prove it so I won't press that.  If he wasn't, then why not admit it now when it's all out there?  Probably 2 possible reasons: He talked in the interview about asking his ex-wife for permission before the comeback in 2009 and she said yes, only if he raced clean.  He may need to lie about being clean in 2009 so she doesn't know that he's lied even to her...A second reason, is that during 2009, if he was using drugs he somehow avoided detection.  That would mean that he has valuable information about how users are currently beating the testing...why wouldn't he want to give that up?  He doesn't want to throw others under the bus.  And if USADA knew he had that information they would hold him hostage to give it up to get a reinstatement.

I think the world is going to remember his lying as his greatest moral sin.  We all saw how vehemently he lied and even attacked his accusers who were telling the truth.  In some cases, their charges were true, but perhaps one or more of the details weren't and he may have then felt vindicated in calling them liars.
But here's how I see that whole thing....If you are in a sport that outlaws doping and yet requires it for success at the same time, then you MUST lie to succeed.  So he began the lie, as did all the pro cyclists.  He knew that he was going to be the prime suspect as the greatest cyclist of all time.  He was going to be guilty unless proven innocent...unlike others who doped but couldn't be the world's best, like George Hincapie for instance.  If you are going to lie, you need to really sell it.  Most of us who could ever even imagine breaking the rules in the first place, would probably not be able to muster up such bold, intense denials...but if Lance didn't respond that way, he would be considered guilty even without proof.  So he had to really sell it...

I'm not calling any of this right, I'm just saying that this is how his mind was probably working.  And aren't most people asking: "What was he thinking?"

Lance said in the interview when Oprah asked if he believed he had to dope to succeed, he was very careful in his response to say: "in my opinion, yes".  He doesn't want to say categorically "yes, you MUST dope to win" because then he will be asked more probing questions, if not by Oprah, then by USADA who he hopes will reinstate him after a while so he can keep doing sports.  These questions would be along the lines of who else was doping?  How do you know?  How was it done?  How is it being done now?  He just doesn't want to do what everyone else did and throw others under the bus.

Cycling was never clean.  I remember in the 80s hearing about the pros using amphetamines and pain relievers in the old days (probably before they were illegal).  The attitude was one of win at all costs right from the beginning.  But in the 1980s I think testosterone was still made from cadaver testes and probably wasn't feasible to use to a great extent and EPO hadn't been invented yet.  I fully believe the occassional blood transfusion was used but perhaps amounted to a singular transfusion for certain riders just before entering the mountain stages...Blood doping was in use as far back as the 1960s among distance runners.

But in the late 80's is when the EPO era began and Greg Lemond is telling the truth when he says that he came back to the tour after winning the previous year and was in the best shape of his life and suddenly couldn't keep up with the pack.  It was painted as him being out of shape and making excuses, but he was telling the truth.  From that moment on nobody could succeed in the tour without drugs.

The real indictment must be on the sport of cycling.  I have no idea if the biological passport system can make the sport clean as Lance says it is.  But I will say this: if it truly is clean then very few athletes will have the motivation to dope.  There will always be some willing to cheat to win, but when nobody who is clean can win you have a situation in which good, honest people will often chose to 'level the playing field'. 

So, that appointment I was supposed to have this weekend to get my PT script?  It was cancelled by the doctor's office.  I was so happy that I would finally be able to start the PT (especially given my new elbow issues) that I had even scheduled my PT appointments for next week.  I am more than a little upset now, because now I have to wait another couple weeks before I can get in!   Thank goodness for my massage therapist as it's making it possible to avoid additional tension in my hamstrings/hip area, but it's not working towards the root problem.  And I would now just like to get my elbow issue looked at too. argh.

re: Lance.  No worries, I am not fatigued by the subject.   I never really paid much attention in the past, and never read very much about the stories and people's thoughts too much.  That is not to say I don't care, though.  Because I did watch the Oprah interview out of curiosity.  But I feel I don't know enough to be able to really form an opinion over the matter.

Samantha, I really hope you get your elbow and hip healed.  Sorry about your appt.

Jeff, like you said, people are going to do things to become the best, whether it is Enron, Baseball, Football, Cycling, attorneys etc etc., etc.  The drugs will not make you win, just helps, they still have to do the work.  I think inside info is worse and I know a lot of that goes on in various industries whether is is the stockmarket, fishing, selling property to build roads on etc etc etc.  It is all very interesting...

Swimming question for the fish around here

I'm trying to figure out how fast i should be swimming my intervals.  For instance today I did 4x [200m at 1:40 pace leaving at 4:00. 100m at 1:35 pace leaving at 2:00. 50m at 1:25 pace leaving at 1:00] with 1 minute between each set.  I kind of just picked times that seemed to make sense...  Lets say my goal pace for this season in august would be 1:30's for a 750m sprint tri, how quickly should I be doing my intervals?

JeffY - 2013-01-21 3:17 PM Jen, "injuries" can be weird. Sometimes continuing to run does nothing, other times it screws you up. Since I can never tell, I keep running until I know I can't. In my past experience, the real injuries were just there suddenly after a run, with no warning during the run. So you did ok running. Run more often, the others are right that your runs are too seldom. Perhaps you start by adding 1 mile on the other 4 days...leaving the day after your long run as a non run day. Since you have your HM coming up, I will hesitantly suggest that you not otherwise spread out your miles evenly. Case in point: my heel pain. Thurs hurt so bad I cut my run down to 1 super slow mile. Heels then were maybe back to normal levels. Due to sickness, no workout at all Friday. No run on Saturday. Heels didn't feel much better...actually worse. Ran yesterday 9 miles on super rough trails and the heels hurt! Afterwards I could barely walk! But today, they feel really good! It's as if running keeps them stable, and not running makes them worse (in the short term). There just aren't too many hard and fast rules with injuries. So now that I've joined the legion of the sick, I need to do what I can to minimize my lost training. I try to train through illness, but just put in easy time. Friday I stayed home from work and didn't train primarily because I can't justify a workout if I didn't work. Saturday was just 90 minutes on the bike instead of 180. Sunday was my SLOW 9 miles off road. I was going to go further but changed plans. Today I feel so bad that I can't talk myself in to training.

Jeff-

Thanks for the input and the slap on the wrist for not running often enough. When I hurt my knee - I was literally having a conversation with my cowoerker about how I 've never had a running injury and then BAM! One week later I was limping.

My husband and I have been talking about this over the past couple of weeks. My husband played semi-pro ball for the White Sox organization back in the later 1990's and has told me how intense testing was on them.

I'm glad you shared your thoughts about Lance Armstrong. Some people will chose to see his legacy in a negative light. I will not be one of those people. He beat cancer! If I beat cancer and lived 10+ years (beyond the expectancy of many survivors), I think the rules that I lived my life by would be a little different than what they are today. I can't help but wonder if he is coming clean because the cancer is back?

Samantha - I am totally pulling for you with regards to the hip and elbow. Have you been to a chiropractor as well?  

Today's swim.... so, after being slightly discouraged about a few little things that shouldn't bother me, I decided to just relax during today's lunch hour swim. Workout - 1500 yards easy.

Well, our local and famous Ironman was waiting for a lane in the pool and guess who's lane he ended up getting in - yeah, mine. Getting lapped by someone who swims at a ridiculous speed would normally really intimidate me, but something interested happened today. Yes, he did lap me like crazy, but swimming in his wake was a really good experience for me. I was able to remain calm and was able to pick up the speed just a bit. I might not have accomplished a significant stride today, but I am proud of this little step nonetheless.

Agree and what a great attitude!

I second the "like" button.

I had been seeing a "chiro" before, but more for ART purposes.  And I'm more content with the massage therapist because I find I get more out of it for the time and money.

I actually received a voicemail from my doctor's office, but of course I listened to it too late and they are now closed. But it sounds like they will be sending over a script without an actual visit to the office, because they asked for where I wanted to go for PT... will be calling tomorrow morning... cautiously optimistic......

I agree that sometimes it's worth it just to focus on the things that you have been blessed with and let it all hang out there a little bit. 

But, be careful with your injury.  If you are only a couple of weeks out from your race race you could begin a taper at the end of this week and allow for some recovery and healing.  Rather than run every day, back things down and only run 4-5 days a week, making everything easy.  You already have a pretty solid fitness.  You don't need to build any more and it's unlikely you would build anything significant at this point anyway.  Just begin to settle in and relax and get ready to race.

For the most part I agree with you.  I think he doped for every year that he'd won the Tour, in my opinion.  It is unlikely that he was able to stay clean and compete in '09 and '10 at the level that other cyclists would have been competing at.  I also agree that it is highly likely that all the other cyclists were doping as well AND tht is why they haven't named, nor will they, any successors to those particular years.  I believe they know the sport was completely full of cheaters and they weren't willing to let it out publicly.

I agree with your assessment that he was vehemently opposing his "accusers" because he was required to in order to maintain the facade that he was actually innocent.  Where I have a huge problem was that he almost destroyed some of his former employees because of lawsuits he filed that nearly broke one of them.  I think he should have to repay much of those damages.

The biggest problem I have is that he had done so much work looking for a cure for cancer and the support that came with it.  And now??  He will never be looked at the same again.  This is something that he could have carried with him as a tremendous badge for the rest of his life.  And now the organization he founded has basically disowned him.  Although I can't blame them.

One last thought.  I wonder if his use of steroids and EPO contributed to his testicular cancer?  Seems likely to me but I am in no means a medical professional.  If indeed the drugs contributed to his cancer it's just another example of how someone can become so greedy for fame and/or fortune that they will allow ANYTHING to happen to them in order to get "what's coming to them."  In a sense of poetic justice, he did just that.

I would suggest that you look at your swimming for the full length of the interval rather than the 100 pace for an interval.  So, if you are doing 500's for the main set you would actually swim at 9:00.  Then you add your rest interval to the time of say 1 minute, for example, making it "500's on 10:00."  If you are swimming 200's and it takes you 4:00 for each rep and you want 30 seconds rest you would say 200's on 4:30 and so on.....

On to your specific question.

Per the example used for the 200's I would say you are pretty close to a good rest interval.  If you wanted to work a little harder I think you could go at 3:50 or 3:55.  I think you could/should cut the rest down since you are only doing 4 reps.  If you were doing longer sets I would suggest you stay at a 20 second rest.  I don't do 200's.  Once I get close to that distance I am at 250 yards and I do 6 reps anytime I do 250's.

The shorter your distance the shorter the rest should be too.  If you are doing 50's you could start slowly and then build to something like 5 seconds rest before leaving for the next rep.  I do a WO that I call the "Fast 50's that is done in a similar fashion.  It looks like this:

• 6x50 on :60 @ Landing at :37-:38
• 6x50 on :55 @ Landing at :39-:40
• 6x50 on :50 @ Landing at :39-:40
• 1 minute rest
• 6x50 on :45 @ Landing at :38-:42

This is a progressively harder WO as it goes along.  By the time I am done I am trashed.  You can see that by the last set I am only getting 3-5 seconds rest before leaving the wall again.

Now that I read your post again it looks like you are doing a ladder WO.  Is that the case?  If so you should start with the shortest distance, build to the longest distance and then reduce the distance in the same manner that you completed the build up.  Each of the reps should be done at a pace that leaves you equally tired as the last rep even though the distance is getting longer.  So, it progresses this way: fastest, faster, fast, moderate, fast, faster, fastest.

One last thing, are you sure you're logging meters or are you logging yards?  Because, if you are actually logging meters, I should be making comments about you being the fish in the water!

As I have reread my post I am feeling very confident I have not answered your question clearly.  If I can get a clearer head I'll come back and answer it again later.  Right now my post isn't even making sense to me.

Sometimes just watching people that are smooth and clean in the water can do wonders for you own swimming.  Next time ask him if you can simply watch his technique.  Make sure you let him know you're new to triathlon so he doesn't think you're a stalker.  He may even offer to help you some.

This one's for you Karl.  I know how much you enjoy running outdoors in the cold air.  I have to admit this picture was from 2011 and not from today but I did run outside today.  This evening's run was 9 degree with a wind chill of -6.  There is no snow on the ground and the humidity was lower for tonight's run than it was for the run in 2011.  By comparison Jan 23 2011 was 3 degrees with a -4 wind chill, so tonight was technically warmer but the wind chill was lower by 2 degrees.

So here's a pic that's actually on my facebook page...................

Finally managed to get a decent swim workout in today.  Granted, it was super slow, but I got in 3000 meters- 2500 of which was non-stop.  Ate a package of peanut butter crackers right before... made a huge difference (I've been doing my swims after work, before dinner).  Just reminded me that I suck at nutrition. 

Swimming question for all of you:  Do you wear ear plugs?  If so, what kind?

If you guys are interested in this read the book by Tyler Hamilton, The Secret Race. I am almost finished with it and it offers alot of insight on Lance and how 90% of the riders were using PED's. According to Tyler you basically could not complete if you weren't doing it. Forget about winning, he said he could not even keep up with the first 4 or 5 groups of racers in these events. The term for riding clean riding was paniagua. It's great book, the whole thing was like an arms race between teams. They were so far ahead of the race organizations resposible for testing it's not even funny.

While I don't condone what these guys did by breaking the rules, alot of these race organizations turned their heads and looked the other way when guys did test positive. It was an absolute travesty. With Lance the biggest problem I have with him is what Dirk said in the way he went after people and the way he treated people. He tried to ruin people. That was absolutely disgraceful. He totally destroyed his legacy and got exactly what he deserved. In my opinion the whole Oprah thing is a sad attempt and some sort of damage control. He is the Barry Bonds of cycling.

Will...Very good point there.  Make sure to always be working on your nutrition.  Your body won't do what you want without the fuel, right?

As far as ear plugs, no I don't use them, the echo of the ear plugs drives me crazy!  I have to use diluted alcohol to get the water out sometimes...are your ears bothering you?

Dirk- Love the picture. I grew up in Buffalo, NY but you would never know. I cannot handle the cold at all. If it is colder than 50 degrees, I run inside.

Jonathan- Your mountain climbing trip sounds awesome. 

Went running tonight with my friend Jamie (she did the HM with me 2 years ago). Can't wait until we're able to run together again. It motivates me to continue the C25K program so we can do longer runs by the spring. As I get older, I start to appreciate good friends & how they are hard to come by. So happy to be have my running partner back.