Lamarvenoy's (Bryan) do your first Triathlon Mentor Group [CLOSED] DOING WORK (Page 4)

That's pretty awesome running in that weather, I have NO tolerance for that.   I'm impressed by all you winter runners. 

Sorry to hear about your knee Erin. Are you going to be able to get some swimming in while your knee recovers?

Ella, how is your recovering going?

Chris

Maybe try some water walking or swimming with a pull buoy so you don't have to kick at all

Swimming for the beginner triathlete

In this weeks installment of triathlon 101, I'm covering swim training. Every beginner I’ve ever spoken to is always concerned with one thing. The Swim. Here are some simple tips to help you overcome the “dreaded” swim.

Recognize the fact that you’re a beginner and get some lessons already.

While it’s entirely possible for you to teach yourself how to swim, a swim coach will help you reach your goal more quickly and make you more efficient and comfortable in the water at the same time.

Try an indoor triathlon first.

Doing an indoor triathlon can be a great way to get you used to the whole race atmosphere without taking you out of the comfort zone of the clean, clear water of you local pool.

Switch up your strokes.

Try using the whole rainbow of strokes to help you reach your goal. There is no rule against using whatever swim stroke you’re most comfortable with. For my first race, I did the breast stroke for almost the entire swim and was perfectly happy doing so.

On race day, start at the back of the pack.

Starting at the back of the pack on race day can be a great way to avoid swim start chaos. You’ll be more relaxed and you’ll also have the benefit of the stream of swimmers in front of you to aid you in your siting.

Flip onto your back if you’re tired.

If you find yourself in trouble during the swim portion of the race, flip onto your back to take a break. 

Sign up for a group open-water swimming class.

If available, a group open-water swimming course can be an invaluable tool in helping the beginner get used to the feeling of swimming with a group of others. 

Happy Martin Luther King Day Everyone.

I have the day of work and no school for my daughter. Big plans for the day involve making root beer and going to see Beauty and the Beast in 3D. But I got a good run in this morning and hope to spend time on the bike trainer later today.

Last week started out rough. I had lots of conflict during my normal exercise times and my right knee was hurting. I spent the first half of the week looking out the window at beautiful weather that I couldn't take advantage of. By Thursday I was in a pretty bad mood. The great weather had turned to rain, the temperature was dropping and the forecast called for snow over the next few days. I had almost talked myself out of running, but I put my rain gear on and told myself I would just go out for 10 minutes or so to stretch my legs and see how my knee felt. After 5 minutes my bad mood was gone, I finished out my normal 5k route and felt great. Ran it again on Sunday with my wife.

I also bought a Cycleops Fluid 2 trainer this weekend. I have heard lots of great things about this trainer. So far (1 workout) it lives up to the hype. I have big plans for the trainer on those evenings when my wife works late and I am on homework and bed time duty with my daughter. After she is asleep I should be able to get on the trainer while I watch TV.

Chris

Awesome Chris! It's amazing what a little run therapy will do for ones mood.

I have the exact same trainer. It's a great little piece of gear. I'm going to be glued to that puppy until it's spring. This will be my first winter training all the way through indoors. Hopefully I see some gains in my bike fitness and performance come spring.

That's the best thing to do... just get out there for a few minutes.  Be careful with your knee though.     That's cool that you run with your wife.  I wish my husband would run with me, but he's way more competitive than I am and he doesn't like to go my pace.  He likes to go FAST even early in the season when he's not conditioned for it, and ends up getting injuries.  (Which is part of why I do Massage Therapy...to try to protect him from himself.  LOL)

I'm really looking forward to a run as a pick me up.  As soon as I get this knee under control....

I hope everyone had an awesome week (training and otherwise).  I know this board will surely pick up in the following months when weather makes a turn for the better. 

Yesterday I took a 12 mile trail run up at island lake in brighton MI. Around mile 4 I ran into a pretty burly german shephard cruising on the trail (soil pants now). It seemed pretty aggressive so I made a game time decision, hopped over the embankment, down a pretty steep hill and snuck past the damn thing. Pretty intense! Here's a pic from the run. Notice all of the foot prints. I got out there at 9:30 and people had beaten me to the punch!

Anyways, I'm working on an awesome essay right now. I'm not going to be posting it tonight because I've had a couple glasses of wine and I don't want it to be sloppy (gotta love rest days). Anyways, I'd like to hear your thoughts on the main point of the essay.

What makes you a triathlete (duathlete, runner, adventure racer, marathoner, etc.)? is it the completion of races that earns you the title or is it the mind set and way of life that makes the athlete? I'm curious what everyone thinks.

My training has gotten pretty consistent. Days are just enough longer now that I can sneak in a quick run after work and before dark.  I have had a chance to use the Cycleops trainer 4 or 5 time now. I find it really helps me fit workouts into my life. Those nights when I know I have to watch my daughter I can schedule a bike workout after she goes to sleep. When I bought it I assumed it would be a winter time thing, but now I am thinking it will be a way to keep schedules flexible even in the summer. 

Swimming is still the tough one to get in. Because the pool I use has limited hours, any conflict causes me to miss a swim with few options to make it up.  But I got one good workout in this week. I did a fairly continuous half mile swim. My daughter joined me for 3 laps in the middle which fun. She has declared that she is going to do a triathlon this summer too (thinking about Tri-Kids-Tri at portage lake) . So she wanted to know how far she would have to swim.  

Bryan, glad you opened the group up again. I hope we get some more voices in the forum. Where is the essay? You can't build us up and then leave us hanging.

Erin, hope rest is doing you knee some good. 

This week will be a short week for me. We are planning to go skiing over the weekend. So I won't do any triwork Friday through Sunday.

The following week my wife and I are doing the Super 5k in Novi.

I can totally see myself utilizing the trainer in a pinch even when the weather is nice out.

As far as the essay. I had crazy writers block today and yesterday. I'd write a sentence then erase it, rinse repeat. I've also been trying to get content for my blog that I'm going to be launching soon so that's been taking up some time.

Running fit has a kids tri in august in brighton as well that's a great atmosphere and just an overall fun time. 

Good morning everyone!

How goes the training?

I am on pace for a little over 100 miles of run/bike this month.  Not great but I'll take it!

Who's officially registered for an event?  When is it?  How can our group help you get there from here?

Have a great day!

Hey Everybody! Just checking in. Sorry for the lack of presence on this forum in the last two weeks, life has been quite busy. We've just finished up month one of mentor program. As I understand it from the mentor program guidelines, there are just 2 months to go. These remaning two months should get you through all of your base training and ready for the start of your individual training program.

To figure out when you'll need to start an actual training plan and not just base training and gaining fitness, count 16 (or whatever you plan shows) weeks back from your race date and boom, there you have it. If you don't have a training plan, you can find a whole bunch of free ones HERE.

Hopefully everyone had a solid month and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that some of the quiet members come back and share their experiences, questions and comments.

I saw some pretty solid progress this month. Since swimming more regularly and longer for each session I've managed to maintain a 1:50 per 100m (which is still pretty slow from what I've been reading). My biking has gotten a lot better especially since I swapped my saddle out for the adamo Time Trial. Now I can just plop down for an hour no problem and hammer away. Running-wise I've been hitting the trails to switch up the monotony of treadmill and road running. Right now I'm averaging around an 8min/mile over a half marathon. I'm going to put my running fitness to the test in april when I do a stand alone Half Marathon.


I've been working on getting my blog launched as well. So far I have a lot of content but nothing actually up on the inter-webs, still waiting for the design to be completed.

I'd love to hear from everyone! Fire Away!

Hey everyone, ran the first race of the season yesterday. A superbowl themed 5k. The weather was perfect. About 40 degrees, sunny, no wind. This was the second 5k my wife had every done. I think she was a little nervous going in. Kept worrying about being the last person. We ran together for most of the first 3 miles. Just a little faster than our typical training runs. The last half mile or so I sped up bit just to see how fast my legs might still go. My wife finished strong a minute or so behind me. She was very impressed to see that she ended up pretty much in the middle of her age group. This morning I learned that she had friended the local running shop on facebook and is actively planning for an upcoming 5k on St. Patrick's day.

As far as race plans go. I am signed up the Hawk Island Spring in early June. I am using the free 20 week run focused spring plan from this web site with some alteration. I am already running the volume from the end of this program and my swimming volume is somewhere in the middle of the program. So I am working through the program for the bike, doing month 4 on the run and month 3 on the swim. My plan is to just keep repeating month 4 on the run until the bike and swim catch up.

Still thinking about what to do for follow up races later in the summer. Any thoughts on how much time to plan between sprints during my first season?

Chris

Congrats on the first race of the season! Glad to see your wife might have caught the running/racing "bug". That reminds me, I should probably schedule a few early season races myself.

Coincidentally I just started looking for training plans for my HIM in July. Seems like I'm going to end up doing a little modification to the plan. Every plan has me starting way below the volume I already do on a weekly basis.

As far as other races and how long to wait in between, Last season there was a stretch where I scheduled 3 races in 10 days (sunday, wednesday, sunday). It all depends on how you feel after your first race. Typically (unless you injure yourself during the race), there should be pretty minimal recovery time after a sprint triathlon, maybe 1-3 days max. I've read a couple places that you should take a day off (or just take it easy) for every hour raced. If you feel good the next day or the day after, get back to training! For me, the number of sprint races I do in a season is entirely dependant on money. Race entry fees aren't cheap, especially for some of the bigger races.

I can recommend the running fit T-rex Triathlon Series. I've done a couple of those each of the last 2 years and they're a blast, a really laid back atmosphere and Island Lake Recreational Area is the perfect setup for a triathlon. I also really enjoyed the Motor City Triathlon on Belle Isle. Once you get past the idea of swimming in the Detroit River (which wasn't bad at all) the bike and run courses are really awesome.

Not sure if anyone is still out there. But I thought I check in to see how things are going with Twinsmomma.Erin and gbswan.

I have just started the last 4 weeks leading up to my first tri on 6/3.  I did my first open water swim yesterday. A little freaky. Glad I didn't wait until race day for my first OWS. If either of you are still out there let me know how things are going with you.

Chris

It's been brutal.  I lost my dad in March which really killed about three weeks of training and then I lost another four weeks in May due to a shin injury.  It basically wiped out Tri season where I live because I can't swim until JUly 1 with the shins.  As a result, I am focusing on cycling and am scheduled to do a 90 mile ride in August.