kaburns1214 Mentor Group 2013 (Year 3!) - CLOSED (Page 4)

Chris - I'm not real familiar with Decatur or Rome. We lived in Forsyth (Cumming) for about 5-6 years, moved to So Cal for almost 2 years, and moved back to Alpharetta where we have been since 2005. Yes, it's hot and crowded but I do like it here.

Michele - glad the family is feeling better. Have a fun trip!

Deborah - I think you'll be glad you did a HIM leading up to your IM. I was on the fence for this last iron distance race, and thought I'd just do the distance on my own one day. Kelly convinced me to do a race and I'm glad I did. It wasn't the best race for me (hot & hilly!) but it helped to remind me how to race - swimming with other people in race setting, setting up transition, pacing myself.

Merry Christmas Eve.

There are a bunch of questions I need to get to.  I'm running to the pool for a quick swim and then I'll get to answers

Love- I'd be interested in connecting via Facebook as well.

https://www.facebook.com/beverly.s.spence

I have not done the Chattanooga Olympic - but will certainly look in to it as Chattanooga is only about 45 mins for me.  Any other local races you know of or will be racing let me know.   Can't wait to get back in to a normal routine and doing some racing!!!!

Are we going to try and have a meet up prior to the Atlanta HM???

Good morning, all.  This group is moving fast!  Yesterday I had a run test (4 x 1 mile all out with 90 seconds rest between miles).  I gave it 100%. Legs were extremely sore when I woke up this morning.  I got in a recovery ride & run.  The rest of the day will be spent cooking and prepping for tonight's and tomorrow's gatherings.  I'm making a grain & greens casserole that is delicious.  We'll see how it's received at my carnivorous in-laws' house.    

I'm really hoping to use some gift money to get a new trainer.  I do a lot of riding indoors because of the kids' schedules, and I feel as if my trainer isn't the greatest.  I also need a bike fit & new cycling shoes, so we'll see.   

Jen - as much as you ride indoors you should get a new trainer if you don't like your current one. If you shop around online you can usually find pretty good deals. I bought a 2nd one (KK road machine) earlier this year and there were several places that had 20 or 25% off and free shipping.  REI is always a good place to look too. If you're a member you can use your annual rebate (or whatever they call it) and wait for a 20% off coupon. I love REI!

My facebook is - http://www.facebook.com/karen.w.richardson.7

(Idon't know what the 7 after my name is, I hope there are not 7 of me out there! If it doesn't work try without that.)

Chattanooga is great - down river swim (although some years the current is non-existent), really fun bike, and flat run along the river.

I have not planned my races this year yet other than a couple of trail runs, Atlanta half and Tahoe. I'm contemplating making a big move back to California, so I will wait to fill in an olympic and HIM when I know what I'm doing. If we stay here I'll probably do Chattanooga again, it's my most favorite tri.

We should most definitely meet up! We'll have to figure out something after the holidays.

6ish miles in this morning.  Pool doesn't open until 8 so maybe after lunch.  Weather here is PERFECT.  Sorry I'm not in a ton on the conversation, but after I get back on Saturday I will be. 

Finished up reading Racing Weight.  Ton of good info in there that I never really thought about.  Macro breakdowns and what not.  Making me rethink my diet set up going forward.

There are 2 things here -- 1. how to get faster and 2. how to not kill your legs for the run.

1. You get faster by biking more.  The first thing you need to do is build some basic bike fitness.  Best way to do this is to spend 8-12 weeks just biking aerobically.  4-5 bikes per week, nothing super long, just building bike fitness.  All rides should be aerobic (RPE 4-5) and none of them should drain you.  Once you have basic bike fitness, then you can start adding volume and intensity.  Things like a long bike, low cadence intervals, tempo intervals, bikes that start aerobically and step up, hill repeats -- lots of fun stuff.

2. This one is tougher.  Running well off of the bike requires good bike fitness and the willingness to bike smart.  Lots of us like to go out and hammer the bike for all its worth and then we can't run.  I ride with a watts and HR cap depending on the length of the race.  Essentially by controlling the bike, you're able to get off and run to the best of your ability.  The phrase is "bike for show, run for dough."

ETA -- it is possible to run well off of the bike.  I ran my marathon PR at IMFL in 2011 off of the bike and one of best experiences was running up 500 places at IMLP in 2011.

Epic interval workout today. I woke up and just knew my legs felt good. Couple that with my drinking my iced espresso before my workout and I push really hard. First 20 minute interval 345 watt average which is by far a record for me. The second I was still able to pull down a 340 average. 20 minutes in zone one thrown in. I think I finally have my recovery days dialed in to what they should be and can notice the difference on my big days. We'll see though. I've thought before but I do seem to be getting stronger.

Merry Xmas all.

What are some signs that you may be cooking yourself on the bike? I go by HR, and all 3 of my IM bikes have been what I consider a good avg HR, maybe even a bit too easy of an effort, yet I never have a great run. So, either I cooked myself without knowing/feeling it, or I didn't have the run endurance. I'm leaning towards I overdid the bike and maybe just need to slow down???

Surprising number of people at the pool at 6:15 AM on Christmas Eve day.  My wife woke up this morning long enough to tell me I was crazy, and then she rolled over and went back to sleep.  The outdoor pool was closed b/c the temperature was 28 degrees, so that made the indoor pool crowded, even at that hour.  Got in some work, though, and will now complete my night's sleep - luxury!

I think from a running perspective week to week the one thing that really has helped me out since I started back after the last HIM and break is not doing a long run. I was doing 12-16 mile runs regularly until you told me to stop. It's made a huge difference. It was taking me half the week to recover from those long runs. The second thing is I do 75% of my training on the runs in the 127-136 heart rate range. The other 25% has been at tempo pace and every week I've been building on it fairly easily because I'm not killing myself on the other runs. With my current volume the tempo has been 2 warm up, 4 tempo and one cool down. This week I move to 20 miles so that will go to 2-5-1. My pace has gone from 8:25 to 8:00 and that's without forcing it. The other thing I've done and it's killed me is moving to the treadmill for a majority of my runs. It's done a few things for me. One I'm locked into a pace on those general run days where before I had a tendency to speed up and not realize I was doing it and it wore me down and I wasn't rested for the tempo runs and wasn't getting faster which is number two. Third it's been saving my body from the beating all those miles puts on your body pounding on the pavement.

On a week to week biking basic I think finally listening to the advice that a recovery ride cannot be too slow is the big one. This will get tougher off the trainer in the spring. On the road I just want to go. I probably should but cannot bring myself to do the trainer when it's nice out. I know a lot of pros do it but we are here to enjoy this.

Probably a combination of over biking coupled with a need for more run durability.  Its easy to over bike, especially on an IM. For an IM HR should be below aerobic threshold. 

There's a really good test to help determine if the issue is a bike issue or a run issue -- A 3 x 20 minute or 3 x 30 minute run test (warm up easy for 10 minutes and run 3 x 20 minutes or 3 x 30 minutes are best sustainable effort with 3 - 5 minutes super easy between intervals on a flat course).  If your pace for all three intervals has very little drop off -- e.g. you run 9:25 pace, 9:31 pace, 9:33 pace for the the three intervals -- then you have good durability and the issue is likely one of over biking.  If the pace drops off dramatically -- e.g. 9:25, 9:48, 10:01 -- then its a run endurance / durability issue and you need to work on that. 

Karen, with your ultra, I would guess that run durability is not an issue right now. 

Scott makes 2 really good points --

1.  Its not about the volume of any one run, its about cumulative volume.  There's no physical reason to go out and force yourself to do super long runs.  They exhaust you, you loose form and they're tough to recover from.  Before all of my recent IMs my longest single run has been about 13-14 miles and I was able to run 4 hour marathons off of the bike. 

2.  Hard work outs should be HARD and easy work outs should be EASY.  Pushing the easy days is just going to prevent you from really being able to hit it hard when you need to. 

How do you do this?  I'd like to do the same.