Got Your Mojo WORKIN'! group - CLOSED (Page 45)

JOHANNA - Regarding your saddle question. I'm using the stock seat that came on my Specialized Ruby bike - a Specialized Jett 143. I've had the bike for 4 years now and love my set up. However, after I'd had the bike about a year, I decided to try to do some tweaking myself thinking that somehow I might be able to improve performance by getting a more perfect seat. I researched saddles and bought a Terry TRX - a women's tri specific saddle. I played with the height and positioning but never could find it worked better than what I had. Instead of going back to the Jett, I did more research and bought a Fi'zu:k Vitesse Tri Wingflex Kium - another women's tri specific saddle. I did more playing around and again couldn't get it to work better. SO....after that ridiculous outlay of cash, I ended up back where I began. I have both the other saddles sitting here in my bike box so if you'd like to try them, I'd be happy to send them to you to see if they'd work. They weigh next to nothing so it's no big deal. I've heard that some bike shops have a "try it to see if you like it" policy before purchasing so maybe you have that option. If not, I'm very happy to let you check these out.

BRENDA -

All-righty, then! Here I go!

Swim -
At this time of year all I'm doing, really, is stroke refinement. I haven't done any pool straight-swim since I don't know when. I returned to the pool sometime in mid-October, after doing nothing but OWS from about May 20 on. So my swim year really breaks down into two parts -- open-water distance-only for five months, and technique-focused stuff for seven months. (And this excludes a week or two no-swim period in the fall, and the odd week in which I'm away somewhere in the winter.) My open-water swims happen 3-5 times a week, and average probably 40 minutes. Pool swims are 3-4 times a week, and what you see is about right -- an average of 35 minutes of actual swimming. (I do a rough subtraction of the time spent switching toys and yakking and resting between sets.)

Bike -
It sounds like you found the way to each of my entries, but if got garbled somehow, I did five trainer rides last week (I count mine from Mon-Sun): 70', 48', 50', 55', 70'. Few of my rides are "junk" miles, and I just try to keep things hopping. So, when I write "ladder" and "pyramid", those are just my shorthand for sets in which I vary gearing at given points, and in various ways. Ladders usually have me making things getting progressively tougher until I'm tanked, and then there will be a cool-down. A pyramid will see me work up through increasing harder gearings, and then back down again, and then a cool-down. Anything I do on the trainer starts off with 10'-15' fairly easy, and then I'm off. I do lots of "standing grinds", and at least once a week I'll work a bit on single-leg drills. Cadence is a very big part of every session, except the rare junkiest of junk mile efforts. I sometimes use "Workouts In A Binder For Indoor Cyclists", or follow a Spinervals DVD, but mostly I just make it up as I go along.

Run -
Right now I'm just kind of babying my feet, and besides, it's full-blown harsh winter here, so that means 3X a week. I think my past three weeeks have each been 20-milers, and I'm happy with that right now. My longest run since the half-marathon on Oct 23 was 60' on Sunday. I will aim for a 70-75' one this week. There is nothing tricky to my runs, other than a focus on form and cadence; when these are "on", I run well. In general, most of my runs from April until the end of race season are tempo runs -- that is, done at close to race pace for whichever race is approaching. I may occasionally throw in some interval segments on longer runs, but I never do pure speedwork on a track due to injury concerns. I am a big fan of fartlek-infused long runs.

Strength -
Since my torn meniscus in '06, I haven't done any lower body work -- fear, fear, fear! So, my strength work is 3/4 upper body, 1/4 core, and virtually all of it is performance-driven; that is, not lifting for mass, but just to improve myself for racing. I have a whole bunch of things I do, and keep reminding me if I don't get back to you with a list soon. I will have to try to find some conventional names for what I do, as much of what I write in my strength log is kind of shorthand; what I call an exercise might not be understood by anybody else! As opposed to the swim, where I try to just record time actually swimming, in the gym I just start my watch when I begin and stop it when I end, and that's the timing on the session. As you know, lots of time lifting is spent recovery between sets and all, so when you see 62 minutes for a session, well, the time actually spent WORKING is much less than that.

Goals -
Goals? Goals? Huh?
Well, you're right -- they're not there! You see, I have a history of sorts wherein I have bailed on lots of races due to various injuries. Up through '04 or '05 I would by this time of year have my whole race schedule "carved in stone"........and then along would come something that would prevent me from doing a given race, or two, or three. By '08 I realized I had eaten a lot of race fees, and seeing as how I was retired and not making any money, that was something I just couldn't afford to do any longer. That has now morphed into extreme caution with any race sign-up, and one of my many highlights to my '10 tri season was that fact that I raced 11 times and DIDN'T EAT A SINGLE RACE FEE. Perfection!!
As for '11, then.........undecided! My plan by the end of last season was to focus on half-irons in '11, seeing as how I had spent '09 and '10 focusd on sprints and olys by way of building sustained speed that could then be utilized in half-irons. (There is a further story behind this, which involved my '06 aquabike season due to the meniscus, and I'll try to remember to tell you that at some point, as it is actually instructive.) My rough goal over the past two seasons was to get my time for olys down to under 2:30, and that worked, and I felt I was ready to incorporate that into a season of HIM in '11. This was further encouraged by my 1:37:08 at that half-marathon in mid-Oct..............until about four hours after it when a long-dormant bunion started to hurt a lot. It is still a slight problem, but not enough to prevent me from running 20 miles a week. HOWEVER, it has really raised red flags about my ability to do a season based on long(er) runs! So, for now I'm taking a wait-and-see approach to my season, with two mostly equally desirable plans --- focus on half-irons, or focus on olys. I really would prefer the first, seeing as how that was part of a fairly well-conceived three- or four-year plan (of which the first two years were quite well-executed), but if I have to abandon that, well, it will be unfortunate but i can certainly live with the option. In fact, with USAT Nationals and USAT Sprint Championships for the next two years in Burlington, VT, barely three hours from home, three is a lot to be said for keeping my goals centered around those races, which will be in the third week of August.

I guess I should post two possible schedules, but things change so much in my thinking, even at the best of times, that what I put down now will almost certainly change many times bewteen now and the end of the season. Maybe I'll do that tonight, just to see where my squirrel-mind is currently at!

I shall return!

BRENDA again -

As for that '06 story I mentioned last post......

Up through the '05 season I had done about 16 half-irons, and could count on the 5:30 range. I had enjoyed a couple at 5:09 and 5:11 or so, but mostly I just cruised my way to 5:30 +/- finishes. I was pretty much comfortable with the enduance aspects of it (staying upright and mobile, you know), but wasn't pushing any limits at the speed end of the bike or run -- just working away steadily and fairly hard.

The along came the torn mensicus in winter '06.......and away went the tri season. Mercifully, USAT had just begun the aquabikes, so I signed up the one at Mooseman, in lieu of doing the full half-iron there. It occurred to me just a day or so before the race that without having to worry about running 13.1 miles after the 56-mile bike, I could just push myself to the max on the bike -- even though the Moosey course is not one for killer efforts! But I had done Mooseman and its same-course predecessor, Granite Ledges, several times, so I knew all the tricks of the bike route. It's two loops for the 56-miles, and so from the moment the bike started I pushed myself to the limit. Of course, at times I had to back off and so my total effort was more like big surges and spurts punctuated with the shortest recovery breaks I could manage, but it was a new experience for me in a race -- pushing the bike REALLY hard. Then, about mile 40, I broke a spoke and had to hobble the bike back to transition, earning my first of two DNFs.

BUT!!!!! Lesson learned, and that was what it felt like to ride a bike really hard in a race, something which I learned that day I had never done before. That is, I had always (wisely) held something back for the run......but now I began to think I had maybe been holding too much back all along.

For the rest of the season I did aquabikes, seven including Mooseman, and on each my whole goal was push myself right to the wall on the bike. Of course, then the problem became one of how will I return to running and triathlons, and be able to bike hard and then run well, and the short story to that is that it involved tons of fine-tuning efforts in both races and brick workouts.

Through the process of all of this, the biggest lesson was that for most of us, we can't race optimally unless we know what speed feels like, and then how to manage it and sustain it on race day. So, I got to thinking that I should work on that by starting small -- with sprints, then olys. It took me a couple of years to formulate this plan, but by '08 I was playing with the concept and then as I said in the previous post, '09 and '10 saw the goal actually being executed. That doesn't mean that I only raced a bunch of sprints, and then again only a bunch of olys, but my training goals were designed for sustained speeds at those distances.

My longer-term thinking was that once I was confident that I could work hard and race fast at olys, I would then be ready to ratchet that up a few notches and implement some of my 40km bike ability for 90km, and some of my 10km run speed for 21.1km. And that's where the plan sits, with each of the past two seasons having a half-iron each (5:23 in '09 and 5:18 [but slightly short swim] in '10).........and a hoped-for focus on HIM in '11 . (But from the previous post, you know where that is for now!)

The instructive part to that story is just how I learned what it felt like to dig deeper than I thought possible, and with the meniscus I had loads of time to explore that sensation without having the immediate worry of adding the run to it. That was a depressing season at the time, but what emerged from it was (a) me evolving from a decent cyclist into a very strong one, and (b) learning how to ride hard and then run well, which came from the focus of sprints and olys. So as bad injuries go, that meniscus one was pretty good!

Of course, to make those jumps from 40km-90km and 10km to 21.1km is not effortless, and in both of the half-irons the past two seasons ----- mistakes were made! For the one this past season, I rode the first 50 miles too aggressively, then flagged some on the final six, and then struggled mightily to have a barely-moderately decent run. DOH! The previous season's HIM saw me have the good sense to allow my main a.g. competitor to ride away from me on the final 10 miles of the bike, with the thought to just conserve soemthing for the run....and it worked! I caught him at about mile 5, and never looked back! But that was then, and I should've learned from it so as to work similarly this past August, but I just got carried away with hammering the bike. Oops!

But all of this is a work-in-progress, and one of the best ways to learn something is to make a mistake --- and then hope to not repeat it! (A problem for me, at times.) The other mistake(s) I made at half Vermont this past August were coming into it slightly undertrained for the distance, and being too haphazard with my nutrition. I have my oly nutrition locked-in and can actually make do with minimal, but for HIM it's a whole different matter....and I didn't fully recognize/respect that at Half Vermont (or at MightyMan Montauk the year before). Doh! AND Oops!

Did any of that make sense??? Let me know if it's all obscure and useless, okay?

USAT rankings thoughts........stiil coming (and I apologize for being at leat two weeks late with it.). Soon, soon!

Wow, that's awesome!! Butterfly, I think if I tried it someone would throw me the life ring thinking I'm drowning.

Johanne,

I was having problems with my stock saddle as well and it took me forever to find one that works. I will second the Terry suggestion. I have this one, although I think all their women's saddles are great, it's just a matter of preference. This one just worked best for me (I tried a few of them). My brother's girlfriend also has the same one and loves it:

Terry FLX Gel Women's Saddle
http://www.terrybicycles.com/Saddles/Womens-Performance/FLX-Gel-Womens-Saddle

It's soft enough with the gel but still firm for good riding. But it's a road bike saddle and I don't know if you're looking for one for a tri bike or not.

Kasia

Sarah,

How did your master's swim go? If you've been swimming for a few years then you're probably not the slowest. Besides, no one's paying attention to your speed since they're focused on their own workout. At least that's what I tell myself to get past the nervousness

Let us know how it went!

Kasia

Jeff,

Is that a minute or mile walk/run ratio? Are you following a particular plan? Or just DIY? Sorry if you already said that, I'm not quite caught up on all the posts before page 45. I have no suggestions as to how to remedy the stiffness besides to say that your attitude about it all is great.

Kasia

Hey Daniel, I saw your note abt getting unemployment whew, that will relieve some stress.  What's your occupation and I will keep my ears open.
Melinda

Steve -

It ALL made sense - you're a great writer and you make me giggle many times. Thanks so much for sharing your journey. That explains a lot about your workout sessions and how/why you're doing them as you are. It's funny how in life things that seem detrimental to us (like your torn meniscus) actually turn for our good. You have great wisdom about signing up too early for races and having to eat the fee. I think I've already made that mistake for at least one this year due to something that just came up. Oh well, live and learn as you say.

I love your focus and example of building a really solid base before moving on to longer distances. It takes patience, but you obviously have it. So you've not done an IM before? Is that on your bucket list? I can't believe your Half marathon time and your 2 HIM times. At your age?!? Just Wow! You mention the USAT Nationals and Sprint Championships so I assume that you'll be there competing? You'll have to share the story of your second DNF when you have nothing else to do (Ha!). I had my first one in October - got caught in the Powerman Duathlon in rain and dropping temps in Indiana and ended up hypothermic. Not fun but, as before, mistakes are life's way of keeping us learning.

Again, thanks for taking the time to share more of your background and your focus. It was really helpful.

LOL...I would love to take that into my HR Manager! I just wanna TRAIN!
Back in the gym tomorrow...can't wait.

and please....a moment of silence for me between 8am-11am tomorrow...I need all the positive vibes I can get!
David

The ratio is in minutes, 8 run 2 walk. The DIY plan is mine. A few weeks before Thanksgiving I did "something" to myself from increasing mileage too quickly and adding speed work. I was feeling really good, having fun and got over ambitious-cocky. I didn't respect the fact I was injured and kept re-aggravating it up to the 8 mile Turkey trot in Dallas where it became really bad. So I basically stopped running up to a week before the New Years half marathon and experimented with a 5:5 ratio which seemed to work. I have the attitude that if I paid a non-refundable entry fee I will be on the starting line! That half mary took 3:03:31. A far cry from my original 2 hr goal but I was happy to finish un injured.
No I am slowly increasing the lengths of my running sets and respecting the feeling deep in my thigh, quad and knee. Last night I may have gotten a message to back off a bit so I will. Saturday I have a (paid) 10k and I will just treat it like my other easy runs and probably try 7:3, or 8:1 since it is a flatter course than my neighborhood 5 and 7 mile routes.
 Mind you, I have no diagnosis, I spent many untold hours googling symptoms, reading web forums etc. I never made a conclusion but I suspect a torn or strained quad muscle that also lead to some over use injuries in surrounding muscles such as the prifomris, and hip abductors. So stretching and some intimate moments with my foam roller as well as paying close attention to what my body tells me. (I ignored the first warnings back in Nov thinking I could just "run through it"?
 The slow times are hard to swallow but I run allot in the dark so maybe no one sees me shuffling by? When I ran my first ever 7 miles it was in 1:17. Last night I did a regular 5 mile run in 1:15!
 My first tri is still 9 weeks away and it is a sprint. My leg and thigh generally feel better each week but never completely "discomfort" free. Especially after sitting a long period in certain chairs or driving more than an hour.
 My current training plan I borrowed from triathlete magazine for the iron distance. I like the pattern and timing of the workouts, I simply reduced the volume more appropriate to my goals-an Oly in May and perhaps a HIM in September, and a marathon in December.

Last year I did my very first 5k in April and my time was 40:18. This year I want to beat that time (I think it will be fairly easy). What would be a reasonable goal time for this year. Do you think 35 is possible to get to in the next 3 months?  

I have to admit, I love pictures. Plus, I love to share pictures

So today, I felt like I had to change up my run a bit and went on one of my favorite trails. It was a hard run in the sense that there are a lot of ups and downs but I love the scenery and isolation of the trail. The best part was after the first mile my legs warmed up and felt pretty strong. It wasn't fast but it was fun! 



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Well.....my picture adding didn't work very well!

I clicked and it downloaded saved and saw them. Looks like a fun run.

Oh good. Last time I posted a picture it showed up right on the page. I'm not sure what I did different!  

Ahhhh - your run looked so beautiful, Johanna. Thanks for sharing. Like Craig, I was able to see them too. You look very happy and bright out there.

A 3-hour test, David? Yikes! Sending you out some positive endurance vibes!

Craig, without a doubt you can do your 5k in April in 35 minutes or less. If YOU'RE determine to do it, then I know you can!

Johanna how lucky you are to run in such a beautiful place!
Craig--you can do 35!!!! Dont' think, just run/ 

BRENDA -

Another something I forgot to mention this morning was that as part of the volume from last week were four cross-country ski sessions, of which the first two were somewhere between pokey and leisurely. The 3rd had some oomph and the 4th bordered on pizzazz for several moments at a time.....but all in all thsoe four accounted for 95', I think, that were hardly demanding. Much better exercise for our ancient dog than for (ancient?) me!

There have been two IM, also. The first was Lake Placid in '04, which I did it 12:57. The second was The Canadian (not IMCanada, but a local race in Ottawa) in '05, which was done in 11:54....but the run was measured about TWO MILES LONG!!!!. I would very much like to do another full iron, probably when I turn 65 in '14.

As for those two fastest half-irons, twisted stories for both!

The 5:13 was Eagleman '04, but my actual time for it was 5:09. That is, I received a drafting penalty for 4', and it was completely mindless and without malice on my part. I had been passed by two guys at about miile 14, maybe, and was just crusing along not really thinking -- and definitely not thinking of dropping back the three bike lengths. And right behind them was the USAT motorcycle, and he nabbed me. The good thing about that was that it didn't cost me an a.g. placement, as the next guy behind me was about 6 minutes back of the 5:09. Whew? The bad news is that was a PR, but with a big old asterisk next to it. Humbug!

Then along came The Canadian Half-Iron, same course and same RD as The Canadian iron, above. I crossed the finish line in 5:07, and thought "SWEET! The asterisk is gone! I got me a new PR!". And then a day or so later I got an email from the RD apologizing for the slight mis-measurement of the run course -- short by about 1.6km. Well, 1.6km for me on that day was about 8 minutes......and 5:07 plus 8 is 5:15.....and ARGGHHH! No P.R.! The asterisk is back!

FWIW, the photo shown here is from that race, just as I'm approaching the finish line and seeing that (ultimately ephemeral) time on the clock just ahead. I can tell you that I wasn't smiling when I got his email!

I don't know what is worse -- having an official time that is from a race mismeasured long or mismeasured short. I think the latter, as that deprived me of something that I quite wanted. The other snafu, the iron, would've brought it down to about 11:37, and while that would've been nice....I dunno, I don't really regret the mismesasurement.

As for the half-iron this past August, the swim was short by maybe 4-6 minutes (no way can I swim 1.2 miles in 32'!!), so in my honest little heart the 5:18 needs to be adjusted accordingly. Rats.

The meniscus was my second Best Bad Injury. The first Best Bad Injury was in '00, when I suffered a tibial stress fracture from too much running. My sports doc diagnosed it along about this time (mid-Jan.) and said "You know, you really have to spend more time on your bike. At your age and doing all that running mileage, you're just going to end up getting hurt over and over." I had to tell him I didn't own a bike, hadn't for about 25 years. So to keep from going nuts during the 6-8 weeks rehab, I started swimming. Midway through a lap one day the lightbulb clicked on and I thought "Hmmm. I'm swimming now, and I'll get back to running, and I'll get a bike......Maybe I ought to try that triathlon thing I've read about." And that was all she wrote!

Your DNF is just like one I heard about a few days ago -- hypothermic from a cold, rainy bike. Did you require any extensive medical service? That is pretty scary, regardless. I always take risks with that, meaning that I stay down-dressed even when conditions suggest that is not wise. Maybe I ought to re-think that position, in light of your situation and that of the friend I just referred to.

Finally, yes, I found the focus and patience of that plan very rewarding. It maybe explains why I am an advocate of most people taking their time building their skills up through the distances. Now, I have NOT always been that way.....and maybe I wiill tell you about the times that I have rushed things a bit, and with less-than-favorable results.

Onwards!

DAVID -

No note, then? Well, I'll do the next best thing, which is sending major mojo your way between 8 and 11!

JOHANNE -

Jeezum jumpin' crowdogs, that's gorgeous! And hey -- no snow!

Where exactly is that place -- Nirvana Junction?

CRAIG -

Ys, I think it is doable. I'm focusing on the middel mile from the 40' run a few days ago, and at that pce for the full 5km would bring you right around 39'. But that is now, and April is April, and if you can get some consistently steady running over the next 2-3 months until race day, I can see you at 11:30 miles, which would do it!

Remember, though, to not aim to hit that pace over the next few weeks. Work gradually towards it, and keep the long view -- 9 to 12 weeks -- firmly in mind!

Promise?

Well I made it thru my Wednesday! LOL
Masters: Went to water aerobics first - like it for the social aspect so I go and then swim laps after. Anyhow- Coach said my form was pretty good. Like Kasia (I think) lots of what I've fine tuned in my swimming has been done in the last few years. I was on a kid swim team at like the age of 12 LOL. I got a cramp doing some kicking drills and I knew it was time to get going. I took off the fins and finished the set then 50 cool down and got out of the pool. Good workout and I was pleased.
Weight lifting class: I was surprised how well it went. I really liked it and I know my legs are going to be a bit sore from lots of lunges. 
Actually my muscles are a bit tired after the last 2-3 days... so easy is the plan for tomorrow.
Tomorrow, I'm off from work (usually get a day off each week part time) so maybe I'll sleep a bit, get kiddo off to school, then get an easy run in before I set off on errands and chores.  

David,
So what is the test for? 

JEFF -

I'm not sure you've mentioned those symptoms before. I will think about what it could be, but I make no guarantees.

Actually, I see two things there - one involves the thigh/quad/knee area, the other up higher, kind of groinal. I too have have a problem there, which can also woozle around to my hip. It is only a bother when I sit for mo than about an hour, with the car being the biggest culprit.

Have you tried any therapies for your problem(s)? If not, then I would recommend A.R.T., which is Active Release Technique. It is superb for soft tissue woes, but can be a bit painful -- think a cross between massage and rolfing! I am sure there is a practicioner within an hour of you, and you can find whomever is closest at their website, which I think is www.activerealeaseteachnique.com; I guess that makes sense!

As for that ill-rememberd record store in F.W., it was on the east side of University just north of Berry. I would say maybe four or five stores up from Berry. One of the owners was something-Burton or Burton-something, a fairly well-known and very talented blues guitarist. i will not rest until I figure this out!