Kenj - triathletes in training CLOSED (Page 48)

Congrats Ice!! Glad you are happy with the new bike!!

That was funny!

Race well and have fun Sunday Adam!!

As far as the 910 goes, I have had mine for a couple of months.  I did get a few pool swims in with it before the shoulder issue and thought it was ok.  But I may not have been using the features completely.  Interesting side note, on the day my shoulder issues started it said I did 800 yards of butterfly.  I was doing freestyle, so I am guessing my stroke was way off.  I think if your stroke is good it does a pretty good job of picking up distance.  It doesn't track drills well since it relys on the arm movement.

On the bike it does a great job of picking up power, pace, grade, etc.  If I had a complaint at all it would be that there is so much info available tough to figure out what to display!  I have settled on the basics and look at the rest when I upload it.

Pretty much the same for the run, lots of info!

PR'd my Oly today in a pretty big way (2:33) but some of the credit has to go to mother nature for sending the river (estuary?) Tides that had to be worth 10 minutes of swimming :-)

Bill - thanks! I went to the 50m pool, and because I don't know the schedule of when the full 50m is open vs a bunch of 25y lanes. Now I do, and I found the water quality to be a LOT better than the gym pool. The timing kind of stinks though...5-8:30am is when the 50m open.  When I was there, there was quite a few lanes open for kids to play, and public diving area. So I need to adjust my timing...I can't just "go anytime", but I think it'll be worth it in the end.

What drills do you do for your backyard pool?  I think my backyard pool is about 10y or so. I can certainly add one day of drill focused swim. 

Robin - If you have a bit of experience with the Oly distances for s/b/r and treat it as a fun day, you'll be fine. That's what I did for the first two triathlons of the year. I can easily do the distances, just not fast, and I had a lot of fun doing them...and was really undertrained for the swim and the run.   Do the best you can.  Get the distances in, but I wouldn't fret about "going hard". 

Adam - congrats on your PR! And lets see that RR!!

Bill (again) - Congrats on your Oly PR!! RR time! :-P

So, I've been training for 8 days straight, and I feel AWESOME! :-P  Last week was just a very bizarre fluke, and I'm definitely going to get myself checked out, but it's a PIA to find a GOOD Internal Med doc in town. 

Saturday - I went on a 30 mile ride with some cyclists and we hit Villa Ridge, which is a hard climb for 3 miles at 4-5% and certain areas is 10-15% grade. I kept up a good cadence and didn't push hard, just nice and easy. 

THEN - I originally planned on a long run today, but a columnist of a major Vegas magazine was doing an article on Biking in Las Vegas, and my BLV group decided to do a last minute ride. 30 miles, and I get to hit Villa Ridge AGAIN (the columnist wanted some hard climbs)! Some of the folks thought my friend and I were crazy for doing Villa Ridge twice in a row...well, that's a feather in my cap! :-P 60 miles for two days with over 4000' of climbing. Ta da! 

Tomorrow, I'm supposed to do a long swim, short run. Then off on Tuesday. Slightly disappointed that I had to skip my long run...again, but today was totally worth missing it. I'm not sure if it'll be better just to take off tomorrow as recovery, and switch workouts around a little bit. 

This weekend is supposed to be a Club Triathlon, and I did want to do it, but now with the little bit of a messed up week, I don't think I will do it, and I rather put in a long run vs. a triathlon. I *have* to put some more longer runs in. I think the long run will be more valuable of my time vs. a sprint triathlon...it'll be the only triathlon left before the HIM in a couple months...so I don't think I can really consider it as a "practice". ***complementing***

Oh yeah...it's supposed to be a scorcher this week too - 115 degree days.  Yay for trainer/gym tracks. :~P

Hope everyone else is have a great weekend, and take it easy in the heat! 

Congrats Bill!! Take any advantage you can, especially in the water!! My guess though is that all of the swimming you have been doing lately is a help!

Glad you worked the swim situation out DJ!!

Great job on the bike with all the climbing your cycling will get very strong!

I was think of ideas to offer you to find a way to fit the tri in next weekend till you posted the temps!! Sounds like trainers, treadmills and indoor tracks are a much better option!!

Time for some Monday morning quarterbacking....

In my race yesterday I killed the bike leg. It was a personal best and pretty fast overall. I've made some huge leaps in this discipline over the last few years.

However on the run I was actual I about 1 minute slower yesterday than I was 2 years ago. Now granted my run fitness is a down from where I wanted it to be for this race due to my knee issue. (On a side note the knee feels fine today - YEAH!) And I really went for it on the bike and I know I paid the price a little on the run.

I always find that adding a few brick workouts seams to help me on the run but other than that what can I do to improve run speed after coming off the bike? 

Bricks help!!  I think it was in the Time crunched Triathlete I was reading about some brick interval sets.  Personally, I think running off the bike is a balancing act.  If you go a little too hard on the bike the run will suffer.  A little too easy and the run is great.  Being your overall time improved I think you just found a better balance!   I wouldn't stress about being a little slower on the run. 

Isn't that the nature of being a triathlete that we stress out over these things.....

DJ, here are my favorite drills for the small pool.  I try to do drills that work the core since I hardly ever do any core work on dry land -

Sculling - I use a pull buoy when I skull and either breath to the front or use a snorkel so I can just focus on pushing water around.  Try to keep your arms out front (mine like to drift to the sides making a cross) and your elbows/upper arms high.

Vertical kicking in the deep end - if you have a deep end, I use fins and no arms and just slowly kick to stay afloat.

Dolphin kicking back and forth - Do the "worm" from your fingertips on down and end with a little dolphin kick.  I stink at this, but its a great core workout.

One armed swim with kickboard - rest one hand on TOP of a kickboard and use the other to swim..

And of course - Flip Turns.  Us triathletes are never going to get street cred with the swimmers if we can't flip   There's a great YouTube series from GoSwim on these if you don't already do them.

Thanks Bill!  Yes, I have a deep end (I have a diving board). I could work on my flip turns because the only times I do them is when I do the workouts, so it would make sense to just practice flip turns vs. during the workouts.

Adam - You KILLED the bike.  I guess that will take it's toll, but I don't bike that fast...  I do know that I don't bike hard enough in training, so my bricks aren't really indicative of raceday performance and I suffer on race runs. So maybe instead of focusing on the run portion of your bricks, focus on pushing it on the bike.

Bricks are debatable about the value, although I think a couple of them leading up to race day have value and certainly to a newer triathlete.  I like bricks and do them from time to time, but I use them more as a way to eliminate a double session or to add in extra run sessions (probably part of the premise of the Time Crunched Triathlete).  Some coaches prescribe a lot of them, other coaches don't.  Those that don't believe that you gain more value from running on rested legs.  I am sure the argument could also be made that to some extent the value depends on the individual as well.  At the end of the day, you should do the training that you and your coach (if you use one) feels works best.

Adam, I haven't seen you mention it or I missed it, but was the heat a factor?  I know it was hot this year down your way, but don't what the temps were last year.  The time off running probably was a factor, but considering the volume you had for the marathon, probably less then you think.