Ironman Louisville : Official Thread (Page 51)

NashinAK- If got my tendonitis over the Internet...dude my apologies. You have an early opportunity to rest it and ice it. I may be gone in a matter of days.

Jillian- I would love to help you with your race wheel situation, but the only race wheels I had (which were chuck full of awesomeness...were given to me and they left me when I sold my bike (650s; I have 700s now). Cube seems to have a handle on this though. Good luck.

My bike drama. I'm taking my bike in today. Hopefully this week they will be setting my bike up as to as close to my previous bike as possible. I would love it if it works.

Achilles...well, Tuesday it didn't go great, we'll see how tomorrow goes. I'm working on a plan where I only run twice a week...for now. We'll see.

My first event is May first (Duathlon). We'll see if I have a bike and/or healthy enough Achilles to attend. My expectations will adjust accordingly.

Keep up the good work!

Peace, ~Sam

FELTgood- The swim takes athletes up river for a stint then takes a turn down river for the majority of the swim. I didn't notice the current one way or the other in '09, but that isn't to say there wasn't an impact.

exnavydoc--I don't have any experience on the course; but from all indications, there aren't too many large climbs.  The constant rolling hills is what I have seen discussed in my research and my knowledge of the area. 

I would be interested in any accurate data regarding elevation gain on the course.  I've seen a lot of mixed reports and nothing that has been verified by multiple sources. 

Good luck!

I did Louisville last year and was just popping into the forum to see what's going on but I'll give you my $.02 on the bike course hills.

Prior to the race I was not able to ride the course at all and I was concerned about the unknown going in to my first IM.  For my training I checked out the elevation profile on Map My Ride.  I then made sure to include lots of training rides around my home that had similar hill profiles.

The strategy worked well for me.  I rode the bike faster than I had predicted and felt pretty good heading out on to the run.

Regarding the mixed reports, here's my take.  Most inconsistencies that I found when trying to research the course were the big difference between people who used garmins to determine course elevation vs. those who used websites such as mapmyride.  Just make sure you are comparing apples to apples and all will be fine.  I don't know which one is more accurate but I believe that both are consistent.

Just to show you what I mean regarding the inaccuracies of the elevation gain data that I have seen, here is a list of a few places that list out the elevation gain of the Ironman Louisville route:

Mapmyride: 2041

trimaven.com: 8416

slowtwitch forum # 1: 7578

slowtwitch forum # 2: 3622 and 4300

veloroutes.org (92 miles): 1728

BT forum 2009: 6749

It would help me considerably to know what to expect and train accordingly.  What am I missing?

Nathan

This thread should show you the comparisons.  Ironman Lake Placid is described as a very hilly course, and the climbing comparison from IMLOU to IMLP is only around 350' difference.

IMLOU is the 6th hilliest 140.6 event and IMLP is the 3rd hilliest.

Here's the link:  Bike Course Elevation Comparisons

NiceTriCoaching- Thanks for the link. Very interesting.

The one thing about the comparison I would note as it pertains to IMLOU v. IMWI is that I perceived IMWI's bike course to be more challenging. It seemed IMLOU had more frequent hills, but they were more rolling and gave back more than IMWI, but this may be my skewed view of my experience.

I guess I see it this way. Yes, it is a hilly course, so plan for hills. However, I don't think it is anything to panic about. Make sure you can cover the distance and do strength work. Yes, ideally you will be able to train for the distance with hills, and yes, I do have this 'luxury'. But people, you are strong athletes...you can do this. Hills make the course more interesting. It's all good.

Hey Sam, I haven't checked in for a while as I have been quite busy (taxes, work, training, eating... you know) but I wanted to take a second to tell you to hang in there. I haven't had the achilles problem before (knock on wood) but I imagine I would be in full panic mode right about now if I were you! You're taking it like a champ. 

I read the bit above about you preparing yourself for a possibly less than stellar event, but I think it is quite the opposite. Sure, there is something to be said for going out and rocking an awesome time (and I'm a very time oriented person, trust me), but the Ironman is so much more than that. I have done two 140.6 races, the first one was nearly perfect and I had a great time for me, on the second one (IMLou 2010) pretty much everything went wrong, it was a total disaster, I wanted to quite every inch of the last 60 miles, I had to walk 19 miles of the run, I went over an hour slower than my first race, and my wife beat me by over an hour. However, looking back on everything I am way more proud of the second one than the first because it cost so much more pain, effort and mental toughness and I learned that my limits in those areas were way beyond what I imagined. My point is that if you can suffer these injuries, take it on the chin and still go out and finish this Ironman, whether you go 7:59 or 16:59 you have had a STELLAR RACE! Don't think of this race as a sub-par finish if you go slower than your pre-season goal time, think of it as your finest hour because of what you were able to overcome!

I know I don't have to tell you this, you've been there and you know what it is all about, but I thought I would just give you a friendly reminder to use as encouragement on this journey. Now go get yourself healthy so we can have the pleasure of racing with you in August!

tulkas-Thanks for the encouragement. I hear what your saying.

...I hope to ride on my trainer tonight with the new set-up on my GURU. My fingers will be crossed. Well, figuratively, I don't want to fall off.

Jillian O

I hear and feel your pain about the hill training situation! I live in the swam flat land of South Florida where our only hills are bridges so I know the "rolling hills" will be the Himalayas for me ;-O...I am doing the best that I can to train.

I am planning on doing the half ironman in Clermont in June which is steamy hot and hilly in preparation...any interest in doing it?

Happy training!!

Alicia

Hi all,

How is everyone's training going? I've been battling Tibial Posterior Tendinitis for the past two weeks. It has limited my training a lot due to limping. I could barely swim because even the slightest kicking of water (out of habit) hurt. I can now ride with little pain but I will not start running again until Monday.

It's been upsetting because I had what i thought, a strong base coming into my 20week training plan. It looks like the overuse really got to me.

Hopefully I can bounce back with no more injuries.

I'm just going to take it a day at a time...

We are certainly battling our personal demons. Fatigue, time, injury, mechanical issues, or what have you. There is not doubt that this can be daunting. Keep moving forward in ways that make sense to you.

I ran two miles this morning. Achilles discomfort was apparent, but not dibilitating by means. Moving forward.