Fred Doucette's Half-Iron and Ironman Focused Group! -CLOSED! (Page 51)

I ran outside with my husband but it was not particularly nice outside here in MA.

Tomorrow and Thursday forecast is for upper 40s. I may try riding either my road or cross bike outside at warmest time of the day. I need to decide if I want to get my PT wheel off Ordu and put on regular tire so I can ride outside with power or just ride.

I have a big training week ahead with lots of bike time. Late the following week I'm going to Florida and helping a friend move to TX.

Nice to be able to ride lots outside!

How did your trail run go? Sounds like a blast to run with other like minded folks.

Well, I officially reached the end of Jorge's 15 week winter training program, and I'm really pleased with the results.  I've gone from 3.06 watts/kg to 3.5 watts/kg, and bumped my CP from 213 to 245.  15% increase in 15 weeks - couldn't ask for more than that.

But I also realize that I've basically taken the low hanging fruit in terms of power increases.  I'm expecting it will be much harder from here on out to continue making increases.  The goal remains getting my watts/kg above 3.7 in time for the HIM which isn't until Sept - so I've got some time, and lots of work ahead.

Good thing the program ended when it did, cause I need some unstructured time for the next few weeks.  I'll be travelling for work in a couple of weeks, and then off on a vacation (not sure where yet!) the week after.

On a final note (sorry for rambling), I was very happy to actually run outside today without multiple layers, and managed to go 15km without ITB pain.  Thank goodness for small successes.

Great job Neil.  Hope you all had a good weekend.

After almost a month and a half solely on treadmill I finally ran outside 10 miles.  Wow definitely felt like I struggled up the hills, etc. (for better or worse I don't bother with inclines on the mill) Pavement felt a little harsh... in central park (where I do virtually all my running) we have these awesome bridle trails that are nice and soft to run on but they are covered with snow and ice right now so no go.  The other thing that may be different from where you all run is the enormous number of other runners out there with you.  Normally I quite love it, it feels like a big party... but sometimes like today I get caught up running other peoples paces.... I wanted to catch up to these two speedy looking gals... and did  but probably should have stayed doing my own thing.   

This user's post has been ignored.

Great job Neil!

15% in 15 week rocks~

Hope you continue to make gains leading up to your HIM.

This is the time of year that it is beautiful to ride and run outside. It will be great for about 3-4 more months and then we have brutally hot summers (110-118 degrees). You just get your rides in before 9am in the summer.

I bailed on the trail run because I pushed so hard on the bike on Sat. I got up at 5:45a this morning and said "Not going to happen today". I'm trying to get up early and get my workouts done but it's counterintuative to the way I live. I'll get up 3 days really early a week and that's it. The next 8 weeks are going to be more mental than physical I guess. I'm going to have to focus on getting all of my workouts in.

Great job on the gains. I guess I would be at 2.0 - 2.5 watts/kg right now. I haven't done any tests but I know where I'm at for an hour spin class. It must feel great to see gains in such a short time. I can see this paying good dividends in your HIM times.

Last week was the biggest s/b/r week I have had in a long time with nearly 12hr.  Something I really was not sure would happen ever again like 4 months ago.  It was more so a bike focus.  I ended up with some decent runs in.  Swimming was not so much a focus.  So I will most likely make this a rest week which will be around 9-10hr s/b/r at a easer pace.
 
Weekly totals & Avgs
 
Bike
110.73 Mi - 5h 20m 30s
Pace: 20.73 Mi/hr
 
Run
35.95 Mi - 4h 31m 33s
Pace: 07m 33s /Mi
 
Swim
5550.00 Yd - 1h 42m 30s

This user's post has been ignored.

This user's post has been ignored.

Kate - Running with so many others would def be a big change for me.  I usually see 1-2 other runners when I'm out for an hour run.

Neil - Congrats on the power gains.  As others have said, pretty impressive.

I've rolled my bike through several nice hotel lobbies while traveling for work - never had an issue.  You get more weird stares than anything and every once and awhile you get the cute kid in the elevator who says "wow! that bike looks fast!".

Along those lines, t?????here are three conferences our team needs to cover the same week in March - one in boston, one in Atlanta and one in Tampa Bay.  ??A?f?t?e?r? ?s?o?m?e? ?r?e?s?e?a?r?c?h?,? I chose Tampa because the government contract flight will be Southwest (i.e. $50 bike check fee, vs $200 on most others), it will be warmest and it is the same week the clocks change and we gain an extra hour of sunlight at night (making the bike after conference possible).  Only then did the look at what the three conferences actually were about.  Luckily, it was also the best match for my current duties (Atlanta was close if not equal, but that conference, Pitt Con if anyone knows it, would have been as boring as running on a treadmill and biking on a trainer in silence while facing a wall).  The one I chose was a Test and Evaluation Conference.

Congrats on the gains so far Neil.  At this 1%/week trend you're on, you'll be up to like 315 Watts by September!  Time to find that middle hanging fruit!

James - nice volume last week.

Joe - I like your way of planning....consider what the conference is about as the last consideration - nice.

Easy day for me today, just a swim at lunch.  Only got in one swim last week as we had an ISO audit being done at our site, so I need to make up for it this week.

Solid week of training James!

My volume was lower than my normal last week with 2 travel days but worked well as nice bit of rest/recovery. I rarely take rest days or week.

Joe, I like your thinking on picking which work trip works best for training.

Fred, we often travel with bikes (up to 4) which means bringing them into the hotel. We've never had an issue bringing them into our room. One hotel in FL offered us to store the bikes in their storage room. We will put 2 of the bikes in there but bring my bike into our room.

HAPPY VALENTINE's DAY to all the amazing wonderful spouses and significant others you all have in your life... really to do the kind of stuff we do I think we all must have some amazing partners to support this.... I can't believe what a baby I am being about being away from my valentine today (will be working all night) ... thought 12 years of marriage would make me less aware of such things. 

Fred, the one time I saw a person walk through a hotel with a tri bike (besides a race) was at Disney World.  We go to Disney a lot... hope you have great weather.   I am going to Florida Keys next week. 

Bingo Kate!

Treadmill run on lunch today (intervals), and tonight I have my first appointment with the massage therapist to try and work on the IT Band.  How's everyone else's day looking?

This user's post has been ignored.

Edited by Fred Doucette 2011-02-15 10:59 AM

VO2 Max bike interval today doing 30/30s...30" hard/30" easy...felt really strong

Then had my 3rd PT visit

He said my knee has improved since last visit 2 weeks ago and is maybe 80% and goal to get to 95% by next visit in two weeks; I was able to get full knee extension faster, easier and it stayed longer than last visit. I'm almost to the point I can work on functional strength but not quite there with knee extension. His estimate is in 2 weeks can work on functional strength and by April 1-10th or  after 5-7 weeks to make big functional strength progress and in plenty of time for IMLP build.

He made my PT work harder but nothing new

Right now with not full extension, it effects my gait by having my weight on ball of my foot, effecting my soleus, effecting the angle of my hip and making my low back to work that my glutes and hamstrings should be doing while running.
I can bump up my running 8-10% a week now and am talking over with my coach how to go about that probably adding frequency like running 2 days skipping a day

Will run later