Beer Drinker Appreciation Society (BDAS) - Open (Page 51)

Baseball question I will hope for the Yankees but honestly predict Mets over Blue Jays in October.

-Matt

Yankees at the top of the page - clearly you must have some kind of fever....

Good bet on the World Series Matchup.... Toronto's pitching is pretty good!

Jenn - So glad things are finally picking up for you. Help me - with the lack of a job, I cancelled my Y membership with it's beautiful pool that's perfect for aqua jogging and and stuck trying to use a machine to get a low impact run in. I tried several and all of them where causing my achillies to do more work than I would like. Is your "free strider" something I should try. Is so - could you take a pic for me? I need to find a way of working out when injured using the machines at the gym. It occurs to me that worse case scenario I could just walk IMMD's marathon but that is so not my style, Too bad getting injured is. : )

Anyone have any suggestions for me?

I love a good brick - makes me feel more like a bad@55 - which when your injured is money in the bank.

Speaking of bricks- anyone racing soon?

Orioles!!!

Mike - Good advice on letting the achilles heal. I'm sitting here watching the Indians/Sox game with an ice pack on my calf... I didn't do myself any favors this morning. I will try walking on Thursday and see how that goes and then I will give your treadmill idea a try. Thanks!

Ditto on the resting. I might add an ice bucket foot bath, twenty on /off x2.
If you stop running, it may heal itself, but chances are it will persist if you continue to run.

I can try posting a link as to what it looks like. The link below is off Ebay but it's the same machine - Precor AMT free-stride. If this doesn't work I'll take a picture of it the next time I'm in. It looks a lot like an elliptical machine, has moving arms or a thing to hold onto. Notice in the picture the things connected to the foot decks are like giant rubber bands. You could swing your feet back and forth or go in more of a jog motion or even a longer stride if you wanted to. I'm not sure with an Achilles injury if it would be good or not without checking in with a PT. If your gym has one of these machines, maybe try a short, easy stride to not pull on the achilles too much and see how it feels? It took me a while to figure out what the heck I was doing. No one was flying on these things like you can with an elliptical. I think it's geared to more closely simulate running perhaps. I haven't really researched them and it was the first time I've ever used one. It kicked my butt for sure.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/PRECOR-AMT-885-P80-CONSOLE-w-OPEN-STRIDE/27...

In the end, rest may be the best thing for an achilles to not irritate more and cause major problems in the long run - ease back into things. Getting injured stinks....I feel your pain literally; but we both will see our issues through and cross that line. There is no try, only do.

Hey Mark! Glad to hear things are mending! I love that the running is going well - that's great! Your road/trail run sounds wonderful - can't wait to get on some trails here. Good job taking it easy with that shoulder - no need for aero just yet, let it heal. hahaha

I finally hit the pool today, yay! Here is the kicker - I did 10 x 100 and took it nice and easy (as prescribed) and focused on extending/reaching, showing my armpit to the bottom (for a good roll) and pulling all the way through - just working technique. My swolf was lower than usual by 2 strokes and I shaved 4 seconds off my 100 time consistently without going hard.
Okay, okay - I finally bought a new swimsuit after 4 years of use in my old one which was so baggy it was like swimming with a parachute. But seriously, easy stroke with decent technique....now I just need to make my easy stroke faster... so happy.
Slowly trying to get back on schedule...though IMMT is 20 weeks out now and going in the "build" phase of the program.

HI all. Found an interesting article for those with supposed It band issues. I know I have weak glute meds and work forever to get them strengthened and able to fire correctly.
Please note that the article isn't really telling you to not foam roll, but more to find the culprit and treat that.

http://breakingmuscle.com/mobility-recovery/your-it-band-is-not-the...

This may have been posted before.
Refrigerator is getting fixed! Yay!

way to muscle through - sometimes it's good to recognize when you're fatigued so it doesn't lead to poor form and possible injury. Crush it in the pool!

Morning all! Early up for me today--60min on the trainer at 5:15 (#134) and then followed shortly by a swim about 1:15 later ((#135). Swim was in the dreaded 50m pool. I don't know what it is about that darn thing, but I swim slower in it. Mental? Certainly wouldn't be the first time someone called me that!

IronFit Secrets for Half Iron-Distance Triathlon Success
Don and Melanie Fink, 2014

Chapter 3--The Crucial Training Principles, Training Cycles, and Practice Races

This chapter is about the underlying structural principles of training, but without essentially any science behind discussed. The Finks say in this chapter that their experience has been athletes don't want to know the theory behind why the training works, only that it does and exactly what they need to do and when they need to do it to improve. Not sure I agree with that philosophy, but to each their own, I suppose. The briefly discuss the overload principle--that bodies need to work either harder or in different ways to improve. Volume, in their definition, is a combination of duration (length of workouts), frequency (number of times per week each sport is done), and intensity (heart rate or perceived effort). This sounds like the TSS score Garmin will spit out for you and I'm really interested in quantifying volume beyond the simple metric of time. I wish they had gone into some detail here about how to work out what your volume is using these three variables. This book is definitely written for folks who just want to be told what to do and when to do it, not those who want to know why they need to do things at certain times or in certain ways.

The next section discusses training cycles, which are weekly, A-race, and annual. The weekly training cycle focuses on putting workouts in a single week into an order that your body can recover from each activity, but at the same time be stressed by something else in order to maximize their effectiveness. The A-race focuses on that one important race (duh!). The annual focuses on the big picture and includes off season training and maintenance phases.The focus then moves to the specific plans outlined in this book, all of which are 16 weeks long. First 8 weeks are base-building (all aerobic, moderate intensity) with constant time increases. Second 8 weeks has peak training for about 6.5 weeks with higher intensity to build strength, speed, and endurance, followed by a 9 day pre-race taper. They are very emphatic that the 9 day taper is very important!

Training races are the focus of the next section of this chapter. They suggest three different types, the open water swim, a sprint or Oly tri, and a HM. Open water swim races are suggested for those who don't have much experience either in OW or swimming in a wetsuit. They suggest a 1mi swim race during weeks 4-15. The tri is suggested as a straight up practice for race day, wherein you have the opportunity to practice everything that goes into racing. Suggested to be done in Weeks 10-14. HM is suggested for those who have not raced that distance before as a confidence builder during Weeks 10-14.

This chapter ends with one of their "Half-Iron Distance Success Stories", which are basically short little bios of people they coach (or, at least I presume they are actual clients and not made up). I am not a fan of these little bios. Sure, it is interesting to see individuals "just like me/you" doing the HIM, but there really isn't a lot of info in the bios and they are gratingly sexist. Individually, none of them is, but when you look at all 10 included in the book (one at the end of most chapters) there is a pattern that just grates on me. They write about four women and six men. Three of the women are stay at home moms. The other woman is an independent pilates instructor and swim coach. Of the six men, one is listed as an "elite competitor" and the other five are corporate managers, company owners, partner at hedge funds, etc. There is nothing wrong with being a SAHM, but I certainly would have liked to see some equality in coverage of the women and men. Where are the women working in demanding jobs? Where are the stay at home dads or the men working in manual labor jobs? What they add to the overall book for the reader's education and/or enjoyment is far outweighed by the negative opinion they leave me with of the authors. I really, really don't like these bios and wish I hadn't read them.

It could be mental?... or It might just be your level of fitness. Did you feel tired last year at the end of the season when you were in the 50 meter pool?

Edited by Qua17 2016-04-06 2:00 PM

Glad to hear you are crushing it on the trail and that your shoulder is getting better. Please send some good shoulder mojo my way!

Finally... A post with some good news. I've eaten as well during the last two days as I have since I got let go at my school and I've finished under my calorie limit for the first time in at least a month. Plus, I just had my best biking working out on the trainer that I've had in a while as well. Get this - I might be the only guy on BT who watches the BBC version of MacBeth while doing a speed workout

Here is something new that I'm doing to motivate myself. I took an old board and hung it from the wall and painted it with blackboard paint and made it my motivation board. It's got a spot for the number of weeks til IMMT, a motivational quote, my monthly training plan, a goals section, a weight loss section and a place for my kids to cheer me on. Everytime I walk down the hall way there it is!

Off to PT - hope he can fix my shoulder and calves/Achilles!







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Anyone have any advice on how to choose a set of clip-on aerobars for my road bike? Getting a set for my birthday next month and need to send a link to Mom!

Catching up!

Mark and Jenn, glad to hear your training is picking up! DQ same with you! A good workout definitely helps up the motivation! I agree with the others too, definitely rest that achilles. Teammates of mine in college had that nag them for months to years (not to scare you!). Give it some time to heal so you can get back on the road. Also, that chalk board is pretty cool! That's great your family gets involved.

I have not been training much this past week. I have no good excuse though, other than going to Orioles opening day and now trying to catch up on my sleep. Might get a run in today, if not tomorrow morning. Think I am going to my gym Friday and Sunday morning, and will swim tomorrow and Saturday before or after my lessons. My motivation has been lacking b/c I am somehow the heaviest I have ever been even though I felt like I was doing really well. I need to really focus on my eating habits (I might've posted about this last week, but it's only gotten worse). MFP is fine when I'm at work b/c I can have the website open, but I hate doing it on the app on my phone, so I think I'm going to start having a little notepad that I document meals on, and then all at once put them into MFP. I also need to start meditating daily.

I've been really unhappy at my job lately. I leave feeling like I didn't accomplish anything, and feeling extra tired. Actually in the process of applying for a new position at UA and the prospect has me really excited. I would interact with people more rather than sit behind a desk crunching numbers all day, and I would work for a company the is all about fitness, which I think will inspire me more to be consistent with my workouts. I also need to get my boyfriend out on runs with me to help motivate me as well. We'll see about that one

Have you tried other apps? I use SparkPeople, which has a great app--I use it exclusively, even though I sit at a computer all day too. I could understand though if you said it was too much of a hassle to set up a new account with all your stuff in it (that is one of the reasons I'm not on MFP).