Baowolf mentor group is [ Closed ] (Page 56)

Joe, your running is really coming along nicely!  Lot's of firsts and sounds like you are having fun with it.

Steve, amazing training as always.  I could maybe run the first mile with you at your paces, then I'd be done!

Had a really nice 32 mile bike ride this morning.  Started with a rear flat in the garage, which wasn't so nice.  But I'm glad it happened there because I had to get the needle nose pliers to get the metal fragement out of the tire.  Does anyone carry pliers on their bike?  Then averaged 16.4 on the road miles, which is good for me.  Rode w/ a friend this morning, and that + cooler temp/lower humidity were a help.  We did our first tri together, and were reminiscing about riding our comfort/hybrid bikes that first go-round, and all the other things we have overcome in the last couple years.  She just did her first 100 mile ride (Hotter 'n Hell), and I did my first full marathon in the spring.  Yep, we've come a long way baby!!

Carol - Good time with good friends always make great stories. Nice pace on the bike.

My friend from my hiking days is the one who invited me to run this first Tri, walked me through the course a couple days before the race. Now we are hooking up more regular again. We used to work together and climbed Mt Washington, NH with various friend a few times. Now it is running and Triathlons.

Hey all! I am checking in during the biggest build week of my life. Not sure how well I'm doing, but I am getting things done. I shorted a swim and a bike for various reasons. I am dealing with a high level of tiredness and legs are more sore than normal. Too be expected i'm sure. Focusing on getting my longs done. 3000 yard swim tomorrow. 65 mile bike on Saturday and 14 mile run on Sunday. I feel confident I will get them done and keep up with my shorter stuff - for the most part. Bike is night and day different now that it has been fitted to me. I can hardly believe I rode it 65 miles knowing how many adjustments were made. He even changed my stem to make it shorter and pulled my aero bars way back. Plus I got a new saddle (Adamo Typhoon - thank you Larry!) Today was my first ride with all the adjustments and new seat and I'm pleased. Always a little bit of breaking in, but overall I think it's gonna be great. The bike is way more than I can handle right now and I hope I grow into it otherwise I will feel it is being wasted. It is my second ride so I will give myself some slack. I could not stay in aero going downhill and the fastest I felt comortable going was 25mph. On my other bike I could hit 30 and feel okay. I'm sure it will be a matter of time, but I am also sure I won't ever go 40 down a hill New wetsuit had its maiden voyage today. It fits well and I was pleased with the difference it made. I think all I have left to get is a tri top and I will officially be ready for my race. That and half a week more of intense training. BRING IT!

Love having more people back in the group posting. Now its hard to keep up But you all are doing so well and I love having this blog to come back to with my success and struggles.

Good night!

Samantha, sounds like you are mentally ready.  Awesome!!

I ran 800 repeats today.  The goal was 4:00 each.  I ran 3:55, 3:56, 3:56, 3:58, 3:59, and 3:40, with a one lap jog between each.  I was hurting, but it felt good.  Our football coach has a great quote he tells our kids that I am trying to live by "Get comfortable with your body being uncomfortable."

Samantha, survive this last bit and you will be all set for the race.  But, please build slower for your Im 8). 

Larry, solid 800s there.  Yes you need to get out of your comfort zone to gain speed.  But because we are not 16 anymore, remember to let the body recover between intense workouts 8).  Because we are talking about 5-10 years of a build up for race fitness, cramming too many intense workouts back to back (not that you are) can leave one pushing too hard to fast.  Give me patience Lord, now.  Breath in.... breath out... pat yourself on the back, get a good night sleep and a nice steady pace run today. 

Hey, everyone. I'm finally checking back in. Started up again this week, althought low volume just to get things moving again. Everything felt good, although my run fitness is really just crappy now and I'm essentially starting over. Holiday weekend weather looks good and I'm going to get out on the bike for a while tomorrow AM and hit the outdoor pool for a final time as it closes for the summer on Saturday night. Swimming this week has been great.

You guys & gals are just ripping it up from what I'm reading. Larry continues to blow my mind with his incredible progress, Steve is the local SuperMan -- that HM will be smokin' fast based on your splits! Samantha -- you are so ready for this race. Glad the bike fit is helping. And yes, 40+ mph on a bike is, uh, interesting. Certainly makes you focus.  Joe - Nice run. 57 degrees? Wow, fall is coming it seems. Always liked running on those crisp autumn mornings, so I'm all for it. Carol -- hope it gets cooler your way soon!

Thinking this fall will be heavily run focused, with the goal of getting me ready to start HIM training again in January. Swim will be in maintenance mode with my masters class good for 5000+ yds/week. Cycling may be a 2x/week thing as well with an outdoor ride on Sat AM's until I can't take the cold anymore.  Hopefully get in 4/5 runs week (2 short, 2 med, 1 long) and get some base run fitness back. I'd also like to drop 15-20  pounds by year end. If I can pull all this off, I'll be a happy guy.

Hey gang!

Wow, Samantha, your swim paces are awesome!  And a 3K yard workout, crazy in a good sort of way .  You are almost through your last build week. Getting really excited about your race!

Ha, I guess it was interval week!  Great job to Larry & Steve for pushing it up a notch.

Joe, really nice 10+ mile run you had there!  And yes, having a bit of cool weather envy here.  But hey, just hearing about it is great.

Mike, sounds like some good planning going on, and glad you are back at it this week!

Elena, how goes it?

Mitch, you out there?

And Jim....how the heck are you feeling these days?

Still missing you Ceril. Come back when you can!

I'm actually looking forward to playing hostess tomorrow morning on a bike ride.  Several other cyclists w/ diabetes, and a few assorted friends coming out as we join the Saturday Lifetime ride.  My hubby is going to lead a ride on one of our local muti-use paths.  Lots of firsts happening!

August was not a stellar month in terms of...well...anything.  But I'm happy to just get out there every day and move:

Think I'm on track for my annual bike (2K) and run goals (1.2K).  As for the swim, I'm pretty sure one actually has to go to the pool to get any swim yards in, and that has not been happening. 

Happy long weekend!

I'll play, month end totals.  I had a recovery week or two this month, but here are the numbers. Lets see how everyone else is doing.  Your numbers don't have to be awsome if your name isn't Samantha, it is just a way to look at where you were for last month. 

Steve -- thanks for the feedback on the fall/winter plan. I used some of the earlier posts in this mentor group to figure out what may work best. Appreciate it!

Went out on my bike today and it was fun. Didn't get as far as I wanted as I flatted *twice* and only had 1 tube. At one point, I came around a corner and right into a bunch of broken glass, and within two minutes, I was calling the sag wagon (my wife ).  LBS is having a sale this weekend, so I'll be loading up on tubes. Tires seem fine.

Bike question -- whats the best way to wash a bike? Like I would a car? I don't want to get water where it shouldn't be (crank, etc), but otherwise, is that a decent approach?

Yes 1 to 2 weeks to recover from a HIM.  You can do some swimming and low level shorter bike rides the first week, but probably no running for at least 4-5 days, walking is fine.  If you have years of distance training you can recover quicker or not depending on your genetics.  You can look at my 2 weeks after my HIM to look at what I did for workouts... probably after you are done with your him, get there first.  But I was low intensity and no running for maybe 4 days. 

I am cautious about washing my bike.  The primary areas of concern are the areas where your cables go inside of the bike or tubing where moisture can get caught and cause rusting of your cables (bad).  Sucks to have cables break during a HIM...also inside the rear hub, less of a concern but inside front hub as well.  I have seen folks use compressed air like you would use to clean a computer keyboard to blow out cable housings of water.  I use a rag/washcloth/spong and just kind of wash it without drownding it.  I am very cautious about getting water where it shouldnt go because I haven't crashed my bike enough to not care about the little things.  (it has its love scratches). 

So I did that 10.7 mile hill of death continuous uphill of 4 miles 3% grade and 6 miles 6 % grade  today and looked back at my times on it for comparison.  Not sure I got all of them but here it is:

4/19/12:  1:03:12,

4/26/12:  1:02:38,

6/23/12:    59:17,

9/1/12:      53:40

So I cut 10 minutes off my climb of the mean 10 mile hill this summer.  Got to be happy with that.  Hopefully the weather holds and I can get a 10/1/12 reading. 

Oh as much as I hate to read I am just that despirate to get better on the bike.  So "cyclists" classify themselvs this way:

Beginner 5000 miles per year 350,000 feet elevation gain

Intermedieate 9000/500,000

Expert 12,000/750,000

Semipro 15,000/1,000,000

Pro 18,000/1,250,000

Worldwide pro 22,000/1,500,000 (1,800 hours per year)

So.... ya don't think any of us has reached our full biking potential.  Oh my gosh really?  I guess that is how they get to 27 mph for an IM.  (when they convert to triathleetes from cyclists.

So to help reduce splashing out the straw I put those camelback bite valves on the ends of the staws (much nicer on the mouth $6).  To avoid splashing try to not overfill the chambers.  When they are up to the brim they splash more.  For my last HIM I did nto need to refill the Infinit so I took a plastic bag and a rubber band, put it over the top and poked a hole in the top so air could get in.  It kind of depends on how bad your roads are. 

Nice ride Samantha... you are ready.  But, you learned an important lesson for the run. In the race you will be able to start fueling as soon as you get on your bike because the swim will take you roughly 45 min including transition and getting out and into a pace.  But once you start the run you probably want to hit a GU/gel somewhere in that first 1-2 miles and then every 30 min there after.  Your system seems sensitive to wanting its calories.  So you are going to need to watch that carefully.  I measured how much infinit to drink using the supplied straw and measuring how many ounces 3 swallows was and then dividing total calories per 24 oz/ x number of ounces consumed in 3 swallows.  So if 3 swallows is 2 ounces.  Then 1100cal/24ozx 2oz= rougly 90 calories.  So 3-4 swallows every 20 min = 300 calories per hour.   Make sense?  Then wash it down with an equal or slinghtly more amount of water depending on the heat.  If you slack on calories on the run it sounds like you are going to bonk.. Monitor closely and brain function does not improve as races get longer 8). The only thing to be careful with on the run is taking in too many calories/water and getting side stitches.  Try to take your Gu's with like 3 ounces or so of water to help with digestion so time it so you finish your Gu just before a water station and then chase it with water.  If feeling like it is not enough take a little gatoraide at an imbetween aid station instead of water to help catch up, but not gatoraide at the same stop as Gu.

Really nice ride, and excellent pace Samantha!  Steve is a blessing for sure.  Awesome to have that kind of advice.

Really enjoyed today's ride.  43 miles of making sure others had a good time left me feeling better than most rides do.  I did fall going through a roundabout (got tangled w/ another rider), but the pavement was really slick, so no road rash even though I slid a bit.  Thankfully the other rider stayed up, and bike is OK.  All's well that ends well!

Glad you are ok Carol.

Nice run Larry.  The run is coming along nicely.  But ya it is work. 8)

Samantha - Way to go the distance and at a nice pace to. 18 miles at that pace nearly did me in last week.

Larry - Excellent run! Looks like you are seeing some great improvement.

Carol - Seems like you are finding a nice happy place. Good for you! 

Steve - Awesome improvement on the bike. Those bike numbers are impressive. I have been saying to my wife there is a "big" hill by use that I will do bike repeats over and she looks at me strange but seems like that is a good way to improve the bike. 

Ok August numbers here:

Swim:  45 min

Bike:    1:28     23.69 miles

Run:    16:46     87.89 miles

Definitely run focussed although throwing in a bike here of there does seem to help remind the legs to keep the turnover up. And now the pool is here I will take advantage of some recovery swimming. Goal achieved... ran 20+ miles for three consecutive weeks. This weeks mileage is similar to two weeks ago and it took 11 minutes less to complete. So liking the results so far. 

Plan on a light week for recovery this week something like 3,5,4,race 6 on saturday. Next goal run 25+ miles for three consecutive weeks.