Jonathan22's mentor group - CLOSED (Page 7)

Is anyone having problems running on back to back days?? I ran 3 miles on Weds and 2.5 on Thursday. My feet are killing me!! I wanted to run again this am but no way, hurt to much when I got out of bed.

It's not muscle soreness it's in the joints.

Is condroiten  (sp?) helpful?

Thanks

Steve

Looks like most, if not all, of the country is getting a weather reprive this weekend. What's everyone got planned?

I'm planning a 60-75 mile ride on Sunday afternoon in prep for a Century ride in March. Supposed to be nearly 70 and sunny here (hopefully not windy as it always seems to be blowing in my face). Trying to dial in some nutrition on the bike. Really looking forward to a long ride. Last time I tried, I made it to mile 50 and then hit something in the road which almost entirely cut my tire in half (amazing that I didn't go down as I was riding one-handed in aero with a peanut butter sandwich in the other hand). Ended up making the walk of shame back home as I promptly blew out my spare tube through the gargantuan hole (or rather slice) in the tire. Amazing again (the bike gods must have been smiling on me), I flatted only about 2 miles from my house out of the 25 mile loop I was doing. With better weather, and hopefully a debris-free path, I am looking forward to some quality time in the saddle.

Thanks guys,

I run at 4:30 in the morning, riding my bike isn't an option at Odark30 on rurral roads!! I don't get home most days untill 6pm. Then I want to spend some minutes with the kidlens before bed.  I guess I need to get on the trainer (YUCK) 3 days a week and run 3. I'll see how that works!!

Thanks

Steve

I had a chance to get out on the bike again today, the weather is great here.   I'm just curious about a couple things.  

1)  Does anyone use a mirror on their bike?  If not, why not?  I don't see well out of one eye and I have a hard time turning to look behind me.  But I also don't want to use a mirror if there are some detriments to it.  

2)  What's a good average speed to be training at?  I've been doing about 14-15mph but I'm still pretty new on the bike and getting comfortable.

Thanks for the swim drills. I'll try to be patient when I get back in the pool on Monday. My last swim was better, but I know I have a long way to go.

I got my bike computer and finally installed it this morning. I went for a 4.5 mile ride and was able to tell a huge difference in shifting, gearing, and cadence. It's almost impossible to tell that you're going faster in a lower gear. Once I put on the computer, I realized that dropping down allowed me to pick up the pace by about 1-2 mph. I was really surprised. I also worked on pedal standing to get some kicks in. I'll probably get some shoes and pedals soon. Right now I'm in sneakers and on platform pedals.

This week I'll see if I can do some longer rides and learn to deal with traffic. I got passed by a big truck in my neighborhood and my steadiness gave me some confidence.

Baby steps.

I've been an off and on runner......make that an off, off, off and on runner for 2 years. It's the consistancy thing that kills me. I try to build and I break, this getting older is for the birds. I've been running at least once most often twice a week for a year. But I still have a hard time going longer than 3 miles, and even then I need walk breaks!! I ran a 5K the other day with no walk breaks and finished in 36 minutes. So I may as well have been walking. I run on the streets, asphalt, that's supposed to be slightly better than concrete. Iknow trail running would be better for the joints but I run at 4:30 am so driving to a run spot and then running in the dark,would be a tough pull.

Thanks for the thoughts

Steve

I'd guess about a third of the roadies that I do group rides with have a mirror attached to the bar ends. A couple have one mounted to the helmet. I don't have one right now and rely on my hearing and peripheral to figure out what happening behind me. This really hasn't worked great in group situations since I can't tell if someone's on my wheel or I've dropped them until its way too late. I probably will eventually get one just for training rides, makes sense and should make things a little safer. I've never seen a tri-bike equipped with one, even in training. Obviously there's some aerodynamic disadvantage.

For question #2, my take is that this is very individual and is based solely on your fitness. Keep in mind that I'm still only in my second season but I am mainly bike focused right now due to running injuries. I can highly recommend "Total Heart Rate Training" by Joe Friel. He BTW also wrote the Triathlete's Training Bible and a the Cyclist's Training Bible. Here he basically uses heart rate as a measure of both fitness and a guide to where your mosts effective training is (hence the z1, z2, z3... HR training zones). Basically, your effort (and thus speed in the case of the bike) is dictated by your cardiovascular fitness. Theoretically your max avg speed on a sufficiently long ride will be near your lactate threshhold (LT, the point where your body cannot process any more lactic acid and your muscles start to burn). Earlier in my training, I fell victim to seeing what types of averages others on the board were posting and trying to achieve those (really hard not to compare yourself to others). My fitness just simply wasn't as good as those folks so I was wearing myself down and not improving my fitness as well as I could. Late last year, after my initial "winging it" period, I started trying to get smarter about my training and reading more on training methods (now take it that I still don't use a training plan, that's the next step in my evolution once I able to train in all 3 sports). I can tell you I have seen some serious gains in my biking in particular by paying attention to HR, by being much more consistent in training, and by increasing my training volume. I know this is a long, round-a-bout answer to your question but the speed you should be training at is simply whatever your body lets you. If you have a goal to be at a certain speed for races (and assuming it is faster than you are currently going), you will simply have to increase your level of fitness to get there. You won't just be able to pedal faster and do it (at least long term and to still be able to enjoy it). Granted that since you sound like your new to biking, you likely would see improvements unrelated to fitness  as you simply spend time on the bike and learn good form. One such thing I experienced was moving to clipless pedals as the ability to pedal "all the way around" pulls more muscles into the pedal stroke. Hope this helps in some way!

If anyone was curious about the Kripsy Kreme Challenge I ran this weekend in Raleigh (run 2 miles, eat a dozen krispy kremes, run back 2 miles)...lets say this is a once in a lifetime event!  It was LOADS of fun with hundreds and hundreds of people in costume (as I was, in a grass skirt, giant straw hat, lei, and buff hawaiian guy bib). 

Lets just say that I am still "glazed and confused" 24 hours later!  Eating the donuts at the time was hard but managable.  The rest of the day i slumped into fetal position as I came down from the sugar high. 

That said...I turned in a pretty impressive performance for a 33 year old dad...finished 51st out of 5200 runners (AND I was in costume)!  Finished with a time if 36:11 which included the time to eat the donuts.

If any of you are looking for a once in a lifetime experience, you have to make the trip to Raleigh in 2010 for the Krispy Kreme Challenge.  It was by far the most fun race I have ever done. 

For some pictures you can click here on NC States web page:  http://files.technicianonline.com/kkc/ and news video here: http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/local&id=6646463

Thanks!

Luckily I didn't have many people in front of me to see any "aftermath" of the race!  Getting them down was hard but once they were in my belly, i didn't have a problem keeping them there.  The worst thing was trying to start running hard again after stopping for 7 minutes (and it was mostly uphill the way back)!  

Needless to say...my stomach absolutely hated me for 48 hours though.  Had a bowl of soup as my only meals for two days!

Average speed = wrong question.  The real question is how fast can you go and still complete all your workouts for the week.  14 mph might be at your top end but if it whipes you out for 2 days, than that speed is too fast.  Don't be afraid to go a little faster as long as you can hold that speed (average) for the entire ride.