Brian's group - FULL (Page 7)

IronCowgirl - 2010-05-12 2:19 PM Thanks Rod! I'm feeling a lot better today, so I'll put in my cut-down workouts. I've skipped a few classes to get extra sleep, been drinking lots of water and taking my vitamins so hopefully I'll be back on top by the end of the week. I better be, 'cus on Saturday a group of us are heading up the Trail of the Coeur 'd Alenes which is a 72-mile paved loop for bikes and such and I'm super excited about it. I've never ridden more than about 30 miles at a time, so this will give me an opportunity to see how far I can get in a day. 

ray6foot7 - 2010-05-13 11:16 AM We have several people racing this weekend.   It looks like Rod's first tri, and Katie's first Oly.  It also looks like Beth and Katie will be at the same event this weekend.  Remember to keep it fun, and we'll be waiting to read those race reports.  Good luck this weekend.

brian - 2010-05-10 7:05 AM Okay, there has been some general 'slackiness' in keeping the training logs up-to-date.  Remember that this is a key ingredient in the Mentor Group program as it is the window into your workouts, the manner in which you receive feedback and motiviation from your peers and ... most importantly ... the means by which you hold yourself accountable to accomplishing your workouts.

I cannot tell you how many times I have stood on deck at the pool at 5:30 am, staring at the water and comptemplating the reasons why I did not want to do that workout ... but got in the water because I knew my BT friends would dog me for not doing it.

And why is this accountability important? Why do you need to consistently train for two weeks?  ... because results from exercise, first and foremost, are the sum total of the consistency of the exercise performed not the individual total of each workout.  Endurance is not like a bank account where each mile is like depositing a dollar whereby it is stored for later use.  It truly is a case of 'use or loose'.

It is for this reason that some of a work out performed is infinitely better than none of a workout done.

Log your workout!

... that is all, please now returned to your normally scheduled programming already in progress

ray6foot7 - 2010-05-14 11:11 AM Cheeks asked me, "What keeps you motivated?"

I was asked to give a small presentation on this subject for our biking club whenever we get organized.  So I thought I would share it here.

1.  Find something you enjoy doing.  It looks like we have all chosen triathlons.  The key to fitness is consistency.  If you love doing it, you will be more consistant.  With that on my mind, is how I selected my training plan for this year.  It contained many workouts that I knew I would enjoy.  Is it the best plan for optimal performance?  It is for me simply because I will be more motivated to do them day in and day out.

2.  Accountability.  This mentor group can help with that.  Another way is to find a training partner.  It can be a friend, club, or team.  If you know someone is waiting for you at the pool, it is a lot easier to get to the pool, than it is to explain to your friend why you stood them up.  If you miss a weekly club ride, then you have to answer why you weren't there.  Also, let people know your plans.  I wouldn't want to tell my friends that I didn't even start my IM because I didn't get the training in.

3.  Set a goal.  Make it a concrete goal.  eg. "I plan on doing OKC Redman 140.6 on Sep 25 with a goal time of sub 12:00."   My goal until this year has been, I would like to finish an IM someday.  That hasn't worked out so well for me.  I have been saying that since I was 11 years old.  Will I get sub 12:00?  Who knows, maybe not.  But I am training like I want to be sub 12:00.  If my goal was just to finish sub 17:00, I would probably allow myself to skip quite a few training sessions.   Whenever I am feeling unmotivated, I tell myself, "You aren't going to be sub 12:00 by watching t.v. today."

4.  Make a financial commitment.  Once you sign up and pay for your desired event, it adds a whole new level of motivation to your training.

5.  Do other races and fun events before your 'A' race.  Run some local 5k's, or some organized bike tours.  These help make training a lot more enjoyable and less of a grind.  You can also meet people with similar interests.  Meet enough other "crazy" people and it can become a lifestyle, rather than a one time event.

6.  Reward yourself.  After a solid bit of training, go buy that new piece of biking gear you've been wanting.  Treat yourself to a steak dinner or sundae.

7.  Use Triathlon Jedi Mind Tricks.  1. Convince yourself that you are only gonna train 5-10 minutes.  If you still don't feel like training after that you can call it quits.  Most of the time though, you will decide  you really don't feel that bad and will continue with the work out.  (There are more mind tricks, but my notes are at home)

8.  Have a written plan on how you are going to reach your goal.  It is easier to be consistant while following a plan that it is to wing it day to day.  Your plan can be a brief outline or a detailed day-to-day plan.  It can be homemade, premade or a combitation of both.  Find one that is both enjoyable and manageable.  If it is filled with training sessions you dislike the most you are going to have a hard time following it.  If it is too hard, you will get discouraged and most likely quit. 

9.  Schedule training time into your personal and business schedule.  I e-mail my wife my training plan every week and when I plan to do each training sessions.  She is very supportive and will try to schedule chores and social commitments around those if possible.  If not, then I reschedule my training sessions to available time slots.  This also helps with accountability.  Just this Wed as I was tooling around the house, my wife said, "Aren't you supposed to be biking right now"  I had no choice but the jump in the saddle and head out the door.

I believe I had more keys to staying motivated, but my notes are at home.  I will try to find those and add them later.

I hope this helps a little bit Cheeks.

bdroppleman - 2010-05-13 11:21 PM

Oops I almost forgot: my 2nd time trial is a 5k.

27:10

It was SUPER hot since I ran on a track w/no shade. I pushed it hard, and I'm ok with the time. I kept trying to relax pain on side of left knee and belly breathe to lower HR.

based on the 220-age formula, here are my stats.
highest HR was 170=98% of max;
avg HR was 125=72% of max.

I was actually trying to do with my HR monitor what I read in the article Brian posted, but when I got home I realized that the avg heart rate was taken based on all my entire workout time including the walk parts at beginning and end...of course! Sometimes when I run I am not thinking clearly, or maybe it's that sometimes when I'm doing math I'm not thinking clearly. No matter. I don't really know what my avg HR is for the last 20 mins of a 30min trial, so I guess I'll need to do that again. But I have to agree that it seems my threshold must be a little higher. 

I ran 12.5 mins in zone 5==wouldn't I have passed out if that was really close to 98% of my max? ???I? ?c?a?n?'?t? ?h?e?l

???I?  

ray6foot7 - 2010-05-14 12:11 PM Cheeks asked me, "What keeps you motivated?"

I was asked to give a small presentation on this subject for our biking club whenever we get organized.  So I thought I would share it here.

1.  Find something you enjoy doing.  It looks like we have all chosen triathlons.  The key to fitness is consistency.  If you love doing it, you will be more consistant.  With that on my mind, is how I selected my training plan for this year.  It contained many workouts that I knew I would enjoy.  Is it the best plan for optimal performance?  It is for me simply because I will be more motivated to do them day in and day out.

2.  Accountability.  This mentor group can help with that.  Another way is to find a training partner.  It can be a friend, club, or team.  If you know someone is waiting for you at the pool, it is a lot easier to get to the pool, than it is to explain to your friend why you stood them up.  If you miss a weekly club ride, then you have to answer why you weren't there.  Also, let people know your plans.  I wouldn't want to tell my friends that I didn't even start my IM because I didn't get the training in.

3.  Set a goal.  Make it a concrete goal.  eg. "I plan on doing OKC Redman 140.6 on Sep 25 with a goal time of sub 12:00."   My goal until this year has been, I would like to finish an IM someday.  That hasn't worked out so well for me.  I have been saying that since I was 11 years old.  Will I get sub 12:00?  Who knows, maybe not.  But I am training like I want to be sub 12:00.  If my goal was just to finish sub 17:00, I would probably allow myself to skip quite a few training sessions.   Whenever I am feeling unmotivated, I tell myself, "You aren't going to be sub 12:00 by watching t.v. today."

4.  Make a financial commitment.  Once you sign up and pay for your desired event, it adds a whole new level of motivation to your training.

5.  Do other races and fun events before your 'A' race.  Run some local 5k's, or some organized bike tours.  These help make training a lot more enjoyable and less of a grind.  You can also meet people with similar interests.  Meet enough other "crazy" people and it can become a lifestyle, rather than a one time event.

6.  Reward yourself.  After a solid bit of training, go buy that new piece of biking gear you've been wanting.  Treat yourself to a steak dinner or sundae.

7.  Use Triathlon Jedi Mind Tricks.  1. Convince yourself that you are only gonna train 5-10 minutes.  If you still don't feel like training after that you can call it quits.  Most of the time though, you will decide  you really don't feel that bad and will continue with the work out.  (There are more mind tricks, but my notes are at home)

8.  Have a written plan on how you are going to reach your goal.  It is easier to be consistant while following a plan that it is to wing it day to day.  Your plan can be a brief outline or a detailed day-to-day plan.  It can be homemade, premade or a combitation of both.  Find one that is both enjoyable and manageable.  If it is filled with training sessions you dislike the most you are going to have a hard time following it.  If it is too hard, you will get discouraged and most likely quit. 

9.  Schedule training time into your personal and business schedule.  I e-mail my wife my training plan every week and when I plan to do each training sessions.  She is very supportive and will try to schedule chores and social commitments around those if possible.  If not, then I reschedule my training sessions to available time slots.  This also helps with accountability.  Just this Wed as I was tooling around the house, my wife said, "Aren't you supposed to be biking right now"  I had no choice but the jump in the saddle and head out the door.

I believe I had more keys to staying motivated, but my notes are at home.  I will try to find those and add them later.

I hope this helps a little bit Cheeks.

Rod1 - 2010-05-17 4:25 PM Race Report - Mini Sprint Triathlon 300m swim/6km bike/1.5km run.
I'll try to keep it short! So overall happy with the time 26:41, which placed me 7th out of fifteen, and 6th out of the eleven men competing (OK so Jersey Triathlons are somewhat thinner in terms of contestants than your Triathlons will probably be!). This was a novice triathlon, so you could only enter if you hadn't completed a Triathlon in the last five years. Swim time at 4:50 was within what I'd allowed myself, but 20 seconds slower than what I was doing in training, and I came out of the pool tireder than I was from the training pace. I don't understand this. Bike leg was good, at an average speed of 29km/hr. I lost just under a minute versus the leaders on the bike leg. Transition was good, but I did manage to have the toe of my shoe hit the road as I was getting on the bike, which was scary for the moment that my back wheel left the ground. Getting off the bike was better (at least the practice paid off there!).And then...the run...uggh! It was only short, but it was painful and slow, I stopped for about 10seconds to catch my breath about 200m in, and overall lost 2 minutes versus the leaders on the run. Ran at about 10.5km/hr - yet I can do the 5km run at close to 12km/hr in training. Overall I deliberately didn't push as hard as possible on the Swim and the Bike to have something left for the run, but still didn't have anything left for the run :-) The best part of the race however was having the spectators singing happy birthday as I crossed the finish line! (First triathlon on my Forty First Birthday!). Overall the event was a lot of fun, and as hard as I find the run, it is a great feeling when you finish. I am both excited and nervous about the Sprint Triathlon the weekend after next!