Beginner 1/2 Ironman Plan Group (Page 78)

If you don't have anything nice to say...... Ah forget that ....

I would like to officially scold myself for the crappiest swim workout ever; form was aweful, got winded after 50 meters, had no motivation. It sucked...I sucked....I finished, but I sucked!

Should have known it was gonna be an off swim when I get to the pool and realize I forgot my goggles. Had to wear a fog filled POS pair from the lost and found at the gym.....but it was better than nothing.

Glad it wasn't race day!

On a more positive note, the run immediately after the swim went well. I swear I'm getting better at running! Something about running more to get better at running seems to work :-) 8:30's seem quite effortless where a few months ago they were effort. I wish my HR was consistently under 150 though at 8:30 pace.

Who's racing this weekend?

I was that way too. In my taper week every little strange feeling made me worry. Then I would do something like stub my toe a little and I would be a wreck about getting injured after all that work. You will be ok and that will go away as the last few days get here! Have fun on the 50 this week!

That's awesome! Enjoy the taper days. Before you know it you'll be joining the "Beginner Ironman Training Plan" forum for another 20 weeks of pain :-)

FIRST OWS WAS TODAY:

Donned wetsuit and jumped into 63* Lake St. Claire in Macomb, MI afteter setting two buoys .25 miles apart. We were out on my boat with friends so they followed me as I swam back and forth between the buoys. The water was very muddy (vis under 6 inches) and littered with debris from all the rain we've been getting (grasses, sticks, logs, reeds, etc...).

I put ear plugs in because I thought the cold would make my ears hurt (something I've experienced in colder water in the past while scuba diving). I'd worn the ear plugs in the pool once but didn't like them.

So I start swimming and almost immediately, within the first 100 yards or so got the anxious feeling. I felt kind of disoriented and was like, "oh sh*t....not anxiety ...you've got to be kidding me." I've been swimming my whole life (not endurance), scuba diving for ten years, and never had anxiety.... I stopped, called the boat over (very calmly.....I was very calm....just slightly disoriented and felt wierd), climbed on the swim platform, and took the ear plugs out. I remembered the pool swim with the ear plugs so I just said if my ears get cold then they get cold.

I very quickly jumped back into the water and was off.

I had planned to a mile - down, back, down back.

As I got back to swimming, I wouldn't exactly say I was in a groove. There was about a foot to a foot and a half chop on the water, so my bilateral breathing pattern I'd been practicing in the pool gave way to a single sided (down wind) breathing pattern. Also, I didn't feel like I had a good sighting groove. Sometimes I'd sight every four strokes, sometimes every ten. When I forgot to sight for longer stroke counts, I was always drifting right when I finally looked up. I think my right arm was crossing over on my pull, but I could only manage breathing, sighting for now. The stroke will have to get fixed some other time!

So I'm chugging along with what I feel is terrible form, and before you know it I hit the first buoy. Well, not hit it, but managed to get within about 25 yards before correcting and making my first turn. As I turn toward the first buoy I think to myself, "Really.....that was a quarter mile....that didn't feel like 440 yards.....huh." I had completely forgotten the first 100 yard ear plug incident and was going good....(good used lightly to describe horrible form, questionable sighting, and a some pretty good mouth fulls of pretty brackish water :-))

The up leg was better than the down, so I made the turn at the second buoy and kept on keepin on. Buoy three came and went and as I approached buoy 4 (1 mile) I flipped to my back and yelled for my time keeped to hit lap instead of stop .... I was doing another loop!

While everything didn't feel perfect, I wasn't tired. My breathing was okay, sighting ... okay, anxiety - NONE! It was at the 1 mile mark that I really thought to myself, "Okay....you've gone a mile and you're not even tired.....what's up with that?" I realized that what's up with that was the back half of my body. My wetsuit was a dream. My legs were effortlessly at the surface and my body was perfectly horizontal.

My previous "long" continuous swim in the pool was a 1500 and I was pretty spent by the end. By the end of my third lap today, I'd gone 2640 yards, and wasn't even that tired when I called it quits. I called out for my time and .... are you ready for this ..... 45 minutes 51 seconds!!! The math comes out to 1:45 per 100. I knew it was decent, but I never thought it would have been that decent.

Now to be perfectly honest, three exclamation points is probably two too many. I'm not really that happy with my time/speed, but given that it was my first swim.....I'm thrilled! With my sh*t for and at times off-course path to the buoys, I know I can get that down to 1:30-1:35 range pretty easy. And with the performance of my wetsuit, I won't even be tired!!! (that really does get three exclamations). Props to Xterra wetsuits :-)

Sorry to write a novel, but today was a good day!

After the swim, I enjoyed the beautiful day on the boat with friends and delicious food.

DV - Nice swim in some challenging conditions. Sounds like you got the hang of it pretty quickly. It always amazes me how much easier it is to swim in a wetsuit (love my Xterra as well), you have to remind yourself to kick every once in a while. As for siting, try swimming in a pool with your eyes closed in between breathes and that may help you as well with swimming straighter. Get as many OWS as possible because you can never have enough. Also, try and swim with as many people as possible to simulate race conditions because it is the contact and swimming in close quarters which can really freak you out.

Just finished week four and as planned used the final workout to ride 43 miles and run 8 miles as a brick (bagged the transition practice workout of alternating intervals of bike, T2 and run). Really glad that I laid this one down as a 3.5 hr continuous workout - it was a good learning experience. The ride was a pleasure and the new race wheels are the bomb and was able to hold 20+ mph for much of the ride on course like conditions. Took Perpetuem on the bike and am not sure whether I liked it once it got warm. Unfortunately, my training partner crashed and got some pretty nasty road rash and cracked his helmet (which either saved his life or saved him from a nasty concussion). Once we cleaned him up, he stayed with the ride and run until the end.The run was tough - took four bottles on the belt, which was not enough. Hydration will be an issue for me as my course is known for being very hot. As the course is very well supported, I will make it a priority to take on water and putting ice into my kit (core temp is also key). I also practiced some walking to simulate walking through aid stations. I found the walk to help me mentally and physically.Assuming conditions are decent (not so sure of this since last year it was 98 degrees) and no unforseen issues arise, I'm gonna target a 5:45 race time.

Glad your friend's okay Joe.

I keep hearing of wipe outs and can't even imagine going down at 20+ mph. I sometimes think to myself as I'm cranking along.....people wreck at this speed....how do they not break every bone in the body?

So I need to get my tri career under way. So far I'm registered for my frist tri, an Olympic, on June 12th. My A race is Ironman Steelhead on August 14th.

I have the opportunity to do a tri this weekend. I can do the Sprint or the Olympic. I want to do the Olympic at an easy pace just to get the feel for things. At the same time, I don't want to mess up my training by going a distance I shouldn't.

Sprints just seem awefully short to me....and perhaps not worth my time. I know I'd learn stuff just by being there and going through the physical and mental motions, but unless there's some consensus on here that an Olympic is too much, I think I'll do the Olympic.

Any honest advice would be appreciated! 

Nice job as usual Joe! Hope your friend is feeling OK today. The heat is creeping in here too. It is amazing what a difference it makes. Somewhere along the line my body has become accustomed to 50 degrees and raining. 88 degrees and humid is taking a toll on me. I'm not complaining - I love the warm weather. Just another adjustment.

Why? I never understand this attitude. I love sprints. Great workout, easy to recover, fun, fun, fun and I'm home before lunch. I mean you can do whatever you want. It's your training. I'm just sticking up for the value of racing a hard sprint. If you want a long training session then do the Oly. If you really want to RACE, do the sprint. I'm getting all excited writing about it. A sprint is just that - you are maxed out from the time you get in the water until you cross the finish line. You will test your will to fight, to work as hard as you can and never let up. It is a totally different experience than the RPE 2 or 3 work that is in the training plan.

To me a lot depends on where you are in training at this point. You obviously are not going to tapper for a race this weekend if you are just deciding on it now. So I look at what is on your plan for this weekend and what level you are up to. A sprint will be a hard workout for an hour to an hour and a half. An Oly will put in more like two an a half. Both will be harder workouts then the plan probably has and may effect the next weeks training if you are hurting after. Are you up to the swim/bike/run distances of the Oly in your training now? If you feel good about all that do it. If you are not sure drop down to the sprint. It will be "worth your time" both as a good workout and as good transition practice. Just my opinion, good luck either way and have fun!

Thanks for the thoughts!

I registered for the Olympic for the reasons Pops mentioned. I've not yet gone through speedwork in my plan and don't want to hurt myself pushing for time in the sprint. I'll use the Oly as a learning experience and a nice brick session; time is irrelevant.

It will be interesting to see what my RPE and HR are on the run. I've only done one brick of similar length, and never after a swim.

OKAY...... I'M OFFICIALLY EXCITED!!! FIRST TRI IS IN 5 DAYS!!!

I told my wife I registered and her exact response was, "If the weather's nice I'll come with you."

I laughed out loud for about a minute before getting a dead serious look on my face and stared her down.

She's coming :-)

My only other endurance event was the Motor City Half Marathon last year and she missed it due to work. Sans work, she gets no non-spectator participation excuses this year!

OMG OMG I'M EXCITED!!!

Good choice, DV.  While your intentions may be noble, don't underestimate how hard it will be to refrain from pushing it.  How many times can you hear "on your left" without having to answer the bell? It is not easy holding back, but Pops is right about the run.  Hold it back for the first 5K and see if you can open it up on the back end.

Great advice guys!

Negative Split the run is my new goal :-)

Need some help here with Week 3.  Here's what the plan says:

Weds - 30 min bike, 2 hr run brick

Thurs - Off

Friday - 3 hr bike, 20 min run

Sat - Off

Sun - Off

Fact of the matter is that I can't swing a Friday bike of that duration.  My thought would be to move Friday's workout to Saturday, but I don't really like the idea of taking Thursday and Friday as back to back off days. Was thinking about adding a recovery easy paced swim on Friday. I haven't seen back to back rest days this in the plan before and I don't think I need the extra rest going into a two week taper. Thoughts?

Man you guys are in the final few weeks!

Today at work I took a break and read ahead in the plan to see what was upcoming and in the future. I don't feel like I'm pushing enough right now and wanted some evidence that it will get harder. Um.....3 hr. bike ride and 30 minute run brink will be plenty hard thank you very much!

I also noticed today that I haven't taken a day off in 14 days.....but I feel great. I'm motivated, have energy, body feels good, I'm stretching, etc, etc, etc... I honestly can't see the harm of doing an easy recovery run just about any day of the week.....after just about any workout. Unless I'm in full on taper, I don't plan on taking two days off in a row.

My advice is get something in. That week looks swim light anyway, so an added swim might be a good idea!

Man you guys are gettin close. Who will I talk to after you're done?