jesse_d Mentor Group - Closed (Page 8)

Hey Jesse,

I have 2 1/2 weeks to my first road race - it's just a 6K run (weird I know) - which I don't think will be a problem. I have 2 tri's this summer - 8 weeks (7/26) till the first one - 1/3 mile swim, 15 miles b, 5K run.

SWIM: I think my swim is coming along. I am up to 550M and plan to extend that to at least 1/2 mile by July. I need to get out and do some OWS soon now that the water is just starting to warm up here. (people are still wearing wetsuits in the larger lakes.) I'm gathering more ideas for drills and my next time in the pool I will extend my distance, do a longer combination of drills and more sets of intervals. I plan to have my husband tape me - hopefully he will agree to this!  I just signed up for a one-day OWS clinic, which a friend of mine recommended.

BIKE: I've been spinning a few times a week and ride the bike at the gym usually once a week. As far as outdoor riding, I need to get out more, but am finding this difficult b/c we have to travel to a place to ride and usually need to find someone to watch our son. Also, I want to feel more comfortable riding with the clipless pedals. I need to extend my rides to more than 15 miles.

RUN: I feel on target and am planning on doing a few more 5 miles runs and hopefully extending them a bit.

I feel that I have come a long way since I started in March. I am feeling on target. My plan is to do some OWS, longer brick workouts and extend each leg.

What are your thoughts?

Training!!! You mean you are not going to do the race for us if we are not ready. Some mentor you are!!!  J/K   Training is going good, about 7 weeks out. 

Swim -  2-3 days a week. Still need work I almost alwas do swim after run or bike. I am going to start do swim first or concentrate on one workout by itself. I do good with balance during part of the workout and then goes bad. I get my mind off of the balance. As long as I keep my mind on balance I should do better.

Run - average 3-4 days for runs. Mostly 4+ miles each run and will probably top out at 9-10 miles. Fell good with run. Will start doing tempo/interval this week

Bike - 2-3 days. 1-2 days spinning and 1 day usually 20 miles or longer. usually do intervals for 1-1.5 miles and rest then same. Some rides may go up to 30+. Also training for the BikeMS tour in Oct.  which is 172 miles this year.

Overall I am happy with my progress. I just need to work more on swimming. Once that is down I believe I will do great.

I'm racing in the Jacksonville Sprint Series #2 on July 18th. The have six sprints from May - Aug.  Jax Sprint Series and Beached Fine Art Series. They just added Atlantinc coast tri HIM and I think Oly distance in Amelia Island.  I though about that race but it is the same day as the BikeMS tour. Hopefully next year.

Michelle,

Thanks for posting the video.  First, I believe you have some good things going on there.

It appears to me that you were going hard for this video.  This appears to be more of an interval pace?  That is okay I just wanted to ask/clarify. 

Let me start with some bullet points (the good and the bad).  Then we can talk about what to do.  Again, I am not a swim coach, or even a great swimmer, but I think the advice will be useful

Issues:

• Good - Your arms really come around nicely.  You are pretty strong!
• Bad – Your arms cross over your midsection.  This causes you to wiggle a little like a worm.   After looking at the video more your right arm is the primary culprit.  Your left arm crosses over just a bit sometimes. 
• Bad - Your feet compensate for the above issue by scissor kicking.
• Good - You keep your head down pretty well. 
• Bad - You are breathing only every 4^th stroke.
• Good - Your flip turn was fine – it was functional and I would keep it up.  You’ll notice when you move to every stroke breathing and you have more oxygen that you’ll be able to do all flip turns.
• Good – you aren’t sinking.  Most people’s feet sink.  Yours do not.
• Catch – it was difficult to tell.  I have a note about it below.

Fixes

• What you need to imagine there is an imaginary line through your head all the way through your body.  And your hands shouldn’t cross over that line at any part of your stroke.   So, do some drills where you are exaggerating your arms being placed out in front of you at about 5 inches (maybe more if need be) out further than you are used to.  What I mean exactly is take your right hand and when it enters the water it should be 5 inches to the right of where you normally have it.  This might feel weird at first.  But, it will become normal after a bit.  This drill might be best served with a pull buoy or fins so you can just focus on it.  But, you can certainly do it without that.  See how this feels.  And video tape yourself a lot more (I need to do more of this myself).  What you want to see in your next video is your arms entering the water and not crossing your midsection. 
• Breathing – Focus on doing the following.  Alternate breathe when you are swimming slow.  I mean when you first start out and you are just poking along getting lose and just starting to get in a rhythm then breathe every other stroke.  So, right side, stroke, stroke, left side, stroke stroke, right side.   Then when you start to pick it up breathe every time to your strong side (your right I take it).  When you are in a race you will most likely only breathe on your right side and you will want to do this every stroke.
• Your kicking issue (too hard and “scissory&rdquo is just a symptom of your arms crossing over.  Once you fix that I believe that your kick will also work itself out.  What you should focus on with the kick (after you fix the arms) is just a nice little 6 inch flutter kick.   You want to focus on not scissor kicking.  You want to focus on not making too much splash on top of the water too.  You can practice this both in your normal swim stroke and with aids (kick board).  With the kick board (you might have them at your pool on the side – we do) you grab both hands on it and then just kick away to the other side.  Your focus will be on keeping your ankles loose and a nice little flutter kick.  The goal of your legs/feet in the type of swimming we do is to keep you balanced.  That is different that Olympic swimmers that also use them for propulsion.
• Keep focusing on keeping your head down.  The further your head is down the more in balance you’ll probably be.
• From this video it was a little difficult to tell about your catch.  But let me share something.  When you start your stroke more wide (like I suggested above) you’ll also be able to catch the water wider and this will help your speed.   Right now it looks like because you cross over your midsection a bit that your catch starts more under your body than it should.  I think you are going to see some massive improvements once you work out just this one issue.

When you work on any of these things below do them slowly (or mid speed).  You want to feel the water and feel the changes you are making.  Don’t do them at top speed

If you find a local tri group it might be worth asking some people if they know anyone with an underwater camera.  I think someone charged my like $20 to video me underwater.  It was worth it.

Good job!

Jesse