kenj mentor group - back for another great season! CLOSED (Page 8)

Welcome to the group!  Looks like a great schedule.  Not sure about NM, but there are a lot of HIM's in the fall depending on haw far you want to travel.

I know that at least a couple of us train with power.  I personally find it much more effective for me then HR due to the lag, but many people have a lot of success with HR.

I currently am using a coach, but Monday was the beginning of this so prior to that I trained on my own using plans from here and a couple of other sites.  Here is a good program to get started, it is talked about a lot in the forums and referred to as "Jorge's" plan.  I have used it a couple times in the off season.  If you click on programs above, and go to the bottom of the available list you will find this plan and the HR alternative.  Great off season bike work.

I personally don't, but I know a lot of people do. I can't afford a power meter, which is why I haven't even considered it or read into it much. Now that I have a Garmin 910xt on the way, I believe I will be able to use trainer road, to get power numbers fairly accurately. From what I've heard trainer road is a pretty good tool to use. 

I'm going to do some research into it and talk to my coach. 

I found your IMAZ race report too. Great job! It was such a fun day overall. I used Be Iron Fit too. It worked for me and I would use it again. Are you doing an IM this year? I'm holding off until 2014.

Sabres fan? 

I've been a Penguins fan my whole life, but due them being terrible and hockey being my least favorite of the big 4 sports, I stopped following for a while. I went to the University at Buffalo, and the Sabres 2005-2006 run got me back into hockey. It was awesome having just turned 21 in '06 and being able to go to any jam packed bar on whatever weeknight they were playing, and get drunk and cheer with literally everyone in there. Luckily my Penguins have been good since I left Buffalo, but all this BS is making me not care anymore. 

I too am holding off before going back for more. Right now I'm thinking IM Lake Placid in 2014, or maybe one of the newer nonbranded races in the Northeast.

For anyone mostly using power measurements inside, i would start with synthetic power measurements like trainerroad (never used that either). Trainerroad and programs like it convert speed on a trainer to power using a curve that the manufacturers put out. Speed inside is objective (no hills, wind, etc) so there is a strong correlation to power. Even if it would give you a slightly different answer from a PM, it doesn't really matter, since your goal is to increase that number, whatever it is.

if you dont use trainer road and want to try power with the BT/Jorge plan i can send you a great spreadsheet that another BTer put together. It converts speed from tests you take to power equivalents, then back to speed to target for training rides. I think the curve was put out for a Kinetic trainer, but I'm sure that its is essentially the same a CycleOps.

Yes, the Sabres are my  team.  I will come back when they do, but I doubt that a lot of casual fans will.  Both the players and the owners are being short sighted in this.  I honestly think that all but the highly paid first stringers would cross the line as very few players are making the type of dollars that the player unions is chasing. 

Oh well, at least the Rochester minor league team has a lot of the prospects for the Sabres and the games are cheap.

ME TOO!!  Had to get in before the rates went up.  Let me tell you, I sat here for a while gorging in self-doubt before I actually hit that pay button.  Please tell me that we are not crazy?

My goals for January are pretty simple.  Slowly ease back into running and eat right!

Hope everyone is enjoying the new year!  Now to go back and learn who everybody is.

Karen

Holy Cow!  I was on vacation.  Looks like I've got 10 pages to catch up with! LOL  I'm returning from the last group.

NAME: Meulen/Brian

STORY: I'm 37years old. I had an athletic background in HS/College. I played baseball, basketball and golf in HS and played golf in College. I weightlifted through College and ended up pretty bulky. That bulk turned to fluff pretty quick after that. I was basically your typical party animal kid through my twenties. I got married at 24 and continue to pack on lbs. till I was in my 30's. I ended up being north of 215 (I quit weighing after that in denial! ). At 6' 1" with a small frame I was pretty pudgy. It was about 4-5 years ago I finally said enough. I got back into the gym and started trying to lose weight. I then bought a hybrid bike to ride around the block because I was too heavy for my knees to run much. It was about 5 years ago I did my first indoor tri. I could barely swim across the pool! I met some poeple mountain biking after that and they sucked me into mtb racing for a year. The following year I came back to tri's and have been here ever since. My first outdoor (real tri) was Xterra Ft. Custer 4 years ago. I've done several since then, including Racine 70.3 2x now.

FAMILY STATUS: I'm married to my AWESOME and BEAUTIFUL wife Anne Marie. She's in my cornor at every event and she even does some training and racing with me. Couldn't ask for anything more!

2013 Races: I'm looking to start the year with a the Palos HM, then going back to Fr Custer to do the Xterra again.  From there it's off to Kansas for the HIM and then Muncie for another HIM.  I'll finish off with the Naperville Sprint tri again and the USAT Nationals in Milwaukee (already qualified).  I may add a couple in there here and there.

WEIGHTLOSS: I'm definitely one that struggles with weight. I just lost 10lbs to get back to 170. I'd like to be more close to 160 and possibly under this year. I've been working with a coach and he has me on a diet for the next 3months.

Great to hear from you Brian and good to have you with us again!

Sounds like a pretty good season ahead of you!

I think that the basic plan is good, the plan available to the paid members is a little better IMHO only because it has more detail and structure tot he workouts.  With your goals being realistic, but also aggressive, you may want to look at either joining BT or picking up a copy of Be Iron Fit by Don Fink.  He has 3 different levels of IM plans that are very good as well.  The Be Iron Fit book is probably the cheaper option and from what I have heard from people that have used them, very good.  His plans are longer (30 weeks) than most.

Let us know what you decide there!

Thanks Ken!

this will be my first season with a coach.  I've been working with him for a few months now.  I've had some success already on the bike.  But there are definitely some challenges!  I continue to have sinus issues.  I keep getting sick, especially this time of year and especially when I spend more time in the pool.  I'm also dealing with Plantar Fasciitis....ugh!

I had another PF flare up recently.  I sat with my coach and still decided to sign up for the Palos Half Marathon to open my season in May.  He has me taking the month of January off of real running.  All of my base miles this month will be pool running.  I've been doing that this week and already having some better days with my foot.

Excited this week to start working on my new pain cave!  I've got a guy finishing my basement, which includes a theatre room, storage area, and pain cave.  I have to decide soon which trainer to put down there.  I'll be putting in either the Wahoo Kickr or a computrainer.  Just can't decide which one yet.  I want to wait and see what people who get the new Wahoo start saying about it.  I'm also going to be on the hunt for a dreadmill and will be putting in a weight bench and some weights.  Coach has me doing a lot of strength taining in off season and would really like to do that at home.

Hope you all had a good xmas and new years!

Being a free member myself I haven't see the BT plans. I used Don Fink's "Be Iron Fit". There are 3 different plans, starting with a "just finish". I believe I used the middle of the road one. They are all 30 week plans, broken down into 10 week segments. I thought the plans worked well andI could have used them WAYYY more effectively, but didn't. He gives specific work outs to do in specific HR zones and also has swim plans. You can find a copy pretty cheap and I think its worth it.

As for goals, for the first the goal should be to finish. For me that's A goal, but not THE goal. Worse comes to worse, I want to at least say I finished. My goal for IM #1 was sub 13. Foot pain forced me to walk since I couldn't train due to injury and didn't start running (literally, had never ran for the purposes of exercise) until 7 months before the race. 

For this year, my goal is sub 11. I think its a goal I will have to work very hard to accomplish, but its possible. Could it be a bit too ambitious, yes, but it will make me work harder. Also, you have to prepare for the worst; I have yet to have a "perfect" race. So have smaller goals for an IM.

Last year, I did a HIM plan to get me up to a late Spring HIM, then moved over to Fink's 30 week plan for a November IM.  I don't know if this would be a recommended way, but it worked out okay for me.  When the IM plan started, I actually dropped  volume for a while.  But I liked that too, for a reset, plus being able to mix in other shorter races.   I don't think you would want to build, build, build for 40 weeks, though.

This is good advice!  40 weeks is a long time to maintain a heavy dose of training, but for most of us, especially for the first IM, logic tells us we have a big race and we need to get prepared. 

I would look to do a focused plan on whatever sport you want to work on, without neglecting the other 2.  If Finks plan is what you are going to use, 10 weeks of an off season focused on one sport then going into the 30 week plan would make sense.  What ever you decide, make sure any running is done at a fairly easy pace. 

NAME: Eric

STORY: My endurance career has been pretty short and with lots of setbacks.  In 2011 I started to get serious about running and was training for a marathon.  About a month away from my marathon, I was out on my last long run, 22 miles, during the run my knee started to hurt.  I foolishly ran through it, later learning it was ITB.  I really hurt myself and knocked myself out of the marathon.  I was really bummed about it.  The following 2 months were very frustrating, because I needed to rest, but didn't want to, and I kept inflaming my ITB.  Finally after a lot of frustration, a good friend insisted I try biking and consider Triathlons.  I started to bike, which allowed my ITB to heal and before I knew it I was running again.  I started to mix in swimming and quickly I was hooked on Triathlon training.  I'm injury prone, and doing three sports was much easier on my body.

All was going great with my Tri training, I was 6 months deep and loving it.  I was one week away from a sprint race and 5 weeks away from a Olympic race and considering a HIM for later in the year.  I was out biking and was hit by a car and was hurt badly.  I broke a ton of ribs, spinal tips and claivical, had a concusstion.  I had to have surgery on my clavicle.  My whole life was turned upside down for many months.  

Fast forward to three weeks ago when I had my 2nd surgery to take out the plates and screws from my clavicle.  I'm now healing and hoping to start training again.  2012 has been a tough year, but I'm excited for 2013 and to be on the upswing of things.

CURRENT TRAINING: I have to see how my healing goes, I just got on the trainer yesterday and have been walking a lot.  Slow and steady wins the race.

2012 RACES: I did a indoor mini Tri and a Sprint.  Both were terrific.

2013 RACES:  I'm not sure until I have a better idea of my healing.  I'm just going to take it as it comes.  I plan on some sprints/olympics.  I would love to do a  HIM, but with a 2nd kid on the way, this may not be doable.