ASPHALT JUNKIES Summer Bronzing Crew - CLOSED (Page 88)

Dirk, not even close to my PR which is why I have been so frustrated in the pool. 1:19 is my all time pool PR before I hurt my back from the bike fall. That was also when I was in swim 4 fitness class racing the young guys . The hundreds the other day were a descend as part of the warm up. I went 1:40, 1:36, 1:31, 1:26 on 1:45.

Here are the instructions for the next swim from the website (which I am not looking forward to by the way). I'm going to shoot for going off on 1:45. And try to swim them around the 1:35-1:38 range. I'll just do as many as I have time for:

Originally posted by Jo63 Congratulations on your anniversaries!! Brenda congrats on your recent purchase Karl to you and Pam good luck on your HM and that is awesome at your son is doing so great in baseball Matt I hope you get your bike motivation back soon, I am still like that with swimming I went the one day a week or so ago and still havent gone back, I even signed up for Masters Swim and have yet to go not sure what's up with me on that..... Dina a year or so ago I bought a sport count lap counter if you haven't seen it it just wraps around your finger it was like 20.00 and it tracks laps, time your average etc and has worked well for me you can find them at www.sportcount.com October is crazy for us at the salon we do Pink hair extensions both in salon and at outside locations plus we are having a pink party on the 19th all our donation go to a Aurora ( local health care system) and specifically to Team Pheonix, these are breast cancer survivors who get needed equipment and trained to do the IronGirl! We are hoping to raise at least 5,000.00 this During this " off season" I am learning how to go easy with 90% of my workouts. All these years I have always trained hard with every workout no wonder I burnt out lol So yesterday I finally found the courage to go to the cemetery. My dad died 8 yrs ago and my mom 3. I have never been able to go, I sat an sobbed....I miss them both so much....My mom died the day after I opened the second salon along with that My brother, hurried us all thru the whole funeral process and I felt like I never really had a chance to say good by to her, and i believe this all was a big part of why that location failed, and since then my family has sort of fell apart it is unfortunate but I guess all i can do is look at myself and pray that i can be a better person today than I was yesterday. I am defefnitly feeling better after " talking" with my parents, i also want to say to all of you is THANK YOU for all of your guidance and support in everything you guys are an awesome group of people!!!!! Happy Friday!!!

I'll have to check out the sport lap counter! Thanks for the tip!

It takes a strong person to face up to their emotions but it sounds like you are taking steps to do just that. I know my parents are not going to live forever but at the same time I take for granted that they will always be here. Sending you a big hug for what had to be a very difficult and emotional experience.

Ha, that's why you are in the Junkies group Karl . Hope you have a great race today!

Hopefully this trip to the cemetery has provided the closure you need.  Your family has likely not fallen apart but has gone different directions because life has changed.  My experience points that sometimes after key people are no longer around that others drift away and move on to the things in their lives that are most important.  For many people their own children and grandchildren take the place of brothers and sisters, etc.  If you are experiencing this sort of thing maybe you could try to get together more frequently with your siblings.

Hopefully the time you were able to spend at the grave sites has brought you peace and comfort.

Dirk, not even close to my PR which is why I have been so frustrated in the pool. 1:19 is my all time pool PR before I hurt my back from the bike fall. That was also when I was in swim 4 fitness class racing the young guys . The hundreds the other day were a descend as part of the warm up. I went 1:40, 1:36, 1:31, 1:26 on 1:45.

Here are the instructions for the next swim from the website (which I am not looking forward to by the way). I'm going to shoot for going off on 1:45. And try to swim them around the 1:35-1:38 range. I'll just do as many as I have time for:

Karl,  Of course you're probably running your HM right now so my comments about your taper won't make much difference now but here goes.

I am not sure what your long bike are on a routine basis but if I were looking for a PR I wouldn't do anything other than an easy swim the day before a key race.  I wouldn't ride the bike more than 20 miles at a very easy pace either, and that's based on a fairly solid bike fitness.  Now, if I remember correctly, today's race is more of a run with you and Pam isn't it?  If this is the case the workouts from yesterday will provide a great chance for adaptations in your fitness.  Anytime you can put big workouts together, especially into a regular plan that provides builds and recovery, you'll see improvements over time.

Tony,  The bike looks great!  Sometime in the future I would like to put one in my stable but it will probably be a long way off.  They are some trails around here but none of them are particularly close.  It would certainly mean I would have to load up and drive to the sites, adding more time being spent away from home.  Enjoy your ride!

Will,  Knowing you're getting this close to the race is getting pretty exciting.  I am really interested in seeing you cross the finish.

I am not sure what your plan calls for next week.  Depending on how much it calls for and the recovery you generally require it could be a good idea to pull back from this week some but stay higher than the plan calls for.  The key will be that you pull back and begin to allow some of the recovery take place but still keep a touch of the fatigue and development. 

I just checked your plan.  2 of these last 3 weeks are basically holding a number of hours for each discipline.  I think you would be alright to get NOT MORE than 7 hours (stay closer to 6.5) of riding next week and back the swim down a touch.  If you chose to go that route I also think you should pull back slightly more the week before the race (week 19).

The biggest key!!!  Trust your training!!  You are almost there.  Don't begin to question yourself and the capabilities you've developed!  You already know you can complete the distances individually, now it's time to put them all together.  And that will require faith!  I know you know something about faith and the unseen.  You can't see the fitness you've gained but you still work toward what you "know" is there.  Trust you've done all you could have done and put the plan in place to become an Ironman.  FOLLOW THE PLAN!!!

Dirk the warm up for that swim:

Matt I need to follow your run training as you just always seem to be getting better and better, Excellent!

You know what I will say for lung capacity - swim hard . Ha ha ha, I don't know if that translates to running or not but there is nothing like some hard intervals in the pool to leave me gasping for breath.

I've got a run question.

I'm still on my quest to reach 20 miles a week and going about it slowly. It's been 5 weeks since my lay off in August. I've been steadily but slowly increasing time, # of days running and distance every week. From 3 runs/7.5 miles the first week up to this week which was 4 runs/13.66 miles broken up as follows - 3.5, 2.25, 2, 6 miles.

It's been hard to get going again honestly. It has taken several weeks for me to get any kind of running legs back under me. I don't know how to explain it except my legs just did not want to go! As I get older the lay offs really get harder to come back from .

This past week went really well though so I am encouraged. My runs felt good, my legs felt like I could go longer and even pick up the pace. My feet recovered without using Aleeve which is really the best sign of adaptation for me. I don't want to blow it, which is very possible as I start to adjust.

So I'm looking for recommendations. I'm not sure if I should keep slowly increasing or since I've been steadily increasing should I take a week to dial it back? I feel really good right now, my feet, hips, back - all good (knock on wood). And I should probably break up the miles a little more evenly so I'd take some suggestions on that too.

Just a reminder that I have no goal races or anything like that. My biggest goal is to run consistently through the fall/winter for tri season next year.

Maybe I don't even need to run 20 miles a week to do that - I'd take your opinions on that idea too. Understanding that the idea of a HIM is not very likely but I would like to perform better at an OLY distance.

Thanks!

Originally posted by mambos I ran in a 10k today that has been a yearly marker of my progress. Overall I managed to run a 45:49 which is about 45s faster than a 10k earlier in the spring and almost 2 minutes faster compared to same race last year. So good improvement, especially since the weather was less than cooperative. Lots of rain and when the course turned south for almost 2 miles it was extremely windy. Execution went almost as planned, instead of staring at a pace on my watch I set the display to show only HR and distance. My goal was to keep HR around 165 because this is an effort I felt I could hold for the entire length. Early on though I knew this wasn't going to happen, HR from the beginning jumped to 175 and regardless of what I did it would not come down below 170. So I accepted the fact that at some point towards the end I was going to blow up and changed my target to hold the hr between 170-175. Figured I might as well enjoy the ride for as long as I could. This level was fairly easy to hold, even when I went straight into the wind I was able to slow the pace down so that the effort was the same so HR held steady. At mile 3.75 I was really starting to hurt, at this point I had been running into the wind for over a mile and my lungs were really starting to burn. I assumed the implosion was coming.....at the end of mile 4 the course turned east and the wind turned into a crosswind, and this is where it happened....I felt a surge of energy, my lungs stopped burning and my legs responded and I picked up pace. Again I felt this would surely be short lived and to just hang on as long as I could. During the next 2 miles I passed a lot of runners, mostly everyone that went zooming by me when I slowed down going into the wind, I was now smiling as they struggled to keep moving. The implosion finally came though, at the 6.25 marker . Below are my splits, with avg HR in () Mile 1: 6:50 (167) Mile 2: 7:21 (173) Mile 3: 7:31 (173) Mile 4: 7:48 (171) Mile 5: 7:26 (172) Mile 6: 7:23 (174) one thing I did realize during this race is that my legs are in much better shape than my lungs. I felt that my limiter was my ability to pull in oxygen, my legs never really fatigued, and I even managed to run another 2 miles after the race to finish off my day. Any suggestions on how to improve my lung capacity or is this just something I have to deal with after 20 years of smoking cancer sticks?

Great race!!  Your running is becoming very solid!  You're one of the fasties now for sure.

Developing lung/cadio capacity can be done on the bike as well as the run, but I think it's more safely done on the bike.  The development of cardio efficiency  is done by those extremely brutal rides and runs (like yesterday's race) that cause you to question how long you can keep up the pace/effort.   

Long endurance and intensity intervals are one of the ways I feel we can work cardio capacity and efficiency.  Doing long intervals at threshold helps develop this by causing your body to become more efficient with the oxygen and CO2 exchange. I have been doing some really long intervals for over a year (on the bike) and I feel it's made a huge difference in my strength.  A year ago the bike seemed to be the weakest discipline and now it seems I have become somewhat equal across all three.  At my HM last weekend I would have tested my thoughts, and was on track to prove successful, until my knee gave out on me.  With little to no speedwork on the run for over 12 months I would have been able to determine whether or not said cardio capacity/efficiency was better than last year.