lots of news

Even though it was a quiet week for me, it was entertaining enough with the news from Le Tour, the crashes, the sprints and winding up all the Cav-hating troups here and there.
What is more, 4 guys ran sub 8 hours iron distance races in the past 8 days. And Chrissie wellington broke her own record yet another time.
This blog is not going to top those news.
Ever.
Even less in the grey Auckland winter. It's only the last two weeks that the weather got really wintry and the roads are becoming less and less friendly. In the past 4 weeks I went through 6 tubes and 2 tyres (one of them I rode onto for 200m going down a hill at 50km/h). One still has to tick the boxes, so it has been kind of hard.
ACCIDENTS:

I've decided to do hill reps on the windtrainer. Out of three times I was on the road I got two accidents, none of which was serious, but still a bit scary. The first one was a car vs. bike, but as I was going up hill I dodged a right turning car and hit it very slowly. The second one is a puncture at speed, where I stayed upright thanks to my great bike handling skills (and a bit of luck again)

HOURS:
The days are getting like 30 seconds longer each day, which sucks, because it doesn't make any difference if you're going for a 1.45 or a 2 hour run. But all in all I've found the rythm of how to organize my training weeks.

TIREDENESS
For the first time in over two years I had a "hit the wall" week, a combination of stress and fatigue was all too much. I didn't miss a single session, but I was looking forward to Saturday afternoon and a big siesta. I am told that there are points during the IM training where more training is the best way forward. I will try that avenue and seee.

On my TdF I am still quite on track for Cadel Evans. Gessink seemed a bit tired the last two stages. And hopefully Hushov will get back to fight for points instead of trying to keep the YJ.

Enough for today,

happy training to you all

Controversy in the ETU champs

This is the link to the article, but I’d imagine triathlon forums may be talking about the issue. I haven’t got much time to read them, though.


What happened? If you check the video, it appears that the guy in white is blocking the guy in blue. The guy in white is the Pom boy, the blue boy is Gomez. The blue guy is not doing any visible effort to dodge the obstacle and swim towards the rest of the field, but the video is not great quality.

Gomez was not happy about it, and referees have given him some credit, as the brit was disqualified.

The matters opens the question, though, of where do you draw the line. Races at the elite levels are about medals, points for the athlete, points for the country and a bit of argy-bargy about who’s top dog. Wether the purists like it or not, there's obvious team tactics involved.

Drafting races see many times younger guys sacrificing themselves and working hard for the big boys who can later run a sub 33, which is where you need to be these days. Not many breakaways succeed, and when they do is because someone didn’t pay attention or the race was not that important. Is the drafting part of triathlon becoming more of a team sport and this incident is just one symptom?

So, I ask, where does the line need to be drawn? An athlete is penalized for blocking another athlete. Doesn’t that happen at any race at some point or another?, doesn’t it happen often in a 30 or plus guys bunch riding or running into a 180º turn?.

Body over mind

Auckland waterfront at dawn in early june

Many have said that endurance sports is a matter of mind over body. I won’t probably argue with that statement, although I must say that sometimes it is a matter of body over mind. A quick example. I’ve been waking up about 6am most days in order to fit in longer rides and be able to have the rest of the day to do other stuff. The sleep hours have steadied up on 7 to 8 hours which is not bad at all. Anyway, back to my example: Woke up on Sunday at 5.45 and it was pouring down quite heavily. I said I’d better wait and see and go in a half hour (usually it takes me 10min from the alarm sound to me being on my bike outside home). Next thing I know it was 8 in the morning! I mean… it didn’t even took an effort to sleep straight 2 hours. I wanted to go out, I’ve already woken up and I was more than ready for it, but I have my body 2minutes and it just fell off to dreamland.

There is no question that my body needed the rest, and there wasn’t even a fight between mind and body, the body just went for it. It’s crazy how sometimes we forget this small lessons. I guess next Saturday I’ll be going to bed earlier, or sleeping a bit more and re-organizing my day in a better way.



Other than that it was an average winter weekend: long ride on the Saturday, long-ish ride on the Sunday. Saturday customary pizza and plenty of coffee, books and time with my other half. (We’re going for 10 years together this week… I call that endurance as well!)



On the run front, today is VO2 set days, and I am feeling more than VO1. We have to meet a very demanding target running for 7.5min. The distance to be run is taken from the infamous cooper’s test, which we did 2 weeks ago. My result? Just over 3500m in 12 minutes. How was I a year ago?

http://a-bigger-race.blogspot.com/2010/05/coopers-test-night.html Here is the answer. Does that mean I’m worst off? Nope, well…I hope so. It means I’m on a different phase of training.



Anyway, enough for today, be safe out there,

How to find the time

I never planned this when I started blogging over a year ago. I am not able to find the time to keep this thing going continuously.
However, though, there has been a lot of development over the last two weeks and a bit since my last update.
The first one is that I am back into good training mode. I've also had THE meeting with coach about the future of my training, racing and the big IM experience in 2012. What is to come? A good 10 weeks of nice'n easy, long rides on Saturdays, Sundays, and some serious riding during the week as well... to amount up to 500km later in the season. Am I ready for that? I guess, so... we'll how to see how it is to survive it.

The second one is that a good mate of mine, GEOFF CARTER, made his bigg attempt to cross the cook straight. I talked about Geoff a few posts back. He's been an inspiration and an example for many, although his attempt was not successfull I deeply admire him for his discipline put into the quest.

The guy not only had to wait almost 4 months since his original swimming window, he had to keep swimming in excess of 40km a week for that period.

That kept me thinking on the reasons that we have to do what we do. Not only good mate trying to swim between the two island, anyone waking up at 6 for a jog, or at 5.30 to fit a 2hr ride before work and all other examples of extraordinary moves just to have the joy of finding ourselves doing something we really love. And there are many reasons, but one could say that beside these reasons, there is an element of absurd in repeating the routines again and again to say we "did" it. I argue that we don't "do" it, it "does" us. I am not only fairly spent, but changed as a guy and an athlete after many of the daily sessions, and that is what keeps me coming back!,

Anyway, enough rant for today, hope to post tomorrow!

Motivation

I was out on my own to do a 40km TT on the bike. Doing TTs has become an important part of my training in the last year. I counted over 20 TT’s (not including triathlon races) since I started this blog.

At an average 25km each, that’s over 500 kilometres of riding against the clock. If we count the triathlon races (3 half iron rides, 2 oly, 2 sprints) we get close to 1000km of TT riding. It is a fair bit. After a time one starts to get the hang of it and finally like them. They are demanding, usually on the upper reaches of our heart rate and they are tough on the mind. One has to be perfect synch to get all cogs moving and going well in them. I can count three great TT’s in the past year. The rest are good, and then a few average ones and one or two that sucked big time.

Yesterday was a particular one as it is one of those key workouts 2 weeks out of race day. It was the race distance, there was a hard run after and I had carte blanche to go for it. Unfortunately I couldn’t do it with the rest of the squad in our little handicap system. Coach was worried and worried me by saying that I would benefit for being in a situation where there are more around me acting as carrots. I knew I was in a good frame of mind, but the question kept popping. Can you do it? Can you get yourself into a racey frame of mind even if you’re on your own in the middle of the airport logistics and industrial hub?

So it was time for mindgames. this time of the positive ones, the ones that can work enhancing our performance and aid our workout. I originally had nothing in mind other thank going out there and pushing hard on my pedals. But after coach’s questions I thought I’ll put more of a plan into place and got into my mind that this was the most important workout of the whole training programme, that this was THE race or just below. That no other thoughts should cross my mind other than getting there – fast. Every other rider on the route was a target and I was there to catch them. Every time I saw my HR going below certain numbers I would spin faster, and get an extra gear. Every part of the course I kept thinking “ and here is when I should catch so and so” “ and here is where X will catch me… I should try not to let him go too far away” and thoughts like that. There was a couple of patches where I started thinking about work, or uni…. I moved them both away and kept thinking in wellington, and the wind and how similar the TT course is to the race cource, and how similar that TT was to my last race in Welli.

The result? I had a great TT in windy conditions. My secret objective was to be over 90% average HR for the ride, but due to tailwind and headwind influences I was just below. The second objective was to be closer to 1:05:00 than to 1:10:00. I ended up finishing right in the middle.

The run after was not as harsh and overall a great day out on my own.

How do you play your mindgames?

Pure Blonde aquathlon series - Race II report

A lesson learned.
Another gorgeous auckland day on the hottest February on record. It all started with a morning sleep in and late start at work (8.30). Comes mid morning I got a text from my mate Reado that he had come off his bike and was in hospital. Fortunately it was just a matter of a dozen stitches here and there and not major grazing or broken bones. He was commuting to work and a pedestrian just appeared on the road. That kind of brought me to the reality that accidents do happen and it is always wise to be ready for when they come. I'm gonna start commuting to work soon, and this was not the most encouraging news. The good news is that he was able to make it to the race to watch and we were all happy to see him walking around like (almost) nothing happened.

Him and I and Martin are the fastest runners when we're fit. and our swimming is very similar, so it's always good to race them taking the bike off the equation. With Reado unable to race and Martin off crook, it was a matter of checking who else would turn up at the races and trying to hang in there for another placing.

Comes Shannon. He's a really nice guy that races in our age group. We've met here and there and in the last world champs him and Reado did 8th and 9th on the age group, so I knew I would have to make my best if I wanted the win. The format is 3km run split in two laps, 1km swim (another two), and the same 3km for dessert. The start was conservative for the first 400m, then I decided that If I wanted the race I'd have to work hard for it. What better then that puttin a few sprints here and there and try to get into the water with a healthy lead?
I tried once and the small group stuck to me. I tried again and it was me and Shannon, I tried again with the same results. by the end of the first lap I decided to give it one more try. there's a hill that I know I can run hard on a good day.  I did and it didn't work. I decided to wait and try to hang in there for the swim.

We transitioned into the ocean and Shannon took the lead, I followed, not without some effort. It was my time to sit in second place and I did no work for both the swim laps.

I did a flash transition and got a few seconds of lead, it all lasted until halfway the first lap. It was then that Shannon decided to put the feet on the gas and he passed me like I was standing. I tried with all my might but by the infamous hill that starts the second lap I knew I had close to nothing in the legs for a 1.5km sprint. I kept trying until halfway and by then there were 100m distance between us two. that was the race gone, so I held myself up for the finish.

A second place and a lesson learned. I am not sure what was what I learned, but I know that it is about controlling the efforts and been mentally there all the time (which I was). That's why these small races are so important part of my training. they're as real as it gets.

thanks to my sponsor Nat, who bakes the best cakes in the world

Then it was dinner at home and up at 5.30 for swimming squad. I thought it would be a gentle swim.

But I was soooo wrong. We ended up swimming over 1200m of Level 4 and Level 5 (out of 5) stuff. Lucky I had the wettie on. I am happy I nailed the intensity and times in all but one of the sets (I don't like swimming 300metres, it;s a distance where I cannot find the right pace) but it would have been nice to have a wetsuit PB for any of them which didnt happen

All in all a great couple of days, hope yours was up there as well,

Tri Series - Kinloch race report - Part II

THE BIKE 37.16 HR Ave 91% HR Max 95%

The bike was going to be tough business, but I was quite high and happy with my swim and T1 so I kept the good spirits and hammered the first 3km. Reado and I have sort of talked about me hanging on to him on the bike as soon as he passed me. I tried and it worked, for about 10 min I had him in sight but could se the gap getting bigger and bigger. The good news is that while I was concentrated on that I kept passing people and not getting passes so much. Then it was hills time and I did my best to keep going. A guy in a P3 and a young fella stuck to me so we kind of kept each other honest going up and down the next 10km. A few known faces went past me, it was surprisingly late when my other mate, Martin, cought me. He was on a mission and quite bummed about his swim, we talked for 20 secs and he flew away. At the turnaround I was 50th or so out of all males.

Coming down the hills I was as careless as I could and I’m happy to report to have gone past 5 or 6 people, a couple of lightweight kids and a few big boys. We came back into town and TT’d our way through T2, a couple of more passed me and I passed another couple. The legs were full of ants, but I knew that it would be a matter of minutes before the race was finished.

THE RUN 18.20 HR Ave 93% HR Max 98%

T2 was again fast and furious, and out I was pounding the pavement. The hills had taken a toll on me, I could not sprint out of T2 like some other races, and the turnover was pretty low. I got into a better rhythm after 500m and started eating my way through the pac-man that was the Kinloch run course. A young guy passed me halfway through the first lap and I clawed to him for the next lap, he then surged and I responded, but run out of legs to keep going. The last km I got a second wind and left all I had on the run. It helped me to jump from 50th out of the bike to 28th overall.. which is not bad. But I wouldn’t rate this run as one of my best. I finished in a total time of 1.07.19 which got me into 6th in the age group.

THE BALANCE

It was a good race on a gorgeous town. My secret objective was to get a placing, but there was a lot of ambition in that statement. In order to get a placing I needed at least a minute on the bike and 30 to 40 seconds on the run. Are those objectives achievable? I believe they are, it’s a matter of working harder the next time. Was there any mitigating factors? Maybe: I did a race on Tuesday, and a full on TT on Thursday, and I didn’t have any days off for 10 days straight before the race…. That has to show at some point.

How did I feel after? I felt OK right after, now I feel really happy. There’s good signs in the way the HR shows the approach to the race. The incremental efforts allowed me to have some legs for the last bit of the run, although the race was not lost there, it is a good thing to know. The national champs for Oly distance are 4 weeks away, and given the current fitness it could be easily said that there is endurance in the swim, bike and run to make a better effort.

THE PHOTOS

Training for a dive start

out in the course recce

swim practice in the great lake taupo, with Nat



Race face, and a wetsuit full of wee



My Favourite metrics

My favourite quote is from Galileo Galiei "measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so", the hard headed determination of a man of science contained in those 10 words (funny, the spanish translation is also 10words long) stuck to me since the first time I found it while doin an essay at uni. In a way, that motto underpins the history science and technology over the last centuries. It has been great way to bring the illusion of order into situations that sometimes are beyond comprehension.
Brought into the sporty world, there was a whole new world of metrics that I discovered as I got more into triathlons and cycling; from the basics like speed, perceived effort and cadence to more specific like heart rate, stride cadence, power, altitude, pace, and all the combinations that come to play like power to weight ratio,  drag coeficient and blah blah blah. I've learned that there is a huge basket of metrics that one can produce, monitor and record. Coache's job would be to make smart use of those metrics in planning the best possible programme to get us in A shape for our A race.
A self coached athlete will find a way to organize a training schedule makin use of a series of metrics and in most cases it will be a great way to get from day 1 to race day in a better, fitter state.
In my case I work mostly on HR and perceived effort. Cadence and pace come to play a secondary role in the more specific workouts and the rest has been trial and error. I'm a good boy and I do as I'm told. So far the system has worked and I trust it will keep going the same way.


Panmure pool, a great discovery



But when I look back into my diary and check the best days out I've had in the year, most of the sessions have been run paying attention to one specific metric, it is that one that won't allow my mates to get too far away (on the swim, or the bike or the run) and vice versa. the work for it is HONEST, whenever I wrote down in my diary that it was an HONEST session it means that we went in a solid pace, and making sure everybody stays in that zone where you can go hard OK for a good period of time. It's a pity I don't have a honestymetre to use in every workout. I'll have to ensure I do find a way to make it measurable, and pass that information to the boss, It may be the breakthrough metric of 2011 and it may even get me a placing.

On the training front I had to think on my feet to make sure the weekend was put to good use. The brick session of Saturday got cancelled due to rough weather but I didn't get the message. As I was already on the venue with the customary champion's brekkie inside my guts I decided to do a solo brick. I went to a nearby pool, set my bike on the trainer and got to work, picking the session from the pre-Budapest days. It turned out to be a great day, the swim ticked along nicely, the legs felt great on the bike (I made sure I gave them a contained hammering) and the running was just neat, in a stunning volcanick lagoon track. I guess coach did it on purpose (to forget me on the cancellation text) to get me angry and make me use all that anger and aggression in my training day and it worked, thanks G!  (ha ha ... I don't think my theory is true, tho.

champion's brekkie: muesli and beer

Sunday ride was an HONEST ride with my mate Jeremy, I just love doing this. You all keep smiling, and be safe out there.

and then something happened

After an OK weekend. Monday saw us starting a hard week of training, the season is well underway and the two National Champs are round the corner. This means a lot of fun, hard, quality workouts. And a lot of other ones that are not as much fun, but still of good use for the final objectives. 

 The mini-tri's are a good sample of that. So... I was saying, monday was a hard day at the pool, and the evening session was the ever present cooper's test night. A good sign is that I went beyond the last mark by about 30 metres. I probably said this before, but these tests sometimes are a lottery, you never know how the legs are gonna respond during the first 3/4 minutes of the test. Once you're cleared of that the anaerobic motor kicks in and you don't know if there will be enough gas to finish full throttle. It was a good result and more interesting from the HR point of view. This time around I didn't go as high as last time, but I recovered quite fast after 1 minute of rest. If you want to know the secret of how to nail 3685m in 12min go to this post .



gotta love country roads

 Tuesday was off and Wed was a long day at the office, I couldn't make it to the swim session, which was 1000m time trials, I did them today instead. But something happened between my rest day and the rest of the week. The wednesday long run went OK but not great and the thursday bike TT was shite, even though I went as hard as I can, something didn't quite work. And to top it up the swim TT's were average as well. Coach recomended to go for a blood test, which I will do as soon as I can. But it is not a great concern so far... shite happens, everyday and one has to keep on rocking.
So there I went today to do some trackwork and nailed a good set in the prescribed times and in a reasonable HR band.

a view from the top, Mt Eden on a nice day

The current and coming weeks have many workouts where one races against the clock. It is a good way to train the mind and the body to do two things. The first one is to make the mind push the body to the limit of excertion and a bit further if posible, the full syncro between brain and muscles to make sure that all the money that's in the bank is well spent. The second one is to blow up, to go waaaaay too hard to the point where there's just a black tunnel and no light beyond. Only by going there one get's to know the signals that announce the big WASTED state. Every time in the season that we get to these weeks I treat it as the ones where I will learn more about how much I'll ask my body at the time of a race.
I must confess, though, that besides a big blow on last week's bike TT (I had not a lot of legs for a run right after) I haven't hit the wall as much... I will probably do so next time around.

stay tuned!

Q&A session with Valen

OK, I need to set the record straight, I am not great with correspondence. But (and there’s always a but in my speech) I do listen to questions and comments. I’ll go over them in this post.



can he handle the pressure?



The Lance business:

When I thought of the dude coming to Rotovegas I didn’t realize it was for the January sprint distance race, a week later I tried to enter and it was choker. No chance at all. I may consider an entry as an elite, but I need to take a month off to train and rest and not to work.

The races to come:
3 Jan Whangamata Sprint tri
7 Jan Tauranga Half (husband and wife team) TBC
30 Jan Christchurch Sprint tri
6 Feb Kinloch Sprint tri (nationals)
13 Mar Wellington Oly tri (nationals)

Coopers test:
This was explained in an older post.

The season
It’s being a lot about playing and the serious part of the business will start mid January, we’ll have a great time then.

Racing and winning

Yesterday was the last race of the year (I fink)… the PURE BLONDE summer series was on tonight and I got a placing. Third time lucky proved to be true, I was lucky that the guy that took the other two races was not there, and I was lucky the other peope that could have taken the race were a bit back on the field after the 1km swim. The water was warm and the pace was just right for me, It was a group of 4 of us getting off the water in a 10sec span. The run to transition is 70 to 100m uphill, the gradient is 8 to 12 %. after halfway I realized that trying to run all the way was a bit ambitious given the state of my legs and the HR jumping over 100%. I shuffled the rest of the way, got on my racers and off to run. I had a flash transition and was out first. I ran as fast as I could, but it wasn't very fast, I was worried I was going to get cought. After the first lap I saw the chasers were about 30secs behind and promised myself that they would not get me. The legs were screaming for mercy up the hills and I doubt they were as happy as me to be leading. I crossed the line with 45 secs to spare, which is not a bad feast to end the year.
 
And the fun continues
 
Today in the morning it was TT day, we did a 1500m on the outdoor pool. Wettie was not dry from last night and I went for the whole set on my jammers. There wasn't flash times, but there was a lot of gut and self convincing to keep going after halfway. Ended with a sub par time, but happy for backing the race up with solid racing and training. Another positive is that I've offset allt he piggying out that occurred over the last 10 days.
 
It's now be time to pull the plug and start enjoying NZ finest reds,
 
 

the big limiter

yesterday was a day of races, two big triathlons on the same day, one in Auckland, the other in Mt Maunganui, I've never raced any of them in the oly distance, and I hope to do so next year. 

Anyway, a day of races and many guys in the squad were stoked to have achieved more than they hoped for at this time of the year. They were not big races in the national calendar, but for these guys they were either the first one of the season, of the first one ever or a good hit out before a big race in the next month or so. That got me thinking on how good it is to have great results, and how important it is to discover that most of our boundaries are locked from the neck up. 

Our mind is the biggest limiter, and our ability to whithstand pain on the third place I'd put flexibility. But there's no doubt a great deal of our training and racing is played in the head. I had my doubts about being able to run below 40 when I first entered triathlon, I wondered if it was at all possible to run under 40 after biking for a good 70 minutes. And then it happened. 

The same thing during training, every now and then coach will throw a crazy number for a swim or run interval. There are two types of answer, the first one is to start thinking about how feasible it is to go for it, this is the mind trying to avoid the body getting yet another trashing by going hard. The other answer is to duck down and see what happens. I never know which one I am gonna give, but I am trying to marshall my thoughts towards b. 

As the months go through we all get to know more and more about our body, its strengths and weaknesses, and at times we may take other people's word on what they think is one weakness of ours. This can be rather toxic if it stays in the back of our mind. For example, someone could say that I am not great getting off the saddle in the bike. If it comes from someone that I respect, I'll take it, but I need to be strong and proud enough to know that this is an observation of my fitness on one particular time, not an observation of my cycling skills in general. If I can't get to isolate or contextualize the observation, there's the risk that I'd believe and live by that opinion, which will increase my limitations in getting my arse off the seat when I'm racing. (by the way, I am not famous for jumping off the seat of my bike)

 How could I become a smarter racer? I wondered, and although I don't have an answer to that, I am taking this year to explore and be as good as I can in remembering every little thing that goes through my head during training and racing, and how many times I focus on what I think I won't be able to achieve.

I hope to find the triggers and work through them. I have enough experience and more important, I've seen a lot of my mates do what they believed was not possible, that should be able to counter balance the limits the mind tries to put so the body doesn't hurt. 

On the training front, I'm still spitting the last bits of the flu, I'd say that I am 90% there, and in good spirits for a moderate/hard week ahead. 

Stay tuned for more on the upcoming race, miles, and hopefully some fresh photos. 

good coach / bad coach

between racing and coaching, i will always take racing. Being a coached athlete, i think, it's easier than being the coach himself. You have to wear the good coach/bad coach hats at all times and some of us are a real pain in the neck at times. 

In my particular case, I have a good relationship with my coach, and I tend to keep him up to date to the smallest details. I like to try new things and sometimes works gets in the middle, so I make sure the alternatives are discussed and it all moves forward nicely. Some other times I tend to step out of the programme just for fun and do a little sprint that was not meant to be and the training run becomes a little race for 2 or 3 minutes, that seems to annoy him pretty good. 

Anyway, where I am going is that besides the odd incident our partnership works well, I get the results and when it doesnt work, we figure alternatives. 

This afternoon I went to put up a tri club tent on a race venue. The race is tomorrow and we're making sure the club is there to support its athletes. Being on the race environment I felt like I could do one tomorrow, to make up for the one I missed last Sunday. I was going through all the motions and all and I even convinced Nat to OK it. But then I thought I better check with the big boss, and he didn't even think about it, he just said no and that it would not be a good idea to race so soon after the flu. 

I'm gutted, there was no option to do it easy or do the sprint distance, it was just NO, he he he. I guess he was wearing the bad coach hat, or the good one, who knows. 

It'll be 4 hours ride instead, 

why bother

During last week's HIM I got some time to myself and besides the obvious nerves of the race, I started asking myself some questions.
It is not strange, I s'posse, that we ask ourselves questions before, during and after the race. What I am doing here? Can I finish this race? Am I going to hard/slow? where's my gels? why on earth did I pay $xyz to get here if I'm not feeling 100%? and the list goes on.
Those are the types of questios that often times come, showing that the mind is still the most powerful determinant to the result of our race. If you give yourself the wrong answer, you're cooked, you're off the zone and the race is no longer your race, or a race, but something else much more negative than it was intended to be.
Karapiro was not high in my list of races, but after the dissapointment of Budapest, I guess the result came as a good pat in the back. Back to the questions, I was on my bike and had this plan of being conservative for the first hour or so. More than a few went past me and at some point I questioned if I was being too conservative and letting go more than it should be. The answer was not, or better, not at this early point of my training and with little strength on the legs.

The other questions came on the run, I was running fresh and happy, with my chin up and not thinking 'bout the time. As I was passing through a boring part of the course I questioned why bother coming to a place 3 hours from home, without Nat to do a race that would mean little to my season and without throught a little day out afterwards. I said I was happy, so, in a happy mood I said to myself that it is not the destination what matters sometimes, what matter is the trip.

My destinations for this season are three, both Nationals after Feb, and a Half in a month's time. There's little chance that I'll be in peak form for the Half, but at least I'll be setting a benchmark for what it was the base block of the training. There are other races mixed in between, and I am sure the questions will come to me at some point. But, as I said, what matters is the trip. Training and racing takes me to a bunch of beautiful places. Been out on the bike, or swimming in the ocean or doing a running trail, I get to see this country in a way I never thought of. Many training sessions are not just that, but a trip to the outdoors and the chance to see those great places. That's what matters to me.
So, why bother? I guess that I bother because each time I am out there I am doing one of the things I like the most, and I am very humbled that I have the chance to do it and proud to be doing it. Giving up would be stabbing myself in the back.

Thoughts on speed, and an extraordinary evening

You all may do the same and leave the mind wonder while doing those long runs or rides or swims. One of the thoughts that came to me (apart from the supermarket list, stuff about my friends in Argentina and what I would wear for Friday at work) was that there’s a point where speed becomes a by product. I’ll explain, as we keep training and getting fitter and then increasing volumes we all have small or big gains in terms of speed and race results. We may even think we can stop ageing, but that’s not true.


After some time, we all hit a point where the gains get smaller and smaller, and that when we realize that we can’t beat ageing and we can’t beat genetics. However, we can certainly keep improving and that’s when the focus changes to technique. By just reading many of our blogs it’s easy to see a trend that many times end up with us doing small changes to hour swim, run or pedal stroke or cadence and get to another level in each discipline. Stretching seems to be a big one, and then coache’s advise on swimming and running are just behind. I am not sure how it works on the bike, though.

I guess what I wanted to say is that the main focus many times is not going harder faster, but doing it in a way that has not other result than going faster, and then going harder AND faster. Funny, hum?

The second part of this blog is about last nite. There’s this race called stroke and stride, it’s been held in Mission Bay, Auckland for some 20 years now. There’s plenty of stories and many world champions had raced there. It’s a swim-run event and is fast and furious, but it also a good introduction to multisport. Last evening was the first race of this season, and while the girls were out, there was a pod of orca whales swimming with them. This was not a stunt by a wetsuit manufacturer, it was real black big mammals swimming 100metres from shore.

The organizers had to delay the men’s start until the rowers and surf lifesavers moved the whales out. It was cool to watch and I guess it could have played in some of the men starting the race 5min later. The photo is thanks to Sarah, who saw her husband venture into the sea of killer whales. I was supposed to start but I couldn’t fit my long run any earlier, so that’s why I was in the sidelines. Only in New Zealand, he he he

Cooper's test is back

With any new campaign it comes the time to set a benchmark. Cooper’s test at the beginning of the season are that, a benchmark to keep us honest during the next four to six months. Yesterday was a nice day to be out on the track. Many mates did not do the test because the past weekend was a long miles day for them . There was the 200km K2 race, that is really similar to having TdF hills day running in your backyard. And there was the Auckland Marathon and half marathon, both of them filled since June.


Over the weekend I felt the lower part of the calf suffering a bit on the run. I was afraid it would repeat for the cooper’s test, but it didn’t and I’m happy about it. Winter test are done in a 600m loop in concrete with 2 big sharp turnarounds. Summer tests are done in a 400m oval loop in the grass. The splits for each of them are different for obvious reason, so it pays to be aware what to expect for each lap.

Unfortunately the track is not in optimal condition as there are a few bumps and the grass is a bit long. We still gathered a good crowd and I suffered from not having a couple of my fast pacers along. I started on 1.17 and finished on 1.19. The rest of the laps were on the 1.20 to 1.25 range and there were 9 of them. 2 very good ones, one excellent and six average laps.

I’m happy as my pb on the track was 50 metres shorter than what I did yesterday, so I’m preparing myself for harder workouts to come, but also nicer numbers on a 10k’er.

That's two training buddies fromt he old guard, Bob and Cyril, both of them do over 3100m on their cooper's test at their 50's.
 

it starts over

here's the new package. Nothing fancy, just a bit of cosmetics.
The Budapest race is over, so I thought I'd have another title and what first sprang to mind was the racing thing. Then I kept thinking and I wondered if there's any difference between "a season of racing" and "a season of participating in races"
My take is that there is a difference in how one frames oneself for for a race where we are just taking part or for another one where we're racing. That's what the whole "A" race theory may actually anchor. I don't know. I know I want to do some races, and hopefully do well in them. As the saying goes, you're only as good as your last race, so I'll try to be as good.
So, welcome to the first re-incarnation of the blog, there may be more, there may be not. The person behind the screen is the same but different, as I guess many of you out there are after each season. The content will be more of the same, with a bit more social and getting to know mates from the NZ tri world. And summer is good to be out with the camera, so I'll make sure I get some pics as well.

Today was the first day of the comeback, with light running only on the schedule. It was also the last day at the carpark space we use in the winter time. Spring is here and that means back to the grass track in the park. and good times doing conditioning work

Date: 27 Sept
Sport: Running
Comment: run drills and 5x1km... all nice and easy to give the body a rest

Cracking the pace

As promissed, yesterday was a massacre on the windtrainer. Cycling was the only workout to happen and it was a long 1.20min session with a longer than usual warm up and then the VO2 session.
It consisted on a series of 3min workouts with 3 min recovery.
The trick was to hold a speed 3km faster than our 20kmTT speed.
I didn't take my Polar with me because I didn't want to see what my heart rate was, it was a workout and I would do it no matter what.
The effort required to pull that speed for the period of time was well timed, because bang on two minutes we'll hit a little was and rode onto the hurtbox for the remaining minute.
we did half an hour worth of that and another half of recovery.
A long sleep and I wasn't as bad as monday night, and the scheduled 1500m TT was skipped in favour of an endurance workout and practice of deep water starts.
The secret for deep water starts is to be as horizontal as one can be and tilted to a side, once the gun goes on, a power kick and 10 or 20 strokes later one should be in some clear'ish water and the race starts.
Wednesday is long run day, and our last long run consisted of a 20min warm up and then 30min just below the race pace, for me it was my treshold of 83-85% of my heart rate on my seriously tired legs.
I managed to do just short of 8.5km which indicates a good form for the race.
We're scheduled to rest tomorrow, and I will do so happily,
there's bike check to be done, new wheels to fit in, chat to the coach, travel arrangements, work stuff and uni stuff that should be out by tomorrow. Oh... and aero haircut, and some photos

Lists time

Less than a week to fly, lots of things to finalize and lots of lists to make:
-Triathlon gear list
-travel stuff list
-Contacts list for people in Budapest and in the UK
-List of thing that may be a problem for my boss @ work
-list of documents, copies and emails confirming bookings here and there

I also checked the list of the competition, we're a field of about 120 people, which is pretty interesting heading into the first turn on the swim.

And among all the prepping, there is also some serious training still to be done. Today was a killer swim and another superset where we reached the mile in the 5xruns. I cracked a season PB of 2.29 for 200m in the first of 4 all out sprints. Coach told me to back off a bit and I am not sure I would have held that time for the 4 repeats. The evening set was long and tiring, here's what my polar tells me for the run laps (the first 2 are 1200m, the following 3 are 1550m).

1: HRAv 78% HRMx 84%
2: HRAv 87% HRMx 89%
3: HRAv 88% HrMx 92%
4: HRAv 90% HRMx 93%
5: HRAv 90% HRMx 92%
In between each of them there was about 3.15min of excercise where the HR got down to about 75%.
Tomorrow we have the last blast on the bike. We do indoor training with a guy that rode two olympic games and knows a fair bit about training peaks. He reckons tomorrow and Wed are the key days for some serious VO2 session. I am not looking forward to that : )

Hope your training is going well as well,

stay tuned, the best is still to come,

The spirit of triathlon

Another three days gone!,
it is really amazing how time flies when you're having fun. And I have had lots lately, mostly from the triathlon world.
Thursday marked the end of the retreat in the last phase of my training, Friday would mark the start of the last charge. We had a Superset in the midday that knocked me out for good. I was in bed by half eight and Saturday I was a new man.
Another brick session on the Sat. Being the final weekend to go and do things I didn't have a lot of time for a powernap. We also got invited to a good friend and triathlete's wedding. He's a regular appearance in all sorts of distances and I also found he is an accomplished sportsman in many other disciplines. The sad part of this is that I had to stick to a diet coke regime and was unable to take Nat to the dance floor in order to save my legs for today's last TT, whic didn't bring me any brownie points.


This Sunday we weren't blessed by the weather and coach decided to cance the TT due to wetter than normal conditions. The alternative was not an easy one. We did bike/run repeats for over 2 hours!, my HR monitor gave me readings I didn't know I was able to sustain over such a period of time, and it hurts.
8 workouts more between now and my fly to Europe. None of them will be easy, but all of them count and should confirm things are good.
While doing the bike/run reps today my mind started drifting towards tactics for race day. I've already spoken about the swim and how we're planning to do it. Once I'm out I expect to be in a pretty high HR band and to fly through transition with a higher HR. After I've mounted the bike the innevitable will happen. I'll be among the 10 to 20 athletes in the race, and we'll be all in a big group trying to ride off the gross of the field.
The spirit of triathlon is of individual achievement and racing solo, even on the bike. Rules ban drafting and I've seen and been penalized for breaches to these rules.
In the real world my experience is that the bigger the race, the more chances are to be cought in a drafting situation. It is up to the individual to try and not to break the rules because there's never enough marshalls to police the entire lenght of a bike leg.
In my opinion one must never race below their potential to comply with a rule. However, many times I've seen that as soon as I ride next to someone, that someone starts accelerating not to let me pass or to hang on to me.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that drafting in standard distance and sprint triathlon is a reality, specially in popular races where you've got over 600 riders over 10km of road. One can always do so much, then is a matter of luck.

So, after thinking about it over the bike repeats I've made clear that there have at least 2 plans for race day (bike):

Plan A: be a good boy, obbey the rules, do not draft and tell people off when I see them drafting. Conserve energy as much as I can and go hard.

Plan B: be a bad boy, go hard and take advantage of any drafting situation that is beyond my control. Take care of the draftbusters and see what happens.

what shall I do?

Spesh for a day

According to the cheap HR Max calculator, today my HR Max has gone one beat slower. It's a real shame that by being one year older I probably jeopardized my goals in the world champs race. LOL


Same as last year, I kind of celebrated and kind of not. Last night was not a really late one. We had to finish our essays for uni, update blogs and diaries and then get ready for today. We skipped the swim in the morning (birthday treat= lay in) and off to work a couple of hours later. To be fair, I'd like to have a big feed, a decent couple of glasses of red and go to bed late. But I can't afford any of the above at this time of training so it will all wait for a month. And comes Sept 23rd we'll all pretend it is still August.

Work has been indredibly busy, so I've been sitting my arse in front of the computer for most of the day. I managed to do a make up swim at midday and that's pretty much it.

we've got just over two weeks of training left. The next 5 days are an "easy week" today's swim was cruizy and I treated myself with 3 tries to get a 50m PB on the pool. Back in the day in the pre triathlon era I did a 29secs. That's over 3 years ago and it still persists as my 50m pb. Even though I was "spesh for a day" I failed in my endeavours. the first try was a decent 33, the second was a 35 and the last one a 31. No doubut I'm older and slower.

I redeemed myself in tonight's coopers' test. Cooper's tests are good on an easy week because it's a lot of hard work, but it's done and dusted in 12 minutes. Today I tried the red bull shots again and I'm not 100% sure to give the energy drink a credit. But I got a big time PB. My advances in Cooper's tests are usually in the 10 to 20 metres field. Today I got 50m over my best ever PB. I'm over the moon!. Unfortunately I didn't have my good mate Reado to push each other, otherwise I'm sure we'd broken the 3700m mark.

Over and out, it's time for cake and three wishes

Date: 23 Aug
Sport: Swimming/Running
Time: 45min/55min (12min)
Dist: 2km/8.5km (3685m)
Comment: for the 12 min: HR Av. 89% HR Max 95%. There's still room for improvement!