I’ve got a good two or so weeks training in since I last posted. Plenty of time on my feet, in the saddle on and in the pool. Nothing spectatular, just steady solid training. Looking forward to the weekend as my coach is over and I’ll get some solid technique work in.
The rest of last weeks training finished up well. A few good bikes, runs and swims. All pretty normal bar Thursday mornings swim. I swam with a friend thats stronger than me in the water. All was good for the first couple of K and in the main set (300s) I was alright for the first few, then a little tap on the feet signalled he wanted to come through. I let him through and he proceeded to hammer me for the remainder of the set. Toughest swim I’ve done in a long time.
All in all a good weeks training to start back to training!
After a tough session last night and not getting to bed that early when the alarm clock went off for swimming this morning the first thing I did was try to do that mental rejigging of training programmes and schedules to see if there was anyway that I could still get all my training done today, or even this week. I had almost come up with a revised plan and then I realised HTFU. So up out of bed and off to the pool. Some interesting technique based work before a decent main set. I surprised myself by how bad I was swimming. A brick would have moved quicker and more elegantly through the water. My left shoulder was a little sore and stiff, but this usually takes a fortnight to loosen up after a break from swimming. I suffered through the rest of the set and then happily got out of the pool. At least I’d gotten up this morning.
A short run at lunch, all easy, was running okay but struggled to keep the HR in the easy zones. I’m sure that lugging an extra 12 pounds around isn’t helping that. Not looking forward to the next encounter with Mr. Kerns “Hey, Dave Tummy………..”
So after yesterdays disaster in the water I returned to the pool to try and swim again. A good bit of stretching yseterday evening definitely helped with upper body stiffness. A freezing morning on the way to the pool but the one good thing about it being baltic outside is that the water in Westwood seems warm. Thankfully none of the problems of yesterdays swim today, but also none of the times I was hitting before. 15 seconds off per 100m. I suppose in a few weeks it will come back to me. Just need to start swimming with the club again and that will knock me into shape.
Stretching and core work at lunch. My core has always been pretty weak and if I don’t work at it I struggle through my core routine. Needless to say today’s session was tough.
In the evening I was back on the turbo doing big gear work. I’d forgotten how much I loved the turbo. No distractions, no cars, just good honest hard work. I’d gotten out of work later so it was a late turbo and the combination of a long day and trying to shift some weight meant that 55 minutes into the session I ran out of steam and died a death, thankfully that was just before the end of the main set so I had only a few minutes of severe suffering before the cool down started.
In hindsight although I didn’t know I needed the two weeks off I am really glad I took them, yeah I put on weight, lost my feel for the water and lost general fitness but in hindsight I was still a little mentally fatigued and jaded with the whole thing. I didn’t know it then but its obvious now as I’m raring to go and really excited again.
So I’ve only been out of the water two weeks or so, and I was swimming 3k sets a few times a week, but boy does your feel for the water go quickly. By 800m the arms were hanging off my and my lats were killing me. Rather than struggle through the rest of the set I binned it at 1k and swore to do it again tomorrow and bump tomorrows swim to Wednesday. Swimming is so tough and it goes so quickly – I hate natural swimmers and childhood swimmers!
Thankfully running wasn’t as tough and my easy run in the evening didn’t involve me struggling and forgetting how to run. Wind wasn’t the nicest though.
So after years of saying I would never do one I have signed up for IM Austria next July, July 5th to be exact. 3.8km swim, 180km bike and 42km run, all in the lovely heat of Austria.
So why Austria? Why an IM? The Austria question is easy – it’s got a good reputation for being well organised and fast, it’s meant to be spectator friendly and I’ve never been to Austria, and a friend could enter me on site the day after Austria 09. Another factor heavily in favour of Austria was the fact that my coach is doing Austria – defintely helped to make my mind up. Why an IM? That I’m not too sure on. I’ve always wanted to do one but never felt ready. I suppose I feel as ready as I ever will now.
After the 2008 season ended I took a week off and then got back into training end of September. All was going well and I was getting some good miles in the pool in but about two weeks ago I started missing a few sessions and then went on holiday for a week, ends up with me taking another two week training break. I didn’t think I needed it but obviously I did.
So training for Austria starts today and there are 237 days to go.