This last week went well. I actually trained 20 minutes longer than I had to for the week. Doesn't sound like a lot but it feels like a lot. We ran yesterday morning at Mendon and my water froze so all I drank was about 3 ounces of water. Drank about a gallon when I got home.
Today I biked on the trainer and it's getting harder to find things to do while on it. TV is just not interesting enough, so, I put in a DVD of the documentary "An Incovinient Thruth". While it was able to keep my attention for the duration of the ride the CO2 chart only made me think of the bike course profile at Placid, seems to go up forever. I also found myself stopping the ride to go check in my computer if I was "carbon neutral". I'm not, by the way.
Well, with only 145 days to go to the big day and my worry about greenhouse gases I have enough to worry about.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Jackie D - Week 23
Week 23 - starting Monday 19 February 2007
Scheduled hours: 11hrs 15mins
Actual hours: 8hrs 36mins
A bit of a semi- emotional training week this week for me, or perhaps I’m just thinking too much!
It started with coach giving out some homework! This was to think of 3 to 5 athletic goals, could be short or long term, to write them down and to also write the reason why. Well I have put together some notes, after far too much thinking about it but, unlike when I was at school (and a real goodie goodie) I confess to not having submitted my homework yet, even after a first reminder.
I found this more difficult than I thought I would. Triathlon is only a part of my life, admittedly it becomes a larger and larger, obsessive part of my life as time goes on, but it is only my hobby, not my life. It made me think about the reason I started doing these things again (not the initial dare to do the first one). If I am really honest with myself there are two major contributors - food and depression. At the end of the day I like food and have had a hate relationship with my body and yo yo dieting etc for the best part of 20 years. When my kids came along I convinced myself to be less obsessive and that worrying about a few pounds here and there was not worth the mental stress and self indulgence, especially how it affected my moods. There were (and still are!) much more important things in my life. Together with this I often had times when I got pretty down with everything. Fred is such a laid back angel really and just takes me as I come, knowing that even when I was horrid to him I didn’t really mean it and I just had to let it run its course. Well after some research I decided I didn’t want to be labelled as depressed so I chose the self help technique of endorphins ie exercise. So, I knew I needed and wanted to do regular exercise but I also wanted it to be enough to allow me to eat without getting worried about gaining pounds. I needed a goal to aim for, to keep me steady and consistent and triathlon was that goal. Ironman is just an extension - I want to challenge myself, prove I can do it, become the fittest I have ever been, be one of the few and eat what I like!
So, my first goal of course has to be the Ironman this year.
It is very easy to get caught up in wanting to achieve a great time and somedays I think this would be great and some days I think it would just be nice to finish with a smile on my face. I’m hoping the cut-off time of 17 hours won’t be an issue. I am viewing this as a once in a lifetime experience and I want to give it my best and not end up feeling I could have given it more but I want to enjoy the experience at the same time.
I’m still thinking about other goals but they aren’t really relevant to this Ironman journal anyway.
Back to training - the above doesn’t explain the discrepancy in training hours now does it! Well, somewhere along the week I picked up a bad cold/ bug / who knows. Monday to Wednesday I was fine and did a great BT bike workout including riding 40mins in z3 within the workout. I usually struggle on the indoor trainer to keep my HR up in z1 & 2 so I was very pleased with myself. I discovered the key is cadence though. My other bike workout was various gears at 100rpm and it made me wonder how I ever had a problem getting my heart rate up!
I didn’t enjoy swimming. I went to masters and it is the same old story - my times aren’t improving and people are just whizzing past me who didn’t a few months ago. I find this very frustrating. People keep telling me you have to swim minimum 3x a week to improve but as I can already swim the distance is this justifiable if it takes time from bike and run? I don’t know - will have to talk to Mary about this (again!)
Strength work has changed this week. Instead of just doing sets of 12-15 reps, I am now doing a set of 12-15 reps, then choosing a weight that will take me a max of 5-7 to fatigue. This is a completely new ball game. I am amazed how much I can increase the weight and still do over 7 and it makes me wonder if I should have been pushing myself more before - I thought I was pushing myself but……..anyway, I hope I don’t get too muscly.
Thursday came and after a sleepless night not feeling too good I decided to not go for my planned morning run, thinking I could go swimming later. With it being Presidents week recess and the kids home from school my “training gap” is before of after Fred goes to / returns from work. Anyway I decided in the evening that run was more important than swim so I went and did that at the gym instead - it was a BT one with hills and HR z1-4+ so I enjoyed it. A couple of hours later I knew it had been a mistake as I felt awful again (I truly felt OK during the workout) and I ended up feeling sick Friday and spending the day in bed on Saturday still feeling awful.
What with last weeks easy schedule and then not doing the scheduled amount this week I reckon I must have used up any slack built into my training plan now. Eekk. What worried me most about this week was that because of the timing I hadn’t done my 2 key workouts (long bike scheduled Fri and long run scheduled Sun). May have to think about this and try and do them earlier in the week in future. However, on Sunday I was beginning to feel better and whilst Fred took the kids sledging I snuck onto my bike trainer and did a couple of hours really easy pedalling - all time in the saddle is good right? Fred wasn’t impressed that I had been training when he got back - and it was so close - just a minute to go and I would have been done!
21 WEEKS TO GO
Scheduled hours: 11hrs 15mins
Actual hours: 8hrs 36mins
A bit of a semi- emotional training week this week for me, or perhaps I’m just thinking too much!
It started with coach giving out some homework! This was to think of 3 to 5 athletic goals, could be short or long term, to write them down and to also write the reason why. Well I have put together some notes, after far too much thinking about it but, unlike when I was at school (and a real goodie goodie) I confess to not having submitted my homework yet, even after a first reminder.
I found this more difficult than I thought I would. Triathlon is only a part of my life, admittedly it becomes a larger and larger, obsessive part of my life as time goes on, but it is only my hobby, not my life. It made me think about the reason I started doing these things again (not the initial dare to do the first one). If I am really honest with myself there are two major contributors - food and depression. At the end of the day I like food and have had a hate relationship with my body and yo yo dieting etc for the best part of 20 years. When my kids came along I convinced myself to be less obsessive and that worrying about a few pounds here and there was not worth the mental stress and self indulgence, especially how it affected my moods. There were (and still are!) much more important things in my life. Together with this I often had times when I got pretty down with everything. Fred is such a laid back angel really and just takes me as I come, knowing that even when I was horrid to him I didn’t really mean it and I just had to let it run its course. Well after some research I decided I didn’t want to be labelled as depressed so I chose the self help technique of endorphins ie exercise. So, I knew I needed and wanted to do regular exercise but I also wanted it to be enough to allow me to eat without getting worried about gaining pounds. I needed a goal to aim for, to keep me steady and consistent and triathlon was that goal. Ironman is just an extension - I want to challenge myself, prove I can do it, become the fittest I have ever been, be one of the few and eat what I like!
So, my first goal of course has to be the Ironman this year.
It is very easy to get caught up in wanting to achieve a great time and somedays I think this would be great and some days I think it would just be nice to finish with a smile on my face. I’m hoping the cut-off time of 17 hours won’t be an issue. I am viewing this as a once in a lifetime experience and I want to give it my best and not end up feeling I could have given it more but I want to enjoy the experience at the same time.
I’m still thinking about other goals but they aren’t really relevant to this Ironman journal anyway.
Back to training - the above doesn’t explain the discrepancy in training hours now does it! Well, somewhere along the week I picked up a bad cold/ bug / who knows. Monday to Wednesday I was fine and did a great BT bike workout including riding 40mins in z3 within the workout. I usually struggle on the indoor trainer to keep my HR up in z1 & 2 so I was very pleased with myself. I discovered the key is cadence though. My other bike workout was various gears at 100rpm and it made me wonder how I ever had a problem getting my heart rate up!
I didn’t enjoy swimming. I went to masters and it is the same old story - my times aren’t improving and people are just whizzing past me who didn’t a few months ago. I find this very frustrating. People keep telling me you have to swim minimum 3x a week to improve but as I can already swim the distance is this justifiable if it takes time from bike and run? I don’t know - will have to talk to Mary about this (again!)
Strength work has changed this week. Instead of just doing sets of 12-15 reps, I am now doing a set of 12-15 reps, then choosing a weight that will take me a max of 5-7 to fatigue. This is a completely new ball game. I am amazed how much I can increase the weight and still do over 7 and it makes me wonder if I should have been pushing myself more before - I thought I was pushing myself but……..anyway, I hope I don’t get too muscly.
Thursday came and after a sleepless night not feeling too good I decided to not go for my planned morning run, thinking I could go swimming later. With it being Presidents week recess and the kids home from school my “training gap” is before of after Fred goes to / returns from work. Anyway I decided in the evening that run was more important than swim so I went and did that at the gym instead - it was a BT one with hills and HR z1-4+ so I enjoyed it. A couple of hours later I knew it had been a mistake as I felt awful again (I truly felt OK during the workout) and I ended up feeling sick Friday and spending the day in bed on Saturday still feeling awful.
What with last weeks easy schedule and then not doing the scheduled amount this week I reckon I must have used up any slack built into my training plan now. Eekk. What worried me most about this week was that because of the timing I hadn’t done my 2 key workouts (long bike scheduled Fri and long run scheduled Sun). May have to think about this and try and do them earlier in the week in future. However, on Sunday I was beginning to feel better and whilst Fred took the kids sledging I snuck onto my bike trainer and did a couple of hours really easy pedalling - all time in the saddle is good right? Fred wasn’t impressed that I had been training when he got back - and it was so close - just a minute to go and I would have been done!
21 WEEKS TO GO
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Jackie D - Weeks 21 & 22
Week 21 - starting Monday 5 February 2007
Scheduled hours: 10hrs 20mins
Actual hours: 10hrs 24mins
I made masters swimming both times this week which is a pleasant change. It is soooooo hard to drag myself there in the evening when I am tired and it is so cold outside and then to take off clothes when all I want to do is put extra sweaters on and curl up under the duvet with a book and a hot chocolate. Darling hubby (Fred) was very supportive on the second session because I really was considering not going and he just said “Get on and get over there, you have to do your training and you aren’t swimming next week”. Good point and it got me out of the house (of course the scheduled alternative was to do our tax return so that may have helped too!). He thinks I have S.A.D. especially as the prior few days I had been doing stuff at the gym/ inside instead of outside. Once I am at the pool though I am OK and glad I got there. And, the time really flies when you are swimming a scheduled workout with someone.
Another “longest indoor ride ever” at 2hrs 30mins. I had the 3 hr spinerval DVD (look if I put spinerval without the s it doesn’t change it to sinkerballs) which I loosely followed. Couldn’t follow exactly as it was too intense for my planned HR and also I physically couldn’t do some of the standing stuff on light gears. That brought me down to earth with a bump as I clearly have a long way to go to become a decent cyclist!
No long runs this week and I left for my holiday of Caribbean Cruise on the Saturday so the final workout of the week was running roads of Fort Lauderdale around the hotel. Nice thing was it was shorts and T shirt. But it wasn’t very scenic.
23 WEEKS TO GO
Week 22 - starting Monday 12 February 2007
Scheduled hours: 2hrs 50mins
Actual hours: 3hrs 00mins
Yep, that is not a misprint - total training hours way down. Mary is determined I enjoy my holiday without training. On the one hand that is just as well as the ship’s “jogging track” is tiny - my boys (age 7 and 9) could run around it in 20 seconds! I think it said it was 0.06 of a mile - that would be a lot of laps!
Anyway I needed to do something to justify the eating and drinking of the cruise and luckily the ship had a very well supplied gym. I did 2 strength sessions and they had most of the machines I used, free weights and mats etc so I could practically do my normal session.
My first run was scheduled for 20mins and I confess I just couldn’t do just 20mins. I did it on the treadmill and I did stop at 30mins - it was hard but cocktail hour was calling. All the aerobic machines had a 20min max set on them so I hope there wasn’t anyone there training for a marathon as resetting every 20mins could get tedious.
The funny thing about the gym’s facilities were that it was all in kg and km which I am not used to so it was all done by “feel”. I think that was kind of a good thing ‘cos sometimes it is too easy to get hung up on numbers.
Big relaxing sigh and now to tell about some cross training. Kayaking through a lagoon on St Thomas (Virgin Islands) to a little uninhabited island to go hiking, hermit crab racing and snorkelling. I logged this as my planned 30min session - in fact it was a 3 hour trip but it was pretty leisurely except for the kayaking in and out of the lagoon which definitely counted! I was a bit smuggins though ‘cos darling hubby (who had the other kayak with 9 year old son) complained about his arms being sore for the rest of the day. I was fine! Thank you training plan.
I also had my first experience and use of a gym stationary bike since this Ironman training began. That was interesting. I strapped my feet in as well as I could but the saddle - it’s so wide.
So all in all a lovely relaxing week and of course just to make all the snow bound people green, I should finally mention the bits that I didn’t count for my log - the hours swimming around beaches and reefs looking at all the pretty fishies. It actually wasn’t much effort as the sea water was really buoyant so you could just float around.
Back to reality next week
22 WEEKS TO GO
Scheduled hours: 10hrs 20mins
Actual hours: 10hrs 24mins
I made masters swimming both times this week which is a pleasant change. It is soooooo hard to drag myself there in the evening when I am tired and it is so cold outside and then to take off clothes when all I want to do is put extra sweaters on and curl up under the duvet with a book and a hot chocolate. Darling hubby (Fred) was very supportive on the second session because I really was considering not going and he just said “Get on and get over there, you have to do your training and you aren’t swimming next week”. Good point and it got me out of the house (of course the scheduled alternative was to do our tax return so that may have helped too!). He thinks I have S.A.D. especially as the prior few days I had been doing stuff at the gym/ inside instead of outside. Once I am at the pool though I am OK and glad I got there. And, the time really flies when you are swimming a scheduled workout with someone.
Another “longest indoor ride ever” at 2hrs 30mins. I had the 3 hr spinerval DVD (look if I put spinerval without the s it doesn’t change it to sinkerballs) which I loosely followed. Couldn’t follow exactly as it was too intense for my planned HR and also I physically couldn’t do some of the standing stuff on light gears. That brought me down to earth with a bump as I clearly have a long way to go to become a decent cyclist!
No long runs this week and I left for my holiday of Caribbean Cruise on the Saturday so the final workout of the week was running roads of Fort Lauderdale around the hotel. Nice thing was it was shorts and T shirt. But it wasn’t very scenic.
23 WEEKS TO GO
Week 22 - starting Monday 12 February 2007
Scheduled hours: 2hrs 50mins
Actual hours: 3hrs 00mins
Yep, that is not a misprint - total training hours way down. Mary is determined I enjoy my holiday without training. On the one hand that is just as well as the ship’s “jogging track” is tiny - my boys (age 7 and 9) could run around it in 20 seconds! I think it said it was 0.06 of a mile - that would be a lot of laps!
Anyway I needed to do something to justify the eating and drinking of the cruise and luckily the ship had a very well supplied gym. I did 2 strength sessions and they had most of the machines I used, free weights and mats etc so I could practically do my normal session.
My first run was scheduled for 20mins and I confess I just couldn’t do just 20mins. I did it on the treadmill and I did stop at 30mins - it was hard but cocktail hour was calling. All the aerobic machines had a 20min max set on them so I hope there wasn’t anyone there training for a marathon as resetting every 20mins could get tedious.
The funny thing about the gym’s facilities were that it was all in kg and km which I am not used to so it was all done by “feel”. I think that was kind of a good thing ‘cos sometimes it is too easy to get hung up on numbers.
Big relaxing sigh and now to tell about some cross training. Kayaking through a lagoon on St Thomas (Virgin Islands) to a little uninhabited island to go hiking, hermit crab racing and snorkelling. I logged this as my planned 30min session - in fact it was a 3 hour trip but it was pretty leisurely except for the kayaking in and out of the lagoon which definitely counted! I was a bit smuggins though ‘cos darling hubby (who had the other kayak with 9 year old son) complained about his arms being sore for the rest of the day. I was fine! Thank you training plan.
I also had my first experience and use of a gym stationary bike since this Ironman training began. That was interesting. I strapped my feet in as well as I could but the saddle - it’s so wide.
So all in all a lovely relaxing week and of course just to make all the snow bound people green, I should finally mention the bits that I didn’t count for my log - the hours swimming around beaches and reefs looking at all the pretty fishies. It actually wasn’t much effort as the sea water was really buoyant so you could just float around.
Back to reality next week
22 WEEKS TO GO
Saturday, February 17, 2007
Marian, February 17th, 2007
This was a tough mental week. It was very cold and windy outside. No swimming, pools closed. No running, roads are out of the question anddriving to the gym was taking way too long. I had three doctors appointments which made my already busy schedule even more crammed. So, I biked and biked and biked and biked. Every day this week I biked on the trainer. I've become very familiar with the 5:00am TV lineup. Today I biked for 2 hours on the trainer. I decided I needed some motivation to get me through another indoor bike ride this week so, I watched Ironman Lake Placid (still can't find Tom) and Ironman Hawaii. The 2 hours flew by. I had to stop a couple of times to blow my nose after crying. Wow, can NBC make good drama out of anything or what. It was al the motivation I needed, I felt like I could go for another 2 hours and that doesn't happen often. I had some GU after one hour and a salt tab after another 30 minutes. No other nutrition, it was a fairly short ride. I did have another realization during all the bike rides this week. I don't like that no matter how much I tie my hair up in buns and put pins an clips into it, it still loosens up some and I can feel it touch my back. It bothered me all week and became a huge focus point during every ride, so I chopped it all of. Hope I don't regret it in the morning.
Sunday, February 4, 2007
Jackie D - Week 20
Week 20 - starting Monday 29 January 2007
Scheduled hours 11hr 05 min
Actual hours 11hr 55 min
Yippee - I tried something new this week. I went cross-country skiing. In fact I went twice! First time out it was just for 30mins around a flat course in Ellison Park. There is much more balance involved than I thought and I fell down on the first corner….and many times after that too! It was fun though and I can tell it is a good way of working out both upper and lower body. It was also nice to have warm hands. When I run my hands often still feel cold but working those poles seems to keep the hands nice and snuggly. Second time out I ventured out for 50minutes down in Mendon Ponds. Again quite flat but more corners and slopes enough to feel I was making progress. Still fell over half a dozen times though.
My training naiviety came to the forefront with this second cross country skiing episode. I was due to do an hours run that day and Mary had said to us all that you can substitute X country skiing on a 2.5:1 ratio. Well I figured that 50mins only equated to a 20min run so I decided I had to do my scheduled run as well. Oh boy, by three quarters of the way through I was feeling miserably tired but no where to go but back to the car on a big loop. I guess it didn’t help that I was running the snow packed trails in Mendon which was pretty hard going, even with trail shoes. So….talking to coach later she tells me that I can substitute 1:1 but that it is OK to go up to 2.5x as people tend to go out x country skiing for longer periods and it is less damaging to the body. Duh me Duh me! However, if she knew just how often I was falling down and jarring ankles and wrists I am not quite sure about the definition of “less damaging”! I have got my friends husbands ski’s to use at the moment. After she emptied out the mouse poop I only needed 3 pairs of socks to fill the boots up! Hopefully may try some more next week and actually let it count as part of my endurance training.
Longest indoor ride ever this week too. 2 hours and 15 minutes. It is soooo boring. Good mental training though I guess. I watched a film (movie to you Americans). I have ordered another cycling DVD, the 3hour sinkerballs one (OK I don’t know why but my computer is automatically changing the word s p in n er va ls to sinkerballs). At least I will have that for next weeks long ride.
For the long run this week (which wasn’t so long at 1 hour 20mins) I headed to the treadmill at the gym as it was so cold outside (single digits and still have bad memories from run a couple of weeks ago). It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I didn’t realise the gym would be so busy on a Sunday morning. At a couple of times all the treadmills were in use and I felt slightly guilty about using one for so long - only slightly though (the ones at the Y really used to annoy me about having 30min limits). Luckily there are enough that no one seemed to be waiting. Another minor guilt trip was the food and drink policy. It is only supposed to be water but I didn’t want to just drink water for that length of run so I took some diluted Gatorade. I also took a gu with me but didn’t have to work up the nerve to eat that cos I didn’t have a separate “just water” bottle and I didn’t want to risk a bathroom dash. I was fine and didn’t feel I needed it anyway. I did discover that I seem to be a lot slower on the treadmill than I am outside - I thought it was supposed to be the opposite so that was a bit disappointing. It was nice to be able to run in T-shirt and shorts again though.
Onwards.
24 WEEKS TO GO
Scheduled hours 11hr 05 min
Actual hours 11hr 55 min
Yippee - I tried something new this week. I went cross-country skiing. In fact I went twice! First time out it was just for 30mins around a flat course in Ellison Park. There is much more balance involved than I thought and I fell down on the first corner….and many times after that too! It was fun though and I can tell it is a good way of working out both upper and lower body. It was also nice to have warm hands. When I run my hands often still feel cold but working those poles seems to keep the hands nice and snuggly. Second time out I ventured out for 50minutes down in Mendon Ponds. Again quite flat but more corners and slopes enough to feel I was making progress. Still fell over half a dozen times though.
My training naiviety came to the forefront with this second cross country skiing episode. I was due to do an hours run that day and Mary had said to us all that you can substitute X country skiing on a 2.5:1 ratio. Well I figured that 50mins only equated to a 20min run so I decided I had to do my scheduled run as well. Oh boy, by three quarters of the way through I was feeling miserably tired but no where to go but back to the car on a big loop. I guess it didn’t help that I was running the snow packed trails in Mendon which was pretty hard going, even with trail shoes. So….talking to coach later she tells me that I can substitute 1:1 but that it is OK to go up to 2.5x as people tend to go out x country skiing for longer periods and it is less damaging to the body. Duh me Duh me! However, if she knew just how often I was falling down and jarring ankles and wrists I am not quite sure about the definition of “less damaging”! I have got my friends husbands ski’s to use at the moment. After she emptied out the mouse poop I only needed 3 pairs of socks to fill the boots up! Hopefully may try some more next week and actually let it count as part of my endurance training.
Longest indoor ride ever this week too. 2 hours and 15 minutes. It is soooo boring. Good mental training though I guess. I watched a film (movie to you Americans). I have ordered another cycling DVD, the 3hour sinkerballs one (OK I don’t know why but my computer is automatically changing the word s p in n er va ls to sinkerballs). At least I will have that for next weeks long ride.
For the long run this week (which wasn’t so long at 1 hour 20mins) I headed to the treadmill at the gym as it was so cold outside (single digits and still have bad memories from run a couple of weeks ago). It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I didn’t realise the gym would be so busy on a Sunday morning. At a couple of times all the treadmills were in use and I felt slightly guilty about using one for so long - only slightly though (the ones at the Y really used to annoy me about having 30min limits). Luckily there are enough that no one seemed to be waiting. Another minor guilt trip was the food and drink policy. It is only supposed to be water but I didn’t want to just drink water for that length of run so I took some diluted Gatorade. I also took a gu with me but didn’t have to work up the nerve to eat that cos I didn’t have a separate “just water” bottle and I didn’t want to risk a bathroom dash. I was fine and didn’t feel I needed it anyway. I did discover that I seem to be a lot slower on the treadmill than I am outside - I thought it was supposed to be the opposite so that was a bit disappointing. It was nice to be able to run in T-shirt and shorts again though.
Onwards.
24 WEEKS TO GO
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