My 2011 season's training is now into a fairly full swing, and looking at the days flying by on the calendar it needs to be.
It was a rest week a couple of weeks ago, planned in on the basis that I was away for 6 days and training was going to be tricky. Unfortunately on the following Tuesday my wife got ill with cold and throat infection - I held out for a couple of days but by Thursday afternoon I'd caught it, and it really knocked me out. Friday, Saturday and Sunday were completely written off but the sofa was very very comfortable....
Unfortunately the illness meant I wasn't able to get to HPU for my pre-season lab testing. It was a bit disappointing to not make it - the intention being to get a pre-race season baseline for my fitness and give me some good V02 max figures etc to work off for the next few weeks. I'll hope to get along there soon as it's nice to have figures to work from - not just to be working off heart rate and 'how it feels'.
I'm now only two months away from my first race of the season. I'm a little bit behind where I was last year in all disciplines, but I hadn't actually been doing any more than 4 hours per week for 8 weeks up until 21st January, so have only now got 4 solid weeks behind me. I've been putting the long runs in and managing to hit some 6 minute miles on the way back, and on my interval sessions have been hitting sub 3.30 per km. That's where I was at this time last year in terms of speed, but with the added bonus of 12 miles average for the long runs instead of 8.
Swim and bike are a little bit off, but that's to be expected. Those were the two that really suffered with my 8 week sabbatical so I know I need to put the work in. Will be looking to push the swim and bike for the next couple of weeks and see where that puts me by the middle of March.
Saturday, 26 February 2011
Sunday, 30 January 2011
It's been a while...
Well I guess the reason for the first post in 4 months is that I'm getting back into training again (for the first time in 4 months!) Due to work and holiday commitments I've had roughly an 8 week gap in my schedule, so am starting from roughly zero. It's been a long layoff so 2011 is going to be an experiment in how vital a solid winter base really is...!
Going into this year I was looking to race a little bit more low key. With the Europeans and Worlds last year I put quite a bit of pressure on myself, so in 2011 am looking to mix up the distances a little and give the year some variety on all counts.
The year will be starting with Lisbon Half Ironman at the end of April. This will force me to train long for the 14 weeks beforehand and hopefully give me a good platform for the year. From there there'll be a variety of sprint, olympic and middle distance races - all UK based, alongside the usual smattering of run races and TT's.
Right now I've got a pretty solid 10 days under my belt and am not feeling too bad about things. The bike and run are off pace, but I know that with some consistency the speed will come.
A big positive is the swim, I had my first real session back last night and was faster than through all of 2010. With having an enforced period of no swim training I'd been trying to brainwash myself into making some stroke adjustments - hoping that time out of the water would help my body forget certain errors of it's ways and replace them with the new info I was telling it. It will need a couple of sessions to reinforce, but I'm feeling pretty positive that I've made a bit of a breakthrough (2 to 3 seconds per 100m is a decent breakthrough). I'm not going to be moving up to club swimming so know that I need to make my improvements through stroke efficiency and tweaks rather than volume and coaching.
Going into this year I was looking to race a little bit more low key. With the Europeans and Worlds last year I put quite a bit of pressure on myself, so in 2011 am looking to mix up the distances a little and give the year some variety on all counts.
The year will be starting with Lisbon Half Ironman at the end of April. This will force me to train long for the 14 weeks beforehand and hopefully give me a good platform for the year. From there there'll be a variety of sprint, olympic and middle distance races - all UK based, alongside the usual smattering of run races and TT's.
Right now I've got a pretty solid 10 days under my belt and am not feeling too bad about things. The bike and run are off pace, but I know that with some consistency the speed will come.
A big positive is the swim, I had my first real session back last night and was faster than through all of 2010. With having an enforced period of no swim training I'd been trying to brainwash myself into making some stroke adjustments - hoping that time out of the water would help my body forget certain errors of it's ways and replace them with the new info I was telling it. It will need a couple of sessions to reinforce, but I'm feeling pretty positive that I've made a bit of a breakthrough (2 to 3 seconds per 100m is a decent breakthrough). I'm not going to be moving up to club swimming so know that I need to make my improvements through stroke efficiency and tweaks rather than volume and coaching.
Wednesday, 22 September 2010
World Championship Tri Bronze
Waveney Triathlon 2 - 5th September, 1st
I'd entered this race purely as last minute sharpener for Budapest, coming as it did 6 days before the big race. I'd only raced it once before and was looking to try and get a course record. However, with no running under the belt for more than a week before due to a dodgy foot I wasn't really sure how it would play out.
The weather was spot on, lovely and sunny with very little wind. My race certainly wasn't the most balanced, but it got the job done - didn't get the course record, but was only 30 seconds off, and with my aero helmet and disc wheel on their way to Budapest I'm pretty sure it was within my grasp.
I ended up really going hard on the bike leg, and then not getting the legs turning over fast enough on the run. But it was a confidence builder for Budapest. The outcome with the foot is that it's OK in a straight line but hurts turning corners. Absolutely fine - Budapest is a point to point run so no corners...!
Budapest Sprint Tri World Championships - 11th September, 3rd
This race had been my focus since the start of August. Overall, my season seems to have spluttered and not got going as I'd hoped, but having this race big on my calendar helped me out in the preceeding 6 weeks.
We arrived late on the Wednesday, with the race on the Saturday. Our hotel wasn't near the team hotel or race centre - which was great for touring the city, but meant we got to take full advantage of the pretty fantastic Budapest public transport system to get registered/go to team briefings etc.
From Thursday lunchtime it rained constantly without let up which meant our hotel room become a giant laundry room of clothes and footwear that wouldn't get dry. The day before the race was the team briefing and it was announced that disc wheels would very likely be disallowed due to potential thunderstorms coming in. As soon as this was announced my stomach just dropped. I should have learned from them being banned at the Euros. On that occasion I had a spare wheel - on this occasion I had nothing.
After some frantic begging I managed to get a potential loan of a rear wheel. But I wasn't going to being able to get it until the Saturday. And wouldn't know whether I could use it, or whether it would run right (different gearing) until about 60 minutes before my race. Cue a sleepless night, and me pretty much resigning myself to: wind=no race for me. :(
Saturday morning - pouring with rain but no wind. Something to moan about but I could race!! I set up in the rain, wading through a waterlogged transition and before I knew it was waiting on the pontoon for the start....
Swim
The water was cold - very cold. I picked a place in the middle, started strongly and never really let up. I was hoping to find some fast feet to latch onto but ended up being the fastest feet! I put a couple of hard bursts in and broke the tow of the toe tappers behind me. It felt good to exit the water and come running into transition in first.
Bike
I came running out of T1 looking for the bike mount line - one point that would have been handy in the briefing was that there wouldn't be a mount line, just a woman with a red flag shouting "hop, hop...". The bike course was simple - 2 x 9.94km, and the road surfaces not as bad as rumour had been dictating. I led the 1st lap but as my poor cycling this year has dictated dropped back to 4th on the 2nd lap - albeit with 2nd and 3rd right in front of me.
Run
The moment of truth. I've heard athletes quoted so many times saying "4th is the worst place to finish" - coming out of transition in 4th I knew they were right. I would kick myself for ever more if I didn't gain a position. I went hard for the first km and was up behind 3rd place, a Brazillian guy. Decided to kick straight past - go as hard as I could for another km and see if I could break him straight away.... success.
It was the longest last 3km I've raced. The route was right against the river all the way before crossing over to the other side at the end. I'd walked it a couple of times and was just counting off the bridges as I ran - pretty constantly looking behind, scared that suddenly some whippet would come flying past. But no, the finishing chute appeared and I crossed the line in 3rd!
Despite the bike leg not being great, whatever had happened I would have had to run way beyond my current level to get into the top 2. The winner runs 15 minute 5k's, and that's beyond where I'm at unfortunately. I raced the best race I could on the day, and was very very happy to come out of it with a medal!
I'd entered this race purely as last minute sharpener for Budapest, coming as it did 6 days before the big race. I'd only raced it once before and was looking to try and get a course record. However, with no running under the belt for more than a week before due to a dodgy foot I wasn't really sure how it would play out.
The weather was spot on, lovely and sunny with very little wind. My race certainly wasn't the most balanced, but it got the job done - didn't get the course record, but was only 30 seconds off, and with my aero helmet and disc wheel on their way to Budapest I'm pretty sure it was within my grasp.
I ended up really going hard on the bike leg, and then not getting the legs turning over fast enough on the run. But it was a confidence builder for Budapest. The outcome with the foot is that it's OK in a straight line but hurts turning corners. Absolutely fine - Budapest is a point to point run so no corners...!
Budapest Sprint Tri World Championships - 11th September, 3rd
This race had been my focus since the start of August. Overall, my season seems to have spluttered and not got going as I'd hoped, but having this race big on my calendar helped me out in the preceeding 6 weeks.
We arrived late on the Wednesday, with the race on the Saturday. Our hotel wasn't near the team hotel or race centre - which was great for touring the city, but meant we got to take full advantage of the pretty fantastic Budapest public transport system to get registered/go to team briefings etc.
From Thursday lunchtime it rained constantly without let up which meant our hotel room become a giant laundry room of clothes and footwear that wouldn't get dry. The day before the race was the team briefing and it was announced that disc wheels would very likely be disallowed due to potential thunderstorms coming in. As soon as this was announced my stomach just dropped. I should have learned from them being banned at the Euros. On that occasion I had a spare wheel - on this occasion I had nothing.
After some frantic begging I managed to get a potential loan of a rear wheel. But I wasn't going to being able to get it until the Saturday. And wouldn't know whether I could use it, or whether it would run right (different gearing) until about 60 minutes before my race. Cue a sleepless night, and me pretty much resigning myself to: wind=no race for me. :(
Saturday morning - pouring with rain but no wind. Something to moan about but I could race!! I set up in the rain, wading through a waterlogged transition and before I knew it was waiting on the pontoon for the start....
Swim
The water was cold - very cold. I picked a place in the middle, started strongly and never really let up. I was hoping to find some fast feet to latch onto but ended up being the fastest feet! I put a couple of hard bursts in and broke the tow of the toe tappers behind me. It felt good to exit the water and come running into transition in first.
Bike
I came running out of T1 looking for the bike mount line - one point that would have been handy in the briefing was that there wouldn't be a mount line, just a woman with a red flag shouting "hop, hop...". The bike course was simple - 2 x 9.94km, and the road surfaces not as bad as rumour had been dictating. I led the 1st lap but as my poor cycling this year has dictated dropped back to 4th on the 2nd lap - albeit with 2nd and 3rd right in front of me.
Run
The moment of truth. I've heard athletes quoted so many times saying "4th is the worst place to finish" - coming out of transition in 4th I knew they were right. I would kick myself for ever more if I didn't gain a position. I went hard for the first km and was up behind 3rd place, a Brazillian guy. Decided to kick straight past - go as hard as I could for another km and see if I could break him straight away.... success.
It was the longest last 3km I've raced. The route was right against the river all the way before crossing over to the other side at the end. I'd walked it a couple of times and was just counting off the bridges as I ran - pretty constantly looking behind, scared that suddenly some whippet would come flying past. But no, the finishing chute appeared and I crossed the line in 3rd!
Despite the bike leg not being great, whatever had happened I would have had to run way beyond my current level to get into the top 2. The winner runs 15 minute 5k's, and that's beyond where I'm at unfortunately. I raced the best race I could on the day, and was very very happy to come out of it with a medal!
Saturday, 4 September 2010
PB & Injury - highs and lows
Well this could very easily be described as bad timing. I'd had a relatively solid 4 weeks of training after London tri, but unfortunately seem to have aggravated something in my ankle a little over a week ago which has put me completely out of running and in a bit of discomfort on the bike.
With Budapest coming up next week this really wasn't what I was after, but will just have to see how it takes me. I'm also due to be racing Waveney Tri tomorrow - this was intended to be a final sharpener for Buda, but I will now see how I feel when it gets to T2 as to whether I continue or not...
For the Sprint Worlds there's such a small gap between positions that everything has to be spot on. I think if I race like I did a couple of times at the start of the season I can be right up there - top 3. This has proved itself to be my distance, so I just want to do it justice and really nail the race.
Earlier in the month I did a 5k PB in 16.50. I'd run 16.58 during a 10k so knew I should be sub 17, but reassuringly I know there's more time to come. It just felt a bit rushed and my form felt a bit poor, but if it's another 3 years before I run a 5k like it was this time let's hope it's a bit more than a handful of seconds I knock off.
With Budapest coming up next week this really wasn't what I was after, but will just have to see how it takes me. I'm also due to be racing Waveney Tri tomorrow - this was intended to be a final sharpener for Buda, but I will now see how I feel when it gets to T2 as to whether I continue or not...
For the Sprint Worlds there's such a small gap between positions that everything has to be spot on. I think if I race like I did a couple of times at the start of the season I can be right up there - top 3. This has proved itself to be my distance, so I just want to do it justice and really nail the race.
Earlier in the month I did a 5k PB in 16.50. I'd run 16.58 during a 10k so knew I should be sub 17, but reassuringly I know there's more time to come. It just felt a bit rushed and my form felt a bit poor, but if it's another 3 years before I run a 5k like it was this time let's hope it's a bit more than a handful of seconds I knock off.
Wednesday, 11 August 2010
London Triathlon 8/8/10
First let's bring things a little up to date:
European Championships - Athlone
Came out of this race disappointed. I can't say it felt like a bad race, and in reality it wasn't, but again I had such a poor bike leg that it put me completely out of contention.
Swim - 20.46, 9th
Bike - 58.26, 8th
Run - 38.39, 4th
Overall - 2.02.14, 6th in age
Whilst my split was one place higher in the bike than it was on the swim, I simply can't live with losing 3 minutes on rivals on the bike.
July training
Unfortunately after coming out of Athlone knowing I had work to do, July was always the month in the race calendar where my training was going to die a death. 7 days on holiday, 6 days away on business and another 4 without bike or water meant that I would be swimming against the tide just a little.
London Triathlon 8/8/10
I put this race into the year as I knew I couldn't race the Nationals the following week, and wanted to see where I was at after the rough July mentioned above. Last year I'd finished 7th overall in 1.58 after having a pretty good race.
Swim - 21.26
I was determined to find some fast feet. Unfortunately I picked the wrong feet and thought I'd missed the boat - saw a couple of guys further ahead but despite a big surge for 150 metres or so I couldn't make up the gap. Disappointed. Ended up swimming pretty comfortably in a large pack with what I thought was 4 guys up ahead somewhere. It felt a bit tougher than it should have because of the surges at the start, but the splits afterwards showed I was in the lead pack.
Bike - 1.00.14
After a mammoth transition I was out onto the bike. Once more it didn't feel slow, but in reality it was slow. I cycled the whole thing with Mark Yeoman behind (in a non drafting manner though). We passed maybe 5 guys and got told there were only 2 more in front - pleasing.
Unfortunately coming into T2 the cones were out in a silly manner and I ended up taking the wrong way - had to skid to a halt, climb off the bike, down a wall and remount while going uphill. Many many seconds lost. See pic.
Run - 40.43
I didn't enjoy the run at all. It felt tough because I'd put a lot into the bike, but with it being reduced from a 2 lap to a 4 lap the congestion was a nightmare - the course was very tight and there were times when there was simply no way past groups of runners and you'd need to wait until they were through certain sections. There'd been 4 bikes in transition when I came in so I knew I was actually 5th. Ended up being overtaken by 1 guy but coming past 2 more, so ended up in 4th.
Overall - 2.07.22
Was supremely disappointed with the time, but subsequently found that everyone was around 7-8 mins down on previous due to the run being much longer, and much more congested. The only leg I really lost out on compared to last year was the bike.
I've got a couple of little races coming through August/start of September, but it's all about Budapest. At the start of the year I had big hopes for this race - I still don't feel I'm too far off but need to have a quality month in the bank...
European Championships - Athlone
Came out of this race disappointed. I can't say it felt like a bad race, and in reality it wasn't, but again I had such a poor bike leg that it put me completely out of contention.
Swim - 20.46, 9th
Bike - 58.26, 8th
Run - 38.39, 4th
Overall - 2.02.14, 6th in age
Whilst my split was one place higher in the bike than it was on the swim, I simply can't live with losing 3 minutes on rivals on the bike.
July training
Unfortunately after coming out of Athlone knowing I had work to do, July was always the month in the race calendar where my training was going to die a death. 7 days on holiday, 6 days away on business and another 4 without bike or water meant that I would be swimming against the tide just a little.
London Triathlon 8/8/10
I put this race into the year as I knew I couldn't race the Nationals the following week, and wanted to see where I was at after the rough July mentioned above. Last year I'd finished 7th overall in 1.58 after having a pretty good race.
Swim - 21.26
I was determined to find some fast feet. Unfortunately I picked the wrong feet and thought I'd missed the boat - saw a couple of guys further ahead but despite a big surge for 150 metres or so I couldn't make up the gap. Disappointed. Ended up swimming pretty comfortably in a large pack with what I thought was 4 guys up ahead somewhere. It felt a bit tougher than it should have because of the surges at the start, but the splits afterwards showed I was in the lead pack.
Bike - 1.00.14
After a mammoth transition I was out onto the bike. Once more it didn't feel slow, but in reality it was slow. I cycled the whole thing with Mark Yeoman behind (in a non drafting manner though). We passed maybe 5 guys and got told there were only 2 more in front - pleasing.
Unfortunately coming into T2 the cones were out in a silly manner and I ended up taking the wrong way - had to skid to a halt, climb off the bike, down a wall and remount while going uphill. Many many seconds lost. See pic.
Run - 40.43
I didn't enjoy the run at all. It felt tough because I'd put a lot into the bike, but with it being reduced from a 2 lap to a 4 lap the congestion was a nightmare - the course was very tight and there were times when there was simply no way past groups of runners and you'd need to wait until they were through certain sections. There'd been 4 bikes in transition when I came in so I knew I was actually 5th. Ended up being overtaken by 1 guy but coming past 2 more, so ended up in 4th.
Overall - 2.07.22
Was supremely disappointed with the time, but subsequently found that everyone was around 7-8 mins down on previous due to the run being much longer, and much more congested. The only leg I really lost out on compared to last year was the bike.
I've got a couple of little races coming through August/start of September, but it's all about Budapest. At the start of the year I had big hopes for this race - I still don't feel I'm too far off but need to have a quality month in the bank...
Thursday, 1 July 2010
Pre-European Championships
Where does the time go? I'm sitting with all my gear packed up around me ready to head off to the European Championships in Athlone, Ireland......
It's only been a month since I raced at Fritton but it's not been an easy one to get the balance of training/competition right. After racing triathlon for 5 years it's amazing how the body can continue to confound and surprise - not always in a positive way!
After Fritton I was away for a week so training was zero. This was always planned (although not ideal), but the following week I attempted to make up for this shortfall in time and rather overdid it. I raced two 25 mile time trials over a weekend in the middle of June, and put in the worst two performances I think I've ever done. It didn't take a huge leap to realise that I'd overtrained, but it surprised me that I could hurt my body so much in only 5 days of training (albeit very intense training + a day of food poisoning.....)
Since that week I've had to drop the training and intensity quite a bit, and just take it a lot more on feel. This meant a DNS at Dambuster Triathlon unfortunately as I didn't think that racing it would do me any favours. However, I did a 10 mile Open Time Trial on my local dual carriageway course and wasn't a million miles (30 seconds) off a PB in 21.57.
.....So that leaves me sitting here with all my gear around me. I'll see what the race holds - I certainly would say I'm where I planned to be by this point at the start of the season, but we can never quite plan for everything. July is going to be very tough to fit in any meaningful training at all, so I'll give the race my all and see where it gets me.
It's only been a month since I raced at Fritton but it's not been an easy one to get the balance of training/competition right. After racing triathlon for 5 years it's amazing how the body can continue to confound and surprise - not always in a positive way!
After Fritton I was away for a week so training was zero. This was always planned (although not ideal), but the following week I attempted to make up for this shortfall in time and rather overdid it. I raced two 25 mile time trials over a weekend in the middle of June, and put in the worst two performances I think I've ever done. It didn't take a huge leap to realise that I'd overtrained, but it surprised me that I could hurt my body so much in only 5 days of training (albeit very intense training + a day of food poisoning.....)
Since that week I've had to drop the training and intensity quite a bit, and just take it a lot more on feel. This meant a DNS at Dambuster Triathlon unfortunately as I didn't think that racing it would do me any favours. However, I did a 10 mile Open Time Trial on my local dual carriageway course and wasn't a million miles (30 seconds) off a PB in 21.57.
.....So that leaves me sitting here with all my gear around me. I'll see what the race holds - I certainly would say I'm where I planned to be by this point at the start of the season, but we can never quite plan for everything. July is going to be very tough to fit in any meaningful training at all, so I'll give the race my all and see where it gets me.
Thursday, 10 June 2010
Fritton Olympic Tri 30th May - 1st
Well that's the first full distance race of the year all done. Going into the race I knew that all the pieces of the triathlon pie were roughly in place, even if they were unlikely to be anything spectacular.
The weather was a little unpleasant beforehand but the rain eased off from around 7am and left damp but drying roads. The course is an always fast swim, plus 2 laps of a roughly undulating/slightly short bike course and a cross country run. I didn't think a target of 1.57 was unrealistic...
The swim was pretty uneventful - I was off in the 3rd wave and felt pretty comfortable throughout. Practiced a little bit of drafting in the water which felt pretty good, but when we started passing peeps from previous waves I went back to swimming on my own. Out of the lake in 2nd place in 20.12 (always quick swims here though).
T1 was fairly speedy, then out onto the bike course which I know pretty well...unfortunately I had to stop twice during the hour as my rear wheel pulled over onto the brake pad on acceleration and made it instantly unrideable. I haven't checked how long these actual stops took, but certainly not less than 30 seconds each, and it felt like the brake was rubbing through other parts of the ride. 2nd fastest bike split.
Coming into T2 I still figured I should be on for the win, even if a decent time had gone out of the window. It's a cross country run which had been changed the night before to a 2 x 5k route as parts had been deemed unsafe - I was pleased with this as people had got lost on previous years (myself included). It's a tough little run with some steep undulations, but the footing was pretty good and I enjoyed it. 36.31 for a supposedly 9.7km off road course was pretty fair.
Finishing time was 2.00.04 - 1st place. Target was pretty much achieved I think bearing in mind the problems. A few points to work for Dambuster and beyond, but everything's ticking over...
Since the race my training has been erratic. I had a week off following the race due to being away on business on the other side of the country (long hours with no chance of wheels or water) - this was followed by a bout of food poisoning that's taken a little bit of the wind out of the sails. But I've done my best to eat back any weight that I inadvertantly shed...!!.. and am looking forward to my next race - Dambuster tri on 19th June.
The weather was a little unpleasant beforehand but the rain eased off from around 7am and left damp but drying roads. The course is an always fast swim, plus 2 laps of a roughly undulating/slightly short bike course and a cross country run. I didn't think a target of 1.57 was unrealistic...
The swim was pretty uneventful - I was off in the 3rd wave and felt pretty comfortable throughout. Practiced a little bit of drafting in the water which felt pretty good, but when we started passing peeps from previous waves I went back to swimming on my own. Out of the lake in 2nd place in 20.12 (always quick swims here though).
T1 was fairly speedy, then out onto the bike course which I know pretty well...unfortunately I had to stop twice during the hour as my rear wheel pulled over onto the brake pad on acceleration and made it instantly unrideable. I haven't checked how long these actual stops took, but certainly not less than 30 seconds each, and it felt like the brake was rubbing through other parts of the ride. 2nd fastest bike split.
Coming into T2 I still figured I should be on for the win, even if a decent time had gone out of the window. It's a cross country run which had been changed the night before to a 2 x 5k route as parts had been deemed unsafe - I was pleased with this as people had got lost on previous years (myself included). It's a tough little run with some steep undulations, but the footing was pretty good and I enjoyed it. 36.31 for a supposedly 9.7km off road course was pretty fair.
Finishing time was 2.00.04 - 1st place. Target was pretty much achieved I think bearing in mind the problems. A few points to work for Dambuster and beyond, but everything's ticking over...
Since the race my training has been erratic. I had a week off following the race due to being away on business on the other side of the country (long hours with no chance of wheels or water) - this was followed by a bout of food poisoning that's taken a little bit of the wind out of the sails. But I've done my best to eat back any weight that I inadvertantly shed...!!.. and am looking forward to my next race - Dambuster tri on 19th June.
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