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Rev3 Cedar Point Training Plan Evaluation

Saturday, June 12th, 2010

This week marked a major turning point in my adventure towards my big ironman (FullRev) race in September. As Jill so clearly put it, we are both now in uncharted waters. I’m floating around in some strange place where the finish line of a half ironman is not the end, but just another stepping stone towards a much greater goal.

Over the last three years I’ve managed to learn enough about racing and training to know what it takes to get myself to the finish line of a half ironman and that is what I did last week at Rev3 Quassy. Moving past that and keeping my momentum going towards a full 140.6 mile race is an entirely new animal. That is why I had this week marked in my calendar as my “re-evaluation” week. A time to sit back, look at the training plan I’ve been using, how well I’ve followed it, how my individual swim/bike/run strength is progressing and retooling my plan as needed so that I can nail the next three months and get myself to that finish line at Cedar Point.

Here is where it all stands:

The “out of the box” training plan has been effective at getting me to a new course PR at Quassy, but is very bike heavy. My bike is definitely stronger than my run right now, so that focus needs to change.
I’ve been doing regular track workouts and hill repeats, but am hugely lacking in long run workouts that go past that 13.1 mile mark at any pace.
I have 100% NO CLUE (other than blindly following the generic plan that I’ve been using) how to address my running issues other than gently increasing my run volume and frequency up until the few weeks before race day.

I’m AMAZINGLY fortunate enough to have more super speedy athlete/coach friends than I’m able to count To help give some direction, I went to two of the speediest ladies that I raced with last weekend to get some tips on adjusting my training plan: Sonja and Meg. They have both been within reach of Kona spots at one point or another and have some sick run splits so I trust their advice. Plus, I know they read my training updates here more often than not so I trust that they won’t just be regurgitating what works for them, but will help to figure out what works best for slow ‘ol me.

Based on the non-existent ironman training experience that I’ve got, my original plan was to weed out one run and one swim workout on alternating weeks and add in another LSD or long-ish tempo run, with a good portion of them on trails to build strength and help keep a quick turnover. I wanted to avoid empty mileage at all costs and give each workout a specific focus since I think that was a major fault of the training plan that I followed last year.

At least that was my plan until Sonja smacked me around and set me straight. Hearing how few tempo/hill workouts she did was a big shocker.

While tempo and hill workouts are really common in high school cross country (the last time I could actually call myself a fast runner), Ironman is a different beast and I should take more of a “time on the feet” approach. Ultimately my goal is to do as little walking as possible on the marathon. In order to get to that point, I need MILEAGE. Instead of 10 hill repeats at the end of a 5 mile run around my ‘hood, I’d be much better served by a 5-6 hour hike with major hills. Even walking uphill for hours is apparently great IM training.

While focusing on long slow runs too much will just make me into a long slow runner, that won’t be bad. I’ve never actually ran 26.2 before, so running that distance at any speed after 112 on the bike would be a MAJOR accomplishment.

So here is the NEW plan based on a mix of Sonja and Meg’s tips:

Focus on long SLOW (9-10 min/mile pace) at proper HR to build overall Ironman fitness
Focus on outlasting, not speed
Plan for some EPIC run adventures and start working towards them
Adjust the runs of my training plan to look more like I was training just for a marathon
Bump up run frequency to at 4-5 times per week with some two-a-days
Keep track workouts really minimal – use speed work at the end of longer run workouts just to help break things up and keep it interesting
Active recovery after big runs or hikes – short swim/bike/run

Now it is time to go plan for some epic run adventures. I’ve already got some exciting stuff in the works.

Can. Not. WAIT!

Tags: ironman training, rev3 cedar point | Posted in Life, Running, Training Log, Triathlon | 6 Comments »

Half Ironman Triathlon Nutrition Plan

Friday, June 4th, 2010

This weekend I’ve got some revenge planned for the Rev3 half course.

Last year I came unprepared and suffered. The short story is that while my training was pretty solid, I started off the race drained and with not nearly enough water in me. Starting a race already in the red is a great way to spend the day in a 70.3 mile suffer fest.

This year, everything is different. Ditched the coach, got a whole new ironman plan, a fancy new carbon bike, a whole new race nutrition setup and I have a whole mess of lessons learned from painful race mistakes to hopefully get me to the finish line a little faster and a whole lot happier on Sunday.

http://www.vimeo.com/12282703

Here is the plan.

The Day Before:

Bring my full Camelbak with me while I volunteer at the Oly run course aid station with two scoops of EFS. Slurp away slowly all day to have plenty of water in my system at all times.

Morning:

Glass of juice
Cereal
Fruit
Bottle of EFS when I wake up
Bottle of EFS while hanging out in transition
First Endurance MultiV
First Endurance OptygenHP

Swim:

Avoid getting kicked in the face and chomping on people’s toenails
Suck down cup of water on my way to T1

Bike:

Drink one bottle of Liquid Shot mixed with water in the first 40 minutes (400 Cal)
Drink two more bottles of a weak EFS mix (~100 calories) every 40-45 minutes after that
Continually suck from another 400 calorie Liquid Shot flask throughout the rest of the bike.
Grab another water bottle from an aid station and polish that off 10-15 minutes before rolling in to T2

Run:

Slurp down water at every aid station
Mix it with a sip from a new EFS flask (400 Cal total)that I’ll pick up in T2

Post-Race:

I’ll have a bottle with two scoops of cappuccino Ultragen recovery goodness waiting for me back at transition. I’m leaving it without water, so that I can just grab the bottle, fill it up with water somewhere at the expo and suck it down and hope that it helps me be able to walk normally on Monday morning. I love that stuff and it hasn’t let me down yet.

That is the plan that I’ve tested and seems to work pretty well in training. I’m pretty confident that it will work on race day, but there is only one way to find out.

Training wise? I think my bike is a LOT stronger than my run lately, but as long as I can get to mile 5 of the run feeling good, I should be able to bring it all home feeling good.

Tags: 70.3 nutrition plan, efs, first endurance, half ironman nutrition, optygen, quassy, rev3, ultragen | Posted in Ironman, Nutrition, Training Log, Triathlon, Videos | 3 Comments »

Half Ironman Race Simulation

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

Today I did an epic workout. Not because it was ridiculously long or hard, but just because I tore my own legs off for five solid hours.

I want to get some final tweaks in my half iron nutrition/pacing/hydration before Rev3 Quassy next month. What better way to test out your fitness than to replicate a 56 mile bike and 13 mile run back to back?

If you like shaky videos with lots of wind noise, this explains my whole day.

If not, here is the quick synopsis.

The bike went great. I was rocking it. The best long bike ride of my life, then I cramped up at around mile 40. My legs still felt pretty good, but my stomach was all bloated and unhappy.

56 miles later, I rolled back to my car, downed some water in hopes that it would help reset my gut and jetted off on the first of five loops for the run.

I pushed it hard for the first 5 or 6 miles of the run. I got into a rhythm pretty quick and was feeling good, but then totally bonked. I kept on pushing through, tossing water over my head and alternated sucking down EFS and straight water. Nothing was really doing the trick, but I eventually made it through.

Once I got home, I realized what the problem was on the run. All that water I sucked down went right through my system and didn’t get absorbed at all. It wasn’t a pretty sight, but at least it helped me figure out what was happening to me.

So here are the lessons from today’s epic race simulation.

I have a lot juice on the bike than I thought.

Sucking down tons of sports drink is great, but I’ve gotta mix that with plenty of water to keep things flowing.

“Emptying the tank” before a race and pre-hydrating is just as important as hydrating durring the race.

The more I learn about how my body works at race pace, the better I’ll be able to rock it once Ironman race day comes around. I’m slowly getting there…

Tags: BRick workout, runners diarrhea, self supported triathlon | Posted in Cycling, Nutrition, Running, Training Log, Triathlon, Videos | 2 Comments »

The Road To Rev3 Knoxville

Wednesday, May 5th, 2010

I realized that I haven’t officially announced it here, but this is long overdue.

I’m kicking off the 2010 tri season this weekend in Knoxville!

Friday morning, long before the sun rises, I’ll be in my car making the almost 1,000 mile journey down to the other side of the Mason Dixon line. Fifteen hours (God I hope it doesn’t actually take me that long) in the car with just my thoughts, my bike and my iPod. I hear Lady Gaga is good company.

Not only will I get to witness the Trakkers vs. Trek/KSwiss showdown play out in person, but I’ll get to hang out with a TON of my Trakkers, bloggy and twitter friends for the whole weekend. It is going to be tough focusing on actually racing instead of just hanging out with teammates all weekend, but it will be a fun challenge to try and balance. Plus, we issued a challenge to two other age group triathlon teams and it will be fun laying some hurtin’ on them.

I’ll be racing the Oly on Sunday morning. I’m not even going to bother making goals since I have NO clue what is going to happen. I feel like I’m the fittest I’ve been in a really long time, but it has all been ironman-focused. How well does that translate into olympic distance speed? I guess we will find out. All I’m going to say that I feel like a PR might be possible.

No matter what, if I’m driving that far to race, I’m leaving it ALL out on the course. I’ve got no reason to hold back.

I’ll try to blog a little bit over the weekend, but much more info will be up on my twitter account. Check that for all my Rev3 Knoxville adventure/road trip updates.