This triathlon season I have had the opportunity to use and test one of the latest additions to the endurance sports recovery market, Recovery Pump. The inflatable compression boots have been used for years in Physical Therapy and rehab clinics for patients with circulatory conditions, but only recently began offering products to the athlete community.

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What it does:

Your body is extremely efficient at getting oxygen-rich blood through your arteries and into your muscles, but is less efficient at clearing the metabolic waste that comes from anaerobic exercise (lactic acid, CO2 and a laundry list of other waste) out of  your blood stream and into your kidneys to clean out. This metabolic waste is a significant obstacle to increasing your VO2 max and Lactate Threshold, two major determining factors for performance in endurance events.

The thigh-high boots each have four separate chambers and are connected to an adjustable compressor through a series of hoses. Each chamber progressively inflates from your feet up, applying pressure sequentially to your feet and legs. This facilitates your body’s natural cleansing of metabolic waste. The compression helps actively move metabolic waste from your muscles, just like a long easy walk with compression tights would, but without the demand for additional fuel from your muscles – making it much more effective.

The boots can be used for as little as 10 minutes before a workout to help warm up or even longer (I usually go from 1-2 hours) after an intense training session to promote recovery and be better prepared to tackle your next workout.

If you are interested in more information on the science behind Recovery Pump, they have a great list of studies and abstracts here: http://recoverypump.com/Page/Science

Does It Work?

After using it extensively over the whole 2011 triathlon season, I can confidently say that it does what it is supposed to. I first used the Recovery Pump boots in March after a hard day of spring skiing in heavy melting snow that destroyed my legs. I spent 90 minutes in the boots to prepare for a long ride on the bike trainer the next day. I was incredibly surprised how fresh my bike legs felt the next day considering how I was practically limping the day before. I thought it may have been a fluke, but with consistent use over the rest of the season, quality time with my Recovery Pump boots became a staple in my training plan.

The one caveat worth noting is that while it does help flush out plenty of metabolic waste, it doesn’t completely repair all your muscle damage from high-intensity workouts. That your body has to do on its own. But you can get there faster with good nutrition and recovery.

Also, there may be a little sticker shock for anyone considering purchasing their own pair. At $1,195 they aren’t a bargain product, but are MUCH more affordable than some other competing products and will undoubtedly have a bigger impact on your finishing time than the $2,000 carbon disc wheel that you only use on race day. Add up all of the massages you get throughout the year and think about having your own in-home recovery device that you can use every single day. It starts to make a lot more sense then.

Plus, because the science behind Recovery Pump is so solid you can even use your FSA, HSA or HRA to pay for it. When was the last time you were able to use those accounts to save some money on triathlon gear?

If you are seriously invested in better performance and want to make the most out of your training and recovery, Recovery Pump is definitely worth some investigation.

Disclaimer: Recovery Pump is a sponsor through Team Trakkers/Rev3, but in no way contributed to the content of this review. 

Apparently complimenting someone on their “gregarious spirit” is a nice away of saying “this guy clearly isn’t competing for a top spot.” But hey, I’ll take it! (and they were right on both counts and I had a blast.

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Sam and I drove up to Vermont early on Friday morning, hit up registration, some free samples at the vendor booths and made or way to our hotel. I decided to skip the host hotel and go for one MUCH closer to the actual race. We didn’t need our car all weekend and I could see the whole swim course from my window. It was pretty sweet.

The swim course and the Adirondack mountains on the other side of Lake Champlain.

And yes, the sun looked EXACTLY like that streaming through the clouds in real life. Pretty cool, eh?

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RACE MORNING
I was up and at ‘em at 5:30. I dressed, drank some EFS and took down a banana and some yogurt before heading over to transition. My swim wave went off an hour after the first wave and transition didn’t close until late, so I was in no rush. There was a lot of waiting around and sitting on the dock with Sam as we watched the other waves go off, but no real stress.

The minutes leading up to my swim wave is usually when the butterflies start kicking in, but nother this time. Despite being my biggest and last triathlon of the year, I was pretty relaxed. We watched about 5 or 10 waves go off before I even put on my wetsuit. I drank a flask of First Endurance Pre Race then lubed up my neck, shoulders, arms and legs with Tri Slide and I gathered with the rest of my age group to dive on in.

SWIM

We only had a few minutes to warm up in the water before our wave went off. Just enough to get the shoulders loose and do any last minute wetsuit adjustments before lining up for the gun. I warmed up the interior of my wetsuit, and just floated until they sent us off. Despite being in a pretty wide start line where our group was probably only 2-3 people deep at any one point, it was a pretty aggressive start. Elbows and feet were flying everywhere. I did my best to push through ‘em and keep on some fast feet without taking a heel to my eye or fist to the back of my head.

It worked, I managed to stay out of any brawls with other adrenaline fueled athletes and still push the pace. The course made a hard right turn. Due east and right into the sun. UGH. I couldn’t see a damn thing except for a group of splashing feet and elbows about 25 meters ahead of me. I followed them until they realized they were WAY off course and took a hard turn to get back on. Frustrating. While the water was pretty calm in the protected harbor, I think some of the waves in one section where there was a gap in the barriers helped throw me off course too. After some more diligent sighting, I was back on course, hugging the buoys and out of the water.

Going into the race, I knew that I had the fitness to set an Oly swim course PR as long as I stayed on course. I was right. Poor sighting and no PR. Frustrating.  Oh well. Onward and upward.

Time: 28:27

Pace: 1:54/100m

Bike

After a respectable, but not blazing fast T1 (1:33) I was off on the bike. The first third of the bike had some decent (short) climbs and was into a headwind. I kept pushing to try to catch up to some faster swimmers, but going uphill into a headwinds S-U-C-K-S. I felt like my brakes were dragging or something. If it wasn’t for catching up to people in earlier waves, it would have been easy to get down on myself, but everyone was stuck facing the same conditions.

Fortunately, on the back half was treating me much better and I fell into a good rhythm. Nice rollers, pushing hard and a little tail wind sent me home 3.5 minutes faster than my last bike course PR. Big smile on my face. Nutrition wise, I just took one 2oo calorie bottle of EFS.

Time: 1:07:39 (22 mph)

Run

What I did NOT know is that they were live streaming video from the race. My mom, Rachelle and Jill were all watching and cheering for me as one of the cameras caught me coming into T2. If I had known, maybe I would have picked it up a little because they were NOT very impressed with my speediness through transition. Then Jill and Rachelle proceed to heckle me over Twitter. Gotta love teammate support.

Out of transition and onto the course was the only real hill on the whole course, but it was a biggie. Half of the people were walking! Seriously people? Walking in the first 1/4 mile of Nationals? Let’s get this thing done!

I had a pretty slow first mile because of the hill (around 8:00) but after that I kept ticking off each mile at around 7:25-7:35. I kept chugging along and feeding off of everyone’s energy. People were laying it all out there and destroying their bodies just to get to the finish line, way more than any other race I’d been in. It was awesome to be around.

My final time was 46:19, which was 40 seconds faster than the stand alone 10k that I did at Beach to Beacon two weeks ago! Not too shabby, eh?

Edit: Rumor is that the run course may have been a little short, but I’m going to pretend that I didn’t hear that. 

Total Time: 2:25:28

Yes people, that is a HUGE 15 minute PR. I had never even broken 2:40 before. A good day, eh? I feel like this was the race where I was finally able to pull off the race performance that I was capable off. Other than a little zig zagging on the swim, it was just the race I wanted.

And I had expected some fierce competition, but NOTHING like what actually showed up. If I had been lucky enough to PR by only 8 minutes, I would have been dead last. I lucked out big time with not ending up DFL!

The rest of the weekend was spent enjoying local beers, burritos the size of my face, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream sundaes and laying in my hotel bed with Sam watching awful movies on TV. I can’t imagine a better weekend.

Enjoying the post-race beer garden. Cheap beers AND they didn’t need my ID. They just looked at my calf. Kinda awesome.

 Chipotle burrito from Bueno y Sano

Big B&J Sundae

One of my favorite beers: Switchback Ale

And It only took me about 12 hours to think “Damn that was a fast race! I wonder how much faster I can go next year?!”

I think I already have a goal for the 2012 season…

I rolled into Cape Elizabeth around 6:30, and hopped on a bus from one of the remote parking lots to take me to the race start. The bus driver had the heat BLASTING which only made the bus full of nasty nervous pre-race farts even worse! The bus was like I was in a giant fart oven. Not an awesome way to start the morning.

The only reason I’m smiling in this picture is because it is BEFORE everyone’s pre-race farts started. 

A 2 hour drive, a bus ride, and a half mile walk to the start line and I was finally there. I grabbed my number, ran into some old friends that were racing and moved out of Boston, warmed up, peed in the woods and waited for the gun to go off.

Waiting at the starting line

The race itself was fun pretty uneventful. I lined up somewhere just behind the 7:00 minute pace marker and waited for the gun to go off. I didn’t taper for this and the plan was just to train through it and test out my pacing strategy for nationals.

In the end, I was REALLY happy with how consistent my pacing was. Except for a hilly second mile, I held pretty steady 7:30 miles. I would have liked to be a little faster, but since my legs weren’t 100% fresh, I was fine with it. One thing I did notice is that compared to the average runner that was holding a 7:30 pace, I’m WAY better at running hills. At the start of even the slightest hill, every pack that I was running with seemed to slowly fade back as I kept a steady effort. I don’t think this is unique to me, but probably a triathlete thing. Looks like my cycling quads aren’t just dead weight on the run after all!

Does anyone else notice this when doing stand alone running races?

My final time was 47:03. Since I can’t remember the last time I did a stand alone 10k (at least 10 years ago?) I’m calling this a PR. Here are my mile splits:

Splits:
1 – 7:27
2 – 8:03
3 – 7:38
4 – 7:33
5 – 7:30
6 -7:23

After the race, I headed through through the food tent to suck down some chocolate milk, watermelon, and a fist full of mini snickers bars. They were hiding all the good stuff (chocolate and candy) at the END of the food line! Very sneaky.Then I hit up the massage tent, something I’ve never done post-race. Usually I’m busy regrouping with Sam after she spent the morning cheering me on. Since I was flying solo this time around, I took advantage of it and made some friends in the massage line before getting my butt rubbed.

Then, it was on to the beach for a soak! There was a little rocky beach just passed the finish line and only a few other runners took advantage of it for a cold soak. I was surprised more people didn’t dive in for a little cool down, but was happy to have it (almost) to myself.

I tried doing a video race report, and almost got got knocked over by a ninja wave that came out of nowhere….

Click here to view the embedded video.

As for the race itself, I was a little hesitant because I usually hate gigantic races. This one had more than 5,000 runners and sold out in seven minutes. In MARCH. For a TEN K! Fortunately, it was super casual and really well run. There were a TON of spectators lining the course and you can tell how proud the locals were of the race. Super well run, GREAT volunteers, aid stations and finisher’s area. If you can get in, I’d definitely recommend this race. Plus, Portland is a pretty cool little city to hang out in if you’ve got some time to kill after the race.

One more week of hard training then it is time to taper for what I’ve been building my whole season around – Age Group Nationals!

I headed out to the middle of Walden for a while to escape the crowds. I brought along my camera (tucked away Bree Wee-style) and had some fun splashing around all by myself and chasing fish for a while.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I was inspired by this Twitter hashtag, so I have to give props to these people for the help with the video’s dialogue.

What ridiculousness can you use to claim as a part of being a full-on-triathlete?

The one major obstacle is that I’m usually stuck to recording the scene just before or just after the action. Recording a 45 mph descent on my bike would be awesome, but probably not the safest idea with only one hand on the handlebars and the other clutching the record button.

Because I wish that I could do a lot more video blogging of my athletic adventures than I already do, I was psyched when Adventure Eye Video Systems reached out to me for a review on their service. They offer online rentals of point-of-view digital video cameras. The idea is perfect if you have some epic outdoor adventure planned that you want to record, but don’t want to drop a cool $250 on a new POV camera.

The actual process is really simple. Fill out the order form and a box shows up on you doorstep a few days later with a camera, memory card, blank CD and a pre-paid return shipping sticker. From the day that your camera is delivered, you’ve got two weeks to go wild, record as much as you can, download it from the memory card and ship it all back. I think one of the best parts is that if you like it and can see yourself shooting POV video pretty regularly, you can contact them and buy it at a discount.

The two cameras that I had the chance to play around with were the Contour HD and the GoPro HD.

Without going into a deep product review, the Contour HD is an awesome camera. Super easy functionality, one-button recording that can easily be hit while wearing ski or cycling gloves on. My only wish is that it was waterproof for shooting video on open water swims, or giving to a friend to help analyze my swim stroke at the pool.

The GoPro HD camera makes up for the Contour HD’s lack of waterproof-ness, but that is about it. There are a ton of cool features in there on top of video, including taking still pictures, but there is no image preview screen. Having a million features packed into a camera with one really elementary screen and only two buttons to navigate them all just makes things complicated, especially if the camera is strapped to your head. It is especially frustrating when it takes a whole night to understand how to use the camera when you are renting it and the time you have with the camera is limited.

Also, the GoPro HD camera was busted when it arrived on my doorstep and the video quality was completely messed up. This wasn’t AE Video System’s fault since the camera came in brand new packaging, but the quality of GoPro HD’s products is definitely suspect. Again, if waterproof-nes is essential, the Go Pro HD camera is a good choice, but in just about all other situations, you are better off renting something else.

Renting the Contour HD is $75, or $100 with a damage waiver (which I’d highly recommend if there is any chance of you doing anything mildly dangerous or above 5 mph with the camera). The price is good, but you can buy a Flip Mino HD camera for  under $200 so the threshold for when it makes sense to buy instead of rent is pretty low. Do you see yourself shooting video pretty regularly? Adventure Eye Video Systems probably isn’t for you. If you don’t see yourself shooting video more than twice in the next two years and have some big ski, paintball, scuba diving, kayaking or cycling trip coming up? Definitely check out Adventure Eye Video Systems’ online video rentals.

Disclaimer: Adventure Eye Video Systems provided me with use of these cameras at a steeply discounted rate of $0.01, but did not contribute to the content of this review.

I made it to the top of the Ap Gap!

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9.42 miles to the top in 55:15. Yeah, that is 10.1 miles per hour…

Total elevation gain: 1,775.

My quads are screaming (as was my mouth as I was climbing the last mile, which was also the steepest part).

Thankfully, the descent was a helluva lot easier. Plus, I found this little mountain stream off the side of the road. Perfect for a little cool down soak.

Portrait of a happy triathlete.

The biking routes are pretty sweet too. Just about all the country roads are framed with TONS of these blue and yellow wildflowers. I’ve gotta snap some good pics of some of the wildflower fields up here later this week to post here. I’ve been having too much fun riding to stop and take too many pictures, but there will be plenty of time for lollygagging later on.

See those mountains WAAAAAAAY off in the distance there? They are calling my name. I want to go ride over there later this week and conquer a few.

But enough rambling, lets get to the story behind the title to this blog post.

Yesterday a bunch of my friends I’m vacationing with went off to play 18 holes of golf, so I figured it was a perfect time to knock off one of my epic adventures for the week: head North to the Canadian border. I didn’t have my passport so I couldn’t go too far into Canada, but even if I could just roll across the border and turn around to head back home, I’d be a happy camper.

I loaded up my water bottles, pointed North and started pedaling. It was hot, but most of the route followed the lake shore so the breeze coming off the water was a huge gift.

Half way to the border. Stopped for 2L of water and inhaled a chocolate chip muffin at the Hero, VT general store.

As I started to get closer to the border, my phone started buzzing. I got a message from AT&T warning me about extra charges for international data rates, I knew I was close! I rolled past the “Vermont Welcome Center” building and there she was, the ultimate destination of the ride. Welcome to Canada: the land of maple syrup, hockey, God knows whatever else those crazy Canucks do up there.

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The border patrol was about a quarter mile past the border sign. I didn’t bother trying to go through since I didn’t have my passport and the map didn’t seem to show anything worthwhile across the border for at least another 10 or 15 miles. Not wanting to deal with over zealous border patrol or adding another 20-30 miles to an already 80- or 90 mile ride, I did an about face and headed home.

On my way back, I was riding along and kept hearing this crow squacking right over my head. I didn’t think anything of it until I realized he was following me. Actually, it was more like he was chasing after me and dive bombing me, as if he was trying to shoo me out of his territory. This went on for a solid mile or two, no joke. Once I realized that he wasn’t going to stop, I just yelled “SHUT UP BIRD!” and he disappeared off into the distance. Pretty bizarre. Has anyone else ever had this happen to them?

And did I mention that it was hella hot?! This thermometer was in the SHADE at the VT welcome center. 90 degrees and barely any shade for the entire 88 miles. It was a really good test of my Rev3 Cedar Point hydration plan though. Nutritionally, everything went really well. I couldn’t have been happier.

Next up: exploring Burlington, running and whatever other adventures I can manage to think up while floating out in the lake and staring at the clouds…

Following Sonja’s orders, I headed down to the Blue Hills Reservation just south of Boston for a long day of hiking. I packed up  my Camelback full of goodies to keep me going for the whole day.

Side note: I LOVE my camelback for trail running. Maybe it is just because I have no hips and my fuel belt is just too big and won’t stay in place, but this thing is the best. It has little pockets for my wallet, FlipCam, Clif bars and my iPhone and is the most comfortable way with 2 liters of water strapped to my hump. Definitely one of the best gear purchases I’ve made lately.

But let’s continue…

Heading out into the woods and seeing rays of sunshine peek through the fog and tree leaves makes getting up early completely worth it.

Gorgeous.

Despite the name, I was a little unsure about just how hilly the “Blue Hills Reservation” actually was. I didn’t want to go out to attempt some epic hike only to be let down by some ill-named walking path. Thankfully, the blue hills did not disappoint. Within the first quarter mile I was walking up a steep rocky hill and was well into Z2. Happy boy. An epic day was had.

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There were awesome views of the Boston skyline, tons of bounding between tree roots, sprinting down rocky descents and a helluva lotta sweat.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Four hours later and slightly embarrassed that I got a legitimate workout from hiking (which is just another name for a walk in the woods) I was done. My toes were pretty beat up from banging them into rocks. I may need to invest in some legit trail shoes instead of just my regular Saucony Hurricanes, but they did hold up pretty well. There was also a little beach and pond right at the end of the trail. Perfect for a little post-run soak. SCORE!

I managed to average 120 bpm for the whole day. Not too bad for endurance training? Right?! I’ll have to do this a few more times and bump up the time/distance each time.

Saturday night involved two games of bowling, an arm full of beers, a BBQ cheeseburger at midnight and a 1:30 am bedtime. Not ideal for an early morning Sunday ride, but definitely fun. Gotta have that triathlon-life balance!

5:30 am rolled around pretty fast and I felt like death. Thankfully I knew Kim was joining me, or I may not have made it out. Planning my weekend workouts early and sending some peer-pressure filled emails was definitely a good idea.

Fifty miles, lots groaning about my sore quads from yesterday’s hiking, staring at Kim and Mike’s butt’s, and plenty of poop and vagina jokes later, we rolled back into Concord High School and tossed back a few beers before calling it a morning and going our separate ways. Drinking at 11:30 on a Sunday morning in a high school parking lot? Gotta love it. Mike supplied the beer. It was the first time I’ve ever met or ridden with him, but he is definitely a keeper.

So I know what you are thinking. Epic hike is checked off the list. What is next?

Next weekend: one day. +120 miles. Boston to Provincetown.

Time to lube up the road bike!

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 triathlon 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 nutrition lessons learned from painful race mistakes to hopefully get me to the finish line a little faster and a whole lot happier on Sunday.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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.

UPDATE:

Note, I’ve tweaked the order of what I consumed on the bike. Instead of starting with a heavily concentrated water bottle on the bike, I decided to start with a more diluted drink to let my heart rate settle before increasing my caloric intake. More information behind that decision can be found HERE.

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…