Victoria's Obligatory Triathlon Blog

February 20-26: Look, Ma, I Can Swim FAST!

2012-02-27T10:32:00.001-08:00

This week I did something I’ve been unable to do for months. Many months.

I swam fast. Not really fast, and certainly not nearly as fast as when I swam in college – and I wasn’t even that fast then. But I did swim faster than the week before when I had the miserably slow and all-around terrible swim session that I officially titled the “I Hate Life” workout before I went on a business trip.

The one insight I did get from the “I Hate Life” swim workout was that after I started missing my goal times, I just gave up - yes, I’m a lame wimp, I know – and then found myself swimming faster. I realized that I was trying to turn over so fast that I locked out my shoulders, and when I gave up, I went back to my normal, efficient, smooth stroke. The challenge this week was to take that insight and combine the efficient technique with a little power without locking out my shoulders, and it seemed to work. On Tuesday, I did a few 100s in under 1:25/100 meters (long course), which I haven’t done for a while, and on Saturday, I broke out a couple of 50s at around a 1:10/100 yard pace – a pace that I literally haven’t seen in practice in years.

I also ran fast. At times, faster than I was supposed to. On Sunday, I did my last long run before the half marathon coming up this Sunday, and was supposed to go easy - no faster than 9:30 pace. The route was uphill out and downhill back, so I figured a little extra effort on the first mile was appropriate. Then I saw a 9:11 pop up on my Garmin when it lapped for the first mile. Tried to slow down – 9:20. So on and so forth. On the downhill return, I just gave up and ran – it all felt easy anyway. In summary, while trying to do a run at an average pace of 9:30 or slower, I did every single mile faster than 9:30. That adds up, right?

Er…wait, I think I learned something about this, fundamental theorem of calculus or whatever.

Like I keep saying, someday, I will learn how to listen. Today is not that day. But hey, I DID (mostly) listen to the training plan, and here’s how that went.

Monday: 4ish pretty easy miles in the morning with no watch, followed by a 4000 meter swim with a long aerobic set in the middle, where I was creeping towards a 1:35/100 meter pace in that dreaded long course setup.

Tuesday: A 1:10 speed session in the pool in the morning. I used a 2:10/100 meter send off interval to knock out a bunch of 50s and 100s at 1:24-1:28 pace. Can I swim fast again? Is this a fluke?

I added a CXWORX core conditioning class and 10 minutes of upper body cable strength training to the schedule in the evening.

Wednesday: An hour on the bike trainer at an ungodly hour of the morning (read: starting before 5 am), with single leg drills and interval work. Followed by an all-day meeting with electric utility people in DC and an evening flight to yet another meeting in Florida.

Thursday: It turns out that our meeting was in a desolate, suburban wasteland near Tampa, so there was nowhere to run outside. Well, here we go.

At least it was a speedwork morning. I had a 3200 building from race pace to threshold (17:32), a 1600 building from race pace to threshold (8:41) and 4x800 treshold (3:56-3:53-3:54-3:55). It was about 7 miles with the warm up and cool down added in, and with the intensity of some of the threshold work combined with the poor circulation in the hotel workout room, my hair was soaked in sweat by about halfway through the 3200. I was still evidently flushed an hour after finishing, because people in my meeting were asking if I was OK.

Air conditioning, people. It’s necessary, especially around treadmills in Florida.

Friday: Rest day – I’d contemplated going to the pool Thursday night for some extra swim action given this upcoming rest day, but instead I collapsed in my bed and took a nap from 5-7 pm. Tired much? I was still kind of beat Friday and it was nice to sleep in until 6 am (nuclear energy people like to start work – and their meetings – early).

Saturday: A sort of fast swim workout, with some 300s pull down around 1:20/100 yard pace. And some 50s at :36. This is not bad. Followed by 45 minutes of weights and 10 minutes of leg loosening on the elliptical.

Sunday: A 2 hour and 20 minute reverse brick, starting with the way too fast 7 mile run (9:10 pace), and finishing with 20 miles on the bike – both on Beach Drive. The victory here was staying in my aerobars most of the time – even downhill, even on sharp curves, and even on downhill sharp curves. It wasn’t fast, but I don’t care, at least I’m no longer scared of my new bike. Wrapped up with 15 minutes of easy pool running in the afternoon.

Worst part of the week: Nothing bad workout wise, except the inevitable crash on Thursday night, which was more attributable to work overload than training.

Best part of the week: Swimming fast again – finally. Or maybe doing my long run at a good pace, even if it was faster than it should have been. But hey, what’s 20 seconds per mile between friends?

"Race" Recap: Sweetheart Aquatic Triathlon

2012-02-23T09:52:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned Monday, I had RACE last Saturday. Not anything normal – not, say, a 400 meter free at a swim meet or 10k road race. Not even a normal triathlon. No, no, instead, I teamed up with Sharada, who coaches synchronized swimming with me, for some swim-kayak-pool running action.

And we saw Beth there!

She was teaming up with Jon for this race. Oh, the battle was on. We were ready to deliver a butt-kicking. Unfortunately, we were in different heats, so direct competition was tough. But fortunately, Arlington –the organizing jurisdiction – was showcasing their signature level of (dis)organization and there was plenty of time for trash-talking on deck.

Since trusty Coach T was in the area for a run anyway, she dropped by to watch…and cheer! And let me tell you, if you’ve never had a 5’2”(?) ball of energy on deck screaming for you to move faster while you are pool running, you just haven’t lived. As much fun as that was, she was actually there to check out my swimming, and that’s what we started with.

I’ve been frustrated by my (lack of) swim speed recently, and was positive that I’d barely break 7 minutes for the 500 yard swim, but wound up going 6:36. Even more exciting is the fact that Sharada and I basically swam the exact same pace the whole time.

I mean, after all, we ARE synchronized swimming coaches.

Then it was time to kayak, or, practice kayak turning, which is what took up about 90% of our time in the kayak.

Once that was over, it was pool running time – alternatively, time for half the teams to cheat and basically do breaststroke with a float belt on.

Jerks. We didn’t cheat, that’s for sure.

As you can see above, Sharada was a much faster pool runner than me.

But at the end of it all we got third place! The prize was a gift certificate to a local florist.

FYI, I don’t like flowers, but Sharada does, so she got this nice bouquet on her way home.

I got a picture of it. Score.

Overall outcome: fun, a picture of flowers, and a not too terrible 500 yard free time.

February 13-19: Kayaking? And Rest.

2012-02-20T10:03:00.000-08:00

One of the biggest changes that I made when I started working with a coach was the incorporation of rest days into my schedule on a regular basis. And apparently, when my coach says “rest day,” that does not mean “just go swim an easy 3000 meters” or “run but keep it short and easy.” It ACTUALLY means rest. I still complain about this sometimes, but as I’ve moved towards more focused, intense workouts in favor of sheer volume, I find that I’m usually ready for a little bit of rest by the time my weekly rest day arrives – normally on Monday.

However, sometimes, my weekly rest day floats around, based on my work/travel schedule, and the timing of key workouts. I might wind up going, say, nine days, without a rest day.

For example, on Tuesday, I found myself having gone 11 days without a rest day. And I was half dead. It started two Fridays ago, when I had a 2.5 hour block of swimming, running, and lifting that left me a little tired. The next day, I swam. Very slowly. My muscles were rebelling. Sunday was a tough 10 mile run through brutally cold and windy conditions that my body did not appreciate. But oh, Monday, the rest day, it was coming.

Or not. Because of my work travel schedule, I was scheduled for a rest day on Wednesday instead – totally logical but not a welcome fact on Sunday night.

Well. Here we go, then.

Monday: One hour steady spinning on the bike trainer, grimacing about the fact that my legs felt like they were filled with lead the whole time, followed by half an hour of core and upper body lifting at the gym. Painful but necessary dry needling on the glutes (ouch) and hamstrings (!#$^*!*#$) in the evening.

Tuesday: 3600 meters of swimming in the morning that involved fatigued muscles, arms that just wouldn’t turn over, a tight lower back, hamstring twitches, and missing most of my goal times. Followed by five minutes of sitting in the hot tub and contemplating how much I hated my life at the moment before getting out and driving to BWI so that I could fly to San Antonio for work.

Wednesday: The much anticipated rest day. This might be the first time since starting this job that I’ve stayed at a hotel with a fitness center and not gone inside. Instead, I got to talk about maintenance at nuclear power plants with these guys.

Jealous of my job? You’d better be.

Thursday: Having gotten home at a somewhat reasonable hour on Wednesday night, I woke up early to do a fake track workout of 4x2000 meters on the treadmill. Wound up hitting almost 7 miles in a little over an hour because MY LEGS FELT AWESOME. Funny how that rest thing works.

Friday: Easy 70 minute gym session with elliptical, weights, stretching, and foam rolling all thrown in before work, which was a good call because I wound up staying late. Yes, on the Friday before a 3-day weekend. No, I’m not over it yet.

Saturday: Three part workout, starting with an early morning 12 mile run with Mia, where we held a fun 9:28 pace until she split off after mile 10. I had about an hour inside before part two, which gave me enough time to ~~whine to my boyfriend about how much my legs hurt~~ stretch/foam roll and ~~eat M&Ms~~ get in a decent second breakfast of yogurt, fruit, and almonds. Then, it was time for a 90 minute bike along Beach Drive, intended to help me get over my intense fear of my new bike. It kind of worked, and by the end, I was taking some of the sharper downhill curves on my aerobars without slowing down. I’ll get there. Really, I will.

So 3.5 hours of training later, and I’m surely done, right?

Of course not. I had already signed up for the Sweetheart Aquatic Triathlon at Washington & Lee High School in Arlington that afternoon. I teamed up with one of the assistant coaches for the team I coach, and we pulled out third place with our mad kayaking skills.

A “race” report will be coming on Thursday, complete with a blow-by-blow of Jon taking pictures of my ass and my coach cheering for me to go faster while I was aquajogging.

Sunday: More rest! This was also by necessity, since I spent almost 13 hour straight coaching our team to a few medals.

TEN kids won all those medals. TEN. Nice work, laides.

Worst part of the week: I'd prefer to forget Tuesday's swim, thank you very much.
Best part of the week: Either kayaking or coaching. Or maybe holding low 8s/mile pace for the 2000s on Thursday.

Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Energy Balls

2012-02-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

One hallmark of triathlon training is the early morning workout. It’s just math – if you have to fit in a 2 hour workout before work, you’re going to be starting around 5 am. This leads to stories of pre-workout nutrition woe from triathletes everywhere – glycogen stores are partially depleted from overnight, but few can stomach the idea of a full breakfast mere minutes before hopping on the bike for 90-120 minutes.

So what to do?

Listen, you’re talking to the woman who once ate an entire Snickers bar in the middle of an 80 minute lactate threshold set at swim practice and experienced no stomach troubles whatsoever – none. So I may not be the best to speak on this topic, but I can give you a recipe for some energy balls that taste like peanut butter cookie dough.

Even though they taste like cookie dough, they’re made from some nutritionally solid ingredients that will help you during your obscenely early morning workout.

Dates for easy to digest carbohydrates.

Peanut flour for a bit of protein to give you sustained energy.

Peanut flour? Am I nuts? (yuk yuk yuk) No, this stuff is awesome for baking AND upping your protein intake in a serious way, without adding as much fat as plain peanut butter. You can order it here and enjoy the protein-packed goodness anywhere.

Yes, yes, we all need fat…which is why I eat almonds and dark chocolate. If you want to make this with normal peanut butter, just use 1 1/4 cups of it. Your balls will have more fat and less protein but will still be delicious.

Moving right along, there’s one other key thing needed to make these delicious energy balls: a food processor.

Don’t have a food processor? Don’t worry, you can still make these. Here’s how:

Get a food processor. Then gather your ingredients and get to work.

Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Energy Balls (Yields 40)

1 pound dates, pitted

1 ½ cups peanut flour*

1/2 cup water*

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons honey

*Replace peanut flour and water with 1 1/4 cups creamy peanut butter if desired.

Run dates through a food processor until a paste forms. In a separate bowl, mix remaining ingredients until smooth, add to date paste in food processor and process until uniform. Refrigerate 1 hour, then roll into 40 ¾” balls.

Each ball boasts 3 grams of protein, 15 grams of carbohydrates, and half a gram of fat if the peanut flour recipe is used.

And a ton of cookie-dough-like goodness.

February 6-12: Hills. And Hills.

2012-02-13T10:15:00.000-08:00

One common subject of race-related complaints, besides running side-by-side with Mack trucks, is the course elevation profile. In particular, people dislike hills.

You know, hills like this one on Wisconsin Avenue between Davenport Street and Brandywine Street.

Which is just one of about 40+ hills just as steep within a mile of where I live. I have no scheduled running "hill workouts," but it goes without saying that any run starting from my neighborhood includes a hill workout by default. There are hills in every direction. I had to contend with hills during my Monday morning tempo run. I wrestled with the Tenleytown and Massachusetts Avenue hills during my swim-run session on Friday. And then there was Sunday's cold and gusty long run...up and down hilly Connecticut Avenue.

Hills. They follow me. Here's how they factored into my life last week:

Monday: A 50 minute run with a 20 minute tempo section at 9:16 pace, including some serious hill love, in the morning.

Tuesday: 3200 meter swim practice with DCRP masters in the evening, which was, no joke, one third breaststroke. My left hip/”The Situation” did not appreciate that.

Wednesday: An early morning gym session with 20 minutes on the elliptical as a warm up, and 40 minutes of weights for the meat of the workout. Evening mile repeat party at the track, descending from 8:55 to 8:31 for 4x1600 meters.

Thursday: 75 minutes on the trainer, largely in heart rate zone 2 with some spin ups and harder intervals thrown in.

Friday: My blessed bi-weekly day off from work, and an opportunity for my coach to throw 2-3 hours of fun at me. This week, it was an hour of swimming, which included 5x300 yards pull with paddles (e.g. the shoulder killer), followed by an hour of running at my “new easy pace” of 9:35-9:45/mile, which is just a tad faster than my “easy pace” of high 10s earlier this winter.

After conquering that hill up to Brandywine pictured above, it was time to spend half an hour lifting heavy things in a blissfully empty gym.

Granted, even in the morning or evening, the free weight area is inhabited by just me and maybe a dozen dudes giving me funny looks when I pull out the 40 lb dumbbells. But at 11 am? Nobody.

Saturday: A 3700 meter swim workout with DCRP, during which I swam frustratingly slow (struggling to maintain 1:35/100 meters) and tried to ignore my poor, aching shoulders.

Sunday: In theory, a 10 mile run with first 6 miles at my “new easy pace” and the last 4 miles building to goal half marathon pace. In practice, a 10 mile run dedicated to just surviving the single digit wind chill conditions with 30+ mph wind gusts. The overall pace was 9:34/mile, but the headwind was so bad for the last 2.5 miles that I felt like I was pushing a truck. I made the whole experience more tolerable by pretending to be a Viking. It more or less worked. A quick 20 minute pool running session in the afternoon loosened up my legs nicely.

Which is important because the workout schedule for this week beckons.

Worst part of the week: Slow swimming. Dislike.

Best part of the week: Running fast. On hills.

Translating Swimming Training Knowledge Into Better Running Training

2012-02-09T10:14:00.000-08:00

Even though most of my racing these days is run-focused since triathlon season north of, oh, Puerto Rico, doesn’t start until late April, I really only became runner in the past year or so. Sure, I liked to run for cross-training, for fun, and as a productive way to enjoy nice weather, but it was over ten years of that before I entered any races.

Instead, I was a swimmer. I love swimming. I always have. I swam in college. Often twice a day. I swam after college – still almost every day. I think that between the ages of 14 and 30, my hair was wet more often than it was dry. I always smell like chlorine. Always. If I could marry a pool, I would (hello Rick Santorum! How are you today?). But I can’t, so I’ll settle for making friends with people who will do ridiculous swim workouts and open water races with me.

(By “friends,” I mean Beth, not that guy in the background showing ass-crack)

However, I started moving away from swimming many races when I was frustrated by the fact that I wasn’t swimming as fast as I used to. This isn’t surprising, given that I was no longer logging 15,000 yard days in the pool or pushing myself through all-out sprint sets on a regular basis. It was still annoying. So, enter running.

Then, after dealing with minor shin splints and IT band irritation, enter properly-fitted running shoes.

Much better.

For my first few running races, and triathlons, I self-trained based on suggestions I found on the internet. Because, as we all know, everything you read on the internet is well-researched and based on high quality information. These plans noted day-by-day mileage-based workouts for the weeks leading up to a race, but included no other information about the execution of these runs.

Which my brain took to mean “Run x miles as fast as you can without stopping unless absolutely necessary to avoid cars.”

Turns out, this isn’t smart. But why? I mean, obviously any time I was given a distance to swim at a practice, I went all out, and we never took and breaks. Every practice had the same purpose – swim as fast as possible for a given distance and then go home!

Except…not at all. Some days, we did longer continuous swims to build aerobic base. Some days, we did lactate threshold sets where we spent almost as much time resting at the wall as we did swimming. Other days were recovery days, where we swam quite slowly to clear lactic acid out of our muscles, and still other days were workouts with very fast, short sets with a lot of rest to help us with turnover and to allow us to push hard while maintaining our form.

And, because I am not that smart, I never thought to apply such training principles to my running. Instead, for long runs, I went as fast as I could for the prescribed distance, even though it makes no sense to do an all-out, nonstop 10 mile training run when you are preparing yourself to cover 26.2 miles. As a result of all this mono-pace distance, my joints and muscles were starting to rebel, and I finally sought much-needed assistance from the PR Distance Training Program.

Where I was instructed to do slower long runs (kind of like a continuous 1000 at a pace far slower than my mile race pace), faster 800m-2000m runs with 2-3 minutes rest (hmmm…lactate threshold sets, anybody?), and some recovery workouts (sigh…I should know better).

And then, the nagging aches and pains went away, I set seven PRs in three months, and found out that I can actually run much better when I train exactly the way I did when I was in my best swimming shape.

Go figure.

In summary:

Don’t do the same running workout over and over. It’s boring, senseless, and won’t make you (much) faster.
Give each workout a distinct purpose.
Do different types of running workouts each week.
Some of your running workouts should involve appreciable rest intervals.
For the love of God, don’t go all out on your long runs.

January 30-February 5: The Return of Biking(?)

2012-02-06T10:16:00.000-08:00

Last week, I was on my bike FIVE times. That’s a lot more than average these days, as the training plan I’m working with has a swim/run emphasis for January and February. Granted, two of those were 15 minute sessions associated with PT work. But still. That’s a lot of biking for…well, me. Here is an accounting of that biking action, along with some other training.

Monday: A one hour run, in the books before 7 am rolled around. It was not warm outside. Not warm at all. 15 minutes of super easy spinning in the evening per PT’s instructions.

Tuesday: Another 15 minute easy spin in the morning, a 3900 meter swim with DCRP in the evening.

Wednesday: 45 minutes of spinning in heart rate Zone 2, followed by half an hour of core work (7+ minutes of planks and 60+ push ups, owwwww) and stretching. A 5.7 mile track workout with 5x1200 threshold in the evening, hitting 6:20-6:18-6:13-6:11-6:13.

Thursday: My coach had said that in the morning, I’d feel pretty beat up from the double on Wednesday. HA. No, not me, after all, I’m the one who did doubles for YEARS when I was swimming in college.

Someday, I will learn how to listen. Today is not that day.

That morning, I did half an hour on the bike, and wow…my legs did hurt. And then I went and lifted for half an hour. Then I sat in a 6 hour meeting, with my legs protesting every time I stood up (note: not fun when you are on the agenda for two 30-minute presentations). That evening, I did a very easy 1500 yard swim before coaching practice. My legs still hurt. Just like coach said.

Friday: Rest day. Complete with using the foam roller on my poor, aching legs.

Saturday: An accidental monster 3.5 hour run/bike session. Before I get into details, I need to explain something that impacts the mental aspects of this day. See, this is the view from my living room.

Rock Creek Park. Packed with running trails, and featuring Beach Drive, a road mostly closed to traffic from 7 am – 7 pm on weekends. Since it’s right outside my door, it’s a REALLY easy place to go bike or run. This Saturday I started the morning with a 12 mile run, which I was intending to do with the PR Training group, but wound up starting from Pierce Mill and running through Rock Creek Park towards the mall on my own. After finishing that bad boy with an average pace of 9:41, I chatted with coach a bit about the planned bike for the next day, and she said that the point was to get bike handling experience, so if I was worried about Sunday weather, I should go out Saturday afternoon.

Once home, I saw snow forecast for early Sunday morning, and figured I’d just go do the 1.5 hour bike out on Beach Drive, with its rolling hills and periodic sharp curves. Then, it rained on me about halfway through. Since it was in the low 40s, I was pretty cold by the time I got back, so I put on three sweatshirts, two pair of pants, crawled under three blankets, and whined to my boyfriend about how I wanted to eat straight up melted chocolate after 3.5 hours of training outdoors on the same 10 mile stretch of Rock Creek Park on one day in early February. It's long time to spend in the same place, and I was COLD.

Oh, and by the way, it never snowed on Sunday. Nice.

Sunday: The prescribed bike out of the way, and some warmth returned to my body, and I was off to the pool in the morning for a super easy 3100 yard swim. In the evening, upper body lifting and a half hour core conditioning class at the gym, which I figured only weird people would be at, given the Super Bowl. I was right: I saw my swimmer friend Anna at class. And then beat the crap out of my obliques and hips.

Worst part of the week: Rescheduling that bike to avoid precipitation that never happened, and getting rained on in the process. Stupid.

Best part of the week: A solid 12-mile run, right in the middle of the goal pace range that coach had outlined, which is making the prospect of a solid half marathon in four weeks seem like a good possibility.

Coaching: Goal Definition and Achievement

2012-02-02T10:52:00.000-08:00

Many people, when they hear that I work with a triathlon/running coach, assume that I am some kind of fierce, elite athlete. No, no, not exactly. A 4:30 marathon is not elite, to say the least. So this raises the question: why have a coach, if I’m just in this for my own satisfaction and enjoyment? Why not train myself?

This question is especially interesting to me, since one thing that I do when I’m not making chocolate treats, working on nuclear things, or training for that little race in August, is coach synchronized swimming.

(Honestly)

Given that background, I have many, many answers to this question, but today, I’m going to focus on just one: A coach can, and should, provide an outside evaluation and perspective, allowing the athlete to set and work towards appropriate goals, which will ultimately help you enjoy your training and competitions even more.

Take those athletes in the picture up there. They won the 2011 Junior South Zone Team title – an event that was open to 13-18 year old swimmers from across the southeastern U.S. (Texas to Florida to Maryland and everywhere in between). It was something that our coaching staff told them over and over was a possibility. It was something they doubted several times. It was a reach, but having it in sight made them work and ultimately made it happen.

Now that sounds easy, right? Just tell somebody they can do something, and they’ll make it happen.

Not exactly. As I noted above, the coach has to help the athlete set appropriate goals. If we’d gone and said “You can win Junior Nationals this year,” they would have known it wasn’t possible and would have given up immediately. Conversely, if we’d said “You can get 3rd place at Junior Zones,” it wouldn’t have been enough of a reach, and wouldn’t have pushed them to work towards their potential. The athletes can’t really do this alone, since they lack outside perspective and an ability to assess objectively.

And in this respect, I’m no different from the teenage swimmers I coach – it’s hard for me to assess my current fitness level, training performance, and talent level and develop realistic but challenging goals. This became very evident to me at our track workout last Wednesday, when 8 800s were on tap. I had a concept of how fast my threshold and aerobic capacity 800s were based on previous track workouts. For reference, here are some times:

9/14: 3x800: 4:41-4:35-4:32 (workout: 3200-1600-3x800)

10/26: 1x800: 4:10 (workout: 1600-1200-800-400)

12/21: 5x800: 4:17-4:15-4:13-4:16-4:10 (workout: 5x800)

1/4: 4x800: 4:25-4:18-4:21-4:25 (workout: 4x400-(recover)-800)

1/18: 2x800: 4:00/4:01 (workout: 1600-2x800)

So when I went a 4:03 on the first one, I was pleased, even though it seemed just a bit fast. Then, the following conversation took place:

Coach: What was your time?

Me: 4:03

Coach: Pretty good. Try to get down to sub-4 by the end

Hm. The first one didn’t exactly feel easy, but it wasn’t that far above 4:00. So, if I let up on a couple, I can re-start a descent down to sub-4 by the end.

800 #2: Ah, OK, a nice steady pace. Now I’ll have something to drop down from.

3:57 (crap)

800 #3: Alright, now I’m stuck doing all of these sub-4. But there’s enough rest that I can eek out 3:59s for most of them.

3:56 (what?)

800 #4: This hurts more than a little bit. Sub 4 for 8 800s is ridiculous.

3:54 (&^%*&!)

800 #5: This hurts, but obviously I don’t need to push that hard to go sub-4. Thanks, coach, for believing in me!

3:59 (Oops. Slacker)

800 #6: This would be a ridiculous point to stop gunning for sub-4s. Obviously my coach knows what she’s talking about, so just run and push through.

3:55 (There we go)

800 #7: Only two more to go. I WILL go all sub-4. I WILL.

3:57 (Yesssssss)

800 #8: Go go go just finish it fast. Nothing to go after this. 1:57 at the 400! I’m on this!

4:00.08 (SERIOUSLY???)

So was it a failure? I suppose in a way, since I wasn’t sub-4 at the end. But that was a LOT of sub-4 work in there, so ultimately, my coach pushed me to go faster by suggesting that I could, but didn’t suggest I go for some ridiculous time I’d not even bother to try for.

Cool, isn’t it?

I mentioned this in my weekly training summary email to her on Monday, and her reply was:

“Yes, your track workouts HAVE gotten a lot better. Now we need to translate that to pace goals for your weekend long runs, which I’ve noted in your training schedule this week.”

Yeah. About that goal setting thing…I guess it’s never over, you can always get better.

Not a bad thing, of course. Which is why everybody can benefit from coaching if you understand the role they can play in shaping (and subsequently achieving) you goals.

January 23-29: Double-Digit Training At Last

2012-01-30T10:46:00.000-08:00

Oh exciting day! Last week, I finally cracked double digit hours for training. 10:25 for the week, to be exact. I’m pretty sure this week will surpass that mark, too. Here’s how everything went.

Monday: A nearly 2 hour running/strength training/stretching session with everything broken up all over the place in the morning. It wasn’t killer, and it was certainly fun to run 3 miles, go lift heavy things, and then run 2 miles on the treadmill pushing it as fast as possible at the end. Fifteen minutes easy on the bike trainer in the evening per the PT’s instructions

Tuesday: Another 15 minute easy spin on the trainer first thing in the morning per PT’s orders. DCRP masters practice in the evening to log 3300 meters in the pool.

Wednesday: A 6.2 mile evening track workout that was quite fast for me, with 8x800 holding an average time of 3:58. More discussion on this coming in Thursday’s post.

Thursday: Started the day with a 1 hour zone 2 bike trainer session. Added on 30 minutes of medicine ball/core work.

Friday: The coach I work with knows that I have every other Friday off work, and usually uses this to give me some extra training fun. I just about squealed with glee when I saw a 2:30 session, starting with a 7 mile run and finishing with whatever biking time I needed to reach 2:30. The weather looked like it would turn beautiful around 11 am, and I was excited for this.

Then, Thursday afternoon, I was informed that rather than having the day off work, I would be meeting with super-important government person who had asked to meet with me specifically. So…time to plan for a 5 am start, including laying everything out the night before.

(Obsessive? No, of course not)

Since I would now be relegated to the trainer in the pre-dawn hours, my coach kindly sent a 1:30 trainer workout to give me something besides Good Morning America to keep me occupied. This workout included 3x(5 min hard gear/low cadence-3 min easy gear/high cadence-5 min moderate gear/moderate cadence-2 min spin easy). Using a hard gear and low cadence is…well…hard. My legs were totally toasted by a little bit after 8 am.

Saturday: 30 minute CXWORX class, which focuses on core/glute/hip strength, 15 minutes of upper body lifting, and 4300 meters of swimming. I could so feel the past four days by the time I got to the swim, and completely missed my goal HIM pace on some 300s. Now perhaps 20 seconds wasn’t enough rest after each 300 for holding that pace, and I was only about 10 seconds off (4:40 instead of 4:30 in long course meters), but I was still disappointed. And tired. Really tired.

Sunday: Rest day. And perhaps the first rest day that I’ve completely relished.

Worst part of the week: A complete rearrangement of Friday’s training session, which should have been awesome, but would up being incredibly tiring because of a last-minute meeting. That said, this meeting was exceptionally informative and I wouldn’t have missed it for anything, even biking on a mild, sunny day in January.

Best part of the week: Beating my own expectations for 800 pace at Wednesday’s track workout. By a lot.

Addressing "The Situation"

2012-01-26T07:20:00.000-08:00

***First, if you are here because you saw me on The Washingtonian's story on tri blogs by women in DC, welcome! Be sure to look at a few of my posts and I hope you visit regularly.***

As I mentioned last week, I have this thing going on with my hip, which is not an injury, so I have called it "The Situation." And of course, since the pain originates from the gluteal region, several obnoxious comments ensued. Rachel asked if I would be flashing "The Situation" around in bars. Jim noted that he would like to see more of "The Situation" himself.

Some people might get irritated by that. I've decided to roll with it and keep writing about this, but this time, I'll make sure that I don't prompt obnoxious comments about "The Situation."

Back to "The Situation" itself. For many problematic muscles, manual trigger point therapy, which is a fancy way of saying "very hard, very focused massage," is a good solution to getting things working again. However, that's not always an easy option - for example, if the problematic muscle is buried under other large muscles. In my case, "The Situation" largely stems from the left piriformis, which lies deep under the gluteus maximus.

(source)

As you can see, that's a lot of muscle to work through to get to that piriformis.

Drats.

But wait! My trusty physical therapist has a solution: dry needling, which involves inserting thin, flexible needles into the skin and through muscle tissue to reach trigger points, or muscle knots. This way, he can get to those miserable parts of my piriformis (and gluteus medius, as necessary) and start banishing those nasty knots that are making my sciatic nerve unhappy.

Doesn't that sound GREAT?

No, no, I meant having the treatment DONE, not poking me with sharp objects.

Hmph. So much for not prompting obnoxious comments.

January 15-22: What Ice Means for Training

2012-01-23T11:37:00.000-08:00

Another not-too-notable week of early season training. Except for the impact of the weather.

As many DC-area runners and triathletes have lamented, training outdoors this weekend was rough. Weekends are usually the best time for long bike rides and long runs, since it’s difficult to find a large enough block of time during the week. This little ice incident made biking impossible on Saturday and ill-advised on Sunday, and made running treacherous on Saturday and annoying on Sunday, as running on slippery surfaces kills your calves.

So how did it all go?

Monday: Mandated rest day.

Tuesday: 1 hour of stretching and lifting, focusing on glutes/core/upper body in the morning, frustrating and disjointed 4000 meter workout with DCRP Master’s team in the evening.

Wednesday: 5 mile track workout in the evening, with 1x1600 and 2x800 at lactate threshold and fast 400s at the end.

Thursday: 3700 meter swim in the morning, including a 5x400 meter set trying to maintain half-ironman goal pace with 5-10 seconds rest between 400s (mission close to accomplished). Dry needling treatment in the mid morning.

Friday: Technically a rest day (AGAIN?), but the PT ordered 20 minutes of super easy spinning in the morning to facilitate dry needling recovery.

Saturday: 90 minutes of biking in upper zone 2 on the trainer. No breaks, no intervals. It would have bored me like crazy, but I had company from my very kind significant other.

He kindly sat there and pedaled away, watching a movie and not complaining when I interrupted to whine about how hard it is to keep my heart rate in a narrow little range.

Sunday: Early morning 10 mile long run on Beach Drive at just under 9:50 pace, slowing down often to avoid wiping out on icy patches. 10 minutes of very easy spinning on the bike trainer to loosen the legs at night.

Worst part of the week: TWO &)*%!& rest days.

Best part of the week: Hanging out on the trainer, away from the ice, with the exceptionally supportive significant other not mocking my Nuun addiction (often).

It's Not an Injury. It's a Situation.

2012-01-19T10:47:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in Monday's post that I went to a physical therapist for evaluation of some hip and sciatic nerve pain last week. Of course, anybody and everybody I told about this immediately freaked out about my "debilitating injury." Example: the conversation I had with the very caring and concerned significant other who consulted with his M.D. dad.

"My dad said that this kind of pain could be due to some pretty nasty stuff."

"The PT poked around my vertebrae, and given the lack of pain there, it's highly unlikely that the issue originates in the spine."

"My dad also said it could be a fracture in your pelvis. DOESN'T THAT SOUND BAD? YOU NEED TO GET THIS FIXED RIGHT AWAY BECAUSE OTHERWISE YOUR HIPS WILL COLLAPSE AND BREAK AND YOU WILL BE UNABLE TO MOVE FOR MONTHS."

"Honestly, everything indicates that the issue is muscular and there's no reason to be concerned about broken bones."

"He told me that's probably the case if the pain goes away when you stand up, but YOU NEED AN X-RAY OR YOU WILL DIE."

"It goes away when I stand up. Every time."

"Oh. Carry on, then. Did you want me to use beef or chicken when I make stir fry tonight?"

Which is why I am calling the source of this pain a situation rather than an injury. An osteopath diagnosed me with minor piriformis syndrome on my left side several years ago, which answered the age old question of "why is my ass twitching?" I've kept it under control with some self-administered trigger point work and good strength training, but over the past few weeks, I've started having some pain shooting down the back of my left leg. It's likely that it's due to sciatic nerve issues; if you look at the picture below, you'll see why a tight/spasming piriformis could irritate your sciatic nerve.

(source)

Yes. That red muscle (piriformis) and yellow nerve (sciatic nerve) are not friends. But addressing the piriformis problem, along with any other muscular issues exacerbating that situation, should clear it up. And in the meantime, I really have no restrictions on my training, save some short-term (<24 hour) running restrictions following specific PT work.

Which is why this is a situation and not an injury.

P.S. I went for beef stir fry.

January 9-14: More Low Volume Training

2012-01-16T09:11:00.000-08:00

Last week, I whined about how I feel just short of double-digit training hours for the week and how that was lame. This week, I didn't even crack 9 hours. But even though I feel kind of like a slug, I understand why it’s a little subdued right now. August 26 is a long way away, and I don’t need to be killing myself quite yet. That can wait until March or so.

Even though it feels like I didn’t do much, I did do a little swimming, biking, and running. Here goes:

Monday: Rest day. Evening workout of walking to and from Cleveland Park for dinner.

Tuesday: 3500 meter workout with some short rest 200s in 1:10 early in the morning before jumping on a plane to Palm Beach for work. Tuna eating workout in the evening.

Wednesday: 5.2 mile tempo run in 55 minutes with 9:47 tempo pace, which was slower than this week’s long run. Logical. It was super fun doing this at 5:30 am looping around a generic-looking office park. 20 minutes of half-assed weightlifting following the run. Stir-fry eating workout in the evening.

Thursday: Extremely early swim practice with a master’s team in Palm Beach, 3200 meters in 1 hour. I managed to haul one of my colleagues from the meeting along with me, even though it involved waking up before 5 am.

Friday: Long before sunrise, a 90 minute trainer ride (22.5 miles, whatever) with a 5 minute zone 3-4 effort every 15 minutes to prevent total boredom. Immediately followed by a 30 minute lifting session, focused on gluteal and core strength, with some functional training work thrown in. 15 minutes of mandated stretching following that.

**After Friday’s workout, I went and had my left hip evaluated by a PT because my piriformis and hamstring pain has been getting more frequent, and I’ve started having nearly unbearable sciatic nerve pain running all down my leg when sitting for extended periods. Good news is that I have minimal activity restrictions, and I got some dry needling work done to relieve the overactive trigger points all over my hip. I did have to rearrange my workout schedule, because I’m not supposed to run for at least 24 hours after dry needling, but this was no big deal compared to what some people deal with in PT.

Saturday: 3700 meter morning swim in 1:15, including time trials in the 400m-200m-100m. The 200 and 100 were below 1:30/100 meter pace, the 400 was a little above it. Boo.

Sunday: 9.3 mile morning “long run” (everything seems short after marathon training) in 1:30:31 (9:43 pace). It was cold when we started, and still cold when we finished.

THAT was temperature reading after we were done running. Obviously, I needed to spend 20 minutes doing a 1100 yard recovery swim in the evening to enjoy cold water, too.

Worst part of the week: A tempo run so poorly executed that it was slower than my long run for the week. I blame Florida (for the poor tempo run, and other things, including our last president).

Best part of the week: Pulling off a nearly 2.5 hour workout on Friday without crushing fatigue.

2012 Race Schedule

2012-01-12T14:00:00.000-08:00

Since I managed to already get in one race in 2012, I suppose it’s time to lay out that 2012 race schedule. Almost all of these races will be a bit longer than that 5k on New Years Day. Which means I should probably…train? Nah.

1/1/2012: New Year’s Day 5k (Reston, VA)

**2/18/2012: By George 10k (Washington, DC)

3/4/2012: B&A Trail Half Marathon (Severna Park, MD) (Note: NOT a trail race. It’s on a paved bike trail.)

4/21/2012: TryCharleston Half Iron Distance Triathlon (Mt. Pleasant, SC)

5/20/2012: Columbia Olympic Distance Triathlon (Columbia, MD)

**5/26-27/2012: Jim McDonnell 5k/2 mile/1 mile lake swims (Reston, VA)

6/10/2012: Eagleman Aquavelo (1.2 mile swim-56 mile bike-no run) (Cambridge, MD)

**7/21/2012: Crystal City Twilighter 5k (Arlington, VA)

8/26/2012: Ironman Louisville (Louisville, KY)

**10/21/2012: Detroit Marathon (Detroit, MI)

**Tentative

January 2-8: Single Digit Training Volume Week

2012-01-09T09:51:00.000-08:00

I guess the title tells you that my training was a little lame this week, since I didn't hit 10 hours. Whatever. It was 9.87 (yes, really) and I give myself credit for not going and randomly doing an extra eight minutes on the bike trainer last night for no good reason.

The most notable thing this week involved some action on my new bike, which is scary. Guys, it has aerobars and no drops. Scary.

So here is how the week went down, complete with a bit of action on those carefully-fitted aerobars:

Monday: 40 minutes of upper body/core focus lifting in the morning, and in the afternoon, 6.5 miles of scary, windy biking on Hains Point, which included banging up my inner thigh with my new bike when the wind hit me the wrong way while I was unclipping. One hour and five minutes on the bike trainer after that, which included 5x(5 min hard-3 min recovery) for a total of 22.5 miles of biking.

Tuesday: Rest day. Laundry workout in the evening.

Wednesday: Evening track workout - 4x(800 threshold-400 recovery-400 fast). Total of 5.8 miles in 55 minutes.

Thursday: Morning aerobic focus swim of 3200 meters in one hour.

Friday: Morning 6.1 mile run commute in one hour. Beautiful sunrise on Connecticut Ave and along the mall.

Saturday: 40 mile bike on Beach Drive in 2:39 in the late morning/early afternoon. I did not crash my bike and got a little more comfortable on the aerobars, but was uneasy with all the crowds out there.

Sunday: Morning extravaganza of 5 mile run (47 minutes) immediately followed by a 2600 yard swim (40 minutes), immediately followed by a 40 minute weight lifting session. The instructions for the lifting were to "kill my legs." Done.

Worst part of the week: Bruising up my inner thigh like crazy while clipping out at Hains Point. Seriously? Lame.

Best part of the week: Keeping a 9:30 pace on Sunday's run despite the ridiculous hills all over upper NW.

New Year's Day 5k: What Maximum Heart Rate?

2012-01-05T10:18:00.000-08:00

I think most people go out on New Year's Eve, drink a lot, and wake up with a headache sometime in the afternoon on January 1.

Boring. Why not go swim over six miles mid-day, find somebody to cook you dinner, and then collapse before 10 pm so that you can run a 5k the next day?

Sounds like a plan to me. Which is why I entered myself and the about-to-age-up significant other in Potomac River Running's New Year's Day 5k 2012.

Well, that, and my official 5k PR as of 12/31/11 needed to go down. It was 29:10, yet my 10k PR is 54, I can do a 58 10k at the end of a (hot) Olympic-distance triathlon, and the last 5k of a half marathon I did in October was in the low 28s.

Yeah, so, um, that PR wasn't really indicative of what I could do. So when the race started, I went out. Fast. Note the heart rate graph.

Nothing like hitting 90% of your maximum heart rate 0.2 miles into a 3.1 mile race and not falling below that point the entire race. Well, maybe hitting 101% of your maximum heart rate, as noted above, is pretty cool.

(Yes, I know that a maximum heart rate calculated solely based on your age is not accurate. Let me feel badass anyway, OK?)

Now, while I didn't totally die, I did positive split (7:46-8:03-8:16 and then 7:44 pace for the end). However, there was a downhill in mile 1 and and uphill in mile 3. So I give that positive split a big whatever and embrace my new PR of 25:18.

Even though I'm a little irritated that it wasn't sub-25. Damnit.

Fortunately, there was hot chocolate after the race to make everything better.
Everything.

Swim In The New Year: 10,060 Meters for No Good Reason

2012-01-03T12:37:00.000-08:00

The Terrapin Masters swim team holds a really cool even every New Year's Eve - Swim in the New Year! Since we were welcoming in 2012, this year's event was advertised as offering five options: swimming 1x2012 yards, 2x2012 yards, 3x2012 yards, 4x2012 yards, or 5x2012 yards.

I was so in for 5x2012 yards. And then the pool was set up like this.

LONG COURSE METERS. Just so you know, a meter is 10% longer than a yard. This isn't a big deal for, say, 1000 yards/meters. But for 10,060? Yeah. That's an extra 2/3 of a mile.

Now, in addition to the pool configuration, you'll notice that this pool at the University of Maryland is quite nice. And even with this very nice facility, the university is planning on cutting men's and women's swimming and diving after this season.

Stupid. Isn't it? Especially when you see their record of ACC conference titles.
Yeah. Not awesome. Go read more about this idiotic move. And THEN read about how I did 5x2012 meters:

Round 1: 2000 swim, every 8th 50 drill

Round 2: 4x500 @8:45, #1&3 w/paddles

Round 3: 5x(4x100: 75 moderate/25 fast-50 moderate/25 fast/25 moderate-25 moderate/25 fast/50 moderate-25 fast/75 moderate @1:45) <---this one hurt

Round 4: 4x(200 kick-300 swim) <---Angry shoulders demanded kicking

Round 5: 2000 swim <---Just finish already
[Edit: Plus a 6 meter swim out and back at the end of each round to make it 2012 meters. I managed to neglect copying this from my training log when I transferred the notes over here. Obviously I suck. Thanks for pointing that out.]

It's worth noting that I'd have dumped that last one if I hadn't publicly declared on the DC Tri Forum that I'd be doing all 5. Especially since many of the folks who read that declaration were there to see it.

Thanks for the support/enabling, folks. And I'll see everybody at the pool for a shorter swim soon.

The Obligatory Triathlon Blog

2011-12-27T12:51:00.000-08:00

A good way to get your fellow runners/swimmers/triathletes to read your blog is to write about food. Chocolate and chocolate-based baked goods in particular.

But the hazard of this is that eventually, after you read all about their training and racing, they get angry that you don’t share yourself. So fine: behold, my obligatory triathlon blog.

Since it’s obligatory, don’t expect me to include anything useful or interesting. My training is pretty boring. I swim (too much). I bike (not hard enough). I run (really slowly). Sometimes I lift. I rarely stretch. Nothing interesting happens when I race.

But go ahead and read anyway.

Snarky comments are most welcome.

Once upon a time, there was a bike

2011-12-19T11:35:00.000-08:00

If I'm going to bike thousands upon thousands of miles prepping for some little race on my 32nd birthday, I should look cool doing it, right? Enter the electric blue Felt B2.