Easy Recovery Run - lots of boats around

Another good night's sleep - getting back to normality.

Easy 0:30 recovery run this morning, easing me gently into a more intense weekend of training.

Body still not 100% but a pleasant enough run along the seafront. Lots of boats out this morning.

Tomorrow I am back in the pool, which I expect to be a little tougher as I missed the main Club session on Wednesday. Then it is in the saddle for 4 hours. Sunday - long run, which for a strange reason, I am looking forward to.

This time next month - I will be there! A mix of fear and excitment!

Feeling a little better - zoom along the seafront

The nasty 'Man Flu' was still with me on Wednesday morning, however I managed to complete my interval run session as instructed. By the late afternoon I had little energy and with the prospect of a 1:30 Club Swim ahead I decided that it was best to give it a miss and try and get an early night.

After a slightly better night when I managed to get nearly 7 hours sleep I certainly felt a little better this morning. The proposed session for today was a tempo session in aero position. There was however a complication in that I had to drop my wife's car off at Peacehaven. To make best use of the training time I had available today I threw my bike in the back of the car and got in my ride around the coast roads around Brighton and Peacehaven. I was surprised how both hilly and busy the route was so headed for the undercliff pass that runs from Saltdean to Brighton via the Marina - not that long but very quiet and flat, albeit a little bumpy in places. What I do love is cycling so close to the sea - something quite calming - I almost forgot I was supposed to be doing a relatively hard session. Still somewhat in recovery mode I didn't push it too much .

I came out of a client meeting at 5pm only to find a message from the garage where I left the car that it was ready and needed to be collected before they closed at 5:30pm. After a quick change, powered down the computer, tidy desk etc. and on my bike the watch said 5:20pm. I didn't have my Garmin with me but I knew I had a good 8-10km ride to complete in 10mins, which even if I hit the flat undercliff pass again I still had one significant hill climb - Mission Impossible!

Well I might not have completed the distance in 10mins (probably nearer 15 mins) but I did zoom and must have averaged 40kmph, including a hill climb and a bit of traffic getting out of the centre of Brighton.

Not bad for an old boy like me with the latter stages of the dreaded 'Man Flu':

Exciting day - got tickets for the Men's Olympic Cycling Road Race event

At exactly 11am this morning myself and two other colleagues tried our very best to get hold of some Olympic tickets for the Men's Cycling Road Race on July 28th at Box Hill - I understand the riders have to complete 9 loops of Zig-Zag lane (Box Hill) as part of a much larger loop from London through Surrey.

It all started well with the website registering my request quite early and asking for payment details. However, my work colleagues had already got to this point and were kicked out - was I going to be lucky - No!

We persevered - keeping one eye on the stock market and the other on the countdown for another chance to register for the golden tickets, which had just been released. After 3 failed attempts I wasn't feeling very hopeful but suddenly one of the guys struck lucky and had his ticket purchase confirmed. That was followed by another - only me to succeed now.

Finally my perseverance paid off and I secured 2 tickets - very exciting!

I didn't realise but that weekend around Box Hill is going to be a 'Bike Mecca' - there are a number of festivals being laid on for the thousands of cyclists expected to descend on Dorking and the Box Hill area.

Full details can be found at the following link:

http://www.surreyhillsroadracefestival.com/

I believe the festival is open to all whether you have tickets for Zig-Zag lane or not.

It all worked out quite nicely because I could offer the other ticket to my training buddy, Chris (featured in my recent post) as it will be his 50th birthday that same week.

It is also something to look forward to post IM Austria and may help with any IM blues we may be having. Of course we plan to cycle to the event - any excuse to get back on those bikes!

What I am up to for the rest of the week

After the 'Big Bike' week Coach MT has this one down as a 'Normal' week. Details as follows:

Mon: 1:00 Swim (strength based - main set 4x 600m with paddles and pull-buoy) - DONE
Tue: 1:15 Bike - Aero strength ride - DONE (part of commute - actually got 2:00 in the saddle)
Tue: 0:40 Strength exercises at home (squats, lunges, etc.)
Wed: 0:50 Run - main set of 20x 30sec strides
Wed: 1:30 Club Swim
Thu: 1:30 Bike - tempo session in aero position
Fri: 0:30 Optional Run + 0:30 Strength exercises

Then would you believe it is a 'Triathlon' weekend (anyone would think I was doing an Ironman!):

Sat: 1:00 Club Swim
Sat: 4:00 Bike incl. 3hr tempo test
Sun: 2:15 Run trying to negative split (do 2nd half faster than 1st)
Sun: 0:45 Swim - open-water - get in the lake!

In total 15:50 - keeping the momentum going.

I also have next week's schedule already in the diary but will leave that to a future post - all I will give away is that one session is 10 hours and Coach MT ends with the following comments:

'Finish with recovery strategies and then thank the family for being away all day!'

Need to take better care of myself

I need to take better care of myself...

Still trying to get rid of this awful flu - the worst part is the coughing in the evening and during the night, which is playing havoc with my sleeping. I am simply not getting enough hours - normally 6 hours is fine for me but more recently it has been more like 4-5 hours. In hindsight I supposed it would have been better to stop all training for a couple of days, dose up and try to get rid of the flu symptoms quickly.

I opted to train through it in hope that the odd Lemsip or two would do the trick - well it hasn't.

On top of the flu I stupidly did not apply enough sun tan lotion on my back when I ventured out in the tri suit at the weekend. I was warned! Thought I would be OK - another schoolboy error!

So now that is also effecting my sleep, waking me up if I turn over in the night onto the 'red bits'.

Oh well, these things happen - could be a lot worse.

Actually thinking about that point, Matt Ryley from the Club (featured in an earlier post), after breaking his neck in 2 places is now back in training and may even attempt some or all of the Ironman event in July - simply amazing - respect!

I suppose my dose of 'man flu', a bit of sunburn and a few lost hours on the pillow doesn't sound too bad after all.

Dress Rehearsal - 160km in the saddle

Been a bit of an epic weekend.

Friday night - tough Zone 3 session on the turbo in the 'Cave of Pain' - sweating buckets!
Saturday - Club swim (open-water skills + 1,500m test) + 1:30 easy ride
Sunday - 5:30 cycle on tri bikes + 20 mins transition run + 1,500m lake swim

The total for the week was over 17 hours - I think that is my record. The training is getting much more specific now with instructions from Coach MT to use the same bikes, clothes, tri kit, and nutrition that we are going to use on the day.

This morning started at 7:30am when I met my old training buddy and neighbour (Chris - pictured above) who had worked out a route for a 5 hour bike session. We headed down to the coast past Bognor Regis and stopped after 2:30 at Chichester Marina (where these pictures were taken). Thereafter it was back via Arundel, Worthing and then home.

After just over 5 hours and 1-2 km from home, Chris informed me that we were 10 miles off of 100 miles so we kept on going to reach the magic number. In total 5:26 and 160km (101 miles in the bank) - not far off an Ironman bike distance.

It was great cycling with Chris - I would have hated to do that bike session on my own. He is getting very strong in his overall training and preparation. While I can now quite comfortably hold 30-35km per hour in the aero position for some length of time, Chris can push it 10%+ higher than that. He is off on a training camp with the Coach in a fortnight's time so I expect him to be even fitter on his return, just in time for the taper and IM Austria to follow.

For those interested in the route and stats here is a link to Training Peaks:

http://www.trainingpeaks.com/sw/NM7FNYUNB4CR3F5JT2IAGTWHAI

Another couple more heavy weeks await - more on that in my next post.

Less than 40 days - the week ahead

With less than 40 days to go to the big day I expect some serious training sessions ahead before the taper period.

Not a good start as still sufferring a little from a sore throat and bit of a cold but fortunately I feel better today than yesterday.

So after a day of rest I was back in the saddle today with a Zone 2/3 TT ride to work and return later this afternoon. If I am feeling up to it there is also the long club swim tonight (1:30).

In terms of the rest of the week:

Thu - 1:00 run at IM pace or quicker (min 10K in distance with warm-up / cool-down)
Fri - 1:00 Bike interval session + 0:40 strength
Sat - 1:00 Club Swim + 1:30 easy bike technique / skill focus
Sun - 5:00 Hilly ride + 0:20 transition run

So with my charity bike ride and this week's sessions the focus is very much on the bike. I expect that means running next week!