• Tuesday: Lazy day off
• Wednesday: 5k Race - 18:56 (official)
• Thursday
  • AM: 3k swim
  • PM: 1 hour bike w/ 2×12 minutes @ FTP
• Friday
  • AM: 2.5k swim
  • PM: 8.5 mile run w/ 3×1.5 miles @ 10k pace
• Saturday
  • Brick: 1 hour bike (2×12 min @ FTP) + 30 minute run
• Sunday
  • 1 hour bike (3×12 min @ FTP)

It was a tough couple of days, but rewarding.

This week is similar, but tougher, if you have the EN out season advanced bike plan, week #4.

Things are going well.  The last 3 months or so has been an interesting stretch of training.  Lots of false starts, zero’s, sleeping in and the like.  It’s probably been the longest period of low fitness activity since  the 4×100 freestyle relay at conference my senior year of college.

To top it off, I have been horrendously bad about working out my training plan for next year, logging the training I have done, yada yada yada.

It’s January now, and like it or not, it’s time to put up or shut up.  Fortunately, my body seems up to the task - I did the 5k Run into the New Year a couple of days ago, and rolled across the finish line in 18:58.  Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised to be only 17 seconds slower than last year.  The first 2 miles went really well, I just ran out of steam towards the end.  Ran into a lot of folks I knew at the race: Pete Metz, Chris Wichert, Matt, John Lancaster - a good time was had by all I think.

I took some time over New Years to put some serious thought in what I need to do to get back rolling, and be prepared for the next season of triathlons, but more importantly stop the backwards slide into lethargy - hopefully that will finall pay off, and I’ll get rolling in the right direction.

Important things from the plan: next FTP test goal is 275 watts (next week), 5k TT was 18:59  (2 weeks).  Since I met the 5k TT goal, I’ll have to adjust it, say 18:15.

Tonight’s workout is going to suck: ~60 minute run with 3×1.5 miles @  Daniels T Pace with a 4 minute recovery.  I don’t think I’m going to enjoy that much.

In other news my big excuse for not training is complete - the basement is done.  Here are some pictures!

I’m hitting December as a fresh start and with a new attitude (I hope!)  I’m thinking about restarting the Endurance Nation plan 2 weeks from today - going to give myself a little bit of time to just establish a regular routine, then work on building the strength.

The last 5 days or so have seen the best stretch of training I’ve had since IMWI.  To top it off, I got up for the first morning of swimming today since September.

The plan for this week:

• Monday: Off, needed to sleep in after a stressful day of travel
• Tuesday
  • AM: Swim
  • PM: Short Bike + Run
• Wednesday
  • AM: Run
  • PM: Bike
• Thursday
  • Repeat Tuesday
• Friday
  • Repeat Wednesday, but reverse
• Saturday
  • Either a Swim + Bike, or a swim + 5k Race
• Sunday
  • AM Run

If I get bag about 10 hours this week I will be happy, I’ll look to add a few more on top of that next week.

The week after I’ll retest the bike and 5k - and probably throw in a 1,000m or 1,500m swim for good measure.

Thanksgiving is here, and that means Turkey Trots are set to happen all over the country.  I patronize one in Kenosha, WI.  This year will be the 4th time I’ll be doing it.  I enjoy the race because it’s a fun course, it’s a good opportunity to trash talk with my brother-in-law, it justifies overeating at Thanksgiving dinner, but I don’t particularly enjoy it because I run SLOW.  I’m talking 3-4 minutes slowly then my run split at Pleasant Prairie.

Why is this important, why should the general public know this?  I’ll tell you!

A couple of weeks ago there was a thread on slowtwitch where the merits of peaking versus always being fit were briefly discussed.  The thread died a lot quicker then I expected, the two approaches are vastly different and have their merits.  Paulo also brushed on this topic briefly back in April.

To save you a bit of background reading, a brief summary of what I like to call the performance Paradox is this: You can choose to be exceptionally fast once in a while, or you can choose to be fast all of the while - relative to yourself.  As a bit of background, when I use the word fast - I’m not talking fast, I’m talking soul shattering, Destroyer of Worlds fast.

Everyone has a different approach and belief when it comes to this paradox, and everyone probably thinks their approach is the best, here’s mine:

It is very hard (mentally, physically, emotionally) to go fast.  Back in my college days, I would be wiped out by a day of racing that consisted of less then 3 minutes of work.  Imagine what going full-throttle for one (or more hours) does to you as well as the impact it has on your ability to train.

I believe there are a few keys to going fast on race day

• Consistent training - intensity, frequency, volume, and rest applied judiciously across a long period of time.  The use of the term judiciously  is key in the construction of your training paradigm.  To much of any one of those four pieces of training will result in a weak structure - which will prevent you from performing at the level you want.
• Confidence - you must be able to believe that you have prepared yourself for the undertaking to come - “Don’t think you can, know you can”
• Spark - Call it desire, drive, whatever - the ability to dig down into your soul and cut days, weeks, months, or even years off your life all because you are focused on a singular objective.

While I do believe you can race the fast out of you system well in advance of your Arace, I do not believe it to be frome racing to frequently, rather I think it is a function of racing the spark out of yourself.  Everytime you race you reach a point in the race where you have to make a choice - to dig or not to dig.  Everytime you dig, there is less to dig later.  Maybe you only take a little off the top each time, but a little adds up over time, then you get to the big show and you don’t have any left.

The problem with that choice is, it feels bad when you choose not to dig, you finish the race down, almost like you gave up, or left something on the table.  So what do you do?

My solution is to be tired.  For those non A races, I show up worn down, tired, and sometimes very grumpy.  I find that this puts me in a position where my body make the decision for me, and I don’t dig when I shouldn’t.

The last key to this puzzle is recharging that tank after you have emptied it.  I find that it takes me a very long time to fill it back up, I find the rate of recharge to be greatly affected by the depth of the withdrawal, but for me the best way to make it happen quickly is to rest, rest, rest and not rush back to fitness.

That is why I am looking forward to an embarrassingly slow 10k on Thursday!

That puts me down about 17% and 12% respectively from what I estimated myself to be at going into IMWI.  My goal for the long run of this 16 weeks is to run a low 17 5k, and a 330+ FTP.  Four months is a long time to focus though - so my intermediate goal is to get back to my pre-IMWI numbers by the next test.

That means about 18:30 for a 5k and 300+- for FTP, that’s a pretty big jump from this past test, but based on previous off-seasons I am a pretty quick rebounder, so if I accomplish that it gives me 3 months to build strength before I start to look at the endurance portion of my engine.

A bit of Friday Humor

Famous last words:

“Aw, come on, it’ll be fun”
Translation: Assuming you survive.

So tonight was the first day of the Endurance Nation outseason training plan.  I did it with Mary, Matt, Adrienne, and Chris.  I think we all enjoyed it alot; Chris is a monster he put down something like 315 watts.  The picture above describes it perfectly - train wreck.  I did 2×20 minutes on 2 minutes rest to get a rough estimate of my FTP.  The result - down!  263 watts.  Wow.

While I probably didn’t execute the test as well as I could - going out a bit hard, it’s where I stand.  I’ve got a lot of work to do to get back to where I was in August and where I want to be by the end of these 4 months.

Tomorrow is a 5k running time trial - should be lots of fun!

After 10 minutes of clicking refresh and attempting to login to active to register for Ironman Florida - I met with sucess.  I’m in!

• Break your season into manageable chunks.
• Don’t expect to be able to focus for a REALLY long time.
• In November, you aren’t training for a race in September - you’re training to train for that race, or for other fun things before the race.

When I got into Triathlons, I could have used these lessons rammed down my throat.

The training class itself has been quite insightful and good for work, but other then that I don’t have a lot to do, I don’t feel good enough to run, and I didn’t bring any reading books. So I’ve spent the two nights so far watching TV and putzing around on the internet. Fortunately boredom leads to going to be early!

It’s given me a lot of time to think about my approach and goals for training for the upcoming season (even more then I already have).