My race report for the Spirit of Racine is up!

 

I’ve got to go back and post some for earlier races this year!

I’ve learned a lot of things thus far in life.  I can only imagine the knoweldge I’ll have gained over the next 20+ years of life – some of the high points:

• Slow and Steady does win the race – when you consider a race to be a goal or objective over several years
• It’s easier to do the work and let "it" come to you, then to try to take yourself to "it".
• You can’t do it all – better to focus on a couple things and excel, then do lots of things and be mediocore.
• Learning from others, but not copying others is a sure way to succeed.

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Okay that’s enough wisdom for the day.  Last week was a stellar week of training.  My friend Matt and I went up to Stevens Point, WI for a few days of training and to get away.  It turned out to be a good week – and we even got to do a race!  It was a sprint, I came in 1st overall – my first win in a Triathlon!

I am very happy on the results of the race – especially given what I had done the days before the race – 2×4+ hour rides, a 2.5 hour run, a 3.5 hour ride, lots of swimming.  I averaged just under 300 watts on the bike leg for 45 minutes, and ran a 19:XX 5k at the end.  It makes me pretty excited to do Racine this weekend. 

I am very fatiqued after last week, I can feel those miles in my legs.  Hopefully with a nice easy week planned this week I will recover well, and be fresh on Sunday.  Hopefully the weather will be decent and it will be a fun day!

Next week starts the "Build" section of my training before IMWI.  A lot of my training is going to focus on Race specific efforts and the like.  I am planning to do two Key workouts each week

• Long Ride + Run  – at planned race wattage/pace 
• Long Run (2:30 – 2:45 @ realistic race pace)

After that I have 2 secondary workouts each week

• Quality Ride that focuses on HIM – 40k effort intervals
• 10 mile run that takes betweeen 70 and 75 minutes – intent is a workout that is hard enough to force me to have to push to get it done (to build some mental stamina), but not so hard it takes days to recover from

Plan will be to do most other workouts as easier efforts to try and be fresh for the above workouts.  I plan to only do a swim on Saturday to try and ensure maximum awesomeness on the Sunday Brick.

Do this for three weeks, rest – try to break 2 hours at Pleasant Prairie, do a similar, but slightly smaller week, and rest hardcore for two weeks; kick ass in Madison.

Can’t believe that’s all that is left before IMWI.

Matt and I are in Stevens Point for a long training weekend and we found out there is a Sprint triathlon tomorrow.

 

We are going to do it.  It will be awesome.

Then we’ll go ride 4 hours afterwards.

One of my biggest downfalls when it comes to triathlon (and before that swimming) is the expectations I place on myself.  If I look back across all of my athletic career my best performances happened when I expected nothing, and usually when I least expected.  Of course I have had many great performances when I expected it (i.e. when I was rested), but more often then not great performances usually come when I’m not looking for them.

I’ve always explained this to other people as me grasping to hard – I try, and try and reach for what I’m wanting and liked a greased watermelon away it goes.

Despite my best attempts I do occasionally fall into the habit of setting expectations and really focusing on an outcome – rather then focusing on doing my best.  The concept of a Beginners Mind really helps me in this arena.  It’s a good reminder that biases and expectations can hold us back from experiencing awesome things!

Update on last week’s training later.