Legs tired

Got up and left at 9 am with Rob ( Pharmacy-Rob) and Time trial Dan. We went up and over Mt Bachelor to Sparks lake and then back up and over for about 50 miles and then I went for a run that was 6 miles. ( from my house to REI and back along the river). Ohhhh the legs feel that 4.5 hours of training this morning. I must say a pretty big week for post half ironman and feeling good so that makes me feel like with a proper taper I should get through this ironman thing...ya know I all I can do is try.

The weather today is awesome, current temp is

75°F
Clear
Wind: NW at 8 mph
Humidity: 29%

This is the ride i will be doing on Tuesday ( pretty close to my usual loop from the office)


On Sunday will be doing an open water swim with Ben and Bruce in a lake and I think Rob is bringing a boat to tag along so he may get some pics. I may have to hold off on the MURPH until Tuesday or WED.

good snacks

So I came across a fellow Triathlete Bree who I was impressed by her get up and go attitude then i realized she was from Kodiak Alaska. I lived there back in the early eighties and my brothers and I have very fond memories of living on that island. dancing with hot girls at the community center ( well were both only 13 years old but the memories live), camping where we could run into real bears. Fishing down the street in rivers for salmon and the ocean for other fish. The complete;y unregulated fireworks rules in Alaska and of course that oil kicker check we got to buy super sweet BMX bikes ( I bought a nice redline BMX) There was also this kid in my class that told me about this up and coming sport called "mountain biking" and he had some weird BMX hybrid with knobby tires and rode through trails near his house..................what a whack job I thought, If only I would have seen where that was going years later.



So Bree's talking about this salmon jerky that her husband makes and I ask if it is healthy and a good snack for triathlon and she sends me a few samples.................YUMMMMMMY. The teriyaki is sweet. I plan on throwing a few of these in my jersey pocket on my next long ride. I used it as my snack after my KMA yesterday and it hit the spot.

You can get it online here but I wish I could buy it at the store local. Someday.

Thanks Bree


Here is my challenge to myself and others this weekend:

"Murph"

For time:
1 mile Run
100 Pull-ups
200 Push-ups
300 Squats
1 mile Run

Partition the pull-ups, push-ups, and squats as needed. Start and finish with a mile run.

Let me know how you did.

check in with coach and KMA not so much

last night rowed 2000 meters then went on a 18 mile bike ride followed by a 3 mile run....good workout. easy to get in off hour longer workouts as I am a bachelor fo the next two weeks and loving it.

Had a great workout with Kyle today, talked about how to wind up training leading up to Ironman. He is tailoring the rest of the workouts for endurance and strength endurance. Also we are working on a 3 week taper reducing each week the last 3 weeks at 30% less each week.

Today did a workout with Steph again and likely will worout with her bit more, good partner...still looking for pharmaxy Rob to step up before cyclocross season .

I came in early and warmed up with a 20 minute run ( I also rode my bike down to the studio) then we did a 12 minute pyrimad treadmill , same pace but each minute ramped up the incline 1 degree starting at 5%......I got to 11 and then backed down the ladder.

Then we did 1 minute intervals with varoous excercises with set amounts of reps and any time left we held a position.

15 pushups and then hold

20 squats and then hold

jump rope

quick feet over the red box

1 leg squat with med ball 1 leg

jump rope

back on treadmill minus 3 degree decline

other leg 1 leg squat

both legs holding kettlebells

barbell curls

side to side red box

rubber band around ankle side to side

resistance cord rows

plank on med ball mountain climbers

jumping jacks with rubber band around ankles


Stomach:

50 reg. situpos, 25 reverse, 50 bicycle, 25 each side oblique, 10 slow full situps, 15 side plank each side, 25 superman................ahhhhhh all done.

back in the saddle

Well amazing as it is to hear myself say it the half ironman was just a training race for the big one so after a day off I got back on the bike and rode last night with Bruce for a few hours and we did about 50 miles of easy spinning and then went up pilot butte on a night that was gorgeous. You could see forever and the temperature was perfect.

Got up this morning and rowed 2000 meters while watching some of the "escape from Alcatraz" triathlon...that looks like a must do race.

off to work and will get in a 30 minute run and then tonight hitting the pool with Rob and Ben.. good day so far for a Tuesday I must say

Day after half ironman training tip

half ironman number two under the belt

Jim and I pre race setting up T2 ( pic stolen)


The end of the swim and the big scary lake ( pic also stolen)
All done and all went well.

Wow what a difference number two was. I was calm and ready both physically and mentally.

So i had a rested week both by choice and by a work trip top Portland.

On Friday I took my bike to the drop off with Tri-Rob and dropped my bike. the water was a bit choppy as the wind was up but knowing the area I knew likely it would be calm in the morning so no worries. The funniest thing was looking at the redbull inflatable swim buoys. Last year I remember them being 20 feet tall and this year with a little more relaxation I noted they were about 6 feet tall.

Sat morning up at 5 am ( as usual) and had some cream of wheat and made a peanut butter and honey sandwich to t ake up with more for an hour before the swim start. went to Sunriver and met with Tri- Rob and his buddy Jim from Bend. We got dropped off up at the swim lake in the mountains as this is one of the few races I do that the T1 and T2 are 56 miles apart as opposes to two loops coming together at the same point.

SO we hang out in the sun to warm up in the morning at th start with everyone. Met Scott from triscoop and he was doing his first so wished him good luck, ran into my old friend Woody who was taking pics for the event as well as Eric and long time friend form almost 12 years ago who used to wrench at Hutchs Bicycles and had not seem him in awhile and he was like" wow! you got in shape!" and that always makes ya feel good.

The water temp was good ( about 62) and got in and swam about 100 yards to get used to the water on the face ( a Bruce tip that is invaluable) . BOOM the race started. and the swim started...wow I actually feel comfortable. the open water swim the week before with Bruce really helped since I had worked on my sighting and it really helped out this race. Last year I was lost and this year I knew where each buoy was and actually swam in a straight line, I felt great during the whole swim and finished in a group instead of the back of the pack so that felt good.

out of the water to the bike. I decided to wear socks this year which was a first, took a few seconds but I figure if its not a sprint race whats a few seconds? off we went and started passing those silly swim masters people from the get go.......but then:

stomach cramps...damn where did that come from? my side really hurt for about 10 miles. no reason and did not want to eat or drink for 10 miles but thankfully it passed so i was able to eat and sped up.

i tell you though I got chicked a few times. there were some strong women there ( that looked good too) and I could bnot keep up with them. at least they were good looking and fast...what else could a guy want???

Bike went well, passed a lot of people and the people that passed me had super sweet fast bikes with disc wheels so not harm there.

Transition two to the run another first I ran with new shoes with laces instead of quicklaces. only had to stop and retie one time. run run run run....caught Jim and we ran together for about 1/2 a mile and then he needs a porta potty and I chastised him for it.....go in your shorts i kept yelling,,,,,but then I needed one too so we traded porta potty stops and I lost him. the run went ok, not as strong as I wanted but decent. So i come up to this guy in a Beavers tri suit from my alma mater and start up a conversation with him about the Oregon State Beavers going to the Baseball world series and then I mention I know the older sister ( my swim coach Vanessa) of one of their members Alex Polvi....the guy turns to me and says "I am Alex Polvi!" hilarious. so at that point i have someone to beat as i chastise him for going the same speed as a dude that has like 15 years on him and I take off........I beat my swim coaches little brother.....I guess thats worth something?????

finished in an unofficial 5 hours and 39 minutes. Tri - rob rocked the house in 5 hours and Jim was about 4 minutes in front of me.

ok official times are in:

overall 5 hours and 37 minutes

swim was 47 minutes

T1 3 min.

Bike 2 hours 34 minutes

T2 1:53

Run 2 hours and 10 minutes

overall 220 out of 442 ( so middle of pack just like my MOP nickname)




Next day I feel pretty good but it will be a rest day for sure.

looks like I cut almost an hour from my time last year....a freaking hour!!!! so I will get official results and post with pics later

Full size brick

Sat started at 7 with Katy, Frank and Frank number 2, Vanessa, Gil, Audrey and had a pleasant 61 mile ride out past Sisters Oregon. I had the only flat of the group but was prpared so semi quick change. Even stopped in Sisters for a coffee and bagel ( never see that happening with my usual hammerfest group).

so at the leisurly pace we were going we did the 61 miles in a little over 4 hours. So wehn I started the run I felt FRESH!!!!!

about a 5 minute transition while folks grabbed clothes and water etc and off we went. Up the ruver trail to the end near Mt. Bachelor village when we lost Vanessa to a sore knee ( oh yeah that is farther than Frank1 and Audrey got as they bailed after the bike.

So we were down to four. Katy, Gil, Frank and myself. everyone in the group had run a half marathon before but only Frank and I had done the distance after riding that far so we knew the two of us were solid. Katy is a natural machine so not worried about her and for Gil this was her event to see if she could....and she did with flying colors. we ended up running 13.35 miles in a little over 2 hours and thanks to my garmin 305 we all checked it the whole way to see where we were at.........................." how far?........10.2..........................how far?......................11.1..........."

you get the idea.

great BBQ after and a great training day and a great day out with friends. anytime someone invites you to a ride/run with a killer BBQ at the end with a keg.......duh!!!


oh yeah

Last KMA session before half ironman

Steph: our guest workout partner today


Did a great session with Kyle with the Bruce along and this week Steph came and joined us. good group who works hard but has fun with it.

I must say Steph really did a great job. by scaling most of the weights she did everything we did and then when we did group pushups she started doing real push ups and I was impressed! It helps to have freinds next to you to keep you accountable. I have seen kettle bells mentioned a lot in Crossfit and we had used them some but i asked Kyle to work in kettle bells for a bunch of workouts and show us their versatility as well as proper form so we worked on that today

so here was the workout ( did I mention I rode an hour inj the morning before this?)





KMA:

We did three stations and rotated every 2 minutes

bicycle high cadence

bosu ball squats with kettlebell overhead

jump rope

back to bike

bosu ball with two kettle bells doing mini jumps

Burpees with 20lb dynamax ball

Bosu ball quick feet

treadmill at 4 incline fast

Kettleball one arm pushups while balancing on large ball

kettle ball swings while standing on bosu ball

kettle ball 1 arm lift standing on bosu ball

pushups using kettele bells for stands and then a row after each pushup

more jumprope

pushup as a group, we all three got shoulder to shoulder and got in the pushup position and i started by doing 5 pushups, then held the pushup position while Steph did 5 then Bruce did 5 then back to me. we did 4 rounds and waiting in that pushup position was hard.

Abs:

1 min rounds:

regular crunches

bosu with med ball side to side

big ball rollups ( dont ask, it looked bad,......no coordination)

then 50 each side up and 25 reverse............................DONE!!!!


Then Bruce and I went for a mountain bike spin after that which always feels good.


So after I got home I did some more work for a few hours on my laptop for work and then:

well...

Well I had some more video done today thanks to the great Swim coach Vanessa Polvi. I have to say she was great and I would reccomend her to anyone. Our interview is up at Zen and the art of triathlon HERE so check it out.

The plan for the rest of the week is firming up as i approach the half ironman next week. so manana is likely one of my last KMA workouts with kyle. I should do an interview with him and get his thoughts on training for endurance.

Then Friday doing an open water swim with Bruce to get the wet suit out again. Sat doing a psuedo half ironman with some girls that want to do it for personal growth as oppsed to paying for the half ironman....they also want to do a duathlon not a tri so we will bike and run. Not fast so i will hang with them and get a nice long day in for my last big workout before the mini taper for the half ironman.

here is the route they set up:



http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/united-states/or/bend/452361690

http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/or/bend/447731591

back in black

back in black like in the dark, rested now and headed out in the dark today on the mountain bike about 5 am and listened to podcasts while climbing...up all on single track up to where the trail "orange crush" comes in on upper cod. came back down listening to podrunner

great trails coming back, great temp. the picture is a shot of my Turner sitting against a picnic table that is next to some single track in the middle of nowhere and you can see the sun coming up through the trees. good workout.

Got my Fathers day gift ( that I picked out and paid for by selling some bike stuff) which is a concept 2 rower but since it is for fathers day I have to wait until this weekend and Jennele is going to decorate the box it came in. will be a good cross training device.

Well we are now about 10 days out from the half ironman and this year, not so nervous. have a long open water swim out of the way, been training a ton more than last year and feel pretty solid. They changed he course this year and took out the big hill so the times will be faster overall. this year I am going to wear a hat and use mucho sunscreen as I really do not want the sunburn issue again.

Later today doing a final video session with Vanessa and will let you know how it goes.

wasted and then raced

Looking white and pasty!!with the low drag haircut!


I forgot my ankle band for my chip DOHH!!!!

well a hard week ending with poor race performance but the goal was to race tired and i did. I sent audio race report to Jetpack so look for it there or subscribe in Itunes.

Thursday had a hard workout with Kyle and Bruce

warm up on bike 4 min., to treadmill 4 min at 6% grade lunge across room pushup deal ( lunge across room holding barbells and then at each end do pushups in the series, 2 then 4 then 6 then 8 etc up to 20) back to treadmill Sit down, pull bungie chord thing rows Bike/treadmill, again jump rope/100 ea leg (single leg) Burpy ball squat, touch ground and explode up (12lbs) Lots o core 100 of this and 100 of that


Tri- Rob went to the race and did really well, he is a strong racer. I did less than my usual Middle of pack showing.....no excuses ( ok I was tired)

results look in the 35-39 year old males



I will post some better stories etc in the next few weeks heading up the the half ironman at Pacific crest

Back into the workouts after rest day

SO ifigure I will go hard today and Wed and then have a KMA on Thursday and will rest Friday and Sat before the Olympic distance race in Portland.

This morning did:

400 m run
6 pullups
10 burpees with 20# ball
10 pushups offset with one hand on small med ball ( 5 each side)

times three rounds

then plan for today is a 2000 meter swim ( only swam 1000 though)

when I got home from work i added a 2 mile hard effort run before dinner because I had been sitting at my desk at work for the last 4 hours and needed something before dinner.


I am feeling pretty good after rest day yesterday. The weekend really took it out of me thats for sure. Traveling to Portland on Thursday afternoon and may do a short run Friday morning before heading into work meetings there but likely a short one, I will have to take the garmin to see how long the route is I always run by the hotel I stay at.

Day two andthree

Ok so day two starts out with Pickets charge mountain bike race. A C race in my book but a race nonetheless. Went single speed on the $13.50 again and it performed flawlessly any excuses on that bike are weak...it is the engine driving it. We got up to the starting line and there were about 20 single speeds in the category. The starter says "ok so two laps for the single speeds....." amd there was a group....WOOOHAAA!!! We thought 1 lap at 18 miles, we did nt want to do 2 laps on single speeds that day...It was hot too. the starter says ok vote...all of us but 1 guy says "1lap!!!" so they changed it to one lap.....thank god!

off we go into the dustiest start...WOW moondust and hard to see and breathe it was like the paris-roubaix. i found my secret nemesis and stayed on his tail then he faded.....ok good one down.

picture here


another pic here

then i needed another nemesis...what to do??? hey here is a guy with a single spped with the same color as my PB TT bike.....steal my color? ok he is my new nemisis!!! i chase him up a hill and through some techniacl rocky sections and BOOM!!! he is done, blown up!!! two down.....but where is the rest of the SS crew? who knows as I am in the back somewhere for sure.....uggh climbing climbing climbing...I am getting spent. Two Gu's and still hurting. I catch up to the womens pro group and tail a girl for about 5 miles. I have been "chicked" in races but using one to help pull me??? well so what I am tired. once I finally make the turn to the trail back which is mostly downhill and flat I get a second wind and haul back making up some time. Trailing some sport guys through the single track and just killed that section.....so fun times.....here are the results:

1   944 Timothy Jones      Bend               1:20:27
    2   970 John Rollert       Bend               1:21:55
    3   887 Nelson Snyder      Portland           1:22:20
    4   915 Brian Merritt      Bend               1:27:43
    5   864 Kurt Haas          Salem              1:28:22
    6   809 Pat Kudszus        Salem              1:28:43
    7   954 Jeff Kleihaurer    Bend               1:29:42
    8   950 Tim Hittner        Bend               1:30:02
    9   942 Walter Sorenson    Cottage Grove      1:30:36
   10   967 Eugene Cathcart    Oak Ridge          1:31:09
   11   968 Ty Skordahl        Oak Ridge          1:34:30
   12  9967 E Cathcart                            1:36:27
   13   969 Ben Gadomski       Bend               1:37:38
   14   906 Drew Holmes        Bend               1:38:22 
   15   820 Steven Basden      Portland           1:43:00
   16   951 Steve Williams     Bend               1:43:44
   17   963 Dan Gilmour        Bend               1:53:57
   18   901 Eddie Kiloh        Oregon City        2:19:11 

So all in all a solid effort against a strong field after no taper and workout yesterday but that was not even the start of the day.

later that day had race number 2. adventure race put on by BARK here in Bend.

I was going to rest after the race in the morning but that never happened.

The adventure started at 7 PM and we had a solid team of Anthony, Ben ( who beat me by 1 minute at the first race of the day and also gets credit for doing a double day) Rob, and Myslef.

The race started out downtown Bend with a running section with about 9 checkpoints all over the city and we ended up running a few miles there ( with packs weighing about 12 pounds).

Back to the base and we transitioned back to bicycles and as the only team that went all cyclocross bikes that made us pretty fast to get out to the checkpoints that were miles away. ( oh yeah we were also the first team back)

So we are hauling up century drive to get out to the trail system to look for checkpoints and Rob realized he has the wrong pedals on his cyclocross.....ok Rob you jet home and swap pedals as we head out. he was able to pull ahead, swap pedals and get back with us where we lost maybe 1 minute....sweet.

Now we wasted the next 2 hours looking for checkpoints and could not find any of them. and it was full on pitch black now and we were all riding with lights though the forest. the funniest thing was when Rob yells "Car up!" and I am thinking what? we are ina forest and next thing I know here comes a beater car around the corner...guess he was going camping. we were feeling dejected by not finding some checkpoints ( checkpoints being worth points and the most points wins at midnight)

We headed down to plan B which was to hit the 2 mandatory stops. The first one was a sweet zip line over the deschutes river ( again in the dark) . that was very fun. but took more time that we thought sow e jetted to the second point and it was a traverse under a bridge across the Deschutes river near downtown on a 6 inch ledge....no ropes just the chance that if you fell....SPLASH. so we watched a few people start and it looked ok, just have to shimmy across under the bridge. The race official says ok if you go "full Monty" you get double points. A team in front has a gu that strips down and he is off.....bend And I are like "DOUBLE POINTS???!!! YOU BET!!!!" and strip down. next thing you know like a surreal painting there are three naked dudes shimmying across this 6 inch ledge and it is harder than it seems. There is a little tine crack to put you fingers in and then an few spots where you have to palm the roof ( also 6 inches wide)









*** can you tell the 6 inches also slopes downward???? oh yeah


OHHHHHH I am getting tired and a true pump in my arms pulling myself across....in the water? the first guy stops half way and takes a break.....this hurts more...." keep moving dude!" geez this hurts, ok almost there....success, the whole team gets across and we are in double point city!!! We also come to find that most teams also could not find the checkpoints we missed or are too scared to do the bridge crossing and we are back in the race!!!!! we take off and go for one final city checkpoint but it is 11:45 and at 12 you turn back into a pumpkin and are DQ if not back at the bar we started at so we make a weak effort and then we head to the bar and get there at 11:55 with the other team that also got double pints but earlier in the night they went for a super weak city pint so edge us out....turns out we come in second place out of 11 teams.......ROCK AND ROLL!!!! I am baked and have a few beers and declare I will not make the 65 mile ride as i am wiped. get home about 1:30 in the morning and sleep in until 9:30, This is the guy that wakes up at 5 am every morning...I was tired.



Day three: easy tandem ride of about 15 miles at a leisurely pace........today REST DAY

Day 1 of super three done

So ihave a jam packed three days of workouts this weekend and Friday was day one. I met with Tri-Rob in the morning at we rode an easy 25 miles on the roadbikes at conversation pace nice way to start out the day. i then did a fast bike to work transition and changed into my work clothes and rode to work for a meeting ( by rode I mean on the moto).

I then finally took Bruce's advice and sowed up for my first masters swim class at noon. I have to tell you he has been nagging me for months and so has Katy and Lisa .....Ok ok...i never doubted the need for the class but I was scared that i would be so slow that it would be foolish looking. Which for those that know me are asking..."looking foolish????.....when did that stop you before?" so I went for it and the instructor who helped me back at the very start of my swim career Rob Higley rann awesome class. I swam in a lane with Bruce and kept up for the most part and have to say the ime went by much faster with a group and we swam about 2100 yards. It was very enjouyable and one thing I liked was Rob scaled some parts for how you swam. like the main set he said to do 4 sets of 500 or 400 or 300 based on what you want...so that was good and Bruce and I did 400 sets and the last a 300. some new drills with fins were a bit off but fun nonetheless.

Then right after the masters session I had my coaching lesson with Vanessa. no video but we will do that next week as she is going to do a bonus lesson before she heads to Alaska for the summer. We worked on my bilateral breathing and i actually think i did pretty well as she did too. after working on that we decided to spend some time doing flip turns. I never really spent any time on these as i am planning open water swims ( hence no walls) and oh my how funny was that...we spent more time laughing than anything as I looked like a goof trying it, then on one turn i smacked my head really hard on the bottom og the pool and the sound reverberated so much people were stopping and looking to make sure i was ok, later a guy in the locker room told me he though someone dropped a dumbbell in the bottom of the pool.....well i was the dumbbell.


plan for today is single speed mountain bike race at 10 am, come home and take a nap and then adventure race tonight at 7 pm that will go until midnight......double race reports coming up!


* no thats not me in the pic but a sneak peak at upcoming interview with Vanessa on underwater swim analysis......