The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The last 2 weeks I raced three races and experienced everything I could from the good, the bad, and the ugly. Last weekend I raced at the Ontario masters swimming championships and Queen's spring fling. This weekend was the McFarland Rollens Downtown 5k.

The Good

The good included the 2 pbs. I set a 10s pb (5:05) in the 400m free and a 25s pb (16:01) in the 5k. The 5k was from this time last year on the same course so it is awesome to see such improvements, especially after taking 3 weeks off for my it band. This time last year I swam 5:35 for the 400 free so to be about 25s faster in both events is awesome. I have to thank Cliff (http://www.transitionpointtraining.com/) and Ken Fitzpatrick for all their help.

The Bad

In the bad category I would have to place my DNF at the Queen's Spring Fling. I thought I could get away with wearing just the trisuit (which is awesome) and arm warmers, but I froze. After about 3k on the bike I started to loose feeling in my fingers and by the time I was on the home stretch I couldn't shift or brake without pain. I made it to t2, but it took me probably 4 minutes to try and get my running shoes on. After about 400m my body was shutting down and there was no way for me to finish. Luckily my parents were there and quickly got me in the car with blankets to warm me up, half an hour later I stopped shivering. 

The Ugly

This is the heading that most of the racing fits into. I will start with Masters. In the 100m free I missed the wall completely on my flip turn. Thankfully there are no walls in triathlon. I am not even going to describe the 100IM and 100 back, but picture me doing either of those events and you know why it is here. Spring fling wasn't to ugly just cold, I did however swim an extra 50m so we can put my lack of counting skill in the ugly column. The ugly at the downtown 5k was that my shoe came undone 1500m into the race.

So many mistakes in these two weekends I feel like there is nothing left to go wrong in Knoxville. I hope everyone has had some excellent results in the unofficial kickoff of the racing season. Hope to see you guys at some races, don't be shy. 

That Time of Year

It is that time of year where triathletes tend to not update their blogs as much as the final training blocks before the season are being completed. I thought I would give everyone a little update on where I am currently at.

Swimming is going great. For me swimming is just a matter of putting the time and staying consistent. I was thinking about it the other day, and I have not missed a single masters practice since September or October. Only a couple of other swims have been missed, but those have been due to unforeseen circumstances such as pool closures. A lot of people ask me how I improved from averaging over 2:00min/100m and barely making it 500m to where I am now. The answer is this consistency. I am swimming Masters Provincials in Etobicoke next weekend and looking for some pbs.

Cycling is also going great right now, unfortunately my power tap is not working so I am not sure how great. To help with this I just got a new bike thanks to MultiSport-Zone and Cervelo. This year for draft legal races I am going to be riding an S5 team with Ultegra DI2. So far I absolutely love the bike and have nothing bad to say about it. My P2 hates it though as she has been neglected and just sits in my living room.

Running, I am on the mend. I had to take a couple weeks off due to IT band issues. Thanks to Jenn Entwistle at Reactive Physiotherapy in London I am back to steady state runs. Next week we hope to add in some intensity since in addition to Masters Provincials I will also be racing Queen's Spring Fling in Kingston.

I am getting super excited for Knoxville, and I feel I am ready to give it a go with the big boys.

Peace

Swimming Swimming In A Swimming Pool

Lately it seems like all my time is spent in the pool. I am not complaining about this as I have come to enjoy my time in the freezing cold Western Pool. It does help that most of my swimming is done with other people, and this seems to make the time fly by. We really do have an awesome group of triathletes and masters swimmers at the school, and Ken knows what he is talking about. Ken even managed to talk a couple of us into swimming a masters meet at the end of March in Etobicoke. Its going to be interesting to see what I can do in a real race. I don't know how swim meets work at all so I can add it to the list of things I need to learn this season. I am really getting the itch to start racing, and if things go smoothly there are a couple lined up in the near future. Western's Splash and Dash is March 11th and Queen's Spring Fling is the same weekend as the masters meet. These are nice low key events that you guys should come use a spring tune up. I am going to be using them as tune ups for Rev3 Knoxville in May.

Spring break is next week so I wish everyone going away to training camps safe travels. Unfortunately I will be staying in London this year. It is probably a good thing I did not sign up for a camp since I have listed myself as day to day with a lower body injury. 

Alright I have updated you with my going ons (aka wasted enough of your time) and I need my beauty sleep. Until next time. Train smart train hard. Peace

Marathoning and Long Course Triathlon

The past year in the marathon has been extremely exciting to watch with many great story lines to follow. In 2011 Kenya absolutely dominated the marathon world posting the top 20 times in the world with three guys under 2:05 and a new world record of 2:03:38 (this does not include the Boston results). Including a 2:05:16 by a 21 year old, a 2:06:07 by a 19 year old, and numerous other 2:06/2:07 performances by guys at young ages. Already in 2012 a 21 year old ran 2:04:23. It seems there has been a shift in the age of marathoners and it makes sense. With the 5000m and 10000m being so competitive excellent talent is making a shift to the marathon earlier in life and not following the path of many that move to the marathon as they age. Not to mention there is a better chance of making good money running sub 2:10 for the marathon than the equivalent 27:40 10k. 

A similar thing happens in triathlon. All the young pups stick it out in the Olympic distance draft-legal scene and then move to long course when a) they realize they need money or b) they are no longer competitive in short course racing. Long course racing, especially in North America, is what the general public thinks about when they hear the word triathlon. I can't count the number of times people have asked me if I have done an Ironman once they hear I do triathlon. In terms of prize money triathlon is no where near running, and neither long course nor short course offers to much. However, in North America, I believe it is easier to find outside of the sport sponsors for long course then short course (my evidence for this is that there are more "teams" in long course then short course such as the old commerzbank team and tbb). So will this increase in possible income and the competitiveness of draft legal racing drive more young triathletes into the long course world? I know I have thought about it, but my bike is no where near strong enough yet. Perhaps if we do see a move by young athletes the eight hour mark will be broken more and more.

Kind of had to close this off quickly or I am going to be late for swim practice. Hope everything is going well for everyone. Cheers

New Blog

Hey everyone check out one of my friend's new blogs http://triathlon-daily.blogspot.com/. There should be some great interviews and other triathlon related goodies.

Easy Weeks

Contrary to their name I find easy weeks to be some of the toughest in training. Not necessarily physically but mentally. I recently read a blog post by Ryan Hall where he said "I constantly remind myself that resting takes confidence. Anyone can train like a mad man but to embrace rest and to allow all the hard training to come out takes mental strength." I definitely fall into the category of someone who can train like a mad man (and enjoys to), and I am slowly learning to embrace the rest when it comes. The last couple weeks of winter break the volume increased, but I was still feeling great so when the rest week came this week I just wanted to keep hammering. These are the times where I am glad I hired a coach because Cliff knows whats best, and I am confident in his plan (it is easy to have confidence when you are seeing improvements). So this week I will rest so I can go harder in the future.

I also started my new nutrition plan this week. Sunday I went to a class called weight loss for endurance athletes put on at Multisport-Zone by Cliff, and my nutrition plan has been completely reworked. I do not think I have eaten as many vegetables in one day as I did yesterday. With the volume coming up I needed to make some changes that would allow for proper fueling and recovery. I think I will be spending a lot of time on fellow triathlete Cheryl's blog getting some good ideas for food.

Cheers

I just realized for some reason things got highlighted white and were unreadable. I changed it to black so hopefully now it can be read.

Happy New Year

With the new year comes everyone's new year's resolutions, and you can definitely tell at the Western Student Rec Center. The place was packed in there today or maybe it was just because I slept in and went swimming a little later. The holidays have been nice so far because I have been able to do one workout mid morning and another in the evening. I find when I am home it is hard to go to bed early because the rest of my family does not live on that schedule, even though they are awesome. My new year's resolution is to start eating better. To start this off Cliff is sending me to his endurance weight loss class so I can learn some pointers on how to eat better. I did manage to gain some weight from the last time I weighed in, but I am telling myself its muscle from the weight room. Hopefully, this change in diet will translate to better training because I am sure the amount of cookies I eat is not the best fuel for this "finely tuned machine" (right mom and dad :P). This is going to be very important in the next couple of months as the volume starts to pile on. I have some interesting things planned in the new year and can't wait to see some results. I think my first race will be either the 5k or the 10k in London on February 26th. Hope to see some of you out there testing your early season fitness. 

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday, but now its time to get back to work.