Saturday, August 28, 2010

5K TT, CF WOD: 21, 15, 9 45# thrusters, pull ups

21, 15, 9 45# thrusters, pull ups (assisted)
Total time: 8:41


Warmed up with a 1 mile run on the tready. Again, was able to do all thrusters with 45#s. Pull ups were on bar with rubber band to offset my full weight. Had to break 'em all up a bit, but definitely getting stronger.

5K TT: 25:19
Immediately following the CF, I ran my 5K TT on the treadmill. Would have preferred to do this outside, but they just chip sealed the road in front of our house. Chip-sealing sucks!! Loose stone and dust not good! I took 2 breaks during this run to try and catch my breath... just can't find seem to get past this issue...

Its a perfect 10 of a day and 3 or 4 more to follow as my week and a half long vacation starts. My son is back at college today and Sully and I are going camping for a couple days starting tomorrow. Total unplug from the world which is desparately needed. Hoping to stay on top of the prescribed workouts, but can make stuff up next week if it doesn't happen.

Friday, August 27, 2010

CF WOD Run 400M, 50 Squats, 10 burpees x 4 for time

Run 400M, 50 Squats, 10 burpees x 4 for time
I ran .3mile, .3mile, .3mile, .2mile

AHR 144
MHR 158

Total time: 20:36

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Bike tabata and CF WOD 21, 15, 9 45# thrusters and dips

Bike Tabata
1 minute work, 30 seconds rest x 20
Total Distance = 10.31
Average Speed: 19.3 (work + rest)
AHR: 136
MHR: 146

CF WOD: 21, 15, 9 45# thrusters and dips
Total time: 11:28

I didn't rush this one. Wanted to get all of the thrusters done at 45#s and took necessary breaks to do so. I did the dips using Olympic bar down low to ground (like bench dips). Pleased that I was able to complete the thruster sets all at 45#.

Did the CF WOD immediately following the bike tabata.

Days are getting short. This'll be a challenge moving forward. Dread putting the bike on the trainer...

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

CF WOD: 100 ft. walking lunges, 10 burpees, 25 sit ups x3 for time / Run 5K for time

CF WOD: 100 ft. walking lunges, 10 burpees, 25 sit ups x3 for time
I did 36 lunges (18 per leg)
Total time: 11:09

5K Run for time (treadmill)
Total time: 26:46

Monday, August 23, 2010

CF WOD: 30 box jumps, 10 burpees, 30 box jumps, 10 push ups, 30 box jumps, 10 pull ups

Total time is estimated: 9:00
My watch died mid workout :)

I also ran 1 easy mile on the treadmill to warm up and 1 easy but faster mile on the treadmill to warm down: 9:33, 9:10

Feeling pretty good post race. Ankle that I turned is a little sore as is my hamstring. Very minor. Felt good to get sweaty.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Litchfield Hills Olympic Distance Triathlon

Total time:     3:00:22
Swim             27:30 (.9 mile/  100/1:54)
Bike:              1:22:44 (24.8 miles/ 17.99 mph)
Run:               1:02:08 (6.2 miles/ 10.01 mph)

T1:                 6:24 (.2 mile run that requires shoes up to transition)
T2:                 1:39

192/263 OA
10/13 AG F45-49
185 OA Swim
168 OA Bike
223 OA Run

Up at 4:50 a.m. Ate a bowl of oatmeal w/ a couple of walnuts and a tbs. of protein powder, some cottage cheese and some grapes, one cup of coffee and some EFS to sip in the car. Gear and bike ready to go. Loaded the car and off to New Hartford with my sherpa. It began raining as we drove over the CT River. Pretty sure it didn't stop til we got home after the race.

Arrived at the park and it seemed quite crowded. Peed in the woods. In transition, my rack was already pretty filled up. Had to carve out a space for myself. Put my bike and running shoes in a plastic shopping bag to keep them at least a little dry. Peed again in the woods then headed down to the water with wetsuit, old pair of kicks and my sherpa.

Stuffed myself into my wetsuit after finding a spot for my shoes. I wore the long sleeve as it was chilly enough to stand it and hoped I'd be a little faster in it. All females, clydes and first timer guys were in the first of 3 waves. Was able to get a few strokes in the water before the pre-race lecture and then they herded us into the chute. Gun went off and the melee began. You have to sight well on this course because its trapezoidal. Its easy to run wide and add lots of yardage. I feel like I did a good job of sighting from buoy to buoy and this led to my best swim time here. The start was a little chaotic and it took a while to find my gills. I had that icky feeling like you have no oxygen in your blood — took a while for that to diminish. Meantime, I was trying not to lose my teeth :). Was able to stay on some feet for a little drafting action but, per usual—eventually found myself alone mid-course. That is, until the males in the second wave swam over me! Got a bit more congested at buoy where we turned to head back into shore. Here is where I really wanted to be sure I got my eye on the next buoy so as not to swim to far off the line. This is where you can really make the swim long.

Hit the shore and was very happy to see a sub 30 minute time. 5-6 minutes better than last year, but not sure its and apples to apples comparison. The run back up to transition is hard!—especially with a wetsuit half on. Its rocky and uphill.

Hit transition to find that someone had put their transition box practically on my stuff. Really? Come on ladies-you really don't need a box of crap in transition! So I moved that out of my way to reach into my bag and get my bike shoes and race belt. Helmet on and off to the mounting area — which is also a bit of a run. It was raining pretty good at this point so plan was to go hard, but to be cautious too. There's a screaming downhill at the beginning that had potential to be the beginning of the end so took a bit easier than I normally would have here.

This bike course is challenging. You start with a nice downhill and then there's few uphills and then some nice fast stuff until you hit route 202. Here you climb for bit (3-4 miles) and then you get off into the really nasty part. It ends with a real leg breaker. I was doing 4 miles an hour up that last nasty hill and thinking I might not make it up. The road had recently been chipped sealed. It was wet so small stone was stuck to my wheel and jammed between tire and cutout causing the two to rub—the friction making it even harder to turn the pedals. Dave was at the top screaming encouragement — which was awesome because I really, really needed it! I did well on the bike — just a couple of minutes off last year's time

I had 3 GUs, a salt tab capsule and an aero bottle of water on the bike.

Finally to the finish, my legs felt like rubber getting off the bike. Short run over the grass into transition — where I again had to move that danged box to get my wet sneakers out of my bag. Shoes on, helmet off, stuffed a GU in my shorts and off I went for the run.

The course took us through a wooded area with a wood-chipped path. There were lots of tree roots and rocks. It was raining and I had poor visibility through my sun glasses. Turned my ankle good on a tree root. Payed better attention to the ground after that. Again, had to run up that nasty little road from the lake and here I felt the fatigue in my legs. I walked some here but there were quite a few spectators along this park road so felt obligated to run. The first mile was a struggle. The second too. Somewhere in the third, I got annoyed with myself for not performing the way I feel I should be able to. Luckily, there was some downhill here so I was able to get a good run going. I just could not get into a sustainable pace. My legs feel strong but aerobically, I feel off. Walked several times. In the last mile I forced myself to run and keep running. Finally saw Dave at the six mile mark and he yelled at me good as he could see I was giving up. He basically chased me the last .2 miles almost to the finish :).

I took 2 GUs during the run.

So looking at the numbers, I feel like I had a good swim and a good bike, but clearly the run was my limiter today. I'm frustrated that I can't find a pace to sustain and can't find a way to work through the difficult moments and settle into a rhythm to keep going.

However, this was a very solid effort today and I'm looking forward to tomorrow's workout!

Saturday, August 21, 2010

60 minute bike TT

Total miles: 20.46
AHR 137
MHR 146

Pretty solid effort :)

Friday, August 20, 2010

Run 400M, 50 squats, Run 800M, 50 squats, Run 1600M, 50 squats / Swim 300

Run 400M (.3mile), 50 squats, Run 800M (.5mile), 50 squats, Run 1600M (1mile), 50 squats
Total time: 19:31
AHR 150
MXR 170

Run splits:
.3 mile / 2:22 / AHR131
.5 mile / 3:52 / AHR147
 1 mile / 7:57 / AHR155

Fun workout. Sooo glad I got this done this morning!

After work:
Swim 300 yards

300 WU
(6:10)

4x50 DR Catch up
8x25 DR Catch up w/PB

300 SWIM
(5:44/1:54)

50 CD Breast stroke

Short, easy ride on the road bike with my husband after work. Gorgeous evening!

Thursday, August 19, 2010

run 800M (.5 miles), 15 burpees x4

run 800M (.5 miles), 15 burpees x4

accidentally did push ups for the first two sets -- woops!

AHR 158
MHR 182

.5 mile splits
4:00 AHR 142
4:05 AHR 152
3:49 AHR 154
3:57 AHR 175

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 bike intervals and 300 squats for time

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 bike intervals

1 min. @ 1 min. rest     .33 miles / 20.1 mph / AHR 125
2 min. @ 2 min. rest     .69 miles / 20.8 mph / AHR 156
3 min. @ 3 min. rest   1.03 miles / 20.6 mph / AHR 139
4 min. @ 4 min. rest   1.40 miles / 21.0 mph / AHR 141
5 min. @ 5 min. rest   1.65 miles / 19.8 mph / AHR 141
5 min. @ 5 min. rest   1.45 miles / 17.3 mph / AHR 140 (Ferry Lane - short, very steep hill)
4 min. @ 4 min. rest   1.47 miles / 22.0 mph / AHR 137
3 min. @ 3 min. rest   1.04 miles / 20.7 mph / AHR 134
2 min. @ 2 min. rest     .69 miles / 20.6 mph / AHR 133
1 min. @ 1 min. rest     .31 miles / 18.6 mph / AHR 121 (Dark and negotiated a u-turn with another cyclist coming up on my left

300 squats for time = 10.54

Did both workouts after work. Squats came fairly soon after the bike intervals. These are tomorrows' workouts. I'll do today's tomorrow.

Didn't sleep well last night due to an upset stomach so felt very tired and off today. Was easier to talk myself into getting on my bike than getting on the treadmill for 800 meter intervals and burpees. I can always produce a good effort on the bike once I get going.

Not my best time for 300 squats, but consider they came directly after the bike intervals so I'm good with the result. I recovered very quickly too so I'll take that as improvement.

Trying to gather in my strength and motivation for Sunday. Really want to have a good race.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

20 Min. Run TT

Covered 2.33 miles (8:35 mPH)

Ugh! The hardest part of this workout was just getting started. Finally at 8:00 PM I headed out into the dusk after all kinds of procrastinating. Wanted to warm up before cranking on the TT so ran for 15 minutes just super easy trying to get that runnin' feelin' that's so elusive these days. Everything felt nice and loose so that was good. Hit 15 minutes and pushed the TT button. My goal was to push the pace but also to manage it so I wouldn't end up needing to stop before the 20 minutes was up.

Unfortunately, I didn't get actual mile splits for this so can't be sure if I ran the first mile faster than the second of the two complete miles I covered. I felt like I was running faster than 8:35 at times but no way to know for sure.

In any case, I felt good (well, as good as one can feel when one is trying to sustain a out of comfort zone pace for 20 minutes...)

Always feels so much better to get a workout done than to still be hemming and hawing over getting it started. So far so good this week. Gonna try and stay on track right up to Sunday and then — with any luck — perform well at Litchfield Hills :)

Monday, August 16, 2010

5-5-5-5-5 back squat, swim 700 yards

Hit the Y tonight for the back squats
Easy 1 mile run on the tready to warm up

Did 5 sets of 5 with 108#s on the bar. Was ready to shut it down at the first sign of trouble, but the glute and hammy are happy :)

And, since the pool was right there — swam the 700 I didn't get to last week. Went easy with this as I swam yesterday. After the 700, I did 4x50 Catch up drill and then a hard 100 at 1:41 pace.

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Swim 1x100, 2x200, 3x300, 400

My husband and I signed on at the new Y in Ellington yesterday. Today it was open for actual use and I was excited about using the new pool. Its a very nice facility and I think its going to make getting the swim workouts done a lot easier. Bigger windows of time and my husband and I can go together which will help with motivation. Ironman training can be a very lonely endeavor sometimes and just tripping to the Y together will give it a new dimension. Additionally, we now have access to all the other area Ys and even those in other states.

I did a long warm up today because I had trouble getting into a rhythm with my breathing at first. Excitement about the new facility maybe...? Once I started the actual workout, I felt pretty good though. Not finding any record breaking speed however. But I haven't been working that hard at it either...

Tendonitis in the shoulder is pretty epic right now. Frustrated with the aches and pains. Hamstring/glute is much better though :)

Total 3000 yards
750 WU (100, 100, 650)
400 DR Catch up

1x100
(1:44)
2x200]
(3:47, 3:51, 3:55)
3x300
(5:55, 5:54, 5:58)
400
(8:13)


50 CD Breast stroke

Saturday, August 14, 2010

40K TT, CF WOD: 50 step ups, 40 box jumps, 30 sit ups, 10 burpees x2

40K TT = 1:16:40 (19.1 MPH)

CF WOD: 50 step ups, 40 box jumps, 30 sit ups, 10 burpees x2
Total time: 13:11

Not sure what the hell I'm doing here, but I'm not following the plan...

It's not really intentional — just having a hard time doing the prescribed workouts on a given day. I'm revolting against the structure I guess. In need of a vacation I think...

Gorgeous day today!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

AMRAP 20: boxjumps, squats, lunges and 30 minute bike TT

8 a.m.
10, 10, 10 (5 each leg) box jumps, squats, lunges AMRAP 20 minutes
Completed 17 full rounds plus 10 box jumps, 10 squats, 6 lunges.

Wow, this one left my legs shaking. Struggled with the box jumps initially. Kept almost missing the step. Got better as I went on and started putting more of my arms and upper body into it. These bothered the glute a little bit on the box landing, but not too bad.

6:30 p.m.
30 minute bike TT
Total Distance was 10.01 mile (20.0 MPH)

Warmed up for 10+ minutes
Did an additional 8 or so miles post TT

Felt better on the bike than I thought I would. Was really tired and stressed with work today.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

15 minute run TT, FRAN

7:50 p.m.
15 minute run TT x 2
1st = 1.73 miles (8:38) AHR 151
2nd = 1.75 miles (8:34) AHR 167

FRAN = 21, 15, 9 pull ups, thrusters (30#)
Total time: 7:30

I know I was only supposed to do one 15 minute TT. I started running thinking that I would do a 15 minute warm up and then run the TT.  Well I struggle with finding the easy pace these days. Once I started running and was feeling good I decided just to keep pushing for the first 15 and then just take the 2nd 15 easy.  Took a few minutes rest in between the first and the second. Again, just found it easier to run steady and push a bit. Neither set was particularly fast but the effort was good and fairly well sustained.

The hamstring felt pretty good. Maybe a tiny little twinge during the second 15 minute run, but really minor. I was prepared to shut it down at the first sign of real trouble.

It was about dark by the time I finished. I waited for the sun to start setting before I got started wanting it to be much cooler. Pretty sweaty affair...

Afterwards, I did FRAN. I really hate this one. I'd much rather do 4 consecutive unassisted pull ups and call it a day than the 45 half arsed ones I did during this work out. For the thrusters, I loaded 30 lbs on the bar. Want to proceed carefully with weighted squats for now so as not to aggravate the hamstring/glute. These actually went pretty well, but noticed a few twinges in bending over and lifting the bar off the floor.

Glad to be getting back at it. Seven days is a long time to NOT workout. I needed to get back at it. The rest was good though. Just wishing it had actually been more restful... :)

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Swim 20x50 yds.

Hit the pool downtown after work. Missed the 5:15 bus so figured I might as well see if I could get into the drink at the Taking Care Center. As luck would have it, I had the pool mostly to myself to begin with — although it did get busy during my workout.

600 WU (6:12)

4x50 DR Catch up
8x25 DR Catch up w/PB

20x50 @15 seconds rest keeping within 3 seconds of each other
(okay, I did 22...)

:53, :56, :55, :56, :56, :57, :57, :58, :58, :58, :58, :59, :57, :58, :59, :58, :57, :57, :59, :58, 1:00, :57

600 CD (6:32)

Monday, August 09, 2010

Breaking through the inertia...

30 minute run3x12 back extensions
3 sets of full unassisted pull ups  (4, 1-1, 3)

alternated sets of pull ups and back extensions

Okay, so I decided to head out for a short run this evening just to feel out the hamstring. Figured I could disguise the run as a walk if the hammy started to bark at me. Range of motion has been increasingly better with the prescribed stretching and exercises. Figured I'd try and run for 15 minutes just to see where I'm at...

Felt good so I went for 30 minutes and covered 3.28 miles at a 9.09 minute pace. Didn't push too hard, but tried to keep it closer to 9 minute pace so long as nothing was hurting. Definitely finding a much improved stride compared with last week when it was painful to throw the left foot out front. Tonight that was not an issue. Still some discomfort when I'm sitting. Sciatic nerve still irritated but its improved.

The run was just what I needed to break the inertia. When I came back inside, I told my husband that I thought we should just keep our plan to go to Arizona in November. Its likely that the race will go on as planned. And, if it doesn't — we still want to do the Grand Canyon and mountain biking in Sedona and all that fun stuff. This is what we've planned on doing since last November and there's no point in tossing that all out for the possibility of waterless swim venue.

That said... it time to giddyup! (but carefully)

If the race is fubar, I'll just take it as it comes...

I feel better now... :)

Sunday, August 08, 2010

still torn...

about Arizona.

I'm hoping a weeks' rest and the completion of a very big project at work will help me to see the light with regard to whether or not it makes sense to keep working towards IMAZ or to revise my goals for the remainder of this season and look toward next.

I have considered doing Coeur d'Alene next June instead. Or not doing any IM until 2012 and making it a hat trick at LP.

I think I need a nice long run to get my head straight...

With regard to the damn repair, they're posting a weekly report:
http://www.tempe.gov/lake/friday_status_report.htm

Looks like progress is being made...

Saturday, August 07, 2010

radio nowhere

4 a.m. conference call to bring 6 months of hard work to fruition
4 p.m. easy road bike ride with my husband
5 p.m. 4 pull ups

Sunday, August 01, 2010

30 minute bike TT, 12 x 100 (4 @ 75% effort, 4 @ 85% effort, 4 @ 95% effort)

So notice I'm a little off plan — been picking and choosing based on what I think is best due to the hamstring/glute issue. Its feeling better, but not nearly 100%. I want to avoid any weighted squatting type movement until its 100% or I'll quickly be back to square one. I took a couple of days off this past week too just because life was too overwhelming with work and household stuff. Got to keep the priorities straight and also have to listen to the body and mind...


this morning
30 minute TT = 10.18 miles
20.4 MPH  AHR 139

later...

12 x 100 (4 @ 75% effort, 4 @ 85% effort, 4 @ 95% effort)

300 WU (6:11)

4x50 DR Catch up
8x25 DR Catch up w/PB

4x100 @ 75%e
(1:54, 1:57, 1:53, 1:56)

4x100 @ 85%e
(1:48, 1:51, 1:52, 1:51)

4x100 @ 95%e
(1:49, 1:50, 1:51, 1:52)

300 CD (6:14)

wow! not much to be gained by that extra 10% of effort...
 
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