Hell of the South

11th week in: 127 hours and 965 miles of training. This week turned out pretty awesome with the Hell of the South bike race. Ended up raining all day Sunday, so training got cut short 5 hours (no long bike and run). That was cool though since the race effort Saturday was on the 13th day in a row of doing two-a-day workouts (with a couple 3-a-days in there too).

Swim: Back in the pool. 4 workouts, one of which was long course, and I hit a mile (which unfortunately was nothing last year). Swimming still sucks… and so do I… so nothing else new to report here.

Bike: Got two good workouts and a race in this week. Tuesday was about a 22 miler at 20+mph on the trace. Thank god for Jeff and Matthew to drag me in the last few miles as I was struggling. Wednesday was hill repeats in Cool Springs (not a great idea a few days out from a race). I saw more of Lynnwood and Hollytree Gap than I have over the past 6 years of living here. Saturday marked the first bike race I’d ever done. Sure I’d raced my bike in triathlons and done some group century rides, but never a pure bike race. WOW was this fun.

Hell of the South: This race was put on by Swiftwick, SVMIC, and several other sponsors and volunteers. Jeff, Matt, and I went to race for Trace Bikes. It turned out to be an incredible event for its first year. The course was meant to be rough and mimic the old world style European type of racing; it even had about a mile stretch of dirt road. The course felt fast. I spent about the first 8 miles in the front half of the group. Jeff and Matthew held tight the very front and did a lot of work. About 8 miles in, Rachel pulled past me and said, “let’s go”. We sprinted to the front then she pulled off behind me and we kept going up the road. Unfortunately, this was a false flat, but the good thing was, it broke the pack in two. About 20 riders went with us and 30+ were in the second group. Rachel, and especially I, paid dearly for this move. It took 5 miles to bring my HR back down in the 160s. We sat on the back of the lead group and recovered as the course entered a moderate rolling section. At around 20 miles in, the pace picked up a little and Rachel and I moved forward in the group (keep in mind, Jeff was still on the front). We road along there making sure nobody really got away from us, but weren’t in any rush to move to the very front. Nobody seemed to worried with a get away (surprisingly). Anyway, we came up to the last turn, Jeff had sprinted off the front and Rachel and I took off after him. We had intensions on giving him a draft for recovery and keeping that break; however, Jeff had done way to much work on the front and was about done for the day… so Rachel and I moved ahead only to find out it was NOT the last turn… there was about a mile left. We were then swallowed up by the lead pack (but stayed with them). The pace continued to grow as we hit the 1k to go mark and then again at the 200M. Next thing I knew, Matt crossed the line in third and the rest of us crossed with the lead group. The second group crossed a few minutes behind us. It was SOOO much fun to race like that. The distance ended up being 25.65 miles, total ascent was 1,212 per my Garmin, my average HR was 170 (max hit 184), average speed was 22.1mph (max hit 39.1mph). I would like to have helped Jeff and Matt more, but I'm happy with how I performed considering I'd race a 1:29 half marathon the weekend before.

Lift: This will probably be the last time I mention lifting as I have really scaled back. I'm currently only going one day a week and a second day here and there when rain causes me to miss key outside workouts. I will say that the last 3 months has built a great foundation. It has put about 4-5 pounds on me though that I hope to lose as my workouts get longer. The goal is to keep the power and lose the bulk.

Race Schedule is in full swing now. Second race weekend in a row. Next weekend off for training (hopefully ride my bike to my mom’s house in KY) and then 5 race weekends in a row to follow. It’s exciting!

1:29:15 Half Marathon!!!

10th week in: 117 hours and 886 miles of training. This week was a taper week (only 7 workouts) into the Tom King Half Marathon where I ran a PR of 1:29:15 (6:49 pace). FINALLY, I broke 1:30… and not to mention in the middle of Ironman Training. Only 24 weeks left (21 weeks of training and 3 week taper).

Swim: Again, not much to mention this week. Only one 1,000 meter swim. Hopefully I can make myself get back into it soon. I did order an Xtera speedsuit for the Ironman Swim though… I’ll post some pics when it come in.

Bike: Laid off the bike workouts this week since last weekend was training camp and my legs were still heavy. I wanted to be fresh for the Tom King Half. We did end up riding 32 miles in the rain though on Sunday. Checkout how nasty the back of my jacket got.

Run: Tuesday speedwork, Thursday easy, and Saturday RACE. Gotta say it again… 1:29:15!!!! Never thought I could do that. The 5 weeks of speedwork really helped out. Let’s hope the next 24 weeks will really payoff for Ironman.

Lift: This was the last week regular base building lifting. We only lifted two days on account of my race, but going forward, it will be maintenance once per week as my weekend training is going to get long. Feel really good about the base we’ve built and I’m going to miss the gym.

Race season is definitely on now and I’ll be racing (or riding centuries) all but one weekend between this past one and the middle of May. A lot of them are simply key hard workouts with only a couple true all out race efforts (Tom King included), but still it’s going to be busy.

Training Camp and 5:55

9th week in: nearly 108 hours and 832 miles of training covered. The foundation is built, the real training will now begin… 22 weeks of HARD training and racing and then a 3 week taper down to IM. Gotta thank my track coach, strength coach, dietitian, ironman coach, and tons of friends and family who have pushed me this far. Feeling pretty good and strong so far.

Swim: Nothing this past week, pool closed for swim meets. BUT, it’s open now, and I’m back to doing what I hate… SWIMMING.

Bike: Trace Bike Race Team training camp was this past weekend in Chattanooga. We did about 110 miles and climbed 5 mountains (Suck Creek, Sand, and Lookout 3 times). Total climbing was about 8000 feet. I actually felt stronger the second day than I did the first day.

Run: Well, I finally did it. I broke a 6 min mile in my mile repeats. 6:01, 6:02, and 5:55 were my times on Tuesday’s workout. It left me very tired and I could only do my 800s around 3:00 on Thursday. But I was fully recovered and ready for the weekend bike camp (noted above), so I feel pretty good about how quick I’m recovering right now.

Lift: We cut this week down to two days instead of three since I had training camp on the weekend. Since race season will pick up this coming weekend (and I have an event everyday but one until mid May), weight training will taper down to maintenance.

Racing Weight: I picked up this book to read as I’d heard good things. Even though I’ve already worked with a dietitian and have a rather strict diet, I still have a lot to learn about properly tapering my bodyweight down to the optimal racing weight and getting my power to weight ratio exact for Ironman. Right now, I’m about 8 pounds heavier than I need to be for ironman. After getting into this book, I found that most endurance athletes will gain about 8% of their bodyweight during the off season. I also determined that my ideal race weight is about 157-158. Right now, I’m around 166, so it is perfectly reasonable to expect that I’ll be back around 158 when I toe up to the start line of Ironman Louisville (besides, who wants to carry around 8 extra pounds for 140.6 miles?). As my endurance training increases, the weight will fall off. Right now I’m eating about 4,000 calories a day and that will increase to about 5,000 as the miles grow.

6, 6, 6:01

8th week in: 96 hours and 710 miles to date. 26 weeks left. Not sure I was fully recovered from the long run at 6:59 pace the past weekend because this week felt a little hard. I will be taking the current week a lot easier in preparation for training camp and then race season picks up.


Swim: The pool was open on Monday, so I got in a 1,000 meter alternate breathing swim. Not bad for me considering I haven’t been in the water for two weeks because of these swim meets keeping the pool closed.

Bike: I did one spin night with hills and a 70 miler on Saturday. We only averaged 17.5 mph but for some reason, I was tired at around 50 miles. It was tough to hang on for the last few miles. I guess the volume of lifting and intensity of running caught up to me this week.

Run: I did three 1 mile repeats at 6:00.22, 6:00.77, and 6:01.27. Felt fantastic during them. Left me TIRED and sore afterwards. I’ve never been that close to breaking a 6:00 min mile. I tried very hard to break 6 but just couldn’t. Thursday was hill sprints. Yeah, fun… NOT!
Lifting: 3 days, 1:30 each. Friday incorporated one back/shoulder exercise that totaled 500 reps after the 5 sets were complete. It was a tough week lifting. Fourtunately, I’m only lifting two days a week in the next two weeks then we transition to maintenance over the next 3 weeks. Come April, I’ll focus more on the endurance side of biking and running instead of building a strong base in the gym.

USANA: I’ve been taking my personalized vitamin packs from USANA now for about a week. I think I can tell a slight difference in how I feel, but it’s hard to tell considering I was trashed going into this week. I was currently taking GNC products, so it’s not like I was going from no supplements to using them. Hopefully these will pay off in the long run and keep my body clean of all the toxins and free radicals that build up from the training. See the photos, it’s an AM pack and a PM pack, so 16 vitamins a day (well, it’s a multi, fish oil, glucosamine, etc.). They come in that nice back that just dispenses what you need. It’s very convenient.


Giro Aero Helmet: As part of my Valentine’s Day gift from Kiki, I picked up this sucker on Sunday (my rest day; I figured I could do something on my rest day to help make me faster right?). I think Cozmo looks pretty fast in it.