More on that decision a little later, but believe me.........It truly was.
After dropping the kids off on Father's day, it was time for the regular clean up after those two whirlwinds had been around at my place. Finally got to have a sit down and settled in to watch the new series of Underbelly. Anyone else watching it? I'm enjoying it at this stage and look forward to the rest of the series.
Monday was my regular rest day, so it was an enjoyable sleep in to a luxurious 7.30am. It's nice to wake up with the sun shining in the window as opposed to well before sunrise!
Tuesday was back down to the track for, what has become, the regular interval session consisting of 2km intervals. this tends to be a reasonably long session as well as the reps have continued to increase, along with the goal times coming down.
This week, Ruley had scheduled 7 x 2km intervals @ 9.50 per rep. This goal time is down from 10.25 just a week or two ago, so its starting to get much tougher to see consistent performance improvements. The session also includes a circa 2km warm up and cool down.
Ended up completing just shy of 19km in a total time of 1.46 (inc. recovery periods between reps) at an average HR of 155bpm. It's interesting to watch the changes in this as I am getting fitter as well.
After completing my warmup, it was into the intervals and clearly I was feeling ok........or my pacing is just so shithouse.........cause I was done in 8.56! Nearly a minute faster than the goal time. I was worried this would bite me in the arse later but not much I could do about it now. Subsequent intervals were completed in 9.24, 9.36, 9.44, 9.34, 9.28 & 9.19. This averages out to 4.43/km with an average HR of 162bpm. Obviously pretty happy with this session as it was on average 12 seconds faster per kilometre than goal and pleasingly, the last few sessions were a couple of the fastest, so there was no fade at all. Nice.
Tuesday lunchtime was a short sharp swim session of 1200 metres consisting of 400m w/u, 40 x 50m efforts followed by an all out 400m TT and a cool down of 200m. Ruley was keen to find out where I was with the swim as it has been less than consistent of late, hence the TT. I was able to complete this in 7.29, which is nearly 30sec faster than my previous best time, and a fresh target for Ruley to use for subsequent sessions.
Wednesday morning was a sleep in due to a very late night the night before attending a meeting, so as a result the bike session was completed on the wind trainer, with just a steady 60mins to give the legs a bit of recovery after the hard run the day before.
This was followed by 20mins of stretch cord exercises. In the words of Brian "The Bristle" Taylor.........Wow Wee!!! Man, can those things get you going. You certainly know you have been doing something the next day with those friggin things. I'm sure that they are making me stronger, but you must look like an absolute tosser standing in the loungeroom doing this stuff..........well, more of a tosser anyway!
Thursday was another run session, and for the first time, another interval session. This time (and for the first time also) Ruley had scheduled a session of 1km intervals and with another tough goal time of 4.35/km. Certainly a tough goal time for me anyway - I'm not built to go that fast, but I am enjoying pushing myself. So the session was a total of 10km over 57mins inc. recovery periods. After a bit of a warm up it was into the intervals which were completed in 4.17, 4.17, 4.13, 4.16 & 4.18 at an average of 168bpm.
Jesus, did these little puppies hurt..........significantly more than the 2km repeats I have been doing to date. Imagine taking a nail, then hammering it into your own snoz until you can hammer no more. Even then it is only just getting to be a slight discomfort in comparison to 1km intervals.
Interestingly, these times were significantly quicker than the scheduled goal time averaging about 19 or 20 seconds per kilometre quicker. Sadly, Ruley asks for feedback on all these sessions and I know the sadistic prick is rubbing his hands together itching to set a new goal time for the next session of 1km repeats..........I can't wait!!!
Thursday finished off with 20mins of leg & core strength and on tired legs this was an interesting little exercise. How much fun are one leg squats???
Friday was scheduled to be another tough session with a longer bike session than normal with an extra 2 x 10min TT efforts on the bike. I put this out to the rest of the bunch advising that it was my intention to go out earlier than normal and after a bit of a warm up, hook into the TT efforts. Rolling up to the starting point at 5.20am I was somewhat surprised to see 6 of the crew there ready and waiting to go.
After rolling out the road for 10 or 15mins or so, I explained to the boys what the plan was - head South for a 10min individual TT effort, a 2min recovery, then turnaround and head back towards the starting point for another 10min individual TT effort. Sadly, they are all a bunch of numbnuts and wheel suckers and apart from The Rabbit going up the road and Sootie having a bit of a crack, the rest all sat on for their "effort".
For my own efforts, I was please to cover 6.00km in the first 10min effort (well, 10.04 to be exact) at an average of 35.5k/hr. After a 2min recovery, it was into it for the return effort and I covered the same distance in 9.54 for an average of 35.8k/hr (which was into a slight headwind).
Unfortunately, rolling back towards the normal starting point for the bunch I realised how much it had taken out of my legs and I knew I was gonna be in for it over the next 40km or so. The kids in the bunch didn't disappoint and fired it up for the Friday Flog. Ended up completing a total of 60km in 1.51 at a 32.4k average.
Rolling into Friars for the normal Friday morning post ride breakfast, it was time for tall tales, coffee and a feed. Once my breakfast arrived, and despite being hungry, I just couldn't eat..............I was simply too tired to eat LOL. I managed to force it in and have a coffee. And of course, tell plenty of tall tales.
Friday PM was a solid swim session of 2500m in a pyramid session - 100/200/300/400/500/400/300/200/100. Not pleasant (for me anyway) as I simply hate swimming, but another one chalked up and hopefully it will all help out come race day.
Friday night was another late night with a work function at Benalla with the annual business awards. Not getting home till midnight, and into bed by 12.30 didn't help for the session scheduled for Saturday.
You may recall that Saturday was due to be the long run from Violet town to Strathbogie, totalling 33ish km with a fair chunk of it uphill. However, we just weren't able to get it sorted logistically as Ruley was on call for work and being a point to point run, I wasn't overly keen to turn around and run back to my car!!
Therefore, in it's place a session consisting of a triathlon was scheduled consisting of 1.5/45/14. Unfortunately, I awoke Saturday to a fairly windy day. Climbing out of the pool in 30ish minutes, it was then a quick change and out on the bike and what was gonna be tough. Heading East for the first 30mins or so, it was then turning South and straight into the headwind. Whilst I know I am not the most slippery of creatures on a bike (yes, my CdA number is impressive lol) it was exceptionally tough heading into the wind and it was not unusual to see the bike computer sitting around 23/24km/hr...............and it was sapping the legs considerably.
Climbing off the bike after 1.33 for the 45km (avg 29.0k) I was knackered! How the hell was I gonna get through the next 14km?? Pulling my runners on, I had decided my run was going to be an out and back - I can't cut it short if I run 7km from home!
Hitting the road, the first 2km were done at circa 5.30's, but shortly thereafter the wheels feel off and soon 5.40's became 5.50's and from the turnaround point at 7km, they averaged around the 6.00 pace for the trek home.
I have never felt so bad in my entire life. The weeks training had been a reasonable big one, at least for me, and the few late nights for meetings and work hadn't helped, but even so I was rooted. I had followed all of Ruley's nutrition guidelines for the day, which was all part of experimenting around getting that right as well given my previous attempts on my own had been very ordinary, and most of the day I just felt fairly yuck! I felt like all of the nutrition I had consumed was all just sitting there on top of my gut and sloshing around.
Finishing up the run in 1.21 (for the 14km) I managed to get myself inside and honestly didn't know where to put myself. I ended up getting my shoes off and sitting on the kitchen floor, within arms reach of the fridge where I was able to drag out a bottle of coke (full strength) and get some of that into me. I wasn't able to eat for the rest of the afternoon, but did finish off the 1.25l of coke! Considering I normally don't drink the stuff (well, full strength at least) I did pretty well lol.
Overall, the entire session was finished in 3hr25min. Not the longest session I have ever done, nor was it done at the highest intensity I have ever done, but on the back of the big run week for me, it just totally sapped me. I got my stuff together and headed down to the pool to spend some time alternating between the hot and cold spas.
I was heading out for fellow IMNZ entrant Hayley's 30th birthday so it would have been nice to get a bit of a nanna nap in, but it wasn't to be as the rest of the afternoon was spent picking up the our Tri Club bike trailer and loading it up for the next day's Kinglake ride.
So this brings me to my greatest decision ever!!! Heading out for dinner and sitting there not able to eat my meal properly as I still felt shithouse, I realised that there was no way that I would be able to get through the Kinglake ride on Sunday. This was particularly true given the weather forcast of a top of 12 degrees, winds to 25k and 90% chance of rain.
So, after a quick chat with Ruley just to check to see if I was being soft, I pulled the pin!!
In hindsight, this is definately THE BEST DECISION EVER.
The guys who did go has since filled me in on their day and their descriptions of "worst riding conditions ever" and "I've never been so cold in my entire life" and the like, have completely vindicated my decision to be a soft prick and stay in bed on Sunday morning. In fact, it was almost Sunday afternoon by the time I actually got going for the day!!!
Only getting as far as the kitchen for breakfast and then plonking on the couch and waiting for the footy to start to watch the Blues smash the Bombers. Overall, it was a great Sunday!!!
So, what does that mean was done for the week?
Monday Rest day
Tuesday Run 18.8k inc. 7 x 2km intervals, Total 1.46
Swim 1200m, 22.58, inc 400m TT @ 7.29
Wednesday Bike (Wind Trainer) Approx 30km, 60mins
Stretch Cords, 20mins
Thursday Run 10km inc. 5 x 1km intervals, Total 57min
Legs and core strength, 20mins
Friday Bike 60km (inc 2 x 10min TT intervals) total 1.51 @ 32.4k avg
Swim 2500m (pyramid session), 53mins
Saturday Triathlon
Swim 1500m, 30mins
Bike 45km, 1.33, 29.0k avg, 140bpm avg
Run 14km, 1.21, 5.54 avg, 152bpm avg
Sunday Rest day
In terms of diet and weight, that has all being going well since pulling my head in again and jumping on the scales on Monday morning saw 98.3kg flashing back at me. This was a loss of 1.8kg for the week and a total of 21.7kg since entering IMNZ 26 weeks ago. Yep! 26 weeks already. That means there is less than 6months to go till race day! Holy Crap!!
Time to pull the finger out and make sure every session counts from now on...........except for Kinglake. Best decision EVER!
Train safe
Ayto
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