RunTraining

The previous week was one of my best training weeks, but this last week of training has got to be among my most disappointing.

First, the best workout has got to be my long run on Saturday. It went great. I ran the first 12 miles without taking any walking breaks. I ran/walked the last mile to end the run at 13.1 miles. My average pace for the entire run was11:52 min/mile. I will take that any day!

For the remainder of the week, there were two factors at play:

1) I was traveling for work and that makes it challenging to do all my workouts. It’s not that I didn’t have the time. It is just always a little bit harder
2) My motivation these days has been at an all time low

For my swims, I started off as normal, but on my first day swimming in the hotel pool, I got to about 400m when a kid came into the pool. I know he would have seen me swimming laps and there was plenty of space in other parts of the pool. but he seemed to insist on playing right in my path. I almost swam into him a couple times. I ended up cutting that workout short. On my next swim day, I just got tired or bored of swimming and ended the workout after swimming juts over 1000m. My motivation just isn’t there!

All my runs were done as planned, but I had to run/walk while running in FL. The heat and humidity was tough.

My long Sunday ride was disappointing. Due to the weather and a family commitment, I had to start my long ride around noon. While I planned to do a 5 1/2 hr ride, I decided to abandon it after just over 3 hrs. I could have gone more, but just the thought of sitting on the bike for another 2 1/2 hrs was not appealing.

I don’t know if this is normal, but I am so ready to stop training!

Now, to make matters worse, I think I may be getting sick. For now, it’s just a congested feeling in my chest but it’s something to keep an eye on.

I think was my most perfect week of training so far. Not only was it my biggest week at 15 hours, but I did all the workouts and I felt great doing them.

The week was capped off with a big weekend of training. This involved a 2:30 hr run where I ran just over 12 miles and then a 5:28 hr ride on Sunday where I rode 100 miles. This was my first 100 miler.

The long run went really well. Like my previous long run, the cooler weather helped a lot. For this run, I just ate gels every 45 mins and I think I will stick to gels for my actual Ironman.

For the ride, I didn’t know what to expect. When I tried a long ride the previous weekend after a long run on the Saturday, my body was just tired. This Sunday, that was not a problem. The biggest issue was the cold weather. I started off feeling OK, but once I started to sweat, it got a bit chilly. The good thing was that it didn’t start to feel any colder so I stayed the same for the first couple hours. Once the Sun came up, it warmed up a little and by the end of the ride, the weather was comfortable.

For the ride, I stuck to drinking SOS, eating Golden Oreo cookies, and licking salt. I think this is the right formula for me. With the Oreo cookies, I’m getting about 200 calories per hour. I need to see if that is sufficient. I did start to get some very minor initial signs of cramping, but once I licked my salt at my next scheduled time, it went away. I think I was borderline dehydrated. I know for the first couple hours I didn’t’ drink as much as I should have, My first bottle lasted 90 mins instead of 45-60 mins. The colder weather fooled me and I wasn’t drinking as often as I should.

This week was the first for a 3-week stretch with 15 hours planned each week. This was a great start.

This week of training was going perfectly until the last day, but more on that in a bit.

A cold front moved into the North TX area and this helped bring the temperatures down. The result of this was that my runs were great. For my long run on Saturday, I managed to run the whole 10 miles without taking any walking breaks. That is quite an accomplishment for me as all my runs over the last few months have been run/walk runs. I did have a run during the week that was cold, wet, and windy, but I didn’t mind at all.

The downside of the cold front is that it impacts my cycling. While I don’t mind and actually love running in the cold, I hate riding in the cold. I was due to do a 5 hr ride on Sunday, but it was too cold at my normal start time so I decided to start riding around 9 am when the temperature was 60F. Initially it didn’t feel too bad, but as I started to sweat, the wind started to feel cold and I was miserable. I abandoned the ride after just over 7 miles.

I then decided to wait until the afternoon when it was due to warm up to the low 70’s. I headed out and while the temperature was fine, my heart and head just wasn’t in the ride and I abandoned that ride after just over 10 miles. In the end, I rode a total of an hour and I didn’t do my 5 hr ride.

Mentally, I’m getting to the point where training is getting harder and harder. I don’t feel physically tired. I’m just not motivated to do those long workouts. While it is scary that the Ironman is only 6 weeks away, a large part of me is glad. I just want to get it over and done with!

This was my biggest training week thus far and it is only the start of a 4-week block that will see me do a couple 15-hour weeks. The week called for 14 hours, but I only did 13.5 hours. This was due a missed run on start of the week. My body was just still too tired after the half-iron distance training session at the end of the previous week.

The biggest workout was the 5-hour ride on Sunday. I am pleased that I managed to ride 90.6 miles in 5 hours for an average speed of 18.1 mph. It was tiring and if I were in my actual race, I would probably not have pushed so hard in the latter part to try and maintain that average speed so as to save something for the run. Dropping 1-2 mph in the second half would not impact my time by that much.

The second aspect of the workout that I liked is that I may have finally solved my cramping issue. Last week I didn’t have any cramping on the 56-mile ride, but I wanted to reserve judgement until I could repeat that. On Sunday I rode for 5 hours without any cramping. I have to think it’s because of my hydration and the fact that I switched to SOS. It is keeping me better hydrated. I did continue to lick salt every 5 miles. For nutrition, I stuck with Golden Oreos. By the end of the ride, I was sick of drinking and eating the same thing.

The weather here is TX appears (at least for now) to have finally pivoted to fall weather. That should make running and riding a lot more pleasant.