Post 61 - Here we go again...

...And so the 2015 season starts. I’ve been playing catch-up all week after the flight nightmare last Sunday. It’s been straight back into typical London chaos, into regimented days, long commutes, tough times at work, and trying to train and do everything else I need to do. I hope the weeks that follow aren’t as crazy as this week has been… I hope also that this will finally be the year…

The delayed and diverted flight meant I didn’t get anything done last Sunday evening, and I only had 3-and-a-half hours of sleep, which I didn’t manage to properly catch up during the week. On Monday after work, I prioritised getting food into the house, and then cooking for the rest of the week. The unpacking could wait.

From a training point of view, I had planned one moderately intense week this week, not doing too many miles and not pushing too hard. This would ease me back into it, and allow my body to re-adjust to the 6:20am alarms and to the training load. Then I planned an easy week, and after this I’d be back into my usual two tough weeks followed by one easier week. However, a planned work trip to Italy has scuppered this plan, and so I’ll be doing two tough weeks in a row followed by an easier week which will be spent in Italy. I’d rather not do two tougher weeks in a row for my first two weeks, but I’ll just have to be very careful in listening to my body and not overdoing it.

On Tuesday after work, I prioritised training. The unpacking could wait. I usually do a tempo ride - basically a hard blast on the turbo for anything between 60-80 minutes, followed by a run. On Tuesday, I did a 5-minute warm-up, then cranked it up. I went hard but not too hard for 50 minutes, and then cooled down for 5 minutes. I’m annoyed that my power meter hasn’t yet been delivered, I ordered it ages ago and should have had it before Christmas. I wanted to start off this year with the power meter installed onto my bike. It’s currently estimated to arrive by the end of January. Bah.

I didn’t follow this tempo-turbo with a run, as it was freezing outside and I want to avoid getting a cold. I also wanted to make sure I didn’t go too hard this week, overdo it, and end up injured. Then I ate, and then I went straight to bed with nothing unpacked yet. My legs did not feel normal at all after this ride, they were very tired and heavy, and my muscles were aching. They are usually fine after this type of session. I hadn’t done much hard riding for a good long while, and my legs just weren’t used to it. They will come good again soon…

Ready for the first session of the season

 

On Wednesday I had an early medical appointment before work to see about my chest and breathing. This meant I was a bit later getting into work, and therefore had to stay a bit later at work in the evening. The doctor thought I had costocondritis – unexplained inflammation of the cartilage linking the ribs to the breastbone. Apparently nothing to worry about. I ended up using my medical insurance to get a referral to see a specialist in a couple of weeks, and hopefully this will put my mind at rest.

So, I didn’t get home until late on Wednesday. Fortunately, my schedule only called for a 5-mile fartlek run, so I was able to get this done, shower, eat, and then unzip the suitcase to dig out the new shirts and trousers I bought over Christmas – over £200 spent on something I didn’t particularly want to buy, but sort of had to. Think what else I could have bought… £200 would not be much more than one-third of the cost of entering an Ironman triathlon. Anyway, the shirts and trousers had been crumpled up in a suitcase for four days and so needed a bit of treatment. Try ironing six shirts, two pairs of trousers and a couple of t-shirts, when all you want to do is go to bed. It took ages. It’s OK though, I am an iron man… Then it was off to bed, I still hadn’t unpacked and my room now looked like a hurricane had just hit it.

Chia seed stuff that arrived during the week. I'm interested to see what they are like.
"Chia" means "strength" in Aztec parlance...

 

On Thursday I got home after work, stretched, got on the turbo trainer, and did my training. Thursdays are usually bike intervals done on the turbo, followed by a short run. I did seven sets of 5 minutes hard and 5 minutes easy. I was able to push a fairly high resistance without elevating my heart rate too high, which was a positive sign. But again my legs were painfully letting me know how unused to this punishment they were, and how much they wanted to stop. It was the old “mind versus body” argument. The mind won. As Jens Voigt says, “Shut up legs!”

Again I didn’t run after this bike session. I showered, ate, and finally got unpacked. I got through Friday at work, and then hit the pool. I planned to cruise through 2.5km, maybe even 3km if I felt good. It was tough to get into the pool, it was cold and I was being my usual wimpy self. Once I got going though, I felt really good in the water, and ended up doing 3.1km. On the turn at the shallow end, I’m able to get a glimpse of the timing clock which hangs over the deep end. So this means I can get an idea of my pace. Towards the start of the session, I was doing 1:34 per 100m. This dropped to 1:38 and 1:39 per 100m by the end, but I was pleased that I felt good in the water.

Then I bought more food at the shop, got home, and forced myself onto the turbo for my single leg drills. These are both tough and tedious. I hadn’t done single leg drills for about 4 months and wasn’t sure how they would go. The idea is that you pedal with one leg only, with the other leg resting on the turbo trainer frame. This promotes a smooth pedalling action, right through the full circle, ensuring that you push down, pull back at the bottom, lift up, and kick through the top, fluidly and without any “dead spots”, where no power is being transmitted. The dead spots come when you are not engaging any power through the cranks, and the goal is to eliminate these dead spots. You know you’ve hit a dead spot when you hear the “clunk” as the drivetrain re-engages transmitting power to the rear wheel. When I started doing these single leg drills last year I was clunking away, particularly with my left leg. As I persevered, I became much smoother and the clunks stopped.

I thought I might be clunking regularly again on Friday evening – don’t I live the dream? I was actually pretty good, only a couple of clunks. I was happy with that. I somehow managed to summon the energy to cook for the weekend. It was either cook or go hungry. By 9:30pm on Friday night I was flopped in bed, looking forward to a 13-hour sleep. Truly living the dream.

I did the sleeping justice, and over 13 hours later, clambered out of bed, had my breakfast, did my stretching, and got on the turbo. Saturdays are usually long rides followed by short runs. The Saturday turbo rides are sometimes over four hours. I did just over two hours this time, trying to make sure that this week was not too tough. Following the 25 minute run after the turbo, I was knackered and felt my left knee was a bit niggly. Perhaps my body was saying “What the heck has this week been all about?!” After all, it has been over four months since I did this kind of rigorous training.

I was grateful I had another opportunity to catch up on my sleep and having lived the dream on Friday night, I set about doing the same for Saturday night. It was good… On Sunday morning I got up and headed for the pool. It was so quiet. Brilliant. I did sets of 250m, reasonably hard, with a 1-minute break. By the last set, I was swimming slower than 1:40 per 100m, which was a bit disappointing, but probably more an indication that my swim pacing is really poor. Then I went out for a run. I did 60 minutes, with the middle 30 minutes a bit harder. I did a lot of this in a local park, and was only assaulted by one dog. I can’t believe how irresponsible some dog owners are.

Hopefully I’ll get an early night again tonight. Work was absolutely crazy this week and it looks like it’s going to be crazy for a while. But in terms of how I’m positioned from a fitness point of view, I’m looking better off now than I was at the same time last year. I know that if I can get back to the same level that I reached in the summer last year, I’ll have a good chance of qualifying for Hawaii. If I can get into better shape (and I’d like to think that this is possible), then I’ll have an even better chance. So far so good. After my last training session this week, I weighed myself. My current empty weight was 67.2kg.

 

67.2kg is quite light for this time of year. I’ve got through the off-season well. I didn’t have to put on my “winter” trousers (with a larger waist size) in the run-up to Christmas. In the previous off-season, in late 2013, I had to get bigger trousers as my weight was maybe something like 73kg. So I’ve kept the weight off well, and I’ve kept a good level of fitness. I will need to be very careful not to peak too soon, and not to get too light. My swimming is stronger than this time last year, when I was struggling to do even 1km without a break. During this week, I did 3.1km easily without a break.

My cycling feels good, and with living in such a good house with my turbo trainer in my room, I’ll be able to spend all of January and February doing really good, regular turbo sessions. In January and February last year, I was in a different house-share, with the turbo in the freezing cold garage. This meant that I wasn’t able to properly structure my training until late February last year when I moved house. Again I’ll need to be careful not to do too much too soon, and be careful to avoid burn-out.

My running is a bit of an unknown. I had two disappointing races over Christmas that were worse than the year before, but then I had the really good run on the beach at the very end of the Christmas holidays this year. The 17:56 run. If that’s a true indication of where I’m at, I’ll take it. I’ve had another look at my diet. I’ve added a few things, and taken a few things out. I hope to set up a regular session with a sports physio. I hope I can stay injury-free and illness-free, no colds, no coughs. Let’s see what happens.

Morning fuel: porridge with banana, almonds, brazil nuts,

dates, raisins, chia seeds, flax seeds and honey.

Training done this week was as follows:

Monday 5^th January 2015: Rest
Tuesday 6^th January 2015: 1 hour turbo (50 minutes hard)
Wed 7^th January 2015: 30 minute fartlek run
Thurs 8^th January 2015: 1:15 turbo (7 x 5mins hard, 5mins easy)
Friday 9^th January 2015: Swim 3.1km, 1:05 turbo (single leg drills: 10 x 2mins left, right, both)
Saturday 10^th January 2015: 2:05 turbo, 25 minute run
Sunday 11^th January 2015: Swim 3k (12 x 250m), 60 minute run (30mins harder)

Totals: Swim 6.1km, Bike 120 miles, Run 17 miles