Post 88 - Off the scale

All the training has been done at this stage. From a “training” point of view, all that’s left to do is keep myself ticking over, nothing too tough, just some easy swims, easy spinning and easy jogging. All low-risk. If anything goes wrong now, or if I get an injury, or pick up an illness or a bug, there’s no time left to recover from it. It’s quite a stressful time to be honest, all the work and training and time and effort and money and thinking and planning and everything else, it all comes down to one race weekend and one day where everything needs to be perfect. It’s not like I can try again “next week” if something goes wrong. Ironman racing, and trying to qualify for Kona, is pretty unforgiving; you can’t race them every week, for lots of reasons: physical, mental, logistical, and financial.

From an “everything else” point of view, I’ve been working on/thinking about the following: race weekend logistics, food planning and buying, cleaning my bottles, sorting out new tyres, organising a bike service, sorting out race nutrition, looking repeatedly at the long-range weather forecast and working out what race clothing I’ll wear, contacting the hotel to make sure I get a quiet room and to make sure they’ll be able to keep my food in their fridges and heat it up when I need it, drinking lots, taking beetroot juice shots, salting my food, trying to get as much sleep as possible, stretching, checking all my batteries are full and software is up to date for my power meter, heart rate monitor, bike computer and running watch, checking to make sure that all my “spares” are OK (spare tubes with valve extenders, tyre levers, pump, cartridges and adaptor), sorting out my elastic laces and making sure they are the right tightness, and making sure all the paperwork I need is in order. So much to think about. So much to sort out. 

 

Where my bike normally lives. Needs a pre-race service now...

Monday this week was a reasonable day, I got through work, went to the supermarket on the way home, bought loads of food, went home, cooked for the week, ate, watched the Tour de France, and went to bed. 13 days until Ironman. 

Tuesday was a bad day. Three guys at work who had been off on Monday were now back. Two had chest infections, and one had a snotty cold. All three sit within 2 metres of me. This was an absolute nightmare. Very difficult to deal with. From an immune system point of view, I’m probably on a knife-edge. I’m at my physical peak, and I’m likely very prone to picking up an illness or a bug, which would literally ruin my whole year. I’ve had enough years and races ruined in the past few years. I don’t want another disaster. I scheduled a few meetings in different parts of the office and stayed away from my desk as much as I could. I didn’t train on Tuesday night. 12 days until Ironman.

Wednesday was no better. Cough cough, hack hack, sneeze sneeze, snot snot. I was absolutely convinced that I was going to get sick. It was a dead cert. Sitting where I was, with two chest infections and one cold in very close proximity, I may as well have said to a doctor, “Inject me with chest infection germs and sneeze all over me…” I was going crazy. Probably the most stressed I've ever been. And I don't get stressed easily, I'm pretty resilient. Whether psychological, whether stress, or whether for real, I didn’t feel great going home after work on Wednesday. I did some easy training, seriously overdosed on the Vitamin C, and went to bed. Would I wake up sick the next morning? 11 days until Ironman…

 

Read the small print... hasn't happened to me yet...

I decided to take the rest of the week off work. This really is a unique circumstance that I am in, a once-in-a-lifetime thing, something I have worked so hard for, and something which has knocked me back time after time. I don’t want to be knocked back again. Going into work was going to seriously jeopardise it all. What would I do if I got a chest infection, or even a cold? I’d never forgive myself. So I stayed away. I hate being off work for no real reason. But that’s what I had to do. 

On Thursday I slept in, and I discovered that another colleague had called in sick. I guess I made the right decision. I did some more easy training: a 30-minute spin on the turbo trainer, and a 30-minute run on grass in the park. I stopped the run early as I could feel that my left knee didn’t quite seem to be 100%. Argh. For the next few days I would walk up and down stairs like a crab, avoiding putting weight through my left knee.

I was feeling pretty hacked off with wondering if I would get sick, not being in work, and now a knee that didn’t feel right. So I decided to give myself a natural boost and I went outside to sit in the sun. It was hot. I took my top off, thinking I’d get as much sun on my skin as possible. I’m usually very careful in the sun. I only spent about 30 minutes outside. And I got sunburned, on the tops of my shoulders. Argh. I didn’t realise until I took a shower later that evening and it hurt like crazy. To be fair, it wasn’t bad sunburn, it didn’t stop me from sleeping, but it was another thing I could have done without. I used loads and loads of E45 moisturising cream, and hoped for the best. 10 days until Ironman…

On Friday I used my time to sort out a few things. I searched through the bag that contains all my bike “ancillaries” and sorted out my spare tubes, valve extenders, bottle velcro, batteries and software updates. It all took ages. And my phone decided to pack it in halfway through a software update, and this took 2 hours on the phone with Apple’s customer services to put right. More hassle. 

 

Sorting tyres and tubes

I finally went for a swim later on Friday. As tough as the training is, it’s often the easy part… I swam a good warm-up, a 400m flat-out time trial, and a good warm-down, making 1500m in total. I swam the 400m in 5:42. I started off with a lane to myself, then after I had just started my 400m time trial, some slow fool decided he belonged in the fast lane, doing breaststroke and backstroke. He might have cost me a couple of seconds.

Still, 5:42 for 400m, not bad, I thought. Then I looked through my records and saw that I swam 400m in 2011 in 5:43. I was swimming 4 sessions per week and 10-15km per week back in 2011, and time constraints now mean that I manage only 2 swim sessions and 6-7km per week. I swam 57 minutes for the Ironman swim in 2011. Would I take a 57-minute Ironman swim next week? I probably would actually… 9 days until Ironman…

I finally got my Chartered Engineer certificates through in the post, from the Engineering Council and the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. The end of a long process, but let’s face it, I still have a career’s worth of learning ahead of me.

It would be a good couple of weeks if I could add a Kona slot to these certs

On Saturday I slept late again. I “only” spent two hours on the turbo, which passed very quickly compared to the 4 and 5 hour epics I have done earlier in the year. I started off at 130 watts (easy peasy) and built up to 240 watts after 70 minutes, then gradually ramped down again. Then I went for a very tentative run, hoping my knee would feel OK. Thankfully it held out. I had some very rare free time for the rest of Saturday, and I made sure I was sitting as much as possible. In front of the TV, inevitably. Tour de France and Wimbledon tennis were on the menu. At 9pm, a film came on. “Ted”. I wanted to watch it, I’ve wanted to see it for ages. What did I do? I went to bed, of course. 8 days until Ironman… it’s not often you only have 8 days until Ironman…

On Sunday I went to the pool and did a very easy 2km swim. Then I went to the shop and bought all of their flapjacks, and lots of lemons and limes. I drink lemon and lime juice, diluted with a bit of water. It’s good for your insides, and an additional benefit is that it also keeps the skin on your face nice and supple, due to the faces you pull when drinking it. “Gurning”, I think it’s called… 

 

Cool photo of the start of Ironman UK. The iconic mass swim start
is no more at Ironman UK, they are doing a land-based rolling start this year.
A couple of athletes will be released every second.
This means no warm-up in the water, and also that the faster swimmers will
probably be swimming over the top of the slower swimmers in the second lap.

And it means it's not really a "race" any more, but more like a 140.6 mile time trial.

It is what it is...

And that’s it. That has been my week. Not fun. I thought it would be an easy tapering week. And it has been an easy tapering week, but with so many curveballs thrown in. So much hassle and stress and stuff to deal with. I’ve dealt with it all though, I’ve got through the week, and only have a few more days to get through. 7 days until Ironman…

Training done this week:

Mon 6 July: Rest
Tue 7 July: Rest
Wed 8 July: 1 hour turbo
Thu 9 July: 30 min turbo, 25 min run
Fri 10 July: 1.5km swim (400m in 5:42)
Sat 11 July: 2 hour turbo, 25 min run
Sun 12 July: Swim 2km

Totals: Swim 3.5km, Bike 70 miles, Run 7 miles