What off-season? Early season racers Mentor Group - OPEN! (Page 4)

Good morning everyone!

I hear you about the cold, its was a brutal mid 30's with a stiff wind here in FL this morning (it all relative people we we upper 70's & 80's just the other day!) on the coast and I had to take the dog out for a 4 run.  He loved it, I didn't get warm until 1.3 miles into running with the wind!  All was fine after that.

I setup Golden Cheetah last nice and the new bike is on the trainer throne.  Didn't get in a full wo as I acidentally selected stop instead of pause when I wanted to do a spin down check. After a bit I figured out how to FF the starting point of a wo but at that point it was getting cold in the garage and kids were going to bed (school started back up today) and called it a night to attempt the 5' CP test later today or tomorrow.

I have my 11 week training plan formulated but can't get it the cvs file to upload, so I need to get with the BT powers today to see what's up.

Did you export a blank .csv from BT to ensure you're using the correct format?

Yeah, the two bigger ones are also nice. I tend to use ISLAGIATT more as the breakdown fits into what I like to do better, but think more may like Blender as it has more shorter intervals. 8 min or less, whereas the other has them at least that size. A combination I like is ISLAGIATT and The Wretched. I don't do either at 100% and tend to flatten out the intervals. Meaning I don't attack so hard, staying more around the target power I want. This was that 2:45 ride I did on Saturday.

I do tend to take out or lessen the all out attacks that they have, like the 9 or 10, as I'm using them more for developing threshold power. Some races I'm looking at can have short, steep hills where it will be helpful to have that adaptation, but I'll add some of that back in leading into them. I'll just need to be used to working up at that level out of an already hard effort. No need to try developing a monster sprint. Bike racing needs a few things, but for us it's all about bringing up FTP. I also tend to adjust the intensity of the intervals (and overall for the vid) to what I'm looking for on the day. So it's not often that I'll do them truly all out. This is balanced out with the amount of riding I'm doing.

Which race was this specifically? Curious what it looks like as profiles tend to look worse than they are. That 3 mile section might not even register as a hill when your on it as it's only a 1% grade or so. Especially considering where you are now. Probably just seem like you're going a little bit slow for the effort at most, more so than feel like you're going up anything.

What I'm looking at for the attacks are courses that have repeated very short sections, like 30 seconds or less to get over. The one even has them right after another so it's like being on a roller coaster. Momentum from the last can carry up the next. It's long for a sprint, but still a sprint, so I'll be going quite hard and will want to at least be familiar with going up past threshold and recovering by only dropping back down near it. A bike racer may really light it up, but I still need to run afterward so can't get too crazy with it.

I know what you mean about going after them though. I still become alert and start to push the next pedal stroke when the gun sounds. I think they do have a more tri focused vid in the works, but sounds like it's going to be some type of brick setup. Not sure I'll get it though I have all the others. What are you looking for in something that "eases up" later on? I tend to go out rather evenly paced for the bike (per terrain) and go right up to the end. Maybe in the last minute or so I'll shift down a gear and spin a little faster, but that's about it. The cooldown sections of any vid are plenty long to cover that and I actually go a lot easier there than that last minute of the race.

Found a profile of the course. Seems interesting. Gives a similar impression as what I saw of the Rev3 Carolina course (didn't race it, but looked into it). Just like you said, lots of hills on it, but not necessarily major ones. "Pacing" on that would seem to include being able quickly recognize to vary the intensity across the changing terrain. The variations in the larger interval Sufferfest videos should help with being capable of that, as they'll go from 7.0-8.5 a lot and even 6.0-8.5 in some of the newer ones. Not sure what you're doing, but when I follow the vids more closely I'll use changes of 0.5 as ~5% FTP. Then it'll be doing what you can to have the skill to carry speed into and out of the variations while also managing your power appropriately. Going up and down feels different and with terrain like that it can hide how hard you might be working with so many of them. Developing that feel when you can ride outside will help. That and a higher FTP, which tends to help with everything.

Definitely a course to pace by power or HR numbers...

And, as always, a higher FTP, or at least more W/kg, won't hurt!

I'd set your HRM to auto-lap every so often, and just try to keep the average reasonable. Staring at the instant numbers will drive you insane!

I have a pair that I wear for recovery runs (though one could argue that there is no such thing as a recovery run) and they feel GOOD.

Not for everyone, for sure, but I'm a fan.

I do my tempo runs based on HR - and I auto-lap every mile. I have a screen that just shows current HR on the top, and avg for the lap on the bottom. No pace. No mileage. 

For the bike, a 3-5 mile auto-lap might work well. You may want to keep a current HR display though, to try to avoid hitting really high numbers on climbs. 

OK I'm spent, did the 5 minute power test this morning after not riding for a while. KK virtual power average was 258.  Am not looking forward to 20' test, wait check that, I can't wait to do the 20' test!

I actually tend to look forward to the shorter ones less as they're done at the higher intensity.

Know your T-pace (threshold pace) aka your 100yd pace that you can withstand for 1000yds - or at least have a decent idea of what it would be. Most teams will form lanes based on this pace - and base the practice off of this pace. Though, they might not call it t-pace.

Get there a little early and chat with the coach (if available) or other swimmers to get an idea of how things work. 

Don't lead the lane at first! Get used to the coach and the sets first.

First time at masters I didn't really know my pace as had never really had a clock before. So they put me into the beginner type lane. It was nice the first time to get used to things and then kept moving on up since then. Groups are different, but don't expect lots of coaching like what a youth team (of most any sport) might have. A lot of times the set is written, explained and we have at it. Sometimes the coach will help a bit in more skill oriented sections, walking around the deck. She has been very helpful beforehand or in the warm-up, and after practice in explaining/watching various things whenever anyone asks.

I think I have to get a Swimming Coach.  I have to improve in my stroke and techniques.