SBR Utopia ~~~~ Permanently OPEN!! (Page 79)

Yes, I did for a short time - mostly to prove to myself that I could.  

Cripes, that looks more crowded than last year!  Did they try to squeeze in another row of racks?

90 minute run on the schedule for me today.  That and trying to talk myself out of buying a Tririg Omega brake.

Not too different here either. I didn't have power at the time, but was using HR. Had to up in or near the top gear to get in a hard workout, and these were bigger 20' sets. There is a fan option on mine that does add more resistance, but the improved roller feel was lost and that fan was seriously loud. Having the TV or music on wasn't much help. I got tired of the on edge balancing all the time too. It did help improve reaction timing, but it didn't quite match how the bike handled outdoors. Since I don't lean into a turn on the rollers I still had to practice that outside to actually be good at it there.

Raced a half marathon this morning....it was mostly in an effort to get a "baseline" and attempt to make some improvements over the next 12 weeks until my January HM.  I paced it kinda poorly (mostly because I really had no idea what I was capable of, given that I've never run a stand alone race longer than a 5k!), but learned a good deal and am happy with the result.  Will write up a RR later.  

My flip turns used to be quite awful, but after my last race this season, I decided to put in some time to improve them (swam some slower paces and focused on them rather than worrying about hitting intervals).  It took a couple weeks for them to feel natural and I still want to revert back to my sloppy turns on occasion, but they're quite a bit better now.  Not sure how much time savings they've given me (probably none!), but they look and feel better.  I haven't figured out how to make them "fast" yet.

It cannot be physically more crowded than last year....   that's nuts....  Biggest transition area I've ever seen including IMAZ

Originally posted by mndymond Ran about 8k with a friend today. Its getting to be a bit cold now....it actually snowed at higher altitude....all the cars coming into town have snow on the tops... On the plus side I bought some skate skis, boots and poles at the ski swap in town yesterday for $125....so maybe snow would be okay....I'm pretty impressed with my deal. Haha

That does sound impressive!

Have missed seeing both him and his brother up front more!

That's good to hear.

And we have an ice bath thread to kick off the week.

Power testing question - how do you guys/gals find you end up pacing them?  I used to go out close to my previous number and try to hold that over the entire duration while adding to it a little bit.  But, the last couple of tests have both gone well and I found my power increasing over the whole 20min.  Yesterday:

1st 5min - Avg 255
2nd 5min - Avg 258
3rd 5min - Avg 266
4th 4min - Avg 272
Last min - Avg 300

Looking at the first 10min, I wonder if I should aim to push those just a little more, or if I'm really hitting the effort just right.  The other thing I'm doing is covering up my power number.  I check it for the first couple of min to make sure I'm getting up to a reasonable wattage and then throw a towel over the Garmin and just focus on the cadence number on the computer screen.  The goal throughout is to slightly increase the rpm - so yesterday I started out at around 87 but before the final minute push had gotten up to about 91.  At 10min I took a peek a the power number to make sure I was in fact on track, and then covered it back up till the final 2min.

Happy with the past couple of test results, just wondering if anyone thinks this approach may be leaving a few watts on the table during the first 10min.

What is your warmup and how do you feel at the end of the test?

Neil...what testing protocol are you using?  Are you doing the 5' blowout, or just a warmup (with some short efforts in there) and then the 20' test?

I have never done the test with the 5' blowout, but rather a 30-35' warmup that builds to Z3, then 5x1' that slowly increases with each rep with the first 1' at 30w below target, and the last one 5-10w above target.  It's the same way I warm up for short TTs.

From my experience, your pacing is pretty close to what I would shoot for.  Maybe a tad on the conservative side, but generally my first 10' is about 2-3w below my overall target and the last 10' is 2-3w above target.  For sure the last 60-90 seconds is going to be higher as that's when you're unloading whatever you have left.  It seems you were about 5w below your overall average the first 10' and 5w above the last 10', so you're in the ball park and probably could have squeezed out a couple more watts, but it's still a good test.  Its probably unlikely you could have gone 6-8w higher overall unless you felt really good at the end.

I like to play these tests a hair on the safe side.  Because the purpose of the test is a test of fitness to guide other workouts, I rather be a hair under maximum and can adjust for it than completely blow up at the 15' mark and not really know what I could have held the entire 20'.  Also...just for motivational purposes, it's a lot easier to suffer the last 10' when you know power is slightly increasing rather than slightly slipping away.

Anyone have any experience with gout?  Ball of foot and side of big toe very sore.  Woke up yesterday with the pain, and no one incident that would have caused it.  At first I thought plantar fasciitis, but that is usually at the heel and arch.  Not fun

The other day I reached out to a friend of mine for some swim help. He finished 3rd in the M45-49 at IM WI last month with a 10:01 and had a 50:52 swim split. I think next year will be his 3rd trip to Kona.  He said he'd be happy to do some one on one work with me so I will meet him at the Y tonight.  If I can fix my swim issues I might have a fighting chance at KQ one of these times.  I have no delusions that there is a silver bullet but I'd like to know if there are glaring issues with my stroke.  Fingers crossed.

Originally posted by mndymond Ran about 8k with a friend today. Its getting to be a bit cold now....it actually snowed at higher altitude....all the cars coming into town have snow on the tops... On the plus side I bought some skate skis, boots and poles at the ski swap in town yesterday for $125....so maybe snow would be okay....I'm pretty impressed with my deal. Haha

Awesome! Skate is pretty much the closest thing you can get to running without actually running. Plus I mean, c'mon, warming huts? I plan on doing a lot more skate/cross country this year. I also just finished my splitboard so I can do some backcountry touring. 

Just an update to my personal weight accountability...

I've been using myfitnesspal for 2 full weeks now and it's helped at least make me aware of stuff I'm putting in my mouth.  I've tightened down some, but still some work to be done.  I'm down about 1 pound in 2 weeks, which may not seem like a lot, but my body always seems to be 2-3 weeks late on changes.  What I mean by that is if I start eating really bad, I usually won't gain weight for 2-3 weeks.  And if I start eating well and exercising more, the weight doesn't start coming off until 2-3 weeks later.  So the fact that I just came off a 2 week vacation where I ate poorly and did very little workouts...I probably should have gained 2-4 pounds by now...but instead lost 1.    And hopefully the better eating habits recently will start to show soon.

Anyway...back to your scheduled programming.

I looked at some of your past race results.  You seem to average in the 1:15 range.  But you posted a 1:08 at Canada 2010, and a 33 at the triple T half last year.  So you do have a higher gear... not sure why it's not more consistent.  It could be a technique thing that's changed on you and maybe he will help iron it out.

Were you doing anything different in training leading up to those races where you were faster?