Triathlon Europe

One Month to go...

So, one month to go until the big one. In theory I should have some monster miles under my belt following 6 months of focussed and un-interupted training...

In reality things have progressed a little differently. Like pretty much every other first time ironman my training has been interupted by a series of niggling little illnesses and injuries. Nothing serious enough to stop me dead but enough to take the edge off the training and get the little anxiety gremlins chattering. Having said that I have still logged 2300 miles cycling, 440 miles running and 52 miles swimming this year which seems reasonable.

The training programme has certainly really helped to keep me honest, although Fi has had to issue a few more edits than ideal thanks to my fragility. I think that if I had been left to my own devices the numbers listed above would be a lot smaller.

I think the biggest surprise for me in all of this is how mentally wearing some of the training gets. I signed up for the Ironman because I enjoy running and cycling (and was reasonably sure I could learn to tolerate swimming). Because of this I thought the training would be (psychologically) a breeze. As it turns out getting up every saturday to face the prospect of an increasingly familiar 4-6 hour meander through the Surrey Hills is a bit of a drag (although I have always enjoyed the training once I have got going). I think that if I do this again I will enter a lot more sportives and running races - the extra time spent travelling would be more than paid back by the benefits of keeping things fresh.

This is supported by my most ridiculous training session to date - a 2am alarm call followed by an hours drive to swim the Henley Regatta course (2.2km) at sunrise. On the face of it this is kind of stupid - a lot of sleep lost and the distance swum is all wrong but this was easily the most fun I have ever had in a wetsuit and has really got me fired up for the remaining open water sessions in my programme.

Overall I would say that the training has not gone as well as it could but I am still fitter now than I have ever been and I can't say fairer than that. It has been all too easy to get wrapped up in the numbers and forget that I am doing this for fun and for the experience (thanks to the Henley Swim for that timely reminder). As ever the proof will be on the day but looking back I have some awesome moments in the last few months and met some extremely nice people (including several physios unfortunately).

fingers crossed...

The tri season so far....

My tri season is now well underway having completed the Grendon Sprint, Ultra Fit Challenge ³/4 Olympic and the Blenheim Triathlons. 

A lesson learned for 2011: early May is not warm enough to be doing open water tris.  The water temperature at Grendon was a painful 12^o and the air temperature a brisk 9^owhich meant for a very cold, numb race.  In fact, this caused me a major shoe problem in T2 and added minutes to my finish time.  To make matters worse I was suffering with a cold on the race day.  I was quite disappointed with my 1hr 24min time but pleased that I braved the elements and competed.  This race was a World Championships qualifier so it was great to see some top quality triathletes flying past me. 

Next up was my first foray beyond sprint distance, the Ultra Fit ³/4 Olympic at Dorney Lake.  The weather for this one was amazing, 27^o and not a cloud in sight.  Luckily I had spent some time in Australia in March in similar conditions so I felt right at home.  I managed a solid swim and bike with some good transitions.  My run, which is usually my strength, was not as good as usual, and maybe the 3pm heat had started to get to me.  Relatively though my run was pretty good and I managed to get 4th in the 35-39 age group and be 12th individual across the line, finishing in 1:41:20.

My most recent race was the Blenheim Tri, a huge event in an amazing setting.  Once again the English summer didn't disappoint and the temperature was up around the mid to high 20s.  I found this to be a bit a runner's race given the straightforward swim and overcrowded bike leg that would hold back the strong cyclists (which ain't me!).  Overall I got around in 1:17:04 which I was pleased with, almost managing to crack the top 100 males (out of about 3,000) and getting 31st in age group in a field of 660.

 

Next up......

Steel Man Olympic, Dorney Lake, July 4

Dextro ITU Olympic, Hyde Park, July 25
 

You're going all the way to Hawaii to do what?!

Ronan's personal blog of the race can be found here:

http://thehawaiianepisode.wordpress.com/

It ain't over till it's over.

It has been over 6 years since I started running, over 5 years since my first marathon, just over a year since I started swimming and cycling and exactly one year since my first triathlon. In just over a week, I shall be competing in my very first Ironman.

Thinking back on my first marathon, I remember devising a plan to help from a psychological perspective; counting the miles backwards (26, 25, 24, 23...), giving myself treats throughout like a gel when I make it to mile 10 or listening to music for bursts of time. Other inspirations include raising money for a good cause and most importantly, having moral support along the way.

Never underestimate the power of supporters. Write your name on your t-shirt, have a random person scream it out, get yourself a second wind. For me, having friends cheer you on has been invaluable, and this time, my family will be joining me as well.

Reflecting back on my inexperience, at the start line of my first marathon and my first triathlon, I find myself in the exact same situation all over again. Nerves up to my throat and a thumping heartbeat whenever anyone reminds me how close the race is.

"You've done all the hard work, now just enjoy it".

But how does one prepare for an Ironman? Training for starters. In the last six months, I have dedicated 364 hours to training, this is how it breaks down:
1. 150 hours of biking (2,250 miles or 3,600 km).
2. 62 hours of swimming (97 miles or 155 km).
3. 75 hours of running (600 miles or 960 km).
4. 37 hours of strength exercises (gym work).
5. 40 hours of other forms of training (racing, brick sessions, stretching etc.).
That's an average of 15 hours a week, with the peak being 23 hours. So, why the worry?

Well, this is my first Ironman. So the uncertainty is there more than ever. It's not about finishing at a great time, it's not about winning, it's not about breaking a personal best in any of the disciplines, it is about survival and making it to the finish line. As I keep being reminded, an Ironman is not like doubling a 70.3, it's an altogether different endurance race. If you've done the physical training, it's about the mental endurance, being in a positive frame of mind and making sure you can overcome your negative thinking.

So, this is my last blog until the big day, I do hope you have enjoyed reading about my experiences. I promise to write a race review afterwards but until then, please give me all the support you can muster. This can be in the form of "likes" on Facebook, messages, wall posts, texts, emails, calls, physical presence and donations to Keep a Child Alive. Thanks to all those who have had to endure my rants, with me being missing during peak training season and my general unsocial exhaustion! You all mean so much to me, look forward to a beer together soon.

Being disciplined!

  

Discipline: To educate; to develop by instruction and exercise; to train. Or have the whip cracked in your vicinity?!

To achieve your goals as a triathlete..... What does being disciplined really mean?
 
Planning – identifying high priority 'A' category races with performance goals, in combination with races for enjoyment, and a few 'B' races to test out pacing or nutrition strategies. This far into the season it is best to stick to your overall plan and race schedule, in order to maintain the planned progression towards the goals you have identified. If you allow yourself to become side tracked by other people's race plans, then you need to manage your own expectations so you're not disappointed when your recovery, or worse still injury or illness, compromises important training for your 'A' race. Plan time available to train each week, remind yourself of your goals for the season and why you are doing the sport. Discipline is easier to maintain if you can stay focussed on these things!
 
Training – completing your planned/ scheduled sessions consistently which means executing your sessions correctly at the prescribed intensity and duration. Being impulsive with your training is one of the most common cause of injury. Athletes who throw in an extra long run home from work 'because the weather is nice' or to 'get in some extra training before x event' ultimately end up paying their dues being sidelined with injury. If you experience frustration at not being able to train regularly or at a level you desire, then you need to self-reflect on how much of your training is based on impulse rather than a progressive approach. Avoid false economy by playing catch up with sessions, or 'stacking' sessions toward the end of the week, as this greatly impacts on the training - recovery cycle. Eventually this will lead to underperformance in sessions, injury or illness. It is best to address the cause of the problem and look at more creative ways of scheduling your training, and ways to optimise your time so that you can maintain a consistent approach each week! Yes, it's boring having to stick to the plan but remember - there are NO short cuts if you have high expectations of doing your best. Different if you're just doing this sport to 'complete' or for 'a laugh' rather than to 'compete'. Let's face it - nothing worthwhile is ever easy!

Rest - ensuring you have regular rest or planned recovery days. Understanding how much recovery you need as an individual during a given training or race phase, making temporary sacrifices to obtain greater levels of sleep and rest when you need it. Try to listen to your body rather than ignore the signs of fatigue based on the assumption that you can 'normally' manage on 5 hours sleep / night. Working full-time and maintaining a regular training schedule will mean that the body's recovery priorities will eventually catch up with you! Be disciplined about taking you rest days, even if you don't feel you need it on that particular day, make the most of it. Schedule your sports massage to assist the recovery process and check in with your body to identify tightness which could potentially become an issue, enjoy some quality 'down time'
 
Food – Eating a varied and balanced diet, based on unprocessed wholefoods. Ensuring you have adequate protein intake to assist recovery from sessions, regular carbohydrates and hydration methods. Adopting a disciplined approach by regarding all food and fluid as quality fuel, and only eating and drinking what is going to make your body fitter and faster.
 
Feedback – regularly recording your training provides excellent reference data for future training to identify what works well for you as an individual. It can be as simple or as sophisticated a system as you like! Regular recording allows you or your coach to adapt your training accordingly and make adjustments if required, in the short and longer term. The following specifics are useful for feedback after sessions: MHR/ AHR, distance, time, power/ watts, perceived effort, RHR in the morning, weight, general feeling, level of enjoyment and fatigue or stress levels. It takes application to set aside time to record training feedback regularly, many athletes neglect what is essentially a 2 minute admin task which could add significantly more value to the time investment in their training! Who was it who defined insanity as 'doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results'? (Albert Einstein) 
 
Review – think about where you started from before the season, prior performances and strengths and weaknesses. It's important to be disciplined and maintain your expectations for performance centred around what you can do on race day or in training, rather than what other people do. You can only control what you do, not others! Make improvement plans based on developing your weakest areas, comparison of your performances, distance preferences, course profiles, training sessions and most importantly enjoyment! Try to identify what works best for you and what doesn't, and use this readily on any occasion your discipline levels are challenged when training and racing.

As you start to feel the effects of your Spring training and early races, it's easy to allow impulsive training or lack of focus to cause potential issues. There is a cause and effect to everything you do, so make the right decisions as you get closer to your 'A' races this season. Most importantly enjoy your training and racing, and value having discipline in your approach if you want to do well :)

Coach Fi

 

The final countdown

Yes...Its the final countdown!

After months of training preparation, injury and a little bit of sickness.... its 3 weeks to go before my A race of 2010

I missed Swashbuckler due to a stomach bug which rendered me useless for a week... a real shame after a good weeks training in the Pyrenees!

The Chiltern 100 a couple of weekends ago was a tough little ride, some challenging hills over 107 miles that really set me up and wore me out !

I have another week of training before its taper time..... when my next update will be...

Happy training and racing everyone!

Super, Mario!

Four weeks before the big day and I find myself on the run leg of Ironman 70.3 St Polten, the last of many practice races. Sprinting past a number of athletes, the screams from the German-speaking spectators was inspiring. You're going strong, I kept thinking, just a few more kilometres to the finish line.

A few days before heading out to Austria, it was looking unlikely that I would compete in my very first M-dot race. Major obstacles at work, BA strikes and other matters made a simple journey quite stressful. "It would be good to have an official M-dot race under your belt before Nice", said coach Fi, "just so you're aware of the atmosphere and you can practice any strategies, such as nutrition, before your A-race." Boy was she right.

Firstly, if you haven't done an M-dot race, it is like nothing you have experienced before. The crowds, the volume, the quality of the athletes, the bling, it's overwhelming and very intimidating.

For this race, I was trying out the following for the first time: carbon race wheels (complete with tubular tyres as opposed to standard clinchers), compression calf guards and concentrated nutrition with profile bottle during the bike leg. (The latter involves formulating a concentrated liquid of about four portions, marking the bottle and creating the mixture in your profile bottle with the water that's handed out during the race).

Arriving at the hotel late on Friday evening (after our chartered Titan Airways flight from London to Vienna), I assembled the bike with the kind help of Martin Lynch (a few team members of Triathlon Europe got there the day before). Part of the preparation was figuring out a way to carry a tubular tyre with me (these cannot fit into a normal saddle bag). Folding the tyre four times and placing a gas cannister and lever into it, I taped the entire mass to my seat post. "There's a one in a million chance of getting a flat on tubular tyres".

We got to the race site for preparation on Saturday morning. Unlike other races, this event operated with clean transitions (just like Ironman France); your kit is kept in bags within the transition areas with space to change in tents, therefore no clutter around the bikes. Three bags were provided: "Street Wear", "Bike" and "Run". With the exception of your Street Wear bag, all had to be filled and handed in the day before the race. There is no room for error.

On the morning of the race, we arrived with plenty of time to get to our bikes and fill our water bottles. Nothing was left for us to do but get changed into our swim wear and prepare for the start. Martin and I were part of the first wave, we changed and got to the start line just in time to see the pros head out 5 minutes before us, soon enough, I was bobbing up and down in the water, ready to go.

Swim - 35:29

Nervously waiting for the countdown, I stared to my left and at the bank we stood on before entering the water. It was full of first wave participants, looking to my right, ahead of me and behind me, I realised I was smack in the middle of the action with little room to manoeuvre. Not good. The gun went off and the first thing I felt was a kick in the jaw, followed by a slap in the face. Carnage. My goggles came loose and filled with water. I swam a few metres ahead and let people go by, sticking to the side of the pack, I swam the rest of the distance comfortably.

Transition 1 - 8:28

Out of the water and into transition area 1. Some athletes had put flowers on their bags to differentiate it from the masses. I grabbed my bag and headed into the tent. It was a windy and muggy day, do I take my gloves or not? I packed everything into this bag, from leg warmers to the kitchen sink. Why? I could not find my gloves. Tipping everything onto the floor, I managed to scramble around and retrieve them.

Bike - 3:01:45

Off and away, 90km of flat with an 8km hill towards the end of the ride, racing with tubs felt great and my average speed was 32kmph. 20km through, a man in a police bike zoomed by screaming and pointing at my rear wheel. I had a flat. It took me 14 minutes to change my tub, a notoriously time consuming process. Inflating the tire was also a nightmare, I finished up the gas canister and the wheel was only half inflated. (Later would I realise that my extension valve was not screwed on tight enough). Stuffing the old tyre into my back pocket, I decided to go ahead and finish the bike course with caution. "Watch out on corners with tubs that aren't fully inflated, they could come off the rim".

Transition 2 - 4:03

Into the transition area and time to switch tops. (Completely inefficient, will not happen on race day as I shall compete in a two piece tri suit). Smoother than T1, I head out onto the last leg of the race looking forward to my strongest discipline.

Run - 1:30:13

About 8km into the run course, I decide to take a gel. Reaching into my back pocket, I feel around and find nothing. They must have fallen out into the bag. At the next aid station, I grab a Powerbar gel, shoving its contents into my mouth, I gag and spit it out again. It was a tough run but I pushed ahead despite my depleting energy levels. What else could go wrong?

A few kilometres to the finish line, the crowds were still strong. I ran past Mario, a slightly heavier athlete. "Zupa, Mario!" came a shout from the spectators "Zupa, Tarek!". Despite all the technicalities of triathlon racing, and all the hours of training, it is almost impossible to predict what will happen on the big day. Regardless, we can enter the race prepared, by listening to our coach and focusing on our goals. After all, this is a choice for most of us, we have to approach it with an open mind, willing to learn from our mistakes as well as experiences. Oh, and a little bit of comedy helps along the way.

The Beaver Triathlon 2010

Ed raced the Beaver middle distance Triathlon on Saturday 29th May, finishing 5th in age group in 4:40:44. His splits were: Swim 31:51, Bike 2:26:22, Run 1:36:43

results link

Race report:

The drive out to Beloir castle for the Beaver middle distance tri was daunting with rain hammering the windows of the car and the prospect of 5 hours of running, swimmimg and cycling doing little to lighten the mood.
The little beaver race (Olympic distance) was run first and we were greeted by hordes of cold triathletes advising us to ensure we have something warm for the bike... on investigation, I had forgotten both my  arm warmers and gloves.... not a great start!
The race had an unusual start in the shallow Belvoir castle lake.  Unusual in that it was so silty the water was actually black  in certain points.
My swim progressed unremarkably (aside from only getting in the water 10 seconds before the start) and I exited into T1 all ready for the cycle.
The cycle course was technical and really did not play to my strengths.  Due to a recent knee injury getting out the saddle on the bike is tough and anything that involves downhills has me reduced to a nervous wreck with very tired fingers from constantly grabbing the brakes.  Needless to say, my bike leg was less than outstanding.
..and onto the run (the fun part)....
It’s always a pleasure  leaving the bike behind and heading out onto my strongest discipline.   Passing quite a few people I really enjoyed the run leg... the only downside was its length.  While keeping a very keen eye on my Garmin, I was really disappointed to see the 21.1km barrier past with still the biggest hill of the course to go and 10 minutes of running left.  I briefly debated staging a sit down protest to mark my frustration to the race organisers, but instead opted to plough on.
All in all, a great days racing... (made even more so, but pipping my brother to the line by 2 minutes!!)