TDBB; Week1

Ok Week 1 is in the books. Nothing to troublesome but like most training weeks I had to mix it up to get it to all fit in, this is how it all shook out;

Monday – off, check, managed that no problem

Tuesday – The Sufferfest ; Angels, this is all about climbing, a short warm up and some over/unders and then it’s 3 x 8 minute climbs

Angels Ad from The Sufferfest on Vimeo.

Wednesday – Tempo ride; I rode a local loop that has an easy start, some rollers in the middle and then a short sharp climb towards the end. As it’s local it’s something I can rinse and repeat and measure some progress against

Thursday – off, if you say so!

Friday – commuted to work. I am co located between two offices, one is 50 miles away and the other 14 so with a bit of planning I can ride to the local one and use their showers etc. to clean up, there are a couple of nice hills going either way and it’s a good way to get some extra saddle time in without having to do it at 5am or 9pm! This is the ride to work, obviously the ride home is just the reverse

Saturday – The Sufferfest; The Hunted, another climbing ride the meat of which is a solid 20 minutes

The Sufferfest - The Hunted - Trailer from The Sufferfest on Vimeo.

Sunday - a new loop which connects some of my old cycling rides for a 35 mile ride, followed by another 7 miles on my mountain bike as a cool down riding along with TriBeccaTO as she ran. This is the longer ride some nice hillwork in there.

So the totals for the week;

Time	8:32
Distance	121.2
Elevation gain	6,076

No real problems with this, it’s just about time in the saddle and riding terrain which matches the Tour…hills! The only real challenge is that we are currently having our kitchen remodeled and so a lot of the kitchen is in the garage so there is a far amount of set up the trainer and the break down the trainer, it’s a short term issue as a we are getting towards the end of the remodel but it reinforces the “have your kit ready” to use!

Finally no week goes by without something new a shiny catching my attention and this week one of these arrived on my doorstep.

I have yet to unbox it due to the complete lack of space in garage but it will make carrying the mountain bikes an absolute doddle!

The next challenge…

So next up on the agenda is something a little out of the blue, I have signed up for the Tour de Big Bear. It’s a Century ride which in its self is not too onerous, what will be the challenge is that it is at altitude, mostly around 7000’, the website blurb is;

The CLIMB – 100 miles – 7425’ Climbing

Southern California’s most challenging century, this course will duplicate The Grand Tour route over the new bridge, across the Arctic Circle to Snow Valley, back across the Arctic Circle, across the north shore of Big Bear Lake and Baldwin Lake, up and over Onyx Summit, but will extend down the backside of Sugarloaf Mountain into the spectacular Santa Ana River Canyon.  The ride continues down past the Seven Oaks turnoff and turns left and loops up along the edge of the San Gorgonio Wilderness and Jenks Lake.  The return up the backside of Sugarloaf Mountain will test even the most seasoned climbers with a 15 mile ascent before reentering the Big Bear Valley and continuing toward the finish line. Just when you think the climbing journey is over, its back up into the hills as you climb to upper Moonridge with the last short ascent up at about 15% grade at mile 93!!

I obviously need to work on my cycling fitness and need to get some serious miles on my road bike. Given the restrictions I have on time I am using a plan published by The Sufferfest, the only modification will be extending out the long rides on the Sunday to get me some serious saddle time. I am almost at the end of Week 1, I will be posting updates and you can follow my progress on Daily Mile, Garmin Connect and Strava!

Vineman Monte Rio Olympic Triathlon

So I did this race last weekend and you know what it actually went pretty well!

My partner, TriBeccaTO, (wait you knew that right? Oh well buy me a beer and I will tell you all about it one day) had signed up for this way back in February. It’s a new race put on by the group that organizes the Vineman 70.3 and if you signed up early enough it gave you a guaranteed spot to the 70.3 race in 2014, this is a real bonus as that race usually sells out within 10 minutes on line, and as we are both thinking about doing another Ironman next year this is a perfect work up race, any way I digress.

I will spare you all the pre-race and travel details but suffice to say much fun was had during the 600miles, find my Facebook or Instagram feed and you’ll see what I mean!

Anyway race day morning came and thanks to our VIP enrollment when we signed up we got a primo parking spot right next to the start, so it was just a case of final bike prep which always takes longer than you think, a quick, well actually a lot of wriggling into the wetsuit (an additional 10lbs or so has crept on since IMAZ last year and no real training this year hasn’t helped any!) and we were off to the start!

Our plan was for me to be passed by Becca on the swim (she’s a much better swimmer than me) , I would catch her on the bike and then we would run it in together...that was the plan!

Anyway my swim wave went and she was 5 minutes behind me, I splashed my way up the Russian River lamenting that my previously bad swim was now worse! As planned I was passed and finally I exited the water in around 45 minutes, I wasn’t too unhappy as my best Olympic swim time is just over 40 minutes. The run up to T1 was a little challenging, through a parking lot and up a rough road made it a ginger and long run, but finally I was there, wet suit off etc and off on the bike.

We had driven the bike and run course the day before so we knew that the section from M2 to M8 was a pretty rough road and it was. It was here also that I had to stop and adjust my brakes as they were not properly seated on my race wheels and were rubbing, not really a “mechanical” but something that cost me a couple of minutes and evident in my bike splits. Better to stop and fix it rather than lament breaking my wheels etc further in. After this I settled in to the ride and despite a lack of any real aero training it was all very familiar. I saw Becca heading back the other way and she was about 3 miles ahead of me as I approached the 13 mile mark so it was going to be a challenge to catch her at this point. I managed to escape off the bike only being passed by three riders and passing many more although . A reasonable T2 and I was out on the run.

The run was a simple out and back and was along a very shady lane. Despite any real running of late (are you detecting a theme?) I stuck to a pace that was comfortable and just ran, my Garmin 910 was suffering from technical issues and was not displaying any data and so all I had to go with was RPE which turned out to be just fine. At my 2.5 mile mark I saw Becca at her 3.5 mile point so it was unlikely that I would catch her and as my goal was simply to run the entire run section I was happy to stick at my pace and keep going. Again I was picking off people although that thinned out towards the final mile and I was only passed once on the run. With a kick at the end I finished and was done. Of course one advantage of having a faster than you girlfriend is that you stand a good chance of an awesome finishers photo!

So despite any real training I was pleased with my overall performance and now I have a slot for next years 70.3 if I want it.

A few words on the race itself. It’s very well organized as you would expect from folks that put on one of the most popular 70.3s in the country, you get a nice tech shirt and medal. There is a hot breakfast post race which is so welcome! It’s a pretty laid back vibe and while they are very professional they don’t take themselves to seriously. The volunteers are great and there is pretty good sponsorship with Cliff laying on the “on course” goodies. The Russian River is at best shallow. If you are weak or wary swimmer it’s perfect and there are lots of places where you can touch the bottom, in fact some of it is so shallow you have to walk. The ride is pretty with some rolls but no real hills, it’s a bit bumpy in places, but the bulk of it is on freshly laid blacktop and the run is shady and pretty the former, in my mind, is much more important than the latter!

So here are all my details;

As you can see, the swim was meh, the bike better and the run pretty good! Overall from the swim exit to the end of the race I passed over 150 people…it’s not a real surprise but it’s given me food for thought for the next time; duathlon!?!

Onwards…