4, 7, 4, 16
Rain... though shalt not defeat me! Both the medium and long runs were done in light rain. Most likely not a coincidence, these were both also the fastest I've run those lengths. It is not because I want to get out of the rain quicker, because after running through the rain for an hour plus I'm not going to get any wetter if I'm out there 2 minutes longer. It is because I don't get as warm and dehydrated which just exhausts me. Supporting evidence is that I drank a lot less during both of these runs and I felt just fine. Yes, I still re-hydrated plenty but did not need to do as much during the actual run.
This week I only did the medium, second short run, and the long run. As I mentioned in the last post, I was aiming at 13 miles for this long run since I didn't want to jump from 10 to 16. However, I couldn't do just 13 miles since that pesky 0.1 miles to make it a half marathon was just too tempting. It was a great run. I started off stiff and a bit sore, but once I got in the flow then things just went well. With the aforementioned rain, I was able to do my 10 mile check point in 1:56:ish and the entire half marathon in 2:31:48. While I'm not overly concerned about pace, I was happy that it was 11:35 over the course of the entire thing.
Next Week
5, 8, 5, 16
My true goal of this training is to complete the marathon without seriously injuring myself. To that end, I will not be doing the first short run this week either. My body has expressed the need to take that extra time to recover. Along with the gradual ramp-up of the long runs, that one will only be 15 miles since I do want to limit how much I increase every week. Therefore since the medium run and the short runs both went up a mile, I'm not bumping the long run as much. A realistic plan for this week is 8, 5, 15. As a note, the 8, 5, 8 is the longest short/medium run set that the program sets out. It's definitely starting to level out.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Weeks 6-8
Week 6
4, 5, 4, 11
I completed all 4 runs as planned and started seeing my run times coming down. Most of that is related to the weather cooling down.
Week 7
4, 6, 4, 12
I only did the middle runs of 6 and 4 this week. The first run did not happen due to physical illness. The long run did not happen since I chose to spend the day volunteering at Jamestown. Every weekend there is something going on that I would like to be involved in. However, this was the last one that I will do until after the marathon. It is to the point where the prep, run, and recovery are taking more than 4 hours and that is only going to get longer. Plus I tend to be sore/tired for the rest of the day. Therefore I cannot schedule anything on the same day and it would be best not to wear myself out the day before and risk not completing the run.
Another challenge that I started to face this week is the darkness in the mornings. Getting out of my soft bed is hard enough on its own, but when it is still dark out I want to obey my instincts and sleep. For the 6 mile run I ended up doing it during my lunch break at work (yes we have a shower there) so that I didn't need to do half the run in the dark. I did do the 4 mile run while the sun was still coming up.
Week 8
4, 6, 4, 14
This week I only managed the medium and a long run. On both of the short runs I was ill - though with different things. In addition, my long run ended up only being 10 miles since I was still recovering and didn't want to push my body so hard that I relapsed.
To follow up on the darkness issue, I did both of my runs this week well after the sun was up. Though my medium run was after work and I ended up facing the opposite problem where the sun was actually already setting. I chose to do that run through campus since I know it is well lit and figured there would be a few students out. Wow... there were a LOT of students out to the point where running on the sidewalk was actually somewhat difficult to weave in and out of them.
Next Week
4, 7, 4, 16
Those are the mileages put forth by the book and the 16 miles is the first of 3 weeks at that distance. Given that I haven't done more than 11 miles (on purpose), I think for this week I will try to do 13 miles, the following week do 15, and the one after that get up to the 16. I will still do the appropriate short & medium runs.
4, 5, 4, 11
I completed all 4 runs as planned and started seeing my run times coming down. Most of that is related to the weather cooling down.
Week 7
4, 6, 4, 12
I only did the middle runs of 6 and 4 this week. The first run did not happen due to physical illness. The long run did not happen since I chose to spend the day volunteering at Jamestown. Every weekend there is something going on that I would like to be involved in. However, this was the last one that I will do until after the marathon. It is to the point where the prep, run, and recovery are taking more than 4 hours and that is only going to get longer. Plus I tend to be sore/tired for the rest of the day. Therefore I cannot schedule anything on the same day and it would be best not to wear myself out the day before and risk not completing the run.
Another challenge that I started to face this week is the darkness in the mornings. Getting out of my soft bed is hard enough on its own, but when it is still dark out I want to obey my instincts and sleep. For the 6 mile run I ended up doing it during my lunch break at work (yes we have a shower there) so that I didn't need to do half the run in the dark. I did do the 4 mile run while the sun was still coming up.
Week 8
4, 6, 4, 14
This week I only managed the medium and a long run. On both of the short runs I was ill - though with different things. In addition, my long run ended up only being 10 miles since I was still recovering and didn't want to push my body so hard that I relapsed.
To follow up on the darkness issue, I did both of my runs this week well after the sun was up. Though my medium run was after work and I ended up facing the opposite problem where the sun was actually already setting. I chose to do that run through campus since I know it is well lit and figured there would be a few students out. Wow... there were a LOT of students out to the point where running on the sidewalk was actually somewhat difficult to weave in and out of them.
Next Week
4, 7, 4, 16
Those are the mileages put forth by the book and the 16 miles is the first of 3 weeks at that distance. Given that I haven't done more than 11 miles (on purpose), I think for this week I will try to do 13 miles, the following week do 15, and the one after that get up to the 16. I will still do the appropriate short & medium runs.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Week 5
3, 5, 3, 10.
This week certainly didn't go as smooth as I would've liked. The first short run was fine, but I forgot to turn off my watch when I got home. Thus for the medium mile run I had to just estimate based on running time and I did around 4.75 miles. The second short run didn't happen because I was on business travel and planned on doing it when I returned in the evening. I really should've known better that I would be tired. For the long run I decided I would do the Cville 10 miler route since it's a published route and I would like to do it next year. However, I was not familiar with the area and ended up getting lost / turned around. By the time I got it straigthened up, I was about 2 miles off of where I wanted to be. Thus I completed the 10 miles then walked the remaining 2 miles home. Even with all the minor issues, I'm still pushing forward and feel confident that I can complete it if I stick with my training overall.
Next Week
4, 5, 4, 11
It went up by 3 miles this week but since its just the short runs getting longer, the increase on the long run shouldn't be too bad. Maybe I'll actually do the correct 10 miler route and tack on a bonus mile on the end.
This week certainly didn't go as smooth as I would've liked. The first short run was fine, but I forgot to turn off my watch when I got home. Thus for the medium mile run I had to just estimate based on running time and I did around 4.75 miles. The second short run didn't happen because I was on business travel and planned on doing it when I returned in the evening. I really should've known better that I would be tired. For the long run I decided I would do the Cville 10 miler route since it's a published route and I would like to do it next year. However, I was not familiar with the area and ended up getting lost / turned around. By the time I got it straigthened up, I was about 2 miles off of where I wanted to be. Thus I completed the 10 miles then walked the remaining 2 miles home. Even with all the minor issues, I'm still pushing forward and feel confident that I can complete it if I stick with my training overall.
Next Week
4, 5, 4, 11
It went up by 3 miles this week but since its just the short runs getting longer, the increase on the long run shouldn't be too bad. Maybe I'll actually do the correct 10 miler route and tack on a bonus mile on the end.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Week 4
3, 5, 3, 8.
I completed the planned distances although at a slower than normal pace because the average weather when I was running at 7am was 73 and humid. That makes it harder to stay cool and run longer. The long run once again just drained me. I only took 16oz of Gatoraid and 16oz of water with me. Despite that I ran out of energy around mile 5 and the fluid just wasn't perking me up enough. When I got home I realized I had used "Low Calorie" gatoraid which I'm sure was fine for the fluid replenishment portion but I also needed the extra energy from it. Thus I ended up walking the last 3 miles at a 16min/mile pace. That really isn't too bad and if needed I could do that for the entire marathon and still come in below the time cutoff.
As for the Iron Girl Sprint Triathlon I was going to do tomorrow. Due to a variety of reasons, I am choosing not to participate. I'll just be on the 10% of registrants that never show up. Most races actually count on there being about that many who do not attend.
Next Week
3, 5, 3, 10.
The second 3 mile run of the week I will be away on business travel, but hopefully they'll either have a treadmill I can use or some safe roads near by.
I completed the planned distances although at a slower than normal pace because the average weather when I was running at 7am was 73 and humid. That makes it harder to stay cool and run longer. The long run once again just drained me. I only took 16oz of Gatoraid and 16oz of water with me. Despite that I ran out of energy around mile 5 and the fluid just wasn't perking me up enough. When I got home I realized I had used "Low Calorie" gatoraid which I'm sure was fine for the fluid replenishment portion but I also needed the extra energy from it. Thus I ended up walking the last 3 miles at a 16min/mile pace. That really isn't too bad and if needed I could do that for the entire marathon and still come in below the time cutoff.
As for the Iron Girl Sprint Triathlon I was going to do tomorrow. Due to a variety of reasons, I am choosing not to participate. I'll just be on the 10% of registrants that never show up. Most races actually count on there being about that many who do not attend.
Next Week
3, 5, 3, 10.
The second 3 mile run of the week I will be away on business travel, but hopefully they'll either have a treadmill I can use or some safe roads near by.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
3 Weeks down, 13 more to go!
I had intended to do weekly updates, but since week 2 I was gone and had no internet access, you get them all at once.
Week 1
3, 4, 3, 5.
None of the runs seemed too bad. I did the 5 mile run on Friday night instead of Saturday morning and I'm glad I did so that my legs had the over night to rest instead of going straight from running to driving all day.
Week 2
3, 4, 3, 6.
I was camping and very active during this week which threw my running way off. I did 3, 2.5, 0, 6 (though the 6 was technically on the Monday of week 3). The 6 miles kicked my butt in the energy department. The times I've run 5 miles have either been in a supported race where they have water stops & lots of food/drink at the end, or its been cooler. So when I was doing the 6 miles I was starting to run out of energy and need something to drink. Thankfully I knew that the UVA track had a water fountain that I could adjust my route to take advantage of.
Week 3
3, 4, 3, 7.
This week also got adjusted a bit due to returning from vacation and doing the long run of the previous week at the beginning of this week. I did 3, 4, 0, 7. The short & medium runs are starting to get difficult in the mental/motivational department. I have done so many that are that distance over the last few years that I know all the routes and combos near my place really well. Which means I know that from a certain light it is 0.85 miles back to my apartment and for some reason that makes me just really want to be done running. I think its time to start running through more neighborhoods so that I vary the sights and distances.
The 7 mile run went much better than the 6 mile run. Knowing that I have energy issues, a few months ago I picked up a 4-container fuel belt. The front two 8-oz containers I filled with gatoraid and the back two I just filled with water to get used to the weight. The first half mile or so did feel very odd with the liquids splashing up and down, however, I eventually got used to it. I haven't trained a whole lot with drinking liquids while exercising so this time I did 4-oz drinks approximately every 1.5 miles starting at mile 2.5 (so that my last one was at mile 7). I didn't feel nearly as drained this run and mentally I was better able to handle it since my body wasn't fighting my brain for the previous little energy. I was also happy that drinking it in 4oz portions spread out over ~15 minute intervals didn't upset my stomach. Drinking too much all at once can make the liquid slosh in the stomach instead of in the bottles.
Next Week
3, 5, 3, 8.
Unfortunately I still won't be back to a normal week next week. On Sunday 8/23 I'm doing the Iron Girl Triathlon which means I really shouldn't do 8 miles the day before. I'm not going for a great speed in the triathlon, but I do want to be able to finish it without my muscles giving out. I will probably just skip the 8 mile run since in terms of cardio I'll actually be getting a longer work out during the triathlon.
Week 1
3, 4, 3, 5.
None of the runs seemed too bad. I did the 5 mile run on Friday night instead of Saturday morning and I'm glad I did so that my legs had the over night to rest instead of going straight from running to driving all day.
Week 2
3, 4, 3, 6.
I was camping and very active during this week which threw my running way off. I did 3, 2.5, 0, 6 (though the 6 was technically on the Monday of week 3). The 6 miles kicked my butt in the energy department. The times I've run 5 miles have either been in a supported race where they have water stops & lots of food/drink at the end, or its been cooler. So when I was doing the 6 miles I was starting to run out of energy and need something to drink. Thankfully I knew that the UVA track had a water fountain that I could adjust my route to take advantage of.
Week 3
3, 4, 3, 7.
This week also got adjusted a bit due to returning from vacation and doing the long run of the previous week at the beginning of this week. I did 3, 4, 0, 7. The short & medium runs are starting to get difficult in the mental/motivational department. I have done so many that are that distance over the last few years that I know all the routes and combos near my place really well. Which means I know that from a certain light it is 0.85 miles back to my apartment and for some reason that makes me just really want to be done running. I think its time to start running through more neighborhoods so that I vary the sights and distances.
The 7 mile run went much better than the 6 mile run. Knowing that I have energy issues, a few months ago I picked up a 4-container fuel belt. The front two 8-oz containers I filled with gatoraid and the back two I just filled with water to get used to the weight. The first half mile or so did feel very odd with the liquids splashing up and down, however, I eventually got used to it. I haven't trained a whole lot with drinking liquids while exercising so this time I did 4-oz drinks approximately every 1.5 miles starting at mile 2.5 (so that my last one was at mile 7). I didn't feel nearly as drained this run and mentally I was better able to handle it since my body wasn't fighting my brain for the previous little energy. I was also happy that drinking it in 4oz portions spread out over ~15 minute intervals didn't upset my stomach. Drinking too much all at once can make the liquid slosh in the stomach instead of in the bottles.
Next Week
3, 5, 3, 8.
Unfortunately I still won't be back to a normal week next week. On Sunday 8/23 I'm doing the Iron Girl Triathlon which means I really shouldn't do 8 miles the day before. I'm not going for a great speed in the triathlon, but I do want to be able to finish it without my muscles giving out. I will probably just skip the 8 mile run since in terms of cardio I'll actually be getting a longer work out during the triathlon.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Lazyman Success!
This year I successfully completed the Lazyman Triathlon. As of today I did 3.45 miles swimming, 112.19 miles biking, and 46.2 miles running.
Getting the swimming in wasn't too hard because I knew I needed to practice for the Cville Intl Tri. Plus doing the swim part of the triathlon should've given me near a mile (though it ended up being a short this year).
I had more issues with the biking mostly because I wanted to go on Sunday mornings. One time it was a thunderstorm and another Sunday was the triathlon. Thus I ended up trying to go after work a few times but that meant shorter rides. That being said, I still got them all in. It also helps that I'm still in training for the IronGirl Triathlon so I couldn't blow it off as much this year.
The run was clearly the best and I should get another 3 miles in tomorrow (so technically part of the Lazyman time) thus putting me very close to a double marathon in July. I made sure to run 3 to 4 times a week as my version of my pre-training for the marathon training program.
Overall, I'm happy with finishing this year!
Getting the swimming in wasn't too hard because I knew I needed to practice for the Cville Intl Tri. Plus doing the swim part of the triathlon should've given me near a mile (though it ended up being a short this year).
I had more issues with the biking mostly because I wanted to go on Sunday mornings. One time it was a thunderstorm and another Sunday was the triathlon. Thus I ended up trying to go after work a few times but that meant shorter rides. That being said, I still got them all in. It also helps that I'm still in training for the IronGirl Triathlon so I couldn't blow it off as much this year.
The run was clearly the best and I should get another 3 miles in tomorrow (so technically part of the Lazyman time) thus putting me very close to a double marathon in July. I made sure to run 3 to 4 times a week as my version of my pre-training for the marathon training program.
Overall, I'm happy with finishing this year!
Monday, July 27, 2009
Marathon Training Starts Today!
Today is the start of my 16-week training program for the Richmond Marathon. I will be following the program laid out in the book The Non-Runner's Marathon Trainer. It was highly recommended by friends and having read it a number of times (5+), so I think it will be a good program. My goal is just to finish. I have no time goal since just completing it is a large enough challenge and per the advice of the book – I don't want to turn what could be a great victory into a failure just because I missed an arbitrary time by a few minutes.
A quick overview of my next 16 weeks is that I will run 4 times per week. Two short runs, a medium run, and a long run. This first week it is 3, 4, 3, 5 (all in miles). From there it increases each week following the 10% rule which is that the mileage should not increase more than 10% each week so that the body can adjust to the increased strain. The peak week where I do the most miles is 5, 8, 5, 18. That is the most we ever run in a week and is two weeks before the marathon. The last two weeks is about tapering to make sure the muscles are ready for the big day.
Where am I at right now?
Physically I can run 3 to 4 miles four times a week at a ~12min/mile pace and feel comfortable afterwards. I had been running a faster pace as you may have noted in some of my past race reports, but I typically felt terrible afterwards so it was not sustainable for the amount of miles I need to do. By the end I probably will be running faster, but this isn't about the time, it's about the miles.
Mentally I'm both nervous and excited. I'm nervous because that is a lot of miles ahead of me and I know I need to train even on days when it is hot, raining, or sore from a previous run. I know its going to take a lot of motivation to keep going so I'm glad that my friend David is doing the marathon as well and following the same training program. We can keep tabs on each other (aka harass the other one into making sure they are getting their miles in) and commiserate. I'm excited because this will be a challenge unlike any other that I've attempted.
Now off to go run!
A quick overview of my next 16 weeks is that I will run 4 times per week. Two short runs, a medium run, and a long run. This first week it is 3, 4, 3, 5 (all in miles). From there it increases each week following the 10% rule which is that the mileage should not increase more than 10% each week so that the body can adjust to the increased strain. The peak week where I do the most miles is 5, 8, 5, 18. That is the most we ever run in a week and is two weeks before the marathon. The last two weeks is about tapering to make sure the muscles are ready for the big day.
Where am I at right now?
Physically I can run 3 to 4 miles four times a week at a ~12min/mile pace and feel comfortable afterwards. I had been running a faster pace as you may have noted in some of my past race reports, but I typically felt terrible afterwards so it was not sustainable for the amount of miles I need to do. By the end I probably will be running faster, but this isn't about the time, it's about the miles.
Mentally I'm both nervous and excited. I'm nervous because that is a lot of miles ahead of me and I know I need to train even on days when it is hot, raining, or sore from a previous run. I know its going to take a lot of motivation to keep going so I'm glad that my friend David is doing the marathon as well and following the same training program. We can keep tabs on each other (aka harass the other one into making sure they are getting their miles in) and commiserate. I'm excited because this will be a challenge unlike any other that I've attempted.
Now off to go run!
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Cville Int'l Tri Race Report
Today was the Cville International Triathlon. As I've mentioned in previous posts, I was on a relay team with two of my coworkers. I was doing the swim part.
We arrived on site this morning at a little before 6. First thing I did was check in and pick up my packet since I had not done it on Saturday. Normally I do pick these up early so I can make sure I have everything prepped with my race number, but for swimming they only write the number on you so all I could've picked up was my race cap.
For the next hourish I just hung around and chatted with folks. At 7:15 they held the prerace meeting down on the beach. They announced that the water temperature was 80 degrees so wetsuits could be worn but would disqualify the person from any prizes. I was just happy that the water was that warm since the air temperature was only about 65 degrees.
Due to the relatively few participants, there was only 3 starting waves for the swimmers, 4 minutes apart. The first wave was men 34 and under, Clydsedales, and relay teams. Second wave was all the women, and third wave was men 35 and over. A couple minutes before 7:30 my wave entered the water and walked/swam out to the starting point. Even though some of us weren't quite there yet they started promptly at 7:30.
During the initial rush I was kicked and run into a few times, but after that I was mostly out of the pack. I tried to keep a balance between pushing hard and not fighting the water (which happens when I push too hard). The swimming itself wasn't a huge strain, it was spotting the buoys that got me. As often as possible I tried to keep another swimmer within a few feet so I could either see them when my head was in the water or I could see the bubbles from their kick. This helped me feel like I was somewhat more on track.
When I got out of the water I gave the run up the hill all of my power. I dashed past an older man who was jogging and clearly saving strength for later. Since I had nothing else to do after handing off the chip I pushed as fast as possible. Midway up the hill I looked for David to make sure he was ready. He wasn't by his bike since I had told him it would take me about 35 minutes and it was only 27 minutes. I called out to him and he headed to his bike to grab the rest of his stuff. We swapped the chip and he was off.
After talking with other folks and getting a sense of average times, we concluded that the course was probably only ~1200m long. Thus everyone was coming out faster than expected. Open water lake courses like these are just hard to get consistent since the buoys can drift some despite being on anchors. Also some estimation is used as to where to place them.
The bike portion was 24ish miles and David gave an estimate of 90 minutes for him to complete it. After I handed off the chip I started my stop watch so we had an idea of when to expect him back. In the mean time, I changed, wandered around, chatted with folks, and cheered on the people who returned sooner than he did (both because they were better bikers but also were out of the swim well before me). Right on time he came in at 89 minutes and handed the chip off to Will.
We once again played the waiting game and timed when he left. Since the run is two loops we could get a sense when he would finish based on when he came around the first time. He passed by the first time at 28 minutes so we expected him to finish right around 56. His running was very consistent and he passed the finished line after 56 minutes.
Overall we completed the triathlon in just under 3 hours. I'm happy with how we did. We had no prayer of winning it since the first two relay teams had their bikers come back about an hour after David went out. They were much quicker out of the water and on the bike. That being said, we weren't last. I may have been the last relay swimmer out of the water, but David was able to pass one of them on the road. Will kept that advantage through the run.
All said, it was a pleasant morning.
We arrived on site this morning at a little before 6. First thing I did was check in and pick up my packet since I had not done it on Saturday. Normally I do pick these up early so I can make sure I have everything prepped with my race number, but for swimming they only write the number on you so all I could've picked up was my race cap.
For the next hourish I just hung around and chatted with folks. At 7:15 they held the prerace meeting down on the beach. They announced that the water temperature was 80 degrees so wetsuits could be worn but would disqualify the person from any prizes. I was just happy that the water was that warm since the air temperature was only about 65 degrees.
Due to the relatively few participants, there was only 3 starting waves for the swimmers, 4 minutes apart. The first wave was men 34 and under, Clydsedales, and relay teams. Second wave was all the women, and third wave was men 35 and over. A couple minutes before 7:30 my wave entered the water and walked/swam out to the starting point. Even though some of us weren't quite there yet they started promptly at 7:30.
During the initial rush I was kicked and run into a few times, but after that I was mostly out of the pack. I tried to keep a balance between pushing hard and not fighting the water (which happens when I push too hard). The swimming itself wasn't a huge strain, it was spotting the buoys that got me. As often as possible I tried to keep another swimmer within a few feet so I could either see them when my head was in the water or I could see the bubbles from their kick. This helped me feel like I was somewhat more on track.
When I got out of the water I gave the run up the hill all of my power. I dashed past an older man who was jogging and clearly saving strength for later. Since I had nothing else to do after handing off the chip I pushed as fast as possible. Midway up the hill I looked for David to make sure he was ready. He wasn't by his bike since I had told him it would take me about 35 minutes and it was only 27 minutes. I called out to him and he headed to his bike to grab the rest of his stuff. We swapped the chip and he was off.
After talking with other folks and getting a sense of average times, we concluded that the course was probably only ~1200m long. Thus everyone was coming out faster than expected. Open water lake courses like these are just hard to get consistent since the buoys can drift some despite being on anchors. Also some estimation is used as to where to place them.
The bike portion was 24ish miles and David gave an estimate of 90 minutes for him to complete it. After I handed off the chip I started my stop watch so we had an idea of when to expect him back. In the mean time, I changed, wandered around, chatted with folks, and cheered on the people who returned sooner than he did (both because they were better bikers but also were out of the swim well before me). Right on time he came in at 89 minutes and handed the chip off to Will.
We once again played the waiting game and timed when he left. Since the run is two loops we could get a sense when he would finish based on when he came around the first time. He passed by the first time at 28 minutes so we expected him to finish right around 56. His running was very consistent and he passed the finished line after 56 minutes.
Overall we completed the triathlon in just under 3 hours. I'm happy with how we did. We had no prayer of winning it since the first two relay teams had their bikers come back about an hour after David went out. They were much quicker out of the water and on the bike. That being said, we weren't last. I may have been the last relay swimmer out of the water, but David was able to pass one of them on the road. Will kept that advantage through the run.
All said, it was a pleasant morning.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Two Parts Done!
Today I finished both the swimming distance and running distance. I will keep more miles in each of these before the end of the month but I met that part of the goal. As of today I still have 41.26 miles left on the bike. I still have confidence that I can complete that portion too since tomorrow we have a 23 mile bike ride planned. So two more short (10ish) mile rides after that and I'll be over in that category too.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Heart Rate Training
To build my base cardio, the last two runs I've done have been heart rate training. Specifically, I ignored my time and pace, and instead focused on keeping my heart rate in zone 3. For me this was about 150 bpm. I was actually a bit surprised that doing this made the run much more enjoyable. I didn't come back and feel utterly exhausted or feel like I might pass out. I think I may have been pushing too hard in general these last few years instead of building the solid base.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Flat Road
Last night I biked some country roads from a friend's house. The area was mostly flat with a few gentle hills. It only took a few miles for me to realize that biking and really pushing my speed on the flats could be as difficult as some of the more hilly courses. Training out at Walnut Creek for the Sprint triathlon I encountered rolling hills everywhere except for a 2-3 mile section. Here it was just the opposite. On all the flats there isn't a change in how your muscles are being used, just keep pushing hard. Definitely built some muscles.
That being said, I was able to 13.52 miles in 54 minutes which averages out to 15mph. Not bad considering my fastest time on the Walnut creek course is an average of 13.5 mph.
That being said, I was able to 13.52 miles in 54 minutes which averages out to 15mph. Not bad considering my fastest time on the Walnut creek course is an average of 13.5 mph.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Lazyman Started
Just a quick note to highlight the the GoogleDoc plug-in on the side of the blog that tracks in near-real time my progress through the Lazyman (see post below for full description). As you can see, I've already made progress on both the bike and the run. I have plans to swim tomorrow so hopefully that number will go down soon too.
Friday, June 26, 2009
Cville Int'l Tri & Lazyman
July is almost upon us which means the return of the Lazyman Triathlon and the Cville International Tri.
Lazyman
I've participated the last two years in a Lazyman Triathlon put on by some friends at work. The goal is to do the entire distance of the Ironman Triathlon but instead of doing it all in one day, you have all of July to do it. That means 2.4 miles swimming, 112 miles biking, and 26.2 miles running.
The last two years I have successfully completed both the swim and the run with miles to spare in both of them. I have not yet successfully completed the bike portion during the timeframe. Therefore this year I have created a plan in which I do a short bike (10ish miles) once a week and a long bike ride (30+ miles) on Sunday morning (except the last Sunday... more on that in a second). This plan allows a little flexibility in weather conditions and routes, but it is a much more solid plan for getting the miles done.
For swimming I'll probably knock it out fairly quickly since it is only 3863 meters and once a week I try to do 1500+ meters (working on distance) and another time in the week do 750+ meters (working on power/speed).
Since my marathon training program starts the last week in July with runs of 3 miles, 4 miles, 3 miles, and 5 miles all in that first week I need to make sure I'm in shape for it. Thus my plan for the rest of July is to do two 3 mile runs during the week and a 3-5 mile run on the weekend (starting with 3 and working up). Even if I low end the weekend run, that is still three 3 mile runs in a week, so I'll be done with the run portion in 3 weeks.
Cville International Triathlon
Once again I'm part of a relay team for the Cville International Triathlon. This year my team members are my coworkers David & Will. I will once again be doing the swim which is ~1500m (thus why my long swims start at 1500m and get longer). I really want to improve on my time over last year and give my team a fighting chance.
Lazyman
I've participated the last two years in a Lazyman Triathlon put on by some friends at work. The goal is to do the entire distance of the Ironman Triathlon but instead of doing it all in one day, you have all of July to do it. That means 2.4 miles swimming, 112 miles biking, and 26.2 miles running.
The last two years I have successfully completed both the swim and the run with miles to spare in both of them. I have not yet successfully completed the bike portion during the timeframe. Therefore this year I have created a plan in which I do a short bike (10ish miles) once a week and a long bike ride (30+ miles) on Sunday morning (except the last Sunday... more on that in a second). This plan allows a little flexibility in weather conditions and routes, but it is a much more solid plan for getting the miles done.
For swimming I'll probably knock it out fairly quickly since it is only 3863 meters and once a week I try to do 1500+ meters (working on distance) and another time in the week do 750+ meters (working on power/speed).
Since my marathon training program starts the last week in July with runs of 3 miles, 4 miles, 3 miles, and 5 miles all in that first week I need to make sure I'm in shape for it. Thus my plan for the rest of July is to do two 3 mile runs during the week and a 3-5 mile run on the weekend (starting with 3 and working up). Even if I low end the weekend run, that is still three 3 mile runs in a week, so I'll be done with the run portion in 3 weeks.
Cville International Triathlon
Once again I'm part of a relay team for the Cville International Triathlon. This year my team members are my coworkers David & Will. I will once again be doing the swim which is ~1500m (thus why my long swims start at 1500m and get longer). I really want to improve on my time over last year and give my team a fighting chance.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Sprint Triathlon Analysis
I like numbers. So here are the fun comparisons to last year's race stats.
Swim
This year - 11:10. 63rd out of 108.
Last year - 13:18. 81st out of 109.
This is the area I did the most consistent work on through out the year. I focused on getting more power out of my strokes.
Transition 1
This year - 1:56. 46th out of 108.
Last year - 2:50. 85th out of 109.
Being in the mentality of wanting to win instead of just finish I pushed harder to get through transitions quickly.
Bike
This year - 1:13:20. 78th out of 108.
Last year - 1:13:52. 88th out of 109.
I practiced on the course a lot more and got a professional bike fit to make it possible to get more power out. While the time did not increase, my relative placement improved so that is the equalizer of the course having extra gravel.
Transition 2
This year - 1:32. 73rd out of 108.
Last year - 2:09. 93rd out of 108.
Like T1, I knowingly tried to speed this up.
Run
This year - 40:14. 93rd out of 108.
Last year - 32:17. 77th out of 109.
Last year I routinely ran multiple times a week but this year I just didn't have that same commitment to the run. I clearly paid for it.
Overall
This year - 2:08:14. 86th out of 108.
Last year - 2:04:26. 87th out of 109.
So despite the longer time, I was in the same relative position as last year. I am happy with decreasing my swim, bike, and transition times.
Swim
This year - 11:10. 63rd out of 108.
Last year - 13:18. 81st out of 109.
This is the area I did the most consistent work on through out the year. I focused on getting more power out of my strokes.
Transition 1
This year - 1:56. 46th out of 108.
Last year - 2:50. 85th out of 109.
Being in the mentality of wanting to win instead of just finish I pushed harder to get through transitions quickly.
Bike
This year - 1:13:20. 78th out of 108.
Last year - 1:13:52. 88th out of 109.
I practiced on the course a lot more and got a professional bike fit to make it possible to get more power out. While the time did not increase, my relative placement improved so that is the equalizer of the course having extra gravel.
Transition 2
This year - 1:32. 73rd out of 108.
Last year - 2:09. 93rd out of 108.
Like T1, I knowingly tried to speed this up.
Run
This year - 40:14. 93rd out of 108.
Last year - 32:17. 77th out of 109.
Last year I routinely ran multiple times a week but this year I just didn't have that same commitment to the run. I clearly paid for it.
Overall
This year - 2:08:14. 86th out of 108.
Last year - 2:04:26. 87th out of 109.
So despite the longer time, I was in the same relative position as last year. I am happy with decreasing my swim, bike, and transition times.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Race Report
Woohoo! I took first in my category!
Now to the full face report.
Prerace
I arrived at 5:50am to Walnut Creek Park. Took my bike, a towel, and my race number down. Saved my rack spot with my bike and towel, then went to get body marked. After that I went to get the rest of my stuff. Got all of that done by 6:10. Transition didn't close until 7:10 which meant I had a lot of time to kill. Took a short run, did a short bike ride (which was good because I was in the wrong gear initially).
Swim
I was in the 6th swim wave since I was racing in the Athena Category. The prerace camaraderie was great. We were just joking around, supporting each other with Q/A, and cheering for each other. It was great.
Once we got in the water I placed myself in the middle of the pack figuring I wasn't a terrible swimmer but definitely not great. It seemed longer than 500m, but there wasn't anything I could do about it. I actually felt better about it this year than last and I came out of the water with still quite a few women behind me so that felt good.
Bike
Coming out of the swim I was more tired than I expected which I attribute mostly from running through the shallow part of the water to get out. So by the time I got out on the bike I was already breathing hard which is just a great place to start when the first mile is 90% uphill and a rather steep one at that. Thankfully I had trained on it and new I was getting a nice downhill once I got to the top.
The first major downhill I just blew down. I was in my top gear possible and still felt like I could've pushed more. I've really learned to enjoy the speed I can get from that and how far it'll carry me up the next one. Once I got to the first turn on major roads I had to slow down more than I wanted for two reasons. First as I stated yesterday, they had just laid fresh gravel down so it was a bit more treacherous and that means the road isn't as smooth to just crank it. Second, I had managed to catch up to a whole group of people ahead of me and just didn't have the speed to pass. Since we can't draft I had to stay 3 bike lengths behind the person in front of me. I did eventually pass a whole group of them but it was still not as quick as I would've liked.
When I got to the halfway point it is the only relatively flat road and I normally crank hard on it. I pushed hard, but I felt like I could've given it a little more but my energy was starting to drag. I did make sure I pushed hard enough so that if the notorious dogs came after me that I could get out fast since at that point I was pretty much all alone (as far as seeing folks ahead of me, not sure about behind me).
The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. I did use a powergel on the ride back so I could hope that I had enough energy for the run.
Run
I got back from the bike and had promised myself Gatoraid so I guzzled (mistake #1) more than I should have especially since I had not had positive experiences in the past while running with fluids sloshing in my stomach.
This year we did a slightly modified start to the run so that we wouldn't have to run over wet, slippery, uneven rocks and instead extend the path a bit to use a new bike path they had put in to address the issue of bikers trying to go over those same rocks.
The run time will not be good this year. The gatoraid caused my stomach to cramp and lack of enough trail running caused me to walk a large portion of it. I ran off and on passing Lance who I met on Thursday at a tri-club meeting. Eventually I was only walking and he caught up with me and said "come run with me." So I did. It was great to have someone to run with and he had the same opinions about up-hills that I did... they should be walked. Probably around mile 2.5 my stomach was just getting worse so I told him to go ahead and I would catch up. I finished probably about 20 seconds afterwards.
Overall
I crossed the mat at clock time of 2:27ish. Given that I was in wave six that put me 20 minutes behind the clock time, so I did it in 2:07-2:08ish depending on how the chip time comes out. Which means this year I was slower than last year. It could depend on many things... was the swim course actually longer this year (it felt it), did the gravel roads slow everyone down and thus my relative placement isn't as bad, just how much worse was my run since I think my bike was better. In the end, I'll look at all the pieces and see how I did and compare my relative ranking to the other women.
Placing
This year I competed in the Athena category (women over 150 pounds and opt-in to this category). In the past 3 years there have been 6-8 women who have finished each year. I figured I stood a much better chance placing in that then in my age group which had almost 30 women. As of race day there were only two of us. I raced the entire thing not being sure where the other woman was so I needed to either catch her or not let her catch me. In the end, she didn't end up racing. Thus I took first place by default! I still raced hard and given that when I signed up I did expect 6-8 other women, it's still a victory.
Epilogue: Nutrition is the 4th Sport
As mentioned in the run portion mistake #1 happened when I guzzled gatoraid before going out on the run. This was compounded with mistake #2 that I drank an ice cold gatoraid as soon as I finished. I both chugged it and was not used to drink ice cold water or gatoraid. Mistake #3 was eating about a full orange in a rather ravenous manner. Mistake #4 for drinking another ice cold gatoraid. Can you see where this is leading?
If not, let me guide you. In my cube I have a photocopy of a shoe ad that has the slogon "In triathlons, victory and defeat often taste the same" and a picture of a female triathlete on the side of the road curled up and clearly looking like she lost breakfast. Yep, that was me. Expect instead of losing breakfast I lost all that lovely gatoraid and orange pieces. I ended up doing it twice in two separate locations since I was dumb and tried to eat part of banana and water to calm my nerves. Nope, that just came up too.
This left my body in an extreme sugar low (which I already have issues with) and unable to eat. Thankfully the triathlon community is very supportive and so I had many offers of help to either take me to a hospital for IV fluids, take me home so I could rest, or just get me anything I needed. I appreciated it all.
Lesson learned: be careful about both pre-race and post-race nutrition.
Now to the full face report.
Prerace
I arrived at 5:50am to Walnut Creek Park. Took my bike, a towel, and my race number down. Saved my rack spot with my bike and towel, then went to get body marked. After that I went to get the rest of my stuff. Got all of that done by 6:10. Transition didn't close until 7:10 which meant I had a lot of time to kill. Took a short run, did a short bike ride (which was good because I was in the wrong gear initially).
Swim
I was in the 6th swim wave since I was racing in the Athena Category. The prerace camaraderie was great. We were just joking around, supporting each other with Q/A, and cheering for each other. It was great.
Once we got in the water I placed myself in the middle of the pack figuring I wasn't a terrible swimmer but definitely not great. It seemed longer than 500m, but there wasn't anything I could do about it. I actually felt better about it this year than last and I came out of the water with still quite a few women behind me so that felt good.
Bike
Coming out of the swim I was more tired than I expected which I attribute mostly from running through the shallow part of the water to get out. So by the time I got out on the bike I was already breathing hard which is just a great place to start when the first mile is 90% uphill and a rather steep one at that. Thankfully I had trained on it and new I was getting a nice downhill once I got to the top.
The first major downhill I just blew down. I was in my top gear possible and still felt like I could've pushed more. I've really learned to enjoy the speed I can get from that and how far it'll carry me up the next one. Once I got to the first turn on major roads I had to slow down more than I wanted for two reasons. First as I stated yesterday, they had just laid fresh gravel down so it was a bit more treacherous and that means the road isn't as smooth to just crank it. Second, I had managed to catch up to a whole group of people ahead of me and just didn't have the speed to pass. Since we can't draft I had to stay 3 bike lengths behind the person in front of me. I did eventually pass a whole group of them but it was still not as quick as I would've liked.
When I got to the halfway point it is the only relatively flat road and I normally crank hard on it. I pushed hard, but I felt like I could've given it a little more but my energy was starting to drag. I did make sure I pushed hard enough so that if the notorious dogs came after me that I could get out fast since at that point I was pretty much all alone (as far as seeing folks ahead of me, not sure about behind me).
The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. I did use a powergel on the ride back so I could hope that I had enough energy for the run.
Run
I got back from the bike and had promised myself Gatoraid so I guzzled (mistake #1) more than I should have especially since I had not had positive experiences in the past while running with fluids sloshing in my stomach.
This year we did a slightly modified start to the run so that we wouldn't have to run over wet, slippery, uneven rocks and instead extend the path a bit to use a new bike path they had put in to address the issue of bikers trying to go over those same rocks.
The run time will not be good this year. The gatoraid caused my stomach to cramp and lack of enough trail running caused me to walk a large portion of it. I ran off and on passing Lance who I met on Thursday at a tri-club meeting. Eventually I was only walking and he caught up with me and said "come run with me." So I did. It was great to have someone to run with and he had the same opinions about up-hills that I did... they should be walked. Probably around mile 2.5 my stomach was just getting worse so I told him to go ahead and I would catch up. I finished probably about 20 seconds afterwards.
Overall
I crossed the mat at clock time of 2:27ish. Given that I was in wave six that put me 20 minutes behind the clock time, so I did it in 2:07-2:08ish depending on how the chip time comes out. Which means this year I was slower than last year. It could depend on many things... was the swim course actually longer this year (it felt it), did the gravel roads slow everyone down and thus my relative placement isn't as bad, just how much worse was my run since I think my bike was better. In the end, I'll look at all the pieces and see how I did and compare my relative ranking to the other women.
Placing
This year I competed in the Athena category (women over 150 pounds and opt-in to this category). In the past 3 years there have been 6-8 women who have finished each year. I figured I stood a much better chance placing in that then in my age group which had almost 30 women. As of race day there were only two of us. I raced the entire thing not being sure where the other woman was so I needed to either catch her or not let her catch me. In the end, she didn't end up racing. Thus I took first place by default! I still raced hard and given that when I signed up I did expect 6-8 other women, it's still a victory.
Epilogue: Nutrition is the 4th Sport
As mentioned in the run portion mistake #1 happened when I guzzled gatoraid before going out on the run. This was compounded with mistake #2 that I drank an ice cold gatoraid as soon as I finished. I both chugged it and was not used to drink ice cold water or gatoraid. Mistake #3 was eating about a full orange in a rather ravenous manner. Mistake #4 for drinking another ice cold gatoraid. Can you see where this is leading?
If not, let me guide you. In my cube I have a photocopy of a shoe ad that has the slogon "In triathlons, victory and defeat often taste the same" and a picture of a female triathlete on the side of the road curled up and clearly looking like she lost breakfast. Yep, that was me. Expect instead of losing breakfast I lost all that lovely gatoraid and orange pieces. I ended up doing it twice in two separate locations since I was dumb and tried to eat part of banana and water to calm my nerves. Nope, that just came up too.
This left my body in an extreme sugar low (which I already have issues with) and unable to eat. Thankfully the triathlon community is very supportive and so I had many offers of help to either take me to a hospital for IV fluids, take me home so I could rest, or just get me anything I needed. I appreciated it all.
Lesson learned: be careful about both pre-race and post-race nutrition.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
12 hours...
12 hours from now I will likely be on my way to the park. Yep, I'm planning on being there by 5:50 so I can set up my gear right when the transition area opens at 6. Then time to chill out for an hour, eat a banana, and relax.
Swim - A couple days ago I did my first open water lake swim for the year. I really had forgotten how murky the water is and how variable the temperature is. One section would be chilly and another would be warm. A report from earlier today said the water was around 77 degrees which would make it wetsuit legal, but given that it is over 90+ and direct sun out there right now it will probably get back up to the normal 80 degrees.
Bike - Rather concerned about this because %()*&#($*& VDOT decided that Friday would be a great day to tear up one of the main roads we use. It's only a couple miles torn up, but we use that portion twice (going out and coming back). What's worse is that I've really practiced getting up my speed on that portion so I feel like it has been a lot of wasted effort. I guess we'll see how it goes tomorrow morning.
Run - some folks today said that it wasn't nearly as muddy as we were fearing thanks to a lot of the heat in the last couple days. Like always, I'm more worried about my nutrition for that portion.
Race placement - I'm in the 6th and final wave which means I'll have a lot of folks to pass on the bike if I'm lucky. That being said, there will also already be people done with the race by the time I get back from the bike.
Race category - the best I can tell there are still only two Athenas. I know the number of the other woman so I should be able to spot her reasonably well and just make it my goal to get ahead of her and stay ahead of her.
Swim - A couple days ago I did my first open water lake swim for the year. I really had forgotten how murky the water is and how variable the temperature is. One section would be chilly and another would be warm. A report from earlier today said the water was around 77 degrees which would make it wetsuit legal, but given that it is over 90+ and direct sun out there right now it will probably get back up to the normal 80 degrees.
Bike - Rather concerned about this because %()*&#($*& VDOT decided that Friday would be a great day to tear up one of the main roads we use. It's only a couple miles torn up, but we use that portion twice (going out and coming back). What's worse is that I've really practiced getting up my speed on that portion so I feel like it has been a lot of wasted effort. I guess we'll see how it goes tomorrow morning.
Run - some folks today said that it wasn't nearly as muddy as we were fearing thanks to a lot of the heat in the last couple days. Like always, I'm more worried about my nutrition for that portion.
Race placement - I'm in the 6th and final wave which means I'll have a lot of folks to pass on the bike if I'm lucky. That being said, there will also already be people done with the race by the time I get back from the bike.
Race category - the best I can tell there are still only two Athenas. I know the number of the other woman so I should be able to spot her reasonably well and just make it my goal to get ahead of her and stay ahead of her.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Rename to Muddy Buddy?
Earlier in the year I was considering doing the Muddy Buddy which features a large mud pit at the end of the run/bike race. I may get my chance to get truly muddy anyways this weekend. It has been raining every night during the past week and the trail for the run portion was already fairly muddy and waterlogged on Sunday. The forecast continues to call for more rain through the rest of the week, thus the trail is going to be essentially 3 miles of muddy fun. And when I say fun, it really won't be. The trail isn't that wide and mountain bikers ride through it so there are deep gashes in the trail in many places. Therefore, I suspect I'll have to either walk a fair bit in order to not slip & fall, and/or just kick up a bunch of mud onto myself. I predict run times overall this year will be slower. That being said, I'm still going to try my best.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
1 Week!
The final stretch for the Cville Sprint Tri is upon us. In one week from today, the triathlon will take place. This week I'm going to focus on eating right, not injuring myself, and light exercise. Unlike school tasks, this cannot be crammed for. Infact, training hard the last week before the event can reduce performance since it wears you out and the muscles may not be optimally reseted. That being said, it is good to keep moving.
As for my competition... First and foremost I'm trying to improve on my personal recored from last year. It's the same course, but the conditions may not be the same. Temperature, wind, and how much the trail is will all affect things. So I will use both the time but also relative position to the other women. The second part of the competition is that I've stated I want to place in my category of Athena. Right now that won't be too hard, there are 273 people signed up but out of that there are only two of us in the Athena category. There are still 57 spots open so we could get more, but right now its a small field.
The whole thing feels rather surreal. I know it is 7 days away, but it still seems like months away.
As for my competition... First and foremost I'm trying to improve on my personal recored from last year. It's the same course, but the conditions may not be the same. Temperature, wind, and how much the trail is will all affect things. So I will use both the time but also relative position to the other women. The second part of the competition is that I've stated I want to place in my category of Athena. Right now that won't be too hard, there are 273 people signed up but out of that there are only two of us in the Athena category. There are still 57 spots open so we could get more, but right now its a small field.
The whole thing feels rather surreal. I know it is 7 days away, but it still seems like months away.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
4 Weeks!
There are only 4 weeks remaining until the Cville Sprint Triathlon. Which really means only 3 more weeks of training and one week of tapering. It seems so far away and yet not enough time to really improve much on my training.
Swimming
I've been doing 1000m in the pool about twice a week for the last few months. I may pick up a little time over last year, but I will only be able to tell in comparison to my relative standing since as a previous post noted - the times vary greatly year to year. The 1000m I've been doing is plenty since the actual race is supposedly only 500m, but I will need to be able to do 1000m for the IronGirl Sprint Triathlon in August. Therefore I need to start increasing my distance to train for that. In addition, all of my swimming has been in the pool. The local parks open this weekend for swimming, so I shall try to get some murky water swim time in soon.
Biking
I've only been biking about once a week. I seem to come up with all sorts of excuses as to why. The only good thing is the once a week is riding the actual course and thus really learning the hills. I have gotten better at them. I don't know how it'll compare since I've only been doing group rides. In addition, last week was my first time since getting my bike professionally fitted, so I'm still working on building the correct muscles. That being said, already it was better than the old set up I had.
Running
I've been consistently getting 2 runs in a week at 3 miles each run, but on far too many of them I've had to walk a portion of it. Plus, I have only run/walked the entire sprint run course once since last year. Hopefully in the next few weeks I can get out there a few more times.
Overall
I know I'm going to finish it because I feel like I'm in good enough shape for that. I don't know if I'll do better or not from last year since I feel like each of my areas has lots of room for improvement. If I could do this training time all over again, I would've gotten serious about it much sooner and actually stuck with my plan of increasing distances.
Swimming
I've been doing 1000m in the pool about twice a week for the last few months. I may pick up a little time over last year, but I will only be able to tell in comparison to my relative standing since as a previous post noted - the times vary greatly year to year. The 1000m I've been doing is plenty since the actual race is supposedly only 500m, but I will need to be able to do 1000m for the IronGirl Sprint Triathlon in August. Therefore I need to start increasing my distance to train for that. In addition, all of my swimming has been in the pool. The local parks open this weekend for swimming, so I shall try to get some murky water swim time in soon.
Biking
I've only been biking about once a week. I seem to come up with all sorts of excuses as to why. The only good thing is the once a week is riding the actual course and thus really learning the hills. I have gotten better at them. I don't know how it'll compare since I've only been doing group rides. In addition, last week was my first time since getting my bike professionally fitted, so I'm still working on building the correct muscles. That being said, already it was better than the old set up I had.
Running
I've been consistently getting 2 runs in a week at 3 miles each run, but on far too many of them I've had to walk a portion of it. Plus, I have only run/walked the entire sprint run course once since last year. Hopefully in the next few weeks I can get out there a few more times.
Overall
I know I'm going to finish it because I feel like I'm in good enough shape for that. I don't know if I'll do better or not from last year since I feel like each of my areas has lots of room for improvement. If I could do this training time all over again, I would've gotten serious about it much sooner and actually stuck with my plan of increasing distances.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Running the Numbers
While on my lunch break I started playing with doing multi-year comparisons of the race results. 2008 had 109 women finish, 2007 had104, and 2006 had 108. There may be slightly more data points than that in the swim and bike in case women dropped out. I kept the numbers because I don't know why they dropped out.
Overall, the times got lower as the years increased. Not by anything significant. However, the item of major note is that the swim times got longer by a fairly sizable amount. Using the average swim time (though the pattern carried through out including the fastest times), 2006 had an avg of 9:36, then 2007 went up to 10:53, then 2008 was at 11:50. My guess is that the women as a whole did not get slower (especially since it did carry into even the fastest time going from 6:03 to 8:24). Most likely the course distance has been getting slightly longer.
Other than that, my goals to have my bike around 1:05 and run around 30 are well within reason. Those goals happen to be less than a minute lower than the average time. So basically, I'm looking to go from being in the 80s in rank to right around 50s in rank (again, out of about 105-110 women).
I would also like to get my transition times down a bit since every second helps. Last year since I was just going for completing the triathlon I took my time to get something to drink between the bike and the run. If I can streamline that, I think I could easily gain some time there.
Overall, the times got lower as the years increased. Not by anything significant. However, the item of major note is that the swim times got longer by a fairly sizable amount. Using the average swim time (though the pattern carried through out including the fastest times), 2006 had an avg of 9:36, then 2007 went up to 10:53, then 2008 was at 11:50. My guess is that the women as a whole did not get slower (especially since it did carry into even the fastest time going from 6:03 to 8:24). Most likely the course distance has been getting slightly longer.
Other than that, my goals to have my bike around 1:05 and run around 30 are well within reason. Those goals happen to be less than a minute lower than the average time. So basically, I'm looking to go from being in the 80s in rank to right around 50s in rank (again, out of about 105-110 women).
I would also like to get my transition times down a bit since every second helps. Last year since I was just going for completing the triathlon I took my time to get something to drink between the bike and the run. If I can streamline that, I think I could easily gain some time there.
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