2.19.14 Wednesday Double

Work called at 5am with some issues so I didn't get to swim this morning.  I was hoping to get that out of the way and do the hour on the trainer at the CAC and get home early.  Sometimes you have to be flexible.  I have been doing trainer sessions on Wednesday with Shelby so I did that again today.  Good work.  My swim was 2400 yards and I was able to knock that out in an hour.  The swims are getting a little longer.  The soreness is gone from my legs so I'm feeling good again.

2.18.14 Track Run

I got a fairly tough track workout from Jeff for today.  It's a ladder.  400, 800, 1200, 1600, 2000 at 5k pace and the laps need to stay within 3 seconds of each other.  I get a 400 recovery between intervals with a mile warm up and cool down.  Total of about 7 miles altogether.  Up to the 1200, it wasn't too tough but the 1600 and 2000 were rough.  My times were very consistent and I actually got faster until the 2000.  I had the track to myself today.  The gate was locked so I had to hop the fence but I love the track in Lewisville.  Still sore from the trail run debacle but I'm starting to get some speed back again.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/447247749

2.17.14 Structured Training Underway

Jeff has been dropping plans on me for the past few weeks.  It's good to have a definitive plan.  The weather has not cooperated at all making some of the days very tough.  This weekend was a 3+ hour bike ride and 90+ minute run.  The wind was blowing about 15+ on the way back to the house so it was a little slow going.  The run was problematic.  I tripped on a rock at Northshore on the downhill and fell on some rocks.  Knee, elbow and hand were bleeding.  I had a fairly large knot on my forearm.  After checking things out, Joe and I ran it in and I got some hydrogen peroxide on my wounds before heading home.  Looks like the weather is changing for the better this week so hopefully the cold stuff is behind us for the year.

2.4.14 Track Run

Not a great day for a run.  It was in the high 30s with a light rain.  I really haven't been doing much speed work over the past few months so this was going to be hard.  My legs were sore from the strength work with Shelby on Monday morning.  It was hard to get going period today.  I was the only person at the track today.  Usually, a few people will show up in bad weather but not today.  I had a warm up mile, 800 at 7:15 pace, 1200 at 7:20 pace, 1600 at 7:30 pace, 800 at 7:15 pace and a cool down mile.  The times would be difficult when I was peaking last September.  I ended up running the 800 at 7:19 pace, the 1200 at 7:43 pace, the 1600 at 7:50 pace, and the 800 at 7:44 pace.  It wasn't a great performance but I'll take it considering the conditions.  I forgot to turn off my Garmin on the way home so I have some very fast miles after leaving the track.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/440439039

2.3.14 Day 1 of Boulder Training

I received my first weekly workout regimen from Jeff yesterday for Boulder.  At this point, not really all that different from half iron distance training.  I'm sure it will be a gradual progression.  Shelby has a boot camp on Monday morning so I did an hour of strength with him and then swam for an hour after.  I got everything knocked out in one shot this morning.  It looks like the workouts are more geared towards endurance and less about shorter speed which makes sense.  My track stuff tomorrow is smaller sets but with longer distance.  Should be interesting.  If the weather would just cooperate and warm up some.

Plans for 2014

As stated before, I am registered for Ironman Boulder.  It will be my first full distance Ironman race.  I met with Jeff a few weeks ago and he wants me to do a half in the May/June time frame.  Kansas looks like a likely target since it is driving distance and the time is right.  I will probably do a few local sprints.  The Caveman is only a few miles from the house and is in April.  The weather has been truly frightful in Dallas for most of December.  My pool closed for repairs from Thankgiving to New Years.  I haven't been able to swim much or ride the bike.  My running is on par for the most part.  It's always easy to run.  Jeff is going to give me a loose schedule for January and then it's on starting in February.  There will not be many races this year, but the ones on the schedule will be monsters.  I'll probably start checking in on a more regular basis in January to log my progress.  It has actually been nice not having a firm routine for the past month or two.

Off Season

After Kerrville, I shut things down completely for about 8-10 days.  I'm not getting workouts from Jeff right now and I'm doing some maintenance type stuff.  Pretty much what I want to do when I want to do it.  I don't worry about times or speed or anything else.  I'm still putting in base miles for everything.  We have lost the sun for the majority of the day so I'm only really riding on Saturday mornings.  I'm still getting in about 20 miles of running and swimming two or three mornings a week.  I would like to get more strength work in during the off season.  I only have one race on my schedule for 2014 and that is Ironman Boulder which I try not to think a whole lot about because the thought of it is still a little scary.  Jeff says we won't start worrying about that until late February.  I was really tired after Kerrville so it is good to have a little worry free down time.  My wife is running a 10k and half marathon so I will go to those and support her.  The Tri Series banquet is on the 22nd and we will head to Austin one more time for that.  It is a busy month for the family.  My son is a high school senior so we have colleges to visit and Thanksgiving is coming.  I will check in every so often but really don't plan on tracking anything again until 2014.