Monday, December 13, 2010

Week One of IM Training

158 Days until IM Texas ...

And with my official training beginning last week that means week one is in the books and only 23 more weeks remain!

Base training started out very well and I was able to get in 11 of the 12 scheduled workouts.  Overall I was surprised at how easily my body seemed to jump right back into training after being off for a month.  The 12-hours of volume was a nice starting point but I am already itching to crank it up and wreck myself.  Good times ahead for sure!

Here is the breakdown (copied from BeginnerTriathlete.com logs):


S:  
8300.00 Yd
3h 45m
B: 
81.60 Mi
4h 49m
R:  
16.99 Mi
2h 31m 23s


Total Time:  12h 05m 


The one workout missed was a 25 minute recovery run on Sunday evening.  It got scraped because of a head and chest cold that has taken up residence in my torso.  It was okay to miss this one because my Wednesday run was 30 minutes longer than scheduled which is how I hit the scheduled time goal of 12 hours right on the head.

Sunday morning's long ride was an adventure on the bike for my buddy Mike and I.  There was a local 1/2 Marathon going on and they needed volunteers. Since we had a bunch of friends running and Mike's wife was a sponsor we decided to ride from Kingwood to the race, volunteer, then ride back.  In theory, this was a great idea.  But we should have checked the weather.  When we left Mike's house it was 38 degrees. Not too bad - Not much wind, yet.  We rode pretty slow in the 18-19mph range just trying to keep warm.  We got to the race and we were volunteering at the Mile 3 Aid Station.  Luckily, Mike's wife Jennifer, was smart enough to suggest we pack a bag with warm clothes and she would leave the bags in her car for us.  I say "luckily" because the wind started to really pick up as the cold front moved in and the Aid Station was in a shaded area of the woods - it was cold!

After handing out drinks at the Aid Station and cheering on all the runners it was time to head back to Kingwood.  With the warm clothes back in the car we were both freezing as it was getting colder and colder as the morning went by!  We should of hitched a ride back because as we turned to head back north we were greeted with about a 30mph COLD headwind putting the wind chill in the low 20's.  I was still cold as I went to sleep 10 hours later!!

-----------------------------------
Shout outs


  • My lovely wife Annie has finally started a blog.  It is called Retail Runner.  She actually started it many months ago but never posted, but she was inspired by everyone's favorite Belt Buckle wearing hardcore runner EMZ to finally get to it!  So go check it out!
  • Kati from CoachKatie's Blog has entered her Gluten-Free Gingerbread House into a contest and she could win an iPod Toch.  Please go over and vote for her awesome Ginerbread House - She is GBH #10.  Click Here to vote.
  • Aaron Rodgers of the Packers go a concussion in the first half of yesterday's game.  Why is this notable?  He is my fantasy football QB and this was the first week of the playoffs - or my last week of the playoffs.  Damn concussions.
I hope everyone has a wonderful week and all of my Northern buddies who are getting dumped on with snow enjoy some hot chocolate and snow days from work!

Thanks for Reading,

Jeff

22 comments:

  1. Get on out to the bike course... I want to hear all about it!
    Be careful on your mileages as not to hurt yourself...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Snow days!!!!!! HAHAHHAHAHAHA thats the funniest thing I read today, we dont get snow days unless you work for the school district. We have to just leave 2 houurs before we normally do, pray we stay on the road and pray they plow before we leave at night.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I can't believe how fast the days are ticking by already for IMTX. It's going to be here before we know it! Seems like not so long ago, we were all waiting on BT for the registration to open! Anyway, fantastic first week and sorry about the freezing ride - it's probably one thing we'll wish for in May!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Diggin the new look. And I hope you get your training done somewhat indoors today b/c it is cold....these friends of ours to the North don't know what we are dealing with.

    I am fired up for your training....great first week.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Bob - check ur email - sent you some "thoughts" on the bike course.

    BDD - You really need to have MattyO on speed dial. He should be out plowing your commute route like an hour before you have to leave.

    Shannon - let me know when you plan to come down and ride?

    Jason - Seriously, those northerns have no idea what it is like to be all cold adverse and stuff. They all have big jackets and gloves and hats and can handle this weather. I mean the worst part about this cold snap is that I may lose a little bit of my suntan - which would really be a bummer!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great job on your first week of training! Good job with the ride. I rode through cold weather also on Sunday but luckily there was no wind and it was snowy!

    That is really funny about snow days. Yea, we don't get those. Like BDD, we just have to leave 2 hours earlier!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I FB'd Matty yesterday to plow me out, he ignored me!!

    ReplyDelete
  8. A few things from someone who just finished a 30 week training plan:
    I tried my best to never go over on a workout. I made a deal with my body, that I'd never go over, and I'd never skip a workout because "I didn't feel like it." That worked out well.
    Great first week, Jeff. You're going to kill this race. The hardest part of Ironman is the consistent training. When you pull that off, the race itself it a fun day.

    ReplyDelete
  9. What is a snow day? :)

    Awesome first week, you are totally going to rock it!

    AND Carole's blog made me pee my pants it was so funny.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Love it that you are itching to get out there and "wreck yourself!" Nothing worse than a cold bike ride. So glad you guys at least had the extra clothes!

    No snow here and hopefully there won't be for a while, but it's cold!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Week one done... what a great feeling!

    Love Annie's blog - I'm a follower!!! :)

    ReplyDelete
  12. You should record your results and training with this brand new application. Definitely the best one i have seen.

    220 TriLog for the iPhone!

    http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/220-trilog/id405993632?mt=8&uo=4

    ReplyDelete
  13. On to Week 2 - already!

    today I changed the dates on the xls you sent me to match my IMLP dates - my Oly and 70.3 fall exactly where yours do in the plan! pretty cool, cant wait to folllow your weeks

    Also I picked up my Secret Decoder Ring and it is making a lot more sense :) haha

    D

    ReplyDelete
  14. Nice job with week one of training!! Be careful with that chest cold! If you're not careful it can cause you to miss tons of workouts...believe me, I know!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Nice work - looks a great way to start IM training!!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Wow, I'm impressed by how quickly you got right back into it - well done!

    ReplyDelete
  17. Nice start! "Slow in the 18-19 range" ??? Wha?

    ReplyDelete
  18. Your swim volume is always very impressive. I'm secretly competing against you volume was, but you ALWAYS kick my butt on the swimming.

    Thanks for the shout-out.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Be careful what you wish for, crankin' it up will be here soon enough.

    ReplyDelete
  20. A friend of mine and his wife are training for IM South Africa. I showed them your blog and you’ve got them all pumped! I’m off to Annie’s blog now.

    ReplyDelete
  21. oh yeah, with almost five feet of snow, we have NOT had a snow day! A couple of delays, but that's it. I've been out in it every day, just another day in central NY : )

    ReplyDelete