I feel the start of something good...

I'm 3 weeks into the EN Outseason plan and starting to feel the work paying off. Finally starting to shake the sinus infection with the help of some antibiotics. It's always fun to do the fast hard work so I think that is part of the appeal of this plan. Now the hard part is making a decision on a season goal. Ironman or ???? Louisville is still open but won't be open for long I suspect. I need to make a decision NOW!

It's been a weird week. Had some weird pain in my right knee that wouldn't go away for over a week. I skipped a few workouts last week and did some extra stretching but it just hung on. I think I ramped up the intensity too quickly and it bit me in the ass. Able to workout this week but it is just in the background a little. Being careful to do more stretching and keep it in check. I like the limited hours and structure of the EN plan so far but it is weird to do such intense workouts this time of year. Had to do a run on the treadmill yesterday because it was just ice everywhere outside and impossible to do the speedwork required.

First Post of the New Year!

Well the first week of 2011 is over and today is Gavin's 5th birthday! Unfortunately he came down with a bad fever this afternoon. So we've had to postpone his party from tomorrow until next week. Below is a picture of the truck that I painted up for Gavin. He wanted a Batman party and I am giving him one of my old RC trucks as a gift so got a new body and painted it up. A shame it will end up destroyed but that's the way it goes with plastic bodies.




I've decided to purchase an EN training plan and give it a go this year. They specialize in 1/2 and full Ironman training but their Outseason plan is supposed to be great for building speed for the shorter races as well. I'll be putting my training log stuff here this year as I gave up on Buckeye Outdoors.com It just got too slow after his redesign and I couldn't keep up with entries when it was so slow. Basically going back to pen and paper for the logging.

Merry Christmas

Well December has been a big let down. No mojo for training at all. That's OK this is supposed to be the off season. I feel it coming back slowly and will be like the New Year Resolutionaries and start working more consistently in January. Hope everyone has a great Christmas and a Happy New Year.

It's been a nice week off. I didn't need the time off physically but mentally. It was nice not feeling like I should be doing something or the pressure of missing workouts. I have the urge to start training again and that is what I was after. I want to start building up toward a good run at the HUFF this year. I'm also toying with the idea of a longer ultra run somewhere next year. Still looking at the options out there and what sounds like fun.

Had a surprisingly good race yesterday. Finished 24th overall and 3rd in AG with a time of 1:23.45. A new PR by 15 seconds. Looking back through my training I really can't believe I ran that well. I tried to go into this race with no expectations but did want to run well. A difficult balance to achieve for sure. Started off relaxed and went out in 6:40. Then had a nagging blister on back of left heel and stopped at Mile 5 to grab a bandaid. It ended up not helping as my shoe was soaked in blood at the finish. Ran a 6:00 mile from 5-6 attempting to catch up with the pack I was in but then settled back into 6:25 pace. Mile 9 was tough with some sharp hills and lots of turns but going in from there the pace steadily picked up. Finished with 5:55 last mile and felt pretty good. I gave up a few seconds as there was a challenged walker finishing in front of me at the line and I didn't want to be the guy that sprints past a walker at the line. I was really amazed by teammate, Mark Miller, that ran a 1:22 after doing 2 Ironmans in the last month.

Tri Season is Over

I completed the inaugural SWAT tri at Chain O'Lakes State Park yesterday. I went in to it with mixed expectations. Not really expecting to do well with the lack of real bike training this last few months but hoping I might eek out something from the legs. It turned out the accumulation of miles over the last few years does help. I had a better than expected swim in which I believe I caught everyone from the wave ahead of me (4:00 seperation). Once on the bike I just kept telling myself to conserve yet push a little if that makes sense. The run was challenging due to the hills in the park. It was difficult to pick out the age groupers from the collegiate racers that were 15 min ahead and part of a seperate race. Plus the sprint and Olympic races were going on simultaneously. At one point I was pretty sure I was leading the race even with a 4 min cushion on a few guys that were in the wave behind. However there was a 20 year old age grouper that I must have mistaken for one of the collegiate racers. He beat me by :10 seconds. If I had known he was that close would I have been able to make up the time? Hard to say. Just another lesson to always go as hard as you can when racing with wave starts. Two second places this summer for not pushing hard enough at times. Aside from the racing it was a miserable day out with rain and cool temps. Big props out to my wife for coming out to support me. She hung out with Gavin and our newest addition to the family, Tucker.