Different Muscles

NOTE: I started writing this in mid-December but obviously didn't post it right away. It was applicable in January and February as well. Sorry for the hiatus, I'm going to try to stay current from now on.

So, at this point, I can consider myself a cold weather, winter runner. I've never been one before. I've had to learn how to adjust to the cold and what clothing to wear. I think I have all of it down at this point.

Something interesting I've learned though, which maybe some of the rest of you knew, and is certainly obvious when you think about it, is that you have to run on ice and snow just like you walk on ice and snow. For those who live in the south, walking on ice can certainly be done if you tense your legs the proper way. Running on ice isn't much different, other than the fact that you're doing it all faster.

Using those different stabilizing muscles while running on ice and snow these past few weeks has caused aches in places I don't normally feel when I run. At first I really noticed it, however it's getting to be less and less of an issue. I've run on paved city trails covered in ice and packed snow. I've run on unpaved trails with sand and snow, and I've run through many inches of snow on the streets at this point.

The worst that happened was on a 20 miler when I slipped on the ice coming down a hill at mile 14 and really hurt my right hip. I also slapped my left hand on the pavement when I tried to stop my fall. My whole hand was bruised purple. To add insult to my injury, I also slipped at about mile 16 and this time when I went to brace my fall, my hands slipped out and my face smashed the pavement. I had two cuts, one below my nose and one above my lip, and had a very swollen lip for several days. :(

Double Workouts

Three of my training days last week were double workout days. I either swam first then rode (rollers or trainer), or I rode first and then went for a run after a fairly short "T2." I wasn't pushing anything for any of the workouts, I was just trying to put in some miles and saddle time. I was also trying to attain my training goal of 13.5 hours in a week.

I've been reading Joe Friel's "The Triathlete's Training Bible," which is highly recommended reading, and I've been talking with my sister-in-law training partner about properly preparing for this thing. Truthfully, it was my sister-in-law who first proposed a very well fleshed out training plan for me and I'm doing my best to adopt and adapt the plan to fit my needs. The plan called for 13.5 hours of training last week as well as this Thanksgiving week. Given my daily schedule, the only way I can put in that time is multiple workouts throughout the day.

Of course, I'm no stranger to multiple workouts, however, I have not done them this early in the season before. I really think I handled them well (not pushing and keeping things aerobic) and I'm not really tired from them. However, I did take the weekend off, due to some previously scheduled events that would have made doing even one workout a day quite difficult. I rode (rollers) yesterday and ran this morning and it felt great. I think the combination of ramping up the training and then taking some time to rest and recover is a wonderful thing.

This, of course, is one of the basic tenets of training: stress a physiological system then let it rest and recover. It's just pretty neat to see such on-the-surface results from it all. Nice to know I'm making some progress in this long journey!

Confidence Run

I had a great run on Sunday. I almost always run with a partner or small running group these days and rarely run alone. That's quite a change from years past, and even earlier this season, when I would almost always run alone. I also think this reflects my "break through" in running this past season.

One of my fears, though, in running with others is that I wouldn't or couldn't hold the pace on my own. Well, the run this weekend should lay those fears to rest. I ran just shy of 14 miles in 1:54, which is an 8:11 pace. I wasn't trying to run at any particular pace. As a matter of fact, my legs were just a touch tired from a group ride the day before, as well as the cumulative effects of the week's training. I even felt tired at first and considered cutting the run short.

I stuck with it though and hit a great groove. I didn't look at the clock or my heart rate for the first 50 minutes. After that I was monitoring my heart rate to keep it in my aerobic range, below my lactate threshold. I was also watching how things were on the hills (up), which dominated the second half of the run. I averaged 148, which isn't too bad for me.

I also hit another PR on the half marathon distance. Though I don't have a GPS watch, I ran basically the same route as last time (a couple of weekends ago) and remembered roughly where the 13.1 mile mark was. I used my watch and took three splits at the end of three blocks and then when I plotted the run on dailymile.com the 13.1 mark was between the first two splits. The second split was 1:48:19, so I beat my previous PR of 1:48:11, by about a minute.

Yesterday, I signed up to do the Madison Marathon at the end of May, both to keep me motivated to train and as a way to gauge my progress at the beginning of next season. I'd love to run it in 3:30, which would be an 8:00 pace. If I could hold the pace I just ran, I'd finish in 3:34:24. I know that's not reasonable. Typically, you're 5% slower, in pace, when you double the distance. That would mean an ~8:35 pace and a ~3:46 marathon time. So, I still have quite a bit if work to do to shave the 16 minutes.

First Injury?

Well, I think I have my first training injury, but it's a weird one.

When I was 16, I broke my foot. I was on the summer swim team and the water was a bit too cold, 58 F as I recall and coach wouldn't let us in the water if it was below 60 F. So, we went to the park across the street and ran an obstacle course. On the last of many rounds, and near the very end, I slipped of some equipment and came down hard. I got up on my right knee, brushed the grit off my left knee, stood on my left foot and started to run again. As soon as my right foot touched the ground I was down again and in a _LOT_ of pain. I'd broken the 4th and 5th metatarsals, the bones behind the joints of my pinkie and adjacent toes. For various reasons, it was almost 8 hours before I was seen by a doctor and by that time the foot was very swollen and I think they had a hard time setting the bones back. I had an "old fashioned cast" made with real plaster, up to just below the knee.

I'd never really noticed it before, but I think they really didn't get the bones set quite right. In recent years, doing triathlon, I've noticed that the outside (nearest the pinkie toe) tip of my middle toe initially blisters, in the early season, then callouses over by mid-season. This is due to a slight "V" depression between my 3rd and 4th toes (possibly due to the mis-setting of the bones). Not a big deal. The blisters never hurt and the "V" has never bothered me in anyway. Now, however, I have this:

It looks worse in real life, darker and "bloodier"

I'm guessing it's a blood blister under the toe nail. I have no idea how it got there or really when. It seemed like one day it was there, and the other it wasn't, but I really didn't mark the day. It's been this way for a couple of weeks now. I initially thought I was going to lose the toenail, but it seems fine and like it's going to hang in there.

I need to be careful not to blame running though. I also rock climb, a sport I've recently gotten into because of my youngest child, who's taken to that sport like a fish takes to water. I've gotten involved so I can do it with him and have been belay certified so he and I can climb together as a team, him climbing and me belaying. I do a fair amount of my own climbing though when he's in team practice. The shoes you were are supposed to be stiff soled, which I'm used to from cycling, but also very tight. So much so that your toes are bent a bit in the toe box. This is so you can use your toes with strength and support when you're trying to find purchase to stand up in a maneuver. It may be a combination of the tight toe box and the "V" in my foot that's caused this.

However, I've been climbing, in my own climbing shoes, for a couple of years now and I never had anything like this last year. So, I'm not really sure what's going on, and it's really not that bad an injury, if you can even call it one. But, it's something that I'll need to watch. If I do lose the toenail, I'll have to treat it carefully with all the running I'm doing so I don't get an infection. I'll keep you all posted.

Too Much Training?

I'm going to take my first stab at a "real" post and talk about training. I've done a bit of reading, not a ton, over the years and my various athletic pursuits and I know enough about the science of exercise and exercise physiology to not get myself into trouble when devising my own training plans, but I'm no expert by any means.

One of the basic premises are cycles and building a proper fitness base. If you want to ride your bike in a race at a 40 kph average, you don't just go out and push it as hard as you can and hope you can hold 40 kph during your training. You need to build up your base fitness and work all the systems involved in getting you to that speed, and you do that work in escalating cycles of stress and rest (relief). You'll have little micro cycles that make up larger macro cycles that will build you up to performing at your goal effort.

So, I've signed-up for Ironman and have been training. I have to admit that at this point I don't have a formal training plan written down on a sheet of paper nor anything entered electronically. What I've done thus far has been based on my own experience and historical knowledge, plus what feels "right" for me to be doing at this point. My partner, who's the consummate list-driven person, has watched this over the recent weeks and asked if I was doing too much too soon.

I have a tendency to get defensive (that could be a whole other blog in itself), but have tried to take some time to think about that and do see her concern. What I'm attempting to do in my training so far is:

1. Focus on my weakness, which is running
2. Build my fitness base, in all three sports, but focusing again on running first, then cycling, and finally the swim
3. Hold on to some of the fitness I achieved over this past triathlon season

The result has been a lot of running, at distances I've usually not run. Part of that is the fact that I'm going to need to run a marathon at the end of all of this, and I've only ever run one in my life so far. Another outcome is that I've felt I needed to add in the cycling early than I have in the past. In previous seasons, I wouldn't get on the rollers until January. This year I've already added them (for the past couple of weeks). Finally, just this past week I managed to get into the pool again, which felt great.

What this has meant is that I'm up almost every morning at 05:00 and out the door or down to the basement to do something by 05:30. I'm already at back-to-back training days, and it's the off-season. I won't add multiple training days until next Spring, but I do feel that I need to get in the "base" miles and saddle time now so that come Spring, I can really put in some work for speed and endurance.

So, that's the "gamble" I'm making right now. I'm hoping I'm not wrong and that I'm going to be burnt out come Spring, or that I'll be risking injury by training as much as I am now. I guess time will tell, so stay tuned. Another side benefit of all this is that I'm hoping I can eat what I want over the holidays and not worry about putting on weight, as I have in the past.  Not really the best motivator, but it's certainly a factor. :)

A New PR ... in the off-season?

I may have mentioned I'm not a runner. However, back in 2001 I was talked into running a marathon, to date it's my first and last, by a dear friend of ours who'd already run several. Living in the south at the time, we'd picked the Jacksonville, FL event. We trained together through the Summer and Fall. I was following Hal Higdon's book as best I could and she would modify it here or there. Going into the event, we had agreed that we'd run with each other.

At what seemed like the last minute, she found out her brother wanted to run it with us as well. Unfortunately, he really hadn't been training. Being my first one and not really sure how to approach it, I stuck with my promise to run as a group. The pace was quite slow as my training partner's brother wasn't really prepared. As a result, by mile 19, she told me that, while she appreciated that I was sticking to our agreement, I could go on by myself. So, I did, and finally finished in 5:06, 17 minutes ahead of my running partner and her brother.

My knees were killing me and I really didn't see myself running another marathon again -- I'd achieved my goal and could move on. Over the years, though, I did run several half marathons. Again, in all cases, I was committed to running with someone else. Up until this Spring, my fastest time had been a 2:18. Then, literally on a last minute whim, I decided to try to run the Madison (Half) Marathon with several of my sisters-in-law and my brother-in-law. On-line registration had closed, so we all hopped in the car and sped to Madison to try and beat the deadline for in-person registration. We made it with just a few minutes to spare and I believe I was the last one to register. My brother-in-law was doing the full event and the sisters-in-law and I were doing the half.

The next morning we managed to run what turned out to be a PR time for one of the sisters-in-law, a 2:05. Turns out it was also a PR for me, given how I'd been running thus far. I felt surprisingly good after that run, especially for entering without really training for it and doing the run at the last minute. I think I've already mentioned that the rest of this triathlon season went well for me, so I think I approached my training and fitness well. Later this summer, at the end of a 70.3 half Ironman, I managed to run the 13.1 miles in 2:01 for my new PR.

This takes us up to this past weekend. I've been running with a new running partner the past month or so. He's much faster than I am, having run a 1:31 half marathon just this past summer. Running with someone faster than you motivates you to keep your own pace up. As a result, I've moved from a sometimes I can run as fast as 8:00 pace to being able to regularly do so in our training runs. We run on Tuesdays and Thursdays, with Tuesdays being shorter and Thursdays a bit longer.

This past weekend we also decided to run on Saturday. I told him that I'd like to go a bit longer, maybe for two hours. I was hoping that we'd come close to covering a half marathon distance, but that wasn't really my goal. So, off we go, settling into a nice pace right from the start and we start talking. I have a habit of starting to run a bit faster when I talk, especially if we're going up hill. We ran along the Mississippi river so there were several decent hills along our route. Around the eight mile mark, we started discussing how we'd meander on back towards home and I realized that not only would we be able to get in my 13.1 miles, but that we were running faster than my previous best of a two hour pace.

Cutting to the chase, we passed the 13.1 mile mark (using his Garmin GPS watch) and I hit a split on my own Timex heart rate monitor: time was 1:49:47 or an 8:22 pace, and I did it all with an average heart rate of only 148. A new PR, and I did it as a matter of course during a training run in the off season. It really felt good and I've been fine after the run.

I do have some slight concerns that I'm doing a bit too much a bit too early at possibly a bit too fast a pace. There's a chance I could burn-out or, worse, push myself to an injury. I am being careful with my rest and am still working in little microcycles of stress and relief, so hopefully I'm just building a really good base. I guess time will tell.

I can't help but note that if I extrapolate out that time for the full marathon at the end of the Ironman, it would be a 3:38 time. I realize that's likely not possible, given that I'd have also just biked 112 miles before-hand, but it is a nice confidence booster to realize that my running, my historic weakest leg, is truly getting better.

My Background

It's interesting to realize that I'm a triathlete. I think my story is somewhat different from most, mainly in that it's "reverse" of what I usually see. In conversations I've had, and magazines and books I've read, I've learned that most triathletes are recovering runners. Many of them have had injuries and needed to back-off their training and so possibly turned to cycling or swimming during their rehabilitation. As a result, most triathletes are best at the running portion of the event.

I'm just the opposite. I started swimming at age 6. My mother signed me up for the local summer swim team in my home town. I hated it. A lot. I cried and told her I didn't want to do it. She insisted I stick it out, at least that summer. Long story short, I did stay with the team and it turned out I was something of a natural. I was no Rick Carey (my idol, since I was primarily a backstroker) or Pablo Morales (another idol, as I did the IM, too). However, I did win our state championship in the backstroke in High School, took second in the IM, and had another win doing backstroke for the medly relay team. Thanks, Mom, for making me stick with it!

Starting college, I had a very difficult decision to make. I was being recruited by universities to swim for them. However, I wanted to study electrical engineering which takes a lot of time. On top of that, I needed (a lot of) financial aid, which came partially in the form of work-study grants. So, I needed to work, near full-time, to pay my way. I couldn't do all three, so I decided to drop the swimming. It was a hard decision.

Luckily, I had another sport that I'd recently discovered and was falling in love with. I was one of many people to be captured by the successes of Andy Hampsten, Davis Phinney, Eric Heiden, Bob Roll, and, of course, Greg LeMond in the 1980s cycling scene. I also fell in love with the movies Breaking Away and American Flyers. I'd managed to buy an old road-style bike, I can't even remember the brand name, from a garage sale with paper route money. My father helped me drill holes through the frame so I could use standard bolts and nuts to secure a water bottle cage to the down-tube. At first I was just riding out to one of our local attractions and back, a whopping total of 10 miles round-trip. Then I pushed it and started to bike to the next town and back for 22 miles of riding. I had no idea, then, just what I would end up doing on a bike.

I moved from my home town, where I started my undergraduate work, to Madison, WI, where I was enrolled at the University of Wisconsin. Though I was quite poor, I managed to scrounge together (and borrow) enough money to buy a Cannondale touring bike. It was the first bike I'd ever purchased new and it rode like a dream. Unfortunately, that bike was stolen from the porch of the house I was renting (with seven other guys). Luckily, I was able to make an insurance claim against it and used that money to purchase a Cannondale R600 racing bike. It was entry level, but it was the best bike I'd ever been on. I made the jump to clipless pedals (I still ride Look today) and paid to have a professional fit on the Fit Kit at my local pro cycling shop.

With that steed under me, I started riding more and more around Madison and the surrounding area. I then learned of a fledgling student organization, the UW Cycling team. It was a club sport, not a varsity sport, and had just started a year before, but I went to the organizational meeting they were holding and signed-up. I was scared to death. I'd never actually raced a bike before, but now I was on this team. We went to races all around the mid-west (as not many other schools had collegiate cycling teams at that time). I did decently well, never winning a race, but frequently placing in the top 10. Needless to say, I was hooked and continued to ride and race even after graduating.

One other event at the UW-Madison is worth note. During my last year there, I took a physical education course titled "Introduction to Triathlon." An old high school friend of mine who went to the Air Force Academy had gotten into doing triathlons and I thought I'd give it a look. The class was excellent, in terms of learning exercise physiology, something I'd already been studying heavily from my swimming and was the approach I took to my cycling. Class was mostly training, either group rides, runs, or swims, along with some classroom work.

Our final exam was an Olympic distance triathlon, swimming in the pool (for insurance reasons). With about 300 meters to the finish line, I was leading the class, but was passed by the best runner in the group with just 50 meters to go and couldn't catch him. So, I took second in my first Olympic triathlon by just a couple of seconds. I'd managed to do the whole event in 2:02 (hours:minutes). I had no idea at the time how fast that was. All I knew was that I was absolutely spent. I told my partner, who helped in the transitions, that she may have just witnessed my first and last triathlon.

After graduating, my partner and I moved, life changed, and for almost 10 years, I only got out on my bike for occasional rides, some organized. I also had a job sitting behind a desk and started to put on some weight, though never going higher than 95 kg. Along the way, my sister-in-law started getting into triathlon. She was still here in the midwest and was talking about all the events in Minnesota and Wisconsin. She knew I was a cyclist and swimmer and that I'd done the one Olympic triathlon "back in the day," and asked if I wanted to get back into it.

I should qualify that statement. By this time in her growing triathlon career, she was ready to jump into doing an Ironman. Her question really was wondering if I'd do it with her. I dithered for far too long and then gave a tentative "Yes." I had no idea that you had to sign-up a year in advance. I also had no real idea what level of exertion would be involved. I started going out for short runs and found that even just 2-3 miles was very hard for me. I hadn't been in a pool swimming for "real" in 15 years. About all I had going was my cycling, which was my most recent activity.

I never did end up signing up for the Ironman and I never did a triathlon during that time. However, my sister-in-law did and she completed Ironman Wisconsin with nearly the whole extended family there cheering her on. I thought it was incredible! What really got me at the end was hearing this booming voice announcing each runner as they came into the finishing chute and declaring, "You are an Ironman!" Again, I didn't even know enough at the time to know that this was tradition.

By this time, we had moved back "home" to the midwest. With the closer proximity to my sister-in-law, and being in the area where she'd done a lot of her preparatory events, I finally signed-up for my first sprint triathlon in May of 2009. I managed to do three other sprints and two Olympic events that year. In 2010, I added a half Ironman 70.3 to the mix and did decently well. For the 2011 season, I did several sprints, Olympics, and another 70.3. Each year I was getting better and faster. Instead of being a mid-pack finisher, I noticed I was placing higher and higher. In my second-to-last event in 2011, I managed 4th place in my age group and discovered that I'd been shadowing the guy who took 3rd through the whole run, losing to him by just 19 seconds.

Finally, in my last event in 2011, I managed to place 3rd in my age group and get on "the podium" to bring home some "real hardware" (not just a finisher's medal). It was a great feeling of accomplishment. It was partially while I was riding that wave of feeling good that I made my decision to jump in and go all the way for the 2012 Ironman Wisconsin.

Committed to Ironman

On Monday 12 September 2011, at 12:00 local-time, I was anxiously clicking my mouse over the "Register" button on the Ironman Wisconsin page. I had made the decision about whether or not I was going to try to sign-up just the night before, in a final conversation with my partner as we were getting ready for bed. I had already also made the decision that I was going to risk the possibility of not getting a spot by signing up on-line as opposed to driving down to Madison to sign-up in person.

To be honest, I'm not sure if I was hoping I'd get a spot, or find that registration was already full. However, I'd made sure that I was logged into my Active.com account and had all my information ready to go just in case I really was able to register. I even tried clicking "Register" a few times before 12:00, just to see what would happen. Of course, I was told that registration wasn't open yet. I was also testing the responsiveness of the site, wondering if it would lag too much and prevent me from getting in.

As the computer ticked over to 12:00, I clicked the mouse with a surprising amount of force. I guess I really did want this. Unfortunately, I received the same message that registration wasn't open yet. Perhaps the registration servers were using a different Internet time source than my computer. Going back a page in the browser, I immediately clicked "Register" again and the same thing happened. Getting somewhat frantic, I repeated this process several times, noting, each time, that the site seemed to be lagging more and more: others like me were doing the same thing.

Finally, about a minute past 12:00 by my computer's clock, and after a fretfully long delay, I was taken to the real registration page for Ironman Wisconsin 2012! I was amazed at how long the registration form was. They wanted to know all sorts of information about me (including why I wanted to do this, what my "story" was, where I worked, and the like). It took me much longer to fill out the form than I had planned, but finally completed it. Frankly, I hurried through it, again fearful that if I took too long, by the time I was actually going to register, all the other on-line sign-ups would have beaten me to it and I would have a spot anymore. I'm not at all sure if that's how the system works, but I was nervous about it.

After I submitted that form and was asked for payment information, I started to relax a bit, thinking that they wouldn't ask for my money if I really wasn't going to get a spot. Finally, after what felt like an hour, though likely was only 10 minutes, I completed the registration and was looking at a page saying, "Congratulations! You are now registered for 2012 Ironman Wisconsin."

Wow! I'd done it. I'd actually committed myself to doing an Ironman!

It didn't take long, amazingly, before the doubt surfaced. Thoughts like, "What did you just do?!" and "I'm not ready for this!" and "You just paid money to do this?!" floated through my head. I sat at the computer, somewhat stunned, for a few minutes, just looking at that web page. My email flashed notifications as well, showing that I already had a receipt and a confirmation email. I'd really done it. I was locked-in at this point (there are no refunds).

Well, since I'd made the commitment to myself, I might as well make it to the rest of the world. The next morning, I went ahead and publicly posted my recent folly to Facebook and Twitter. I also sent an email to family members. I guess if I was going to do this thing, I may as well create a little extra motivation to really train and do well in the event by making my intentions public. I just hope it works as I expect.

So, now I'm signed-up and looking forward to Sunday 9 September 2012. All that's left to do is train. :)