Some days you are the dog, other days you are the hydrant.
I'd had signed up for a medium course tri many years ago, till a sports injury came in the way and I stopped running and went back to cycling as my main sport. Then life happened, i stopped racing, and by 2017, had pretty much stopped cycling too. But by the time 2019 rolled around, I was missing the training. I knew i no longer had the motivation to do 8-10 hours on the bike, so in Feb, I decided to sign up for a 70.3, to give me a reason to get back to training regularly. My wife also decided to join, and and so we were good to go.
Our plan was to do a run-focused block for around 10 weeks, and then do a structured 18 week training block to get me to the 70.3.
The first block went well - got in a comfortable groove again, and was actually enjoying the training again (the last couple of years of training were an absolute chore - I dreaded each and every bike session). Then disaster - an old eye injury (courtesy an old MMA incident) flared up at the end of April and my eye doctor overdid the treatment, prescribing me a massive dose of steroids for far too long. This wasnt the Good Kind of steroids either - it completely messed me up (I would wake up 5-6 times a night cramping in places where I didnt know i had muscles that could cramp, i was lethargic, i had no taste buds for anything except sweet stuff, etc). By the time I figured out something was wrong, got a second opinion and completed my recovery protocol, it was mid-July and I had literally no fitness left: couldnt run even 5 min or do a Z2 ride for an hour without getting winded.
But with 13 weeks to go, i was finally over the side-effects. At this point, I realized that i was not going to do anywhere close to a great performance, and decided to do a DIY plan based on as aggressive a training load as I could handle. The approximate plan was:
- Cycling: start with SST, progress to FTP/VO2 and then settle into longer tempo/SST efforts
- Running: just build endurance and do some speedwork (followed the FIRST protocol of 3 quality runs a week)
- Swimming: work on technique and build endurance - save harder efforts for bike and run
For the most part, the plan went well, although my weird/freaky minor medical issues continued: needed to get a wisdom tooth extracted, got bit by a wasp on a weekend ride that got infected and resulted in my leg swelling up by 4"' on night (panicky trip to the ER at 1am) and then 5 weeks before the race, had to go under GA for surgery for a minor non-related issue. And course I had to put up with trash talk from my wife (we both have a good-natured but no-holds-barred competitive streak). That limited the amount of long bike rides I could do - i did 2 rides of 2.5 hours, 1 ride of 2 hours and everything else was 90min or less. But I did make up for the volume with intensity - which had worked well for me in the past in my cycling days, so i was feeling pretty good. With several weeks of 800-1200 TSS, I thought I had prepared as well as I could have, given the circumstances. My only concern was whether i had the endurance to hold a good pace for the run.
My only concern was nutrition and fluid intake - I am primarily a roadie and while i have a nutrition plan that can get me through a 3-4 hour hammerfest, I am usually quite done by the end. I had a plan to make sure i ended the bike segment with enough - I just needed to make sure i stuck with it.
Finally, race day comes around.
Morning: had a decent breakfast at 4:30am, headed over to transition, popped a gel, drank half a bottle of Gu sports drink.
Swim: the weather was initially forecasting storm (which made me happy - I am a dive pro, have conducted surface rescues in really choppy conditions and have zero fear of the open water) but by the time the race day rolled around, nothing. Just clouds. It was a rolling start for the 2-loop swim, and the swimmers were NOT segregated by expected swim times. My wife and i made our way up towards the front third, and soon we were off. Except that this was a very weird swim course - the water was shallow and you had to wade about 100-150m out to actually get to a depth where you could swim. There was a surprisingly brisk current going right to left on the counter-clockwise swim - that, and being surrounded by slow-moving swimmers really messed me up. My dive pro instinct is to be very cautious around people on the surface and many times, i instinctively stopped swimming and started treading water because i was sandwiched behind people doing breast-stroke or near-drowning (hard to tell). And of course, i kept getting pushing into the ropes as a result of the current. Finally, i decided to just head to the outside and avoid the mess. On the way back, i was so focused on not getting surrounded by floater, that i lost track of the current and ended up drifting really wide. The second loop went a little better, although i again had a spell where i was surrounded by swimming zombies. I was planning a relaxed 38-40' swim, but my swim took almost 45'. Still, not fatal.
T1: My legs were surprisingly cooked from all the wading we had to do at the start and end of each loop. It was a 350m jog in the sand to the bike transition and I did a relaxed job, and took a minute or so to pop a gel, finish a bottle of Gu and off we went.
Bike: It was a 3-loop course and started out well. The course was mostly flat on one end. with a vicious little climb followed by rollers going to the other end. I had planned to average a comfortable 32kph (which would be a Z2 effort) and preserve my legs as much as possible for the run, and was chugging along fairly well, passing a fair number of people who had gone ahead of me. Then, after about 90', i got a cramp in my left leg - and I rarely cramp, except at the end of really hard 3-4 hour bike efforts. I was quite puzzled as to why this happened: I had been eating my gels, drinking my sports drink and while i probably drank a little less water than ideal, i still had more water than i do on my normal training rides. And the weather was something I was used to and i was averaging a good 20-30W lower than my training rides. After a while, I realized that my saddle was a little lower than ideal (after race, I found it had slide down by about 1.5cm). I debated on whether or not to stop, but by then, i was done with 2 loops, the cramps were under control, so i decided to keep going. But either my legs lost a little bit of zing or the winds picked up (I blame the headwinds. Always!), but that last lap wasnt nearly as good as the first 2. Finished the bike in 2:56 - again, lower than expected, but not critically so.
T2: Took around 3-4 minutes - had a gel, drank some water and off we went.
Run: About 350m into the 3-loop run, my legs seized up. Like, literally. Quads and hamstring cramp on the left leg, quad cramp on the right. I had to get off the course and spend some time figuring out how to fix this - stretching the quads made the hamstrings worse, and stretching the hammies made the quads worse. Anyway, finally got it fixed and started hobbling along. Popped electrolytes, cola and water at each aid station and after a while, the cramps went away but the muscles were shot. My HR wasnt high, but my legs simply had gotten cooked, and with that, all hopes of a respectable finish. Still, muddled along and finished nearly 30' slower than my expected time.
In some ways, I was happy to have finished. Given the littany of health issues I had leading up to the race (I visited the hospital more times in the past 4 months than i have in my entire life before this), I was glad that nothing else cropped up.
The performance was a lot poorer than expected - even without a full training block, i was still hoping for a sub-6 time, but I guess there is only so much you can pack into a 13 week block where you are starting effectively from scratch. Still, a few things I think i could/should have done better:
- Checked the ducking bike -- argh. What a stupid mistake.
- Focused more on endurance than speed in training - I was focused on gaining the speed to do a sub-2 run, and the FIST protocol seemed like a good way to get it. Wrong - I got too greedy. Even on the bike - those short hard efforts would have worked better if i did have my normal base in my legs, but didnt work too well given the situation
- Under-estimated the effect other swimmers would have on my swim rhythm and pacing
My wife won her AG and qualified for NZ (admittedly weak field, but she's also new to endurance sports - with a year of training, she'll be MOP. With a few years more, she's gonna be competitive). Surprisingly, i got a chance via rolldowns - most of the athletes were Indian (*pink* not a lot of diversity here, either */pink*), but not really expecting a slot with my crappy, 6hr+ time, I was in a bathtub at the time. Doh!
Anyway, while the race was eminently forgettable, the good news is that my fading interest in endurance sports is fully re-kindled. Endurance sports has never been my primary sport - from being a nationally ranked squash player who has played against pros, and a fairly decent MMA/jujitsu guy back in my youth, it took (and still takes) a bit of an ego check to participate in a sport where I am not at the pointy end of things. Cycling used to force me to stay disciplined with in my life, and over the last 2 years, I have missed that aspect. Adding running and swimming has made me look forward to my training again and 10-12 hour weeks go by fairly quickly.
Am looking forward to a 5:45 time for my next 70.3 - but more importantly, I am looking forward to the training that goes into preparing for the race.
If you have made it through this far, thanks for reading :)
--
Those who are slower than me suck.
Those who are faster than me dope
I'd had signed up for a medium course tri many years ago, till a sports injury came in the way and I stopped running and went back to cycling as my main sport. Then life happened, i stopped racing, and by 2017, had pretty much stopped cycling too. But by the time 2019 rolled around, I was missing the training. I knew i no longer had the motivation to do 8-10 hours on the bike, so in Feb, I decided to sign up for a 70.3, to give me a reason to get back to training regularly. My wife also decided to join, and and so we were good to go.
Our plan was to do a run-focused block for around 10 weeks, and then do a structured 18 week training block to get me to the 70.3.
The first block went well - got in a comfortable groove again, and was actually enjoying the training again (the last couple of years of training were an absolute chore - I dreaded each and every bike session). Then disaster - an old eye injury (courtesy an old MMA incident) flared up at the end of April and my eye doctor overdid the treatment, prescribing me a massive dose of steroids for far too long. This wasnt the Good Kind of steroids either - it completely messed me up (I would wake up 5-6 times a night cramping in places where I didnt know i had muscles that could cramp, i was lethargic, i had no taste buds for anything except sweet stuff, etc). By the time I figured out something was wrong, got a second opinion and completed my recovery protocol, it was mid-July and I had literally no fitness left: couldnt run even 5 min or do a Z2 ride for an hour without getting winded.
But with 13 weeks to go, i was finally over the side-effects. At this point, I realized that i was not going to do anywhere close to a great performance, and decided to do a DIY plan based on as aggressive a training load as I could handle. The approximate plan was:
- Cycling: start with SST, progress to FTP/VO2 and then settle into longer tempo/SST efforts
- Running: just build endurance and do some speedwork (followed the FIRST protocol of 3 quality runs a week)
- Swimming: work on technique and build endurance - save harder efforts for bike and run
For the most part, the plan went well, although my weird/freaky minor medical issues continued: needed to get a wisdom tooth extracted, got bit by a wasp on a weekend ride that got infected and resulted in my leg swelling up by 4"' on night (panicky trip to the ER at 1am) and then 5 weeks before the race, had to go under GA for surgery for a minor non-related issue. And course I had to put up with trash talk from my wife (we both have a good-natured but no-holds-barred competitive streak). That limited the amount of long bike rides I could do - i did 2 rides of 2.5 hours, 1 ride of 2 hours and everything else was 90min or less. But I did make up for the volume with intensity - which had worked well for me in the past in my cycling days, so i was feeling pretty good. With several weeks of 800-1200 TSS, I thought I had prepared as well as I could have, given the circumstances. My only concern was whether i had the endurance to hold a good pace for the run.
My only concern was nutrition and fluid intake - I am primarily a roadie and while i have a nutrition plan that can get me through a 3-4 hour hammerfest, I am usually quite done by the end. I had a plan to make sure i ended the bike segment with enough - I just needed to make sure i stuck with it.
Finally, race day comes around.
Morning: had a decent breakfast at 4:30am, headed over to transition, popped a gel, drank half a bottle of Gu sports drink.
Swim: the weather was initially forecasting storm (which made me happy - I am a dive pro, have conducted surface rescues in really choppy conditions and have zero fear of the open water) but by the time the race day rolled around, nothing. Just clouds. It was a rolling start for the 2-loop swim, and the swimmers were NOT segregated by expected swim times. My wife and i made our way up towards the front third, and soon we were off. Except that this was a very weird swim course - the water was shallow and you had to wade about 100-150m out to actually get to a depth where you could swim. There was a surprisingly brisk current going right to left on the counter-clockwise swim - that, and being surrounded by slow-moving swimmers really messed me up. My dive pro instinct is to be very cautious around people on the surface and many times, i instinctively stopped swimming and started treading water because i was sandwiched behind people doing breast-stroke or near-drowning (hard to tell). And of course, i kept getting pushing into the ropes as a result of the current. Finally, i decided to just head to the outside and avoid the mess. On the way back, i was so focused on not getting surrounded by floater, that i lost track of the current and ended up drifting really wide. The second loop went a little better, although i again had a spell where i was surrounded by swimming zombies. I was planning a relaxed 38-40' swim, but my swim took almost 45'. Still, not fatal.
T1: My legs were surprisingly cooked from all the wading we had to do at the start and end of each loop. It was a 350m jog in the sand to the bike transition and I did a relaxed job, and took a minute or so to pop a gel, finish a bottle of Gu and off we went.
Bike: It was a 3-loop course and started out well. The course was mostly flat on one end. with a vicious little climb followed by rollers going to the other end. I had planned to average a comfortable 32kph (which would be a Z2 effort) and preserve my legs as much as possible for the run, and was chugging along fairly well, passing a fair number of people who had gone ahead of me. Then, after about 90', i got a cramp in my left leg - and I rarely cramp, except at the end of really hard 3-4 hour bike efforts. I was quite puzzled as to why this happened: I had been eating my gels, drinking my sports drink and while i probably drank a little less water than ideal, i still had more water than i do on my normal training rides. And the weather was something I was used to and i was averaging a good 20-30W lower than my training rides. After a while, I realized that my saddle was a little lower than ideal (after race, I found it had slide down by about 1.5cm). I debated on whether or not to stop, but by then, i was done with 2 loops, the cramps were under control, so i decided to keep going. But either my legs lost a little bit of zing or the winds picked up (I blame the headwinds. Always!), but that last lap wasnt nearly as good as the first 2. Finished the bike in 2:56 - again, lower than expected, but not critically so.
T2: Took around 3-4 minutes - had a gel, drank some water and off we went.
Run: About 350m into the 3-loop run, my legs seized up. Like, literally. Quads and hamstring cramp on the left leg, quad cramp on the right. I had to get off the course and spend some time figuring out how to fix this - stretching the quads made the hamstrings worse, and stretching the hammies made the quads worse. Anyway, finally got it fixed and started hobbling along. Popped electrolytes, cola and water at each aid station and after a while, the cramps went away but the muscles were shot. My HR wasnt high, but my legs simply had gotten cooked, and with that, all hopes of a respectable finish. Still, muddled along and finished nearly 30' slower than my expected time.
In some ways, I was happy to have finished. Given the littany of health issues I had leading up to the race (I visited the hospital more times in the past 4 months than i have in my entire life before this), I was glad that nothing else cropped up.
The performance was a lot poorer than expected - even without a full training block, i was still hoping for a sub-6 time, but I guess there is only so much you can pack into a 13 week block where you are starting effectively from scratch. Still, a few things I think i could/should have done better:
- Checked the ducking bike -- argh. What a stupid mistake.
- Focused more on endurance than speed in training - I was focused on gaining the speed to do a sub-2 run, and the FIST protocol seemed like a good way to get it. Wrong - I got too greedy. Even on the bike - those short hard efforts would have worked better if i did have my normal base in my legs, but didnt work too well given the situation
- Under-estimated the effect other swimmers would have on my swim rhythm and pacing
My wife won her AG and qualified for NZ (admittedly weak field, but she's also new to endurance sports - with a year of training, she'll be MOP. With a few years more, she's gonna be competitive). Surprisingly, i got a chance via rolldowns - most of the athletes were Indian (*pink* not a lot of diversity here, either */pink*), but not really expecting a slot with my crappy, 6hr+ time, I was in a bathtub at the time. Doh!
Anyway, while the race was eminently forgettable, the good news is that my fading interest in endurance sports is fully re-kindled. Endurance sports has never been my primary sport - from being a nationally ranked squash player who has played against pros, and a fairly decent MMA/jujitsu guy back in my youth, it took (and still takes) a bit of an ego check to participate in a sport where I am not at the pointy end of things. Cycling used to force me to stay disciplined with in my life, and over the last 2 years, I have missed that aspect. Adding running and swimming has made me look forward to my training again and 10-12 hour weeks go by fairly quickly.
Am looking forward to a 5:45 time for my next 70.3 - but more importantly, I am looking forward to the training that goes into preparing for the race.
If you have made it through this far, thanks for reading :)
--
Those who are slower than me suck.
Those who are faster than me dope