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"Suffer You Pigs" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid
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Man, if you guys are wondering how Stefan Kuserilis finish Ironman Arizona in 9:40 and got on the 35-39 podium training out of New York City, I have his secret.

The man is a training machine. His is built from the same East German Factory that gave you the likes of Udo Bolts and Olaf Ludwig. I am just glad that he spent his youth doing breastroke in some East German sports academy swimming 100K per week and not biking.

Stefan shows up to IronTour Lake Placid. I thought Barry Dmitruk and I were over the top, always adding "extra miles to workouts" but Stefan make us look like a bunch of soft North American boys on lame designer spreadsheet plans.

Lake Placid IronTour was supposed to be a 4K swim on Friday, on Saturday a 186K ride with 10,200 ft of climbing (7 hour ride) followed by a 30 min transition run and then an hour later a 3K swim. Then Sunday a 2 hour run followed by a 100K ride including 4500 ft of vertical. We upped the ante from a cool down 1 K swim, to a 2K hammerfest swim on the Ironman LP course to close off the IronTour. The total training time on Sat was 8:20. Sunday was 6 hours even.

Through the whole weekend, Stefan kept asking to add on MORE miles. On Sunday, when we were all cooked, he wanted to run more. His entire day on Sunday was a personal Interval session as he would surge ahead and come back to get us. My only saving grace was staying within a minute of him to the Whiteface summit on Saturday and on Sunday, actually beating him to the climb to the Veterans's memorial highway gate. Something about being 45 lbs lighter likely helped me.

On the 14th hour of training on the weekend, we were riding up high falls Gorge at over 45 kph. At the base of Mama Bear, all we heard was "suffer you pigs" and he lets lose at over 40 kph going up that hill. I know cause I was already doing 35 kph at the base of the hill with quads on fire. While I was not totally blown, I could barely respond. I felt like Jan Ullrich getting caught by Lance in the TdF Prologue. Humbled yet amazed at the same time.

At 6'6" Stefan creates his own weather system in the wake behind him. They need an entry on weather.com for a special weather forecast for the area right behind him. He is so huge that I can actually descend a steep hill as quick as him as I push less wind. In fact, I coasted all the way down to Keene on Sunday at 80 kph while Stefan pedalled like a madman !



Anway to give you the full picture of the output from the East German sports factory, I get a call from NYC 5 min ago. Its not like 14-15 hours or so of training over 2 days is enough. For mere mortals it is over the top. I was cripple the morning. But Stefan adds another 175 mile ride from somewhere near Albany to NYC for another 10 hours of training. That's 24 hours over 3 days !

I'm telling you, we North Americans are soft. They don't make them like those East Germans in these parts.

All Hail the Kaiser. We're just a bunch of posers.

Dev
Last edited by: devashish paul: Jul 5, 05 9:22
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [devashish paul] [ In reply to ]
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Best line of the weekend:

"I was just trying to jump on the train, it looked like you guys were going fast..." Heather Gollnick :-)

During the Swim prologue on Friday after almost swimming into us on the first lap. Heather you can join the poser (as Dev would say) "train"! But you're the Engine. I think we held on for about three strokes. :-)
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [Trevor S] [ In reply to ]
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Trevor, I think I had more swimming glory in one weekend than I will ever get in a lifetime. First Heather Gollnick says we are "swimming fast", then Stefan has to "work" during the Sunday closing swim to stay with me (of course, he had no wetsuit).

Dev
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [devashish paul] [ In reply to ]
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It was an honor training with you guys. I am totally motivated to do an IM (IMLP) next year. I set a PR for longest ride, most bike miles in a week (180), and most training hours in one week (17 hours), thanks to spending Saturday with you guys. Did about a 12 mile run on Sunday and felt great. At least for me it seems the more miles I do, the stronger I feel. I guess I need to keep the volum high.

Coolest moment of the weekend for me was when we hit the Keene hill on loop one and Stefan said "Triyoda, take over". Of course that was after I had spent about 5 or six miles holding Trevor's and Stefan's wheels on the flat.

Matt

*********************
"When I first had the opportunity to compete in triathlon, it was the chicks and their skimpy race clothing that drew me in. Everyone was so welcoming and the lifestyle so obviously narcissistic. I fed off of that vain energy. To me it is what the sport is all about."
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [Tri_yoda] [ In reply to ]
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Triyoda...on Sat we had you and Trevor to hammer us. Then you guys leave and on Sat we get Alexandre Albuquerque (MTL) who won Epicman to hammer us. The "Kaiser" Kuserelis was the only guy hammering everyone both days. Barry was a stud on Sat and the Sun run and then paid on the ride on Sunday. I was lame after Whiteface on Sunday all the way through the training until I got my legs back on day two climb to the Whiteface Toll Gate. Then amazingly enough, I was able to hammer up the Bears and even hold my own during the event closing 2K swim.

Bottom line, "Kaiser Kusurelis" was stong on all the stages all the time. There was no one else at the IronTour who could claim that....and no one could claim an additional 175 mile ride on Monday on top of the Irontour !
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [devashish paul] [ In reply to ]
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Great weekend. Tough for this newbie who couldn't complete the entire tour. Stomach cramps and very tired legs put me out after the 2-hour run on Sunday. The drive home was not pretty, as fatigue was setting in during the 5 hour drive along 401 to Toronto.

Thanks for putting this on. I was slightly disappointed at my biking performance, but have talked with a few people about what I did and what additional mileage you guys did and everyone thinks that I should just be glad I came out in the way I did. No one seems to think that Whiteface Mt climb was a good idea for me. Oh well..live and learn. More time in the saddle will help the future.

Best of luck to you guys in LP, and for those that came out "only to train" thanks for the advice and encouragement. Hope you sign up for LP next year. I know it is not in my cards (halfs only next year) but I think I would like to tackle Epicman with a bit more focus over the winter on my biking. If IronTour #2 comes up next year, would gladly go again.

--------
Canadian resident again 10/31/2009
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [cimit] [ In reply to ]
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hey Tim. You did awesome. Keep up the good work and don't believe any of the smack talk that we throw around at Irontour.

You are a brave man for even attempting this. It has taken me 2 decades of doing endurance sport and listening to my body to be able to guage what I can do and how fast I can do it at. As I mentioned, I was way off the back starting the 2 hour run on Sunday, running at around 110 bpm. I knew I was up for another 6 hour training day (after 8.5 on Sat), so I had to really go easy. I was barely doing 10 min miles for the first three miles, but once my food digested, then I was able to pick it up a bit (but only a bit, as I knew there was still 3.5 hours of riding and 40 min of swimming to do).

If there is one lesson to take away from long ultra training like this, it is to listen to how your body feels now, and plan how you WANT to feel in 3 hours. To feel good in 3 hours, you need to hold back now, pace and fuel. Especially on Ironman race day, there is this tendency to get caught up in the moment during the first 50 miles of the bike. If nothing else, I had to suck up a bashing to my ego (ie doing 10 min miles, while the guys were doing sub 7:30's) to ensure that I made it through the day. Good practice for Ironman race day.

That being said, I have always been (and will likely continue to be) the idiot that gets "caught up in the moment" on race day and pay the price later.

I have to remember on race day, "check your ego in with your Dry Strip bag and then pick it up after the race".

Again, thanks for coming out and making it a great event. See you at Epicman next year. We'll have to figure out a date for next year's IronTour LP. Something tells me that I won't get the weekend away from my family again :-)
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [devashish paul] [ In reply to ]
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Dev, quit you computer job and become a sports writer! Your posts (although not always completely true) are the most entertaining ones I saw in a while.
The "suffer you pig" episode was taken directly from the tour that Jan won. His then team mate Udo Boelts apparently noticed that Ullrich wasn't working hard enough and yelled it at him. Jan realized and put more effort in to the mountain ascent, won the stage and the tour later. I felt that our "train" wasn't working hard enough either and took the blame for it since I was the one in the lead. So the suffer quote was more directed towards myself. And it worked o:).
Anyways, thank you guys for a great weekend. Some of the intensity was higher than I usually train in, like the 7:15 m/miles on the two hour run (all Alex's mtl fault!) or the bike "intervals" (I take credit for this one). Also, never climbed a mountain that takes 1hr to get up. Tri Yoda with only 1100 annual miles in his legs showed his class on this one. What a strong dude he is.
I would like to see the amount of food we ate over these 3 days. I killed half of a gallon of Stewards ice cream on Saturday evening just on my own. This was in addition to my regular dinner. Wonder how many calories that is? Gotta keep these 6'-6" moving.
Anyways, this camp was great. You canadians are truly studly. Lake Placid, watch out!!!

Stefan NYC
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [kus] [ In reply to ]
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Kaiser Kuserelis when I quite doing High Tech marketing stuff, I will be organizing some real tri tours for hammerheads like yourself. There will be destinations in the Canadian Rockies, Adirondacks, Alpes, New Zealand and California. These tours won't be quite like the over the top Epictours that Molina and Gordo do, but more like 2-4 day affairs that are mildly over the top, but attainable by your average triposer :-) and only take you away from home/work for a few days.

How are the legs after the 175 mile bonus stage ?
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [devashish paul] [ In reply to ]
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Please do these tours for the duration of a week. i usually need four days to find my legs. :o)
My legs feel fine today. Hey, it's just biking, isn't it?

Stefan
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Re: "Suffer You Pig" Stefan "The Kaiser" Kuserelis, Kills Everyone at IronTour Lake Placid [kus] [ In reply to ]
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Well, if we do one in the Alpes, it will be for a week. Can you import a few hard core East Germans from Leipzig, Dresden or Rostok to keep the soft Americans and Canadians honest ? On second thought, no need to import any East Germans from Rostock. They might be soft like my man Jan Ullrich.
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