Bloody Swimming!

Swimming. The bane of my triathlon life. The thing that makes duathlon look inviting.

Some years I try very hard, some years I ignore it. It doesn’t seem to make much difference, I’m still crap at it. When I was training for the Double Ironman I was swimming 3-4 times a week with a very long swim on Saturday morning. That was when my swimming was at its most comfortable and quickest. I had my 500m down to about 8:50, so nothing really to scare the real swimmers out there. These days my 500m times around up around 9:30. In a word, shit.

I know what the problem is though, which I suppose is the first step to improvement. It’s my legs. Not only do they not propel me, they slow me down.

Yesterday morning I did a little experiment to prove this. I did 5 x 500m timed sets at around 85% effort:

Set 1: Pull Buoy :  9:38

Set 2: Fins : 9:45

Set 3: Pull Buoy and hand paddles: 9:30

Sets 4&5: Free swim 9:50, 9:55

My fastest sets were ones where my legs were raised using a pull buoy. Most swimmers’ fastest set by far would have been the one using the fins. At least I know the problem but fixing it is another matter.

When I use a kickboard, I don’t go anywhere. It’s like running on a treadmill, I can kick like hell and stay still. Mind you, this is progress ... I used to go backwards!

“Get a coach! “ I hear you cry. I’ve had Total Immersion coaching, triathlon club coaching, tips from mates, a coaching course from a member of the GB Olympic Swim team, coached sessions at the local pool most Wednesday mornings. I’m just not getting it and it’s really starting to vex me!

I still remember broaching the subject with the Olympian. He didn’t believe it was possible to go backwards when kicking with a kickboard. The look on his face was priceless when I showed him how annoyingly possible it was. So I had someone who has spent a very large proportion of his life in and around swimming pools telling me I was doing something he’d never seen done in a pool before ... niiiice!

Back to the drawing board then! I’m going to allocate a session per week to working on my kick as until I do this then it’s obvious I’ll be limited in my improvement and I need a LOT of improvement! My last IM swim split was 79 minutes, I need to get that down to 65 minute. So, all kick drill tips gratefully received!!

On a positive note, enthusiasm for training is very high considering the Tri season finished on Sunday. I re-introduced leg weights at the gym on Monday and still have the DOMS to prove it today! I also picked up the core work again, something I was religious about during pre-season but let slip a bit during the season. I still managed to plank for 5:16, so the slippage wasn’t disastrous. Add in a couple of 2.5k swims and a steady turbo trainer session and all is good. Planning on an easy run tonight to sort these DOMS out.

TTFN!

*      Thanks again to Sue Jarman for the photo!

End of Season Flurry

One of the things I don’t really like about endurance sport is that the training hours: racing hours ratio is pretty poor. To put it simply, you do a lot of training for very few races.

There are people out there with better rates of recovery who can race endurance events week in, week out – but I’m not one of them. I need a complete week off after a marathon or an iron distance race, then an easy “recovery week” before I can resume training properly again. I wouldn’t even contemplate racing again for a month after one of these events.  The MK Marathon in April knocked me on my back for a whole month, I caught every bug going and my legs felt like lead for ages.

Up until a few weeks ago, the sum of my 2012 racing was:

1 x Half marathon

1 x Marathon

1 x Standard Triathlon

1 x Middle Distance Triathlon

1 x Iron Distance Triathlon

A grand total of five races! Weigh that up against the hundreds of hours of training I’d put in, it’s a bit disproportional. I enjoy training, but I love racing. Racing is the reason we train, it’s what gets our juices flowing. They are also nice and social too. Rach & I have been on the tri scene for about 6 years now and have met loads of great people from across the country. Races are where we get to catch up with them face to face and talk about training, the race to come and afterwards exchange the war stories about the race just completed. Facebook and the forums are good to keep touch in between races, but you can’t beat seeing people in the flesh (ooh err!).

So, our end-of-season flurry of races has been great fun: Rach & I have raced 3 times in the past 4 weeks. One standard triathlon and two local sprints – all pool based. All have been quite low-key and had nothing really riding on them. We did them for the pure fun of it and I thoroughly enjoyed each one. I haven’t got round to writing race reports yet (most unlike me) but I will over the next few days.  I’m no sprinter and am a bit one-paced (my average running speed was the same for the standard as it was for the sprints!) but I finished in pretty respectable times and placed quite highly.

We’re in the process of planning our race schedule for next season. I’d like to race a little more but I need to keep focussed on what I’m trying to achieve. Every race must be significant and have a direct purpose on the goal at the end. I will repeat the run focus with the aim of running a fast marathon at London and carrying that run speed into the season. Prior to that, I want to run a fast half marathon. My PB is 1:31, that needs to be dropped well under 1:30. I’d like to race some hard duathlons in the spring to sharpen up for tri season. Maybe a tough sportif or two, then I’m thinking of a Sprint, a Standard and one or two Middles leading up to IMUK. The timing of these races is important and allowing the right amount of recovery time without disrupting training too much is crucial.

Rach is putting together her race schedule for next season also. For the first time since we took up triathlon we have vastly different agendas. She’s concentrating on short course and speed next year whilst I’m ... errrm ... not. We’ve historically raced the same races but I’m looking forward to cheering her on from the sidelines. We’ll get a few races in together earlier in the season which will be enjoyable. :)

TTFN!

Thanks to Sue Jarmin for the photo!

New Blog

New Blog

Welcome to my new blog. As the title of my blog suggests, the content will be mainly about triathlon and everything that goes into preparing for triathlon.

The title of my blog also suggests that I have fairly ambitious aims for the next season or two, these being qualifying and competing at the Ironman World Championships in Kona, Hawaii.

For those who don't know, qualifying for this event is extremely difficult, even for the naturally talented triathlete. You can only qualify by competing in an Ironman event and by finishing in the top 4 or 5 in your age group. Age groups are banded in 5 year segments, mine being the 45-49 year olds (aka 'Old Farts').

I've chosen Ironman UK (IMUK) on August 4th, 2013 as my qualifying event.

Up until this year I've never considered Kona as a realistic target, it was purely an event I followed to cheer on the likes of Chrissy Wellington and the friends I have who were "good". I originally planned to take a year off "going long" as I struggled with motivation this season, especially where long bike rides were concerned. And swimming. I've always struggled with swimming though, I'm not good at it and I don't particularly enjoy it. I definitely need to overcome this to stand any chance of qualifying.

So, what changed my mind from taking a year off to hitting it hard instead? It was my result in The Outlaw triathlon in July. The Outlaw is a non-Ironman brand race, but runs over the identical distances. Given the lack of swimming and cycle training over the winter/spring, my expectations were quite low going into the race. Instead, after a predictably rotten swim, I rattled off a 5:30 bike without really trying too hard, then I managed a 3:41 run to post a near 20 minute personal best of 10:42. This time would have been good enough to qualify for Kona at some Ironman races (not many though!). But it got me to thinking, what if I learned to swim properly? What if I hit the bike hard and got some more power? What if I lost that last bit of weight?

These were questions I didn't want to leave unanswered for years to come, so urged on by Rachael (my wife and fellow triathlete) I entered IMUK. Actually, Rach did more than urge me - she entered me into the race when I wasn't looking to stop my dithering!

The next thing I did was engage a coach. Darryl Carter of target-fitness.co.uk coached me a couple of years ago and brought me on leaps and bounds. Finances dictated I needed to go solo for a while, but now I'm in a position to get back on board with him. 

The latest thing I did was start this blog. I'm a big fan of nailing my colours to the mast where it comes to my goals. If find it motivates me to train harder if I've gone on record making bold predictions of my intentions.

So, here we go!! Kona 2012 is next weekend, I know people over there competing and others (like me) who want to be there this time next year! It will certainly be an interesting year ahead.

TTFN!