Yet again, I failed to meet my Sunday evening deadline, no excuses other than I was running late, shattered, couldn't be bothered and just wanted to get to bed!
Last week was the first week of my Roth plan. I was really pleased with how it went. There was good consistency to my sessions, good recovery and motivation was high.
My run sessions are seeing me looking to hold my pace at just above Lactate Threshold (LT) - which for me is 141bpm. So I'm either looking to structure the session around holding 145bpm for a long period or hitting a higher HR (153bpm) for shorter, repeat periods.
After focusing my running on holding good pace for a longer & longer period - as marathons have been my goal races - it has been "interesting" to look to increase the pace & hold it for different lengths of time. I must admit going upto 153bpm for 12 mins, 4 times, was a challenging but productive session.
Strangely, a cross-over benefit from my structured swim sessions is the concept of pacing. Coach Kev has us working off our cruise pace (1.32/100m) so I've grown more accustomed to tweaking the pace in relation to this base. When out on the road on Saturday, it looked like 145bpm was equalling 7:13 min miles. It will be interesting to see how this changes over the coming weeks.
Before I leave the running, another amendment to my "traditional" approach has been the adoption of lighter-weight shoes. I read a really interesting article in Triathlete magazine which basically laid out that most running shoes have far more cushioning than what we actually require. I've started to slowly introduce lighter-weight runners into my training and have found this to be a beneficial change with no side effects. I've taken this a positive indication that both my running technique & overall body composition has improved over the last 2 years - as I did suffer with sore ankles when I tried this before several years ago. I'll still take the move over slowly as it could be a false dawn....
So I'm pleased with the running, feeling confident about the building volume on the bike and the swim continues to improve. Last week, I mentioned the pain I was incurring in my ribs whilst swimming. Thankfully, this seems to have gone away after lots of upper body (lats, obliques) stretching - and interestingly I have changed the fluid I drink whilst swimming.
I had introduced effervescent vitamin C into my water bottle (as natural source of carbs) but I think the fizziness may have caused issues in my digestive system which could have led to the stitch-like pain I was feeling - even though it was higher than where a stitch traditionally occurs....mmm, interesting hey? Good to find these things out early.
Finally before I shoot off.....Sunday saw me take part in a 50km Mountain Bike ride called Hell of The North Cotswolds. An interesting day was had, good experience was gained - especially as I'm interested in adventure racing in the future - and I thought it was a good endurance and strength building session which lasted just under 3 hours.
Two key take-outs for me were......mountain-bikers to not like going up-hill....geez, do these boys ever punch out a big gear?! Secondly, it was perfectly clear that I am an absolute pussy when it comes to going downhill....I knew this before but this just confirmed it to a wider audience!
Still better to be safe than sorry...bigger races await!
Take it easy guys, hope you all have great weeks & I'll catch up with you the Easter weekend.
Sparky
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