As much as I enjoy writing about each of my past training cycles in detail, I am forced to be extremely brief with this weeks post. The very end of this training cycle is the beginning to a very busy period for me. Country USA began on Tuesday, June 25th in Oshkosh. This event is a 5 day concert festival in our county's jurisdiction. From Tuesday through Sunday morning I will be working 11 hour days patrolling the ground of Country USA, attempting to keep some sort of order to a week of pure drunken chaos. Due to Country USA falling on 2 of my scheduled off days and my daughters birthday being the Monday right before Country USA, I opted to take 3 days off from this rotation to be with my family for Delaney's 2nd birthday and to get in some long training days.
This training cycle began with a scheduled 4 hour block in preparations for Country USA. I was able to get my swim/bike brick workout in before hand and attend training. I also picked up a 4 hour block of overtime on the last day of my 3 day work week. On my 2nd day off we planned a joint party with my in-law's. My brother-in-law graduated from UW-Milwaukee this past spring and we held his graduation party in conjunction with my daughters 2nd birthday party. It was forecasted to rain that day on and off all day, but lucked out with beautiful weather. After a couple high volume training days, it was off to start a hectic 8 day stretch of work, 5 days of 11 hours, followed by 3 regular work days on the road.
Brief Recap
The bulk of my training this cycle came on days 6 and 7 with on bike focused brick and one run focused brick. I would be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit intimidated going into those two days for fear of the unknown. My first workout was an 80 mile ride followed with a short 4 mile brick run. I did the bike portion as 2, 40 mile loops. I was fortunate enough to meet up with a female named Dawn from the Milwaukee area who was in town for a wedding. She was out to get in a 50 mile training ride. It turns out she was also training for Ironman Madison. I rode about 25 miles of my 40 mile with her discussing the difficulties of training for an Ironman as well as the strategies and tips/tricks of Ironman Wisconsin. It was a treat to finish a long ride with an experienced Ironman. The very next day was my run focused brick with a 40 mile bike and a 16 mile brick run. I was not extremely sore from the prior workout, but just generally fatigued, as you could probably imagine. I gutted it out in the heat and finished with times I am extremely satisfied with. The last key workout leading up to my Country USA downtime, was a key swim workout of 3,800 meters. It involved 6 sets of 500 meters done at goal race pace. I used my current CSS pace of 1:43/100m to estimate a swim race pace of 1:48/100m or 9:00 for 500 meters. It was another tough workout, but it felt great to get off my feet.
Favorite Workout
My favorite workout from this cycle was my run focused brick. I picked this workout due to the sheer difficulty of the workout. I was not nearly as intimidated by this scheduled workout as I was for the 80 mile bike ride, which is the longest solo ride I have done to date (Race the Lake bike race in 2010 was 88 miles). But I would have never imagined the 40 mile ride and 16 mile run the day after riding 80 miles and running 4 would be so tough. Granted it didn't help that it was 80* and humid throughout the tail end of my bike and the entire run. I was able to remain mentally tough and just kept putting one foot in front of the other for the run and finished with an average pace of 7:40/mile. My average speed on the bike was 20.8 mph which I was also very satisfied with. It was a very tough and rewarding workout, which is leaving me actually looking forward to adding mileage to it!
Moving Forward
The first 3 days of this cycle are the final 3 days of Country USA. Because of working 11 hour days, I scheduled lower intensity and lower volume during these days. Coming out of Country USA, I get right back into Ironman training with an 8 mile run, a two-a-day swim and run, and then an off day before getting back to my high volume off day training. My mileage is getting upped in my weekend training to an 85 mile ride and a 5 mile run, coupled with a 40 mile ride and an 18 mile long run. I have them scheduled to be on the 4th and 5th of July which are presented a problem in and of itself. First, I have my 85 mile bike focused brick for the 5th of July, but my in-laws have a cabin rented in Crivitz, WI and are having the entire extended family over to spend the 4th of July together. Crivitz just happens to be about 80-90 miles away...and my wife wants me there. Soooooo, I will probably be moving my long bike brick workout to the 4th and swapping it for the long run brick workout to be in attendance. I will map out a one way bike ride from Kaukauna to Crivitz and then run once I get to the cabin. On the 5th I have every intention of getting down to Madison to bike the Ironman bike course. It is a double loop route and I plan on riding the loop once before doing my 18 mile long run on site.
Like I said, short and sweet, now I am off to bed for some sleep.
Below are photos from the past week.
Be fast, be strong, and carry on!
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| My 80 mile bike ride. |
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| The birthday girl and the graduate. |
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| Maya and my nephew Bradyn at the local swim lake. |
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| The kids buried their Aunt Lisa in the sand. |
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| Daddy and Delaney at the swim lake. |
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| The entire family at the party. |
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| This was my weekend forecast for training, was lucky to avoid most of it during my training. |
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| Delaney loves playing in the sand. |
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| This is what 1,675 calories looks like to fuel an 80/4 brick workout. |
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| My fueling plan for my long bike brick workout. |
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