Stupid Sick and Dumb Rain

Swim Day
3300yds


There was a good swim between now and the last time I checked in. Unfortunately, that's all there has been. Wednesday I planned to brick, but as I was teaching the throat got progressively more sore and I decided to rest rather than workout kind of sick and get more sick. So Wednesday turned in to rest day and Thursday became a swim day because today was supposed to be a ride day. But it was raining at home, the wife and I are irritated at the woman we share cable and bills with, and we needed to get out of the house together. Since she's not much on the working out like I am that meant something other than a long bike ride. Which I'm fine with. I wasn't looking forward to a bunch of time in the rain. So right now this week stands at only 30 miles ridden and around five run, which is awful meager. But the swims have been good, like I said. Might not be in top form for the Firecracker Sprint but I should be strong next Sunday for the 1.6 mile open water race. Honestly, that's what I'm looking more forward to anyway.
Saturday is booked with other stuff, negating the time for a workout, but Sunday may turn in to some type of brick day to get some more miles in for the week.

Two Days of Strong

Monday
Swim- 3250yds
Bike- 30mi/1:27

Tuesday
Run- 45min fartlek

I know I haven't been writing my swim workouts down and I'd like to but I keep doing this away from my workout sheet. Know that it's big yardage, there are multiple 500s in there, and some drill work. I feel very strong in the water right now. I'm pacing under 1:30 on every set, many times going as low as 1:20/100yds but probably hovering around 1:25/100yds. It feels so damn good to swim this way again. I know that going up against guys and girls who swim and only swim I'll still get beat up, but my inner fish is quite pleased right now. Full disclosure: I was supposed to swim yesterday (Tuesday) too, but I could barely keep my eyes open while I was getting ready and decided sleep would be a better choice. Skipping workouts bugs the crap out of me and makes me feel weak, but I think it was the right choice. And as I type this my throat is getting sore and my ears feel a little clogged. Hopefully it'll pass in a day, but today I have a brick planned and I might lighten it up from the distances I want to do. Or I'll fight through that shit, be happy I did, and then be sick and recover on my rest day tomorrow.
The bike went well also. I feel stronger and stronger on the bike. This one, as Monday's have been for a while, was a ride in to Honolulu and mostly downhill or flat, with only a few short climbs I powered up. And by powered up I mean I'm up, out of the saddle, really trying to stomp up the hills and making it hurt. After Sunday's 50-miler, pounding up hills then next day means there is much the hurtage. It's good, makes Dirtbag strong.I still like my new seat as well and am nearly ready to write a review. Couple more rides ought to do it.
Yesterday's fartlek run went pretty well. Legs felt stiff to start (SHOCK!) but by the halfway point they had loosened up and my sprint sections we going fairly fast. I would still be caught by an elderly, asthmatic, fat, lazy rhino at full tilt, but maybe not a blind one with a broken knee. And I finished covered in gnats again! What the hell, gnats? What the hell? I didn't even see this cloud. They were ninja gnats, probably sent on a suicide assassination/retaliation mission gone horribly wrong. As a final insult, my stomach cramped up again in the last five minutes of an otherwise healthy run. I don't know what's going on with my stomach and running but it displeases the Dirtbag. Information will be given to Sister Dirtbag, Official Trainer of Team Dirtbag and we'll see if she has any ideas. I wondering if hydration is my problem. I don't think I've changed anything about my diet between now and all the training I was doing during the last four months.

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Da Heavy Weekend

Saturday
Swim- 3100yds
run- 6.05mi

Sunday
Ride- 50mi

Big Dirtbag Fitness weekend. Bigger than planned, actually. You see, I planned on swimming Friday but things got in the way and I had to push it back to Saturday morning, pushing my run back to Saturday afternoon, which I think may have contributed to total run fail. Anyway, my swim was pretty stellar. I think having a goal like my upcoming Popo'ia Swim is helping immensely with workout motivation and focus in the water. And I'm laying down some solid splits. Swimming is fun.
Running, however, seems to suck right now for some reason. I don't know why, but for the second weekend run in a row my stomach cramped up and screwed up the second half of my run. I was feeling strong, setting a good pace, and being all kind of positive, when suddenly I was cramping and slowing. Never stopped, but I did slow way down. It turned into a trail run for a while there because I wanted to be off the road in case stopping was required. I've looked at what I was eating before the runs, looked at my hydration during the runs, and I'm really not sure what's causing the problems. I only shut down once in my entire training cycle leading up to the Honolulu Tri and now it's happened twice in two weeks. Frustrating.
Running on the trail also meant that I would encounter wildlife. Not big, exciting wildlife like a pig or a...well, we don't really have big exciting wildlife. However, I did run through a nearly-invisible cloud of gnats hovering mindlessly in the middle of my path. And I destroyed them. Dirtbag Fitness Fun Fact #1: Gnats will stick to sweat.
Dirtbag Fitness Fun Fact #2: When you arrive home from a gnat-filled run, the Super Awesome Wife will make a face, take a picture with a camera that magically appears in her hands, then demand you take a shower immediately if not sooner. *the above picture does not do this justice. I had gnats across my shoulders, down to my waist, and in my hair. Billions of the little bastards. It was a massacre. I'm on trial for war crimes by the Gnat Council.
Sunday was a long ride day. The thing about long rides on the bike is, you really ought to start early. Before the sun gets too high in the sky and temperatures start rising. OR, you could be up late hanging out with friends after spending most of the night battling a severely upset stomach that carried over from the ruined run the day before, causing you to sleep in and not leave on your ride until 11am. It's an option.
But, even with leaving much later than I planned, it was still a good ride. Got really hot a few times, but I also got poured on for about ten minutes. Weather God balance, I guess. I'm pretty happy with how it went. I didn't bonk nearly as bad as I did last week during my 50 miler. Part of that was probably the brutal wind last week as compared to yesterday. I finished in 3 hours 4 minutes, a respectable time. Especially with the climb up Pineapple Hill (which I felt went well and I did in 35 minutes) and the long, shallower but still difficult climb back from Kunia at the end of the ride. I really was gunning for three hours flat and just missed it. Maybe next weekend. I don't know that I like being out on the bike for three hours, but I do like that it makes me feel strong. I'm looking at a century in September so I need to be feeling good after 50. Mileage building. Grind it out and make it smooth.
This was also my first ride with my new saddle and so far I'm very happy. I will write a full review after a few more times out to be sure my posterior has had ample opportunity to form an opinion.

Forever Adjusting Gear: New Seat Edition

Today was supposed to be a swim. Things got in the way that were nobody's fault. So it was a rest day instead, which I suppose I could use. But its hard to take a rest day on a day when I'm geeked up for a long session of pain in the pool. So the weekend, instead of looking like long ride Saturday, long run Sunday, suddenly has become early long swim Saturday, early afternoon long run Saturday, long ride Sunday. Why not ride after my swim Saturday? Because I'm planning 50 miles, which will take a tad over three hours. And I don't want to do that after a swim.
So instead I Gear Fiddled. Gear Fiddling is the fifth event of triathlon. (The fourth is transitions, and the sixth is not puking after completing a triathlon and then consuming perhaps too many of the post-race bagels/bananas/oranges/sugary snacks they always provide.) Today's Gear Fiddling was replacing my seat with a new one, which you all bought for me if you don't remember. I'd been meaning to get around to this since the seat came in the mail last week so I got off the couch and actually did it. And it was easier than I thought. I think it was because I ignored the advice of the ancient philosopher Clarksonius and his First Rule of Fixing Anything and didn't once say, "How hard could this be? Really?" And when it wasn't that hard, I may have reacted in my head like this:

On to fiddling! As I mentioned, the switch was rather easy. Here, you see my old seat compared side-by-side with the new one:

And here are some fancy shots of the new one by itself, all mounted and everything:

(Those of you with sharp eyes, yes, you can see a Wall-E bank, a Final Fantasy XIII Special Edition Guide, and a Pirates of the Caribbean DVD player which is plugged in to nothing in that bottom picture. However, did you notice the top of a Big Daddy action figure in the lower-most corner?)

Now the trick is to see how well I guessed at the angle and forward/backward positioning of the seat. This will lead to the Forever Adjusting mentioned in this post's title. Nothing adjustable is every quite right. Quite perfect. It always feels like there is another millimeter one way or another something can go that would make it juuuuuust a little more comfortable, a tensy bit more aero, ever so slightly more power-productive. So now begins that journey. I'll be sure to let you know how comfortable (or not) the new seat is after it gets ridden on.
Till then, I MENDED SOMETHING!!!

Another Brick in the Fortress of Fitness

Brick Day
Ride
time- 1:21
distance- 24.33mi

Run
time- 30min
distance- 3.5mi

To begin, another race has been planned and registered for. Dirtbag Fitness will be making an appearance at the Firecracker Sprint Tri on June 26th. This will probably be the last race of the summer for me because shortly after that Summer School ends and the wife and I will be shipping out to do the normal Summertime Grand Tour of the West Coast and I'll be too busy traveling and seeing family to plan a race. We'll see, maybe there will be a 5k or something at one of our stops I can last minute register for. Anyway, that leads me to today's workout and my newest conceit: The Fortress of Fitness.
Today was a brick workout, which is an important part of triathlon training. Going from the bike to the run and getting over the jelly legs feeling to get a strong kick going is what bricks are all about. With the plan now being the big swim on the 19th and the triathlon on the 26th, its time to start popping one brick a week into the schedule.
As the overarching goal of all this Dirtbag Fitness foolishness is to have fun, seeing as there are no endorsements in my future, I'm never going to be a professional, and why do it if I'm not enjoying it, I'm constantly looking for ways to keep myself entertained and creatively discuss the journey of triathlon from the Dirtbag Fitness mindset. And since a brick workout lends itself to the easy metaphorical leap to an actual brick used to build things, I decided to go with that. But a brick hut? Too Hawaiian. A brick house? Too Commodores. A brick fortress? Hell yeah, that's Dirtbag Badass. From now on, brick workouts go towards the strengthening of our Fortress of Fitness. (It's like Superman's Fortress of Solitude, but not so...lonely. Or cold. Ok, it's nothing like Superman's Fortress of Solitude. But in my head it looks more like the BatCave. But not underground because what good is a fortress if its underground? So...ummm, SQUIRREL!)
Today's brick was my first in a while, but it still felt strong. The wind was blowing like it was trying to take me to the land of midgets and Technicolor, which always makes the ride fun fun fun. Just keep telling yourself how much stronger fighting the wind makes you. And how being sure you don't get blown into traffic is doing wonders for your bike handling skills. Still, the ride went well and I got up out of the saddle a few times to really drive up the hills, and stayed down on the aerobars the rest of the time to stay out of the wind and pretend I'm quick like Macca. I also practiced getting my shoes off while still rolling and clipped in and I think it worked rather well. I'll be doing that every time I get off the bike now so I can get quick and smooth with it. Will make T2 faster AND I won't be running through the transition area with my cycling shoes on. Once this is squared away I'll start looking at starting with the shoes clipped and putting them on while riding. And not dying.
Quick change into running shorts and my Bikilas, one more squirt of water to beat the heat, and I'm off for a 30 minute run. I'm looking for quick cadence right off the bat with good form and a confident body position. If I can hold these things, I'm good.
After training to run six miles, going out for only 30 minutes was nice. I felt like I could run harder and it was half over before I knew it. I'll be fartleking for 45 minutes and doing a long run of 6-8 miles during this abbreviated training cycle too, so these brick runs will be good for speed and confidence.
In the spirit of keeping it light and fun, I tried to celebrate running with a young lady runner I passed by. That is to say, I held up my hand for a high-five. She held hers up to wave at me. When mine didn't go down a confused moment passed as we approached closer...closer...until finally recognition dawned over her face and she assumed proper five-ing position while running. And then we nearly missed and I almost knocked her over with the force of my Dirtbag Power, Speed, and Exuberance.
Overall, this was a good, strong brick in the wall of my Fortress of Fitness. Now to go to the Bed of Comfiness and the Wife of Snugglitude to sleep the Sleep of Restoration. (Am I done doing that now? Yes. Except the Fortress thing. I like that.)


**This post will also appear on the Run Smiley Collective blog.

Old Friends

Swim Day

1 x 150- Warm-up
Ladder
200- 3:00
300- 4:30
400- 6:00
500- 7:30
600- 9:00
1 x 50- easy
1 x 300- 4:30
1 x 100- Cool down
total- 2500yds

This morning's swim was a mix between success and failure. Success because aside from the 600, I made every time standard with at least ten seconds rest. The 600 I did on a 9:05, so it's not like I missed it huge. Fail because I was visited by old friends today. Senior Shoulder Pain and his friend, Mr. Elbow Twinge.
The right shoulder, almost from stroke one, was not pleased. I know why. I blasted yesterday, including more butterfly than I've done in a long time (it makes me sad this is true. I should do more fly). Of course those joints were going to complain. And the left elbow, that elbow gets a twinge at the beginning of a hard cycle every time. But they were both bad enough that it was affecting my stroke and my times. I had three 300s planned instead of just the one, which would have lifted the total distance to 3100 yards. I made a Dirtbag Executive Decision to cut that last 600 out and save my joints the strain. I'd rather come in slightly under-trained but healthy than over-do it and strain something. So rest day tomorrow, back in the water Friday afternoon. Ice felt good too.
Still, though, that's a pretty good ladder there. I'll probably build it a little more next week, or do the other end of it too.
There was going to be a run this afternoon but the wife needed Dirtbag-time, and that trumps run time every time.