It's time to begin, isn't it?

My first big race "back" has now been completed with the finish of 70.3 St. George last weekend (race report coming in the next post!).  It has been an intense journey back to racing shape over the last 10 months, and it's time for a brief recap of what I've done to get there.  One of my big motivators appeared after going back to look at my previous results at Vineman 70.3.  For both my swim and ride, those who finished ahead of me had a mix slower and faster times for those splits.  For the run, not ONE of the people that finished ahead of me had a slower run.

That really highlighted what I already knew was my weakness--the run.  So, I prescribed myself a run focus for July through December of last year.  It was all about frequency and total mileage--the only "speedwork" was a moderately hard finish (tempo-ish pace) for one run per week.  I had a goal of 6 runs per week, starting at 30 miles per week and going up from there.  By October I was running 30-35 per week, November 35-40 per week, and December 50 per week.  With the slow and consistent build, I avoided most aches and pains, and was not forced to take any running breaks.  This allowed me to start tri training again in January without having to worry about running fitness--only getting faster!  In January, I started backing off mileage and increasing the proportion of faster tempo work, and in March I finally added in track workouts.  I have been satisfied with the progress overall, and have been running faster than ever. 

The second goal was to get to the point where I can take advantage of my relatively strong swim (at least for an adult onset swimmer).  Starting in January, I began swimming at least four days per week (five most), increasing from 14,000 yards per week to 25,000 yards the first week of April.  My pace steadily increased, and I was setting 100 and 50 yard PRs on nearly a weekly basis.  As a result, I set a significant PR on the Tucson Tri swim in March (37 seconds for an 825 yard swim!).  Unfortunately, the big swim peak in April swimming and my lack of bilateral breathing resulted in a nerve entrapment in my left arm and neck.  For a while, I could not extend my left arm without shooting pain from my wrist up through the shoulder.  No bueno.  For the last month I have been working with Melissa of Peak Action Physical Therapy.  The combination of Active Release Techniques (ART) and Graston has really helped, but it's going to be a process to get back to health.  It has also (obviously) really hurt my swim training.  I have been back down to less than 10k per week, and can't do any high-intensity swimming.  After taking this last week to entirely rest following St. George, I'm hardly feeling any nerve issues--just some wrist pain if I push on the back of my forearm.  Hopefully I'll be back to normal in a few more weeks!


I have previously gone through some serious bike focus blocks, so I have been putting that on the back burner so far.  To work on getting my fitness back a bit without committing a huge amount of time, I've concentrated on short, intense workouts, which have been really effective!  Generally only three rides per week with a hilly, hard, solo Tuesday ride, Thursday Computrainer ride, and a Saturday smashfest group ride.  The Computrainer workouts have been awesome.  With the combination of real-time power numbers on the screen and threshold tests every couple months, I know exactly where I'm at and how much I'm improving.  Not having ever trained with power before, I can't really compare with previous fitness.  But I FEEL stronger and I am definitely hanging with riders I haven't been able to touch in the past.

So, where am I at?  I have lost 27 pounds in the last year, getting below my lowest racing weight from 2007 (collegiate nationals).  I actually think a lot of the weight loss came from swimming!  I really started dropping fast after the first of the year.  I have also been eating less bread/sandwiches than I did previously during training (HUGE salads for lunch almost every day), and just eating more "real" foods.  My at-home physical therapy has continued, with serious core and stretching workouts three days per week.  It's looking like I'll be adding some shoulder and neck exercises to prevent the nerve entrapment from re-appearing after it's gone.  I know for a fact that I am running and swimming faster than I ever have--my PR per 100 yards is around 4 seconds faster, and my tempo running pace is 20 seconds or so per mile faster.  My bike is near its best.  So, PRs are new benchmarks to blow past!  I'm looking forward to seeing where I can get with a continued swim and run focus.

It's too late to walk away

As I sit at home drinking a beer and eating pizza (Thursday is my cheating day, give me a break!), I thought I'd finally post an update on my pseudo-athletic endeavors.

About two years ago I decided that I was done with triathlon for several reasons. We had lots of changes going on--sold our house and moved across town, my job was leading to more and more responsibilities, kid activities as they get older, etc.  I also had several lingering injuries, the most annoying being my lower back.  I've had problems with it literally since 8th grade, and it doesn't appreciate sitting on a leather bike seat rolling down bumpy roads for hours on 3/4" wide tires.  Time commitments had become even more difficult.  Cycling and running are generally easy enough to fit in, but swimming is a different issue.  I was driving 20 minutes to get to the pool, swimming for an hour, and then driving another 20 minutes.  Two hour lunch breaks don't work so well with the increased work responsibility.  Finally, a lack of family participation made my triathlon addiction a very selfish activity.

All of these added up to poor, stressful, and inconsistent training which meant no improvement.  A lack of motivation followed close behind.

What's changed?  A lot.

After throwing my back out, again, I finally went to physical therapy.  I am now religious about stretching, core, and hip strength exercises at least three times per week.  The tightness is still there on the road bike, but the pain's a 2 out of 10 instead of a 5 out of 10.  The flexibility and strength has led to gains on the run and on the bike.

We are finally settled in a new house, where we plan to be for a very long time.  Across the street, there's a pool.  A lap pool.  There is literally a lap pool across the street.

My company bought a new office.  There is a pool five minutes away, and a running path 2 minutes away.  On the way to/from the office, I drive past two additional lap pools.  Hmm.

The company has expanded, and I FINALLY have support staff working for me.  My stress level has gone down significantly.  Consulting is still stressful, but at least now I get to spread the stress around :)

Despite success at work, I was still restless.  I am competitive and I need an outlet.  This generally has to do with making myself suffer on the bike or on the run.  I finally accepted that I need to be selfish from time to time for my own sanity.  "We need to fix ourselves first before we fix others.  Caring for yourself is not an act of self-indulgence, it’s an act of self-respect."

Here's the big one.  We have become a triathlon family.  In 2012, everyone in our family did a triathlon--except me.  Rylie did two and now wants to join a swim team :)  Shannon has now done two sprints.  She doesn't have the competitive fire that I do, but she is having fun training and racing.  We also joined Race Tucson, a local multisport group full of enthusiastic, fun people.  We raced together two weeks ago, are again this weekend, and will again the following weekend.

After a year and a half without doing a triathlon, it was time for me to get started again.  In fact I'd say I'm starting over.  I think I'm doing it right this time.  I'll post more of an explanation next time, but let's say that after a couple years training under Brian Grasky (with the Tricats), I had a pretty good idea what I should be doing.  But, I didn't listen to myself.  Now, I am, starting with a huge run build the second half of last year, and a swim build starting in January.  So far it's working.  Training PRs are flowing on a weekly basis, and my first race was a success--swim PR, run PR, overall PR, and 1st AG/9th OA in the Tucson Triathlon.  Here we go.  Next up is Leadman in Tempe and then St. George 70.3.  Let's see what we can do!