I woke up Sunday morning and basically didn't move from the couch all day. On my fitbit I recorded 438 steps for the day. That's it. That .023 of a mile. Just shows me the fitbit is accurate. I was literally doing nothing but watching TV all day.
Here's the rub. I do nothing and I hurt my back from just lying down, too much I assume.
As much as a bad back feels physical it's created from mental. I usually get a bad back when I start feeling a little stressed or something I'm not happy about is going on in my life.
Most people think to rest and relax. That's not the right approach. The best is to try and move around and then to try and figure out what is causing it. Once you can identify the issue it's amazing how quickly the back will heal when you deal with it.
I thing what got me a little stressed was I was doing so well, eating 6.5 days perfectly and then I took 2 days and got off my diet and had snacks and beer. It was kind of a self sabotage move. I worked so hard, saw improvements and then reverse those gains. That's definitely stressful when you are racing against time to get ready for Ironman Boulder and you need to drop weight.
Sunday I started the day off strong thinking that this will be day 1 of a 5 day challenge and then broke down and had some Doritos, sunflower seeds and a snickers and Kit Kat bar. It's the evenings that are the killer for me.
The only upside to doing that is it definitely motivates you to make sure you do your long ride and brick run the next day. Which was today.
I woke up early this morning to do my long ride. I've never done a Monday long ride and brick. I wanted to get out onto the road by 7:30 am, got delayed a bit and was out by 8 am. I can't remember the last time I did a long ride that early. I should do more of them like that. It's nice to get started earlier as you then get finished earlier.
What's cool about living on the east coast and working mountain time is that my 8 am is 6 am in Boise and 5 am in San Francisco. I can get all my training done in the morning by noon EST and it's only 9 am PST. It's a great advantage for training.
It's so good that last November I did a training camp in Arizona and worked on East Coast time, which by the way is so much more productive of a time zone, and be done by 5 pm EST which is only 2 pm PST. Then I'd get out and train in the afternoon.
Taking Saturday and Sunday off to let my body and mind recover was the right decision. It didn't take long for me to get that answer today. Immediately I felt stronger physically and mentally. Within the first hour I knew I was in for the long haul and there was no way I was going to bail.
Two hours into the ride I was averaging 27.8 kph. Not bad considering Friday's garbage ride was 24.6 kph. Big improvement. Another thing to consider is my first 20 minutes of the ride I average about 22 kph due to the steep hill climbing and then I have to ride very fast to make it up and get to 27.8 kph within 2 hours. In fact my whole ride is hill climbing. They are not big hills but they are consistent up and down riding.
The one good think about riding is it doesn't hurt my back. It's easy to ride through it. The tough thing about today's ride was my body was stronger and I was going harder than normal and really giving my legs a workout. The last 3 hours of my ride is in a hilly area and it really gives your legs that burn. I like pain so I push through it and think to myself that it's rides like this that will have some benefit.
One of the biggest challenges of doing a long ride is to try and time your finish according to the schedule. It always causes a bit of anxiety. For example, with today's 6 hour ride it looked like I was going to finish at 5 hours and 55 minutes which meant I needed to ride around the neighbourhood to get more time. 6 hours sounds a heck of a lot better than 5 hours 55 minutes.
In fact I'd much prefer to come home late at even 6:15 and not have to ride around the neighbourhood. There is something about having to put in extra miles riding around your house that sucks. It's so easy to bail and say "well it's only 5 minutes, close enough".
I was happy I averaged 27.1 kph vs my last long ride at 25.6 kph. Improvement is a good thing.
My legs were pumped and sore when I got home. They felt like they used to when I averaged 30 kph. I was dreading my brick run as I knew it was going to hurt and my back was thrown out. It would have been easy to bail on the brick run the one thing keeping me wanting to do it was I knew it would be epic in that I'd remember it as it was not going to be easy. It's these type of moments that help you in your Ironman preparation.
I was right on all fronts. My sore back made me run in an awkward position like I had a pole up my A$$ and my legs were sore. The sore feeling I actually don't mind to much. I can work through the pain. I had to stop a number of times to keep my heart rate down and about halfway through the run my back loosened up a bit. Needless to say it was a slow run.
At the two hour mark of the bike I could feel a bonk coming on. Then I remembered I had power bars with me and started to have one. Then started drinking my Gatorade. On one hand I was looking forward to a bonk on the other I didn't want to have 4 more hours of bonking.
One of the reasons I didn't want to eat to much was because I'm trying to lose weight all the sugar in the drinks and food is not good for weight loss even though you are training. I decided the bonk would feel worse than keeping my fatness.
When I got home I did a full stretch routine. There is never a more important time to stretch than when putting in lots of Ironman training time and after a long anything or speed work anything. Two things have kept me relatively injury free over the past 7 years, stretching and weight training. Those are not to be under estimated in how they keep you healthy and injury free. Tomorrow I do weights and I know they will help my back immensely. Weight training is really a form of stretching.
The other day I got asked by Dave Parker a Ironman buddy if I'd like to coach him. My first thought was what do I know about coaching. I decided to help him and not take the money he offered. I'll just help him as a friend and provide him with the training sessions and basic info. I'm not going to be wiping his nose or giving him my number to call me day and night. This isn't AA.
As I thought about it I didn't give myself enough credit. I do know enough how to coach. I've been following a pretty structured plans for the past 7 years. Ones that have been developed by 6 time Ironman Champion Mark Allen. I don't just know them intellectually I know them spiritually.
It's one thing to read a training plan it's another to execute on them and live them. It's the living those work outs and knowing what they feel like at your core and how you have to deal with them mentally that gives insight. You also understand how to deal with them and there is so much stuff I realized I know that I didn't even realized I knew.
I think I'd be an awesome coach if people just did the workouts I gave them. Did them and only emailed me with questions. I wouldn't want to actually "TALK" to them very often. Maybe at the beginning to get started.
However if someone is looking for coaching and doesn't need their hand held and can work independently I'd suggest you sign up with Mark Allen Online. I love it. Great workout plans and he or Luis is only an email away and they get back to you promptly with all your questions. They also have a forum that athletes discuss and they answer. It's also really affordable I think it's $30 per week. I can's say enough his coaching got me to Kona and Clearwater.
If I was a coach I'd probably not be your typical coach. I'd be like "you feeling burnt out? Go out and have some beers, get drunk, hit the reset button" My other key phase would probably be S.I.U Baby!!! Which beens Suck it Up Baby. Or do you want me to call the Whammmmmmbulance.
To me the key to doing a good Ironman is to train at low heart rate which builds your base and helps reduce injury, follow a good plan that builds you up then gives you perfect recovery time before the race and take time to recover and enjoy yourself. Don't become one of those "slow twitch triathlon geeks" that over analyze and judge everything based on there eating, sleeping and drinking triathlon.
What I find most funny is that I have the anti-Ironman lifestyle yet I've made it to Kona, Clearwater, ITU world championships and the Mark Allen Elite team on it. Not that I could do it today with my pendulum swinging to far the other way.
A big recommendation I give is especially as you get older some supplements really work in aiding recovery and performance.
I spend some time today reviewing my 6 week Ironman Cozumel training program. I was not ready for it and did a 4 week training-work-cation camp in Arizona and somehow managed to pull off an 11:18 Ironman. I'm doing the same thing again. Only difference is I started Arizona at 200 lbs not 206 lbs and I lost 10 lbs over 4 weeks, ate perfect the entire time and no snacking or beer.
On a personal note I want to thank Rich Sohor and Douglas Cash who donated to my Doctors without Borders Campaign. Rich is a good friend and out of all the people who donated I know them all except for Douglas Cash. So cool that he's willing to support someone he doesn't know.
I'm now only $183 away from hitting my $4000 commitment. Once I get that the only other commitment I have is to finish the Boulder Ironman. I can tell you straight up that knowing I have to do this race for Doctors without Borders and not wanting to let anyone down or think their donation did not go into my pain and suffering, it's been the motivation I need to keep it going.
Thanks again for all those who contributed.
My photo's today are of what I see during my training. I can't tell you how beautiful it is where I train. It's the reason I won't move and will commute and telecommute to Silicon Valley instead of moving there.
Long Bike - 6:03:12 / 104 km
Brick Run - 31:10 / 5 km
P.S.Looking for all the support I could get as I fundraise for Doctors without Borders. Big our small donations welcome. Support a great cause. http://events.doctorswithoutborders.org/participant/bryanpayne
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment