Training on Vacation

My next race is this saturday (National Capital Triathlon), so it's been a bit of a taper week for me. Not necessarily by design (this is more of a warm-up race to my "A" race in two weeks, so I'd rather "train through" this race) but by necessity since we took a family vacation to visit friends in Oshawa then spend a few days camping down at Sandbanks.

Not a big deal to go lighter on the training in the week leading up to a race, but I certainly didn't want to take 5 days off from training altogether either as that would leave me pretty flat for the race. And I've been feeling in pretty good form lately - no nagging hamstring/pes anserinus injuries that have been the bane of my season so far, and I finally managed to break 22 minutes on a 13.5km loop I use for bike intervals (there's that goal-setting thing again). So I planned to get some degree of training in while on this trip, and packed my stuff accordingly.

I got a run in before we left on Saturday, and managed to sneak out for another run with Nora on Sunday morning in Oshawa. I didn't have my ice pack for my knee though and over the course of the day and the days that followed some patellar tendonitis reared its ugly head in my right knee. Doing more running less than a week before this race was not going to improve my fitness, but it could aggravate the tendonitis and make things worse, so I decided not to do any more running on our vacation.

I brought my mountain bike with me so I could get a bike session in - I remembered last summer in PEI the red sand that penetrated every nook and cranny of my bike, and didn't want to repeat that with my tri bike. I also wasn't really sure what the roads would be like, and it ended up being a good call as there were definitely some rough sections. I'll say this though: riding around on a steel-framed mountain bike with fat tires and a suspension fork is damned luxurious.

Also got a good open-water swim in - some hard 100m and 200m intervals, and got to work on sighting.

The other complication though was getting enough rest, and the combination of a somewhat uncomfortable sleeping arrangement, drunken Quebecois on their construction holiday, an 8 month old baby, and the birds greeting the day at 5am, meant I was in a bit of a sleep deficit when I got back. I had planned on getting my last good bike session in on wednesday evening but couldn't muster the energy.

Normally thursday would be a rest day and I'd do an easy brick on friday to get tuned up before saturday's race. But it was already a lighter than ideal week for me, so I went with a hard double-brick thursday and will take friday as a rest day. We'll see how it goes on race day. It's looking like it'll be a hot day and my wave isn't going off until 10:15.

Setting Goals

A recent revision to my goals for this tri season, but more on that later.

I remember a couple of years ago when I started jogging I mentioned this to a colleague. He was an avid runner and said something along the lines of "That's great! What are your goals?"

Goals? My only goal in taking up running was not to drop dead of a heart attack at age 40. Other than that I was just doing an activity I mostly despised for the sake of getting it over with.

I wasn't until a couple of years later when I started road biking, and specifically when I got a cycling computer, that I started to see the value in setting goals. The computer let me see distance covered and time, and soon it become fun to try to beat personal bests. I had a few routes around my house that were 20, 30, or 40 km. I'd set target times and try to hit them, and it felt great when it happened. This not only drove me to get out on the bike more, but drove me to ride harder and increase my fitness.

And this is essentially what got me into triathlon. Having an event in which to compete provided another, bigger, longer term goal to work towards, which in turn drove me to exercise and train even harder.

So now I always have goals in mind when training. There's good goals and maybe not-so-good goals. The good goals are the solid measurable ones that are within your control: time. For example at my second tri of this season, I set two specific time-based goals: run the 5km under 25min and complete the full tri under 1:10.  Both were realistic and attainable - I knew what I should get in the swim and bike portions, had a rough idea of transition times, but was not confident in my run, hence the generous target. I knew if I raced my race it would come down to the run and if I hit my run target I'd hit my overall target. And I did.

I have a few long term goals in mind too (run a sub-20min 5km, bike 40km under an hour, swim a sub-24 1500m). The not-so-good goals are the ones you don't have any control over. Specifically, where you place in a race. Totally depends on who else shows up and how they perform. I could have a great race, hit PBs in all 3 sports, and finish way back, or have a crappy race when nothing goes right, and still end up near the front of the pack. It's a common caveat not to set goals relative to others' performances.

But it is a good motivator. I had a goal for the year that I wanted to get an Age Group podium spot. That motivated me as much as any time based goals to train hard. Getting the AG win in my first event and a top 10 overall finish made me revise my goals.

Which brings me to the rest of my season. I had originally wanted to do two sprint distance and two olympic distance. And I'm confident now that I can complete an Oly, but the two races I wanted to complete at that distance are 2 weeks apart. Realistically, I don't think two weeks is enough recovery to be in peak condition for that second race. So I'm going to do race #1 as a sprint, sort of a tune-up to get my body ready for the main event 2 weeks later, which will be my one and only Oly this year, my main goal, and my A race. I'll have some time-based goals for each, and for better or worse, some placing-based goals too (I can't help myself).

Breaking Bad Habits with Athletics

Trading one addiction for another?

I thought I would get this blog started by talking about some inspirational stories. My wife and daughters are what motivated me to get healthy, and that has entailed getting fit, but also stopping some of my self-destructive tendencies, namely, unhealthy drinking habits. There are lots of stories of athletes who have made profound changes in their lifestyles and used athletics to give direction and focus to their lives. I'd like to share the stories of two such individuals - while my own story isn't comparable to theirs, I can relate to their transformation and am inspired by what they continue to do.

Lionel Sanders is one of the fastest rising stars in long-course triathlon. 2015 has been good to him with wins at the North American Ironman 70.3 Championships in May and more recently at IM 70.3 Mont Tremblant. He's not the fastest swimmer, but he's got terrifying power on the bike, and is a beast of a runner as well. On top of this, he along with guys like Cody Beals, Taylor Reid, and Andrew Yorke, are part of a crop of young triathlon stars hailing from right here in Ontario. Lionel's already regarded with almost god-like status amongst the triathlon community based on his impressive bike and run performances, as well as posting a new record up Mt. Lemmon on Strava earlier this year. But perhaps even more astonishing is that back in 2009 he was abusing various drugs and on the verge of suicide. This article sums up his story pretty well and how he turned his life around to become a world-class triathlete. Heck, he's even been profiled by USA Today.

Ray Zahab is part of Ottawa's community of endurance athletes. He's the main force behindImpossible2Possible, which works to educate, inspire, and empower young people. He was a pack-a-day smoker with a penchant for drinking, and no direction in his life. He realized he needed a change, and quit smoking cold turkey to take up endurance running. He entered the the 160km Yukon Arctic Ultra in 2004 on a whim, and won it. He's since accomplished all kinds of ridiculous feats of running, including running 7,500 kms across the Sahara desert in 111 days. Not bad for a guy who describes himself as a kid who never played hockey and hated gym class. He's an inspirational speaker and a powerful symbol for what we can do when we put our minds to it. Here's a good profile on Ray and his philosophy on making change happen in one's life.

I look at these guys as examples of what you can do when you put your mind to it. You don't have to be Lionel Sanders deciding to sign up for Ironman Louisville or Ray Zahab deciding to run across the Yukon (in February). It doesn't have to be that monumental. But those guys are living proof that no matter where we're at, all it really takes is a commitment to making a change, and anything is possible.