Ironman Training: Week 15

Another week where things didn't go quite as planned, but hey, that's how it goes sometimes.

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2/18: 2400m swimming in the morning: 400m warm-up, then 20x100m sets, with every 4th one a sprint (1:35, 1:31, 1:30, 1:32, 1:29, 1:32). In the afternoon an easy 10 mile recovery bike ride to get some blood into my legs.

2/19: Bike/run brick: 10 miles on the bike followed by 3 miles running. Legs very fresh.

2/20: 2700m swimming in the morning: 400m warm-up, then 2000m long (in 39:30), followed by a 3x100m cool-down. Weight-lifting in the afternoon (Squat: 3x5x140, Bench: 3x12x125, Pull-ups: 5 sets, 40 total).

2/21: Another bike/run brick: 10 miles on the bike (including 4x1:00 sprinting intervals mixed in) followed by a 5K run. My heart rate settled in nicely on the run, and then I picked-up the pace for the last few minutes.

2/22: 2400m in the pool in the morning: 400m warm-up, 10x200m sets (most of them between 3:40-3:50), and one 100m cool-down. Pushed the pace on the 200m sets to a fast, but not too difficult, speed.

2/23: Today was my second attempt at my 50 mile long bike ride (after getting rained on last weekend), and once again I went out to Yorktown in the pouring rain. As soon as I arrived I realized that I had left my tire patching kit at home. I haven't gotten a flat tire since buying my tri bike in September though, so the odds of it happening today were pretty low, right? /foreshadowing

I was having a fantastic ride. The rain stopped after the first 30 minutes, my legs felt good, and I was pacing myself perfectly. I did 30 miles before stopping to refill my bottle with gatorade, and still felt fresh when I started my 4th loop. So guess what happened near the end of this loop, at mile 37? Yep, a flat in my rear tire. 37 miles biking, one again short of my 50 mile goal. I walked my bike the 2 miles back to my car (no easy task in bike cleats), changed into my running gear and salvaged the workout with a 4 mile run. I don't know if it's because I've been doing a lot of bricks lately, or because I had a 30 minute cool-down while I walked my bike back to my car, but I had no trouble with this run and my legs felt fantastic. I'll be doing bricks with all of my long rides from now on.

2/24: Bre was running in the Colonial Half Marathon today, so after watching her start the race I went over to Colonial Williamsburg to get my own run in. I ran 5 miles before stopping to get some sandwiches at cheese shoppe, but I ended up running an additional 15 minutes with Bre at the end of the race, so I tacked it on to my first runkeeper to make it an even 10K run for the day. The race was a tough hilly course, and despite that Bre rocked it with a 2:46 time! That's 2 minutes shy of her PR, but that's to be expected on such a hilly course. Great job sweetie!

She did not look this happy at the end.

Weekly Totals:

Swim: 7600 meters (3 hours 10 minutes)

Bike: 68.27 miles (4 hours 10 minutes)

Run: 16.44 miles (2 hours 44 minutes)

Strength: 45 minutes

Total: 10 hours 50 minutes

It wasn't as big of a week as I had hoped thanks to the flat tire, but 10 hours 50 minutes is still the most volume of training I've had since November, and the second largest week ever. I've been icing my feet/ankles lately, and they're finally healed enough for me to get some decent running in, and next week I have a 10 mile long run scheduled to make sure my body is ready for the Shamrock Half Marathon in three weeks.

Yes that's a cooking pot. Don't tell my wife. 

I also signed up for another race: the Jamestown Olympic triathlon, on June 8. This race is two weeks before the Rev3 Half Ironman triathlon, so it should be a good final stepping stone before that.