I have made the difficult decision to stop running for the time being. Running is just too much pain. When I run, I spend all of my time working through pain, rehabilitating the injuries caused by running. When I swim or ride, I spend all my time swimming or riding. I like that.
So for now, I'm shifting my focus. I'll be tracking the whole shebang here.
Ok, enough down time, enough honeymoon, enough not working...the geek is back on track and looking forward at the long and wonderful road that this next season presents.
I'll post in more detail in the next week or so as things solidify, but for now, here's how it looks. After a very fruitful chat this morning with Mrs. Geek, the plan is to spend from now until New Year focussed on run rehab, strength training and flexibility. I've been cleared to run again, so the slow task of rebuilding that fitness can get started again. Target is to be able to run three miles, without stopping, at a decent 10 min/mile pace, by New Year's Eve.
Next up is the Santa Cruz Half Marathon, in April 2006; whether I'll be ready or not is anyone's guess, but its the goal. Training from January through April will still include strength, flexibility and running, but will also add in some base building for the bike and swim, along with possible participation in the SCTA's Nu2Tri program. I'll target a few sprint tri's during mid year.
Finally, the big fun will come from April to September, as I once again and for the third time, take a run and the Santa Cruz Sentinel Olympic distance triathlon. Thwarted the past two years in a row by my hip injury, this is the year it gets done.
This is the season plan as it stands now. As I refine it, I'll be back with updates. Till then, enjoy the fall! Oh yeah, and go Sharks!
Talk about culture shock and jet lag. I'm back from an amazing honeymoon and itching to get back into the training groove. I'll be figuring out the year's racing and training goals over the next few weeks and get them posted, along with the details on the various tools and techniques I'll be turning to this year. For now though, its time to ditch the honeymoon diet, you know, room service at least 3 times a day, and get back to sound eating habits, as well as some consistent base, strength and flexibility work.
Congrats to all those who rocked IMFL this weekend. Over 45 hours in airports and planes over the last 5 days has left me jet lagged and tired, so I'm off to shake the lag with my own triathlon of hot showers, football (Colts v. Pats, woot) and my own bed (which my wife and I haven't slept in for a long, long time).
Ok, two things that don't go together for me are planning my wedding to my wonderful fiance and blogging. Just no time. I barely have time to sleep, much less post. I'm out until I return from the honeymoon. Then It'll be BlogHard 2, Blog Harder!
A strange sense of freedom has come over me this last week and a half. Ever since I really came to terms with being unable to attempt my A race this year, I've been feeling progressivly more positive. My swim workouts are expanding, as are my bike rides. Best of all, my hip *might* actually be healing.
I'll be back tonight with last week's workouts (I hope). Three solid swims and an interesting ride made for a good week.
Where have I been the last few weeks? Well, I have bad news to report. My season has once again been terminated due to my hip problem. Second year in a row. Major bummer. I've been a bit too bummed to blog the last few weeks, as I figure out how to respond to this latest bump in my tri road. I'll be back with my decision when I reach one. For now, its rehab, rehab, rehab.
I'm taking a short break from the Blog, just till I get back from the BP this weekend. Debauchery incoming...well, as much debauchery as you can have in Yosemite. Training continues and gets stepped up a notch on Monday.
Got in a nice ride on Monday night and a decent swim with Masters this morning. More stats to follow; for now, work calls.
This past weekend wasn't what you'd call "hard core" training. It was more of a "hard beer" weekend, as I threw a birthday bash for my lady. Now its Monday morning and gut check time. Gut, check! Yes, its still there, perhaps even reinforced a bit by the weekend. That's OK though, because I've go 7 weeks and change to go until the race and I'm ready for some solid training. First up, a nice ride tonight along the 1 up the coast.
Weighed in at 207.7 today, with the BF at 15.1%. Definite progress. Now lets see if it holds for a week.
Today was technically an off day, but my PT made sure that I worked hard. Running with proper posture is, how shall I say, difficult. I felt like a one legged duck. But at least things didn't look that freaky in the mirror. Good news on that front, I get to do a 1-2 mile interval run, testing out the new posture. Guess that will have to be Wednesday night; Tuesday is booked...dance lessons. Eeek.
As some of you know, when I started this triathlon odyssey, I tipped the scales at 230 and change. That dipped to a low of 201ish, late last year. This year's goal was both to complete my first Olympic distance tri (first tri ever, actually) and compete in my age group, not as a Clydesdale.
While the former goal is still within reach, it appears I'll be a Clydesdale for a while yet. My weight has been hovering between 209 and 213 for the past few weeks. Although leaner overall, I've definitely added some denser bulk through training. No complaints here however. Who doesn't like increased power to weight ratios and better fitting clothing?
I managed to join the 6 AM masters crew at the pool again this morning. My fiance slept in, anticipating a run with our group that evening (I'm still on the running shelf for another 3 weeks...more on that later). It was endurance day and I knocked out 6x400m, in various permutations. Just two sessions with Coach Heidi and I can already feel my stock improving. I may move from the really slow lane to the slow lane if I keep this up.
On the flip side, my PT has me doing a new set of exercises for my hip. They are postural correction exercises, designed to get the ball of my right femur to rotate correctly back into the socket so its not rubbing the hip bone when I walk/run. This is the theory of the month for the cause of my various hip/back issues. He says I can run train again in 3 weeks if I continue doing my therapy. I'm doing my therapy; if I can run in three weeks w/o pain, he gets a nice bottle (or three) of wine. The down side of posture stuff is that my back is tired all the time now from sitting and walking how I should have been sitting for the past few years. I suppose things will adapt; in the meantime, I look like the tin man.
Nutritionally, things are going well. I'm consistently hitting 22-2400 calories a day in intake. Contrast that with a BMR around 2100, plus somewhere between 500 and 1000 in exercise burn (not counting post exercise metabolism boosts). With any luck, I'll be able to lean up a bit despite not being able to run right now. This should make my return to the pavement even more enjoyable.
Apparrently the ball of my right femur sits too far forward in my hip socket and this is the root of all the evil that plagues me these days. So says my new PT. I don't know if he's right or not, but he uses a tablet PC, so that's instant geek cred in my book. No running for at least three weeks and lots of goofy exercises to undue the "damage" I've done over the last decade and a half. We'll see if he knows his stuff or not. I told him I was doing my Oly race, even if I have to walk the run portion.
Otherwise, morning training went well. Did 30 min in the pool, working on the new stroke technique. Its awkward, but I didn't drown, so I consider it a good workout. 2231 cals in yesterday; looking at round 2k today. Nutrition tracking seems to be working well. Now if I can just make it to spin tonight, it'll be a good day.
For whatever reason, I let my core/strength program lapse the last few months. I think trying to fit in 3 swims, bike rides and runs each week squeezed out the gym sessions. In a moment of clarity yesterday, I realized how stupid that was of me. No doubt my slacking on the core/strength program contributed to the hip relapse. <<hangs head in shame like stupid French footballer who can't control his temper and costs his team the World Cup>>
So I woke up at 5:30 a.m. this morning (sorry about the alarm honey) and hit the gym. Did about 20 minutes of cardio warm up, 10 minutes of stretching and then went through the program my PT had designed for me about 6 months ago. The program is great. We took every strength exercise I was doing and adapted it to include a stability ball as a platform. As a result, every exercise became a core exercise; two birds, one stone. In between sets I do a variety of crunch-style exercise one or off the stability ball. Bottom line, core felt weaker today, hip hurt when I did my exercises, so I knew I was doing something right. Welcome back Kotter.
Things are looking up as I continue to heal hip-wise. Managed a solid 46 minute, 13 mile TT ride today. No pain, just a little weakness in the muscles around the injection site.
I met up with some of the Nu2Tri group for an open water swim this afternoon as well, but we decided not to brave the ocean since there were many warning signs posted. Something about nastiness in the water. Any time the lifeguards don't want to go in, I'm not gonna question them.
Finished the day with a class on SMFR (self myofacial release) therapy using foam rollers. Ouch, that stuff gets into the really tight areas. You know how they call the time trial in the TDF the race of truth? The roller is like the stretch of truth. If you have a muscle that is knotted, inflexible, scarred, etc., the roller will tell you. You can't hid from the roller. After just a few different rolls, I felt as if I had gotten a full hour of deep tissue work. I'll definitely be doing this on a daily basis. Updates on progress to follow.
Its nice how quickly things can turn around. On the heels of last nights ride washout, I dragged my ass out of bed at 5:30 a.m. and hit the local masters swim at 6:00 a.m. for the first time. I never swam in high school like my uber-athlete fiance and her brother, so this was new to me. Great hour of swimming though. Aside from open water swims, I can't imagine any of my upcoming swim workouts won't involve these workouts.
The biggest bonus for me was that the coach was able to vastly improve my stroke in like 3 seconds (thanks Heidi). Apparently I was pulling my forward arm back too quickly, not allowing my recovering arm to get far enough forward before the pulling arm went underneath me. Result was my head dipped down and created drag every time I completed a breath. Now, I hold the forward arm out longer, keeping it extended until the recovering arm makes it to about my ear. Speed up, drag down. I like it.
Oh yes, and then there's the workout:
WU: 2x100 (100 FS, 100 BS)
Main: 3x200 (short sets of FS, kick and pull)
16x50 (4x each of FS, kick, pull, other stroke)
2x250 (100 FS, 50 kick, pull and other stroke).
CD: 2x100 (FS, BS)
At least, I think that was the workout. We did a total of 2200 meters in just under 60 minutes. That was a very tough swim workout for me. But I felt great afterwards.
And there was something else happening today...my shot! Dr. Quinn hit my nerve with that lovely cocktail of Novocaine and cortisone and I was feeling better almost immediately. The Novocaine is only masking the pain while the steroid works, I know, but its nice to be relatively pain free again. The real test will be in a few days time, when the Novocaine has worn off and we see if the cortisone did its work.
That's it for now. I have to go eat a disappointingly small PB&J snack. 2280 calories yesterday, going to definitely be higher today. Swimming always jacks up the appetite beyond my ability to control it.
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