Marathon Training v2.0

Gringo78

tisnotover wrote: »

nice session yest + well done on bagging the 1000miles ! Not many lads go sub3 for marathon with the average mileage you had going into it, but u didn't need it as u had more than enuf pace bfore going into it.

Mileage probably not as low as it seems as I would have had on average an extra hour per week of cross training (bike + swim) from about April on which definitly helped. Its something I'll look to keep up over the winter.

Gringo78

Tuesday: 1000m OW swim. Tried out the wet suit and tri suit in the sea. All was grand and the wetsuit made a huge difference to the buoyancy of the legs. Should be ok for the swim Saturday.

Gringo78

Wednesday: 10min easy warmup on the bike and then onto the treadmill. Did 3.5 miles with 3x0.25 miles @ saturday planned race pace (5:50p) with 2 min recovery between reps. Very easy session, HR was recovering back to the 120's between reps so I'm feeling fairly fresh and rested at the moment.

Krusty_Clown

Gringo78 wrote: »

Tuesday: 1000m OW swim. Tried out the wet suit and tri suit in the sea. All was grand and the wetsuit made a huge difference to the buoyancy of the legs. Should be ok for the swim Saturday.

Fair play to ya. You're flying with the swimming (if you'll pardon the expression).

Gringo78

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Fair play to ya. You're flying with the swimming (if you'll pardon the expression).

Thanks KC. I'm sorry I didn't get swimming ages ago. And I'm sorry I left it so late to get a lesson. My doubts that I could swim anything more than a few lengths at a time kept me out of the pool and also thinking that it was better to first get my swim fitness up before going for a lesson, to get the best out of the lesson were so wrong. My advice to anyone, if you want to start swimming, head down to the local pool and book in for a swim lesson, no messing about. Especially if you think you are unfit and could only swim a length or two.....every day you swim without having had a lesson is a bad habit more engrained and more difficult to get rid of. Swimming would seem to me to be a great cross training option and a great way of upping the training load without risk of injury.

Sorry I didn't hit the sea sooner aswell....went yesterday with a guy from work who does a lot of triathlons so was happy to have the company in the sea as I'd have a bit of apprehension going to a strange beach on my own. I'm eager to see how fast I can go in the triathlon - I timed myself at around 15min for 750m in the pool back in April and I feel I've progressed since then (got stronger rather than swimming more correctly!) so I should be able to beat that. I also felt I was faster in the OW than in the pool - anything under 15min on saturday and I'd be over the moon - although that said, OW triathlon swims are notoriously inaccurate so the the course could easily be anything from 600-900m in length. I know the run is down as 6.5km but I know that its shorter than that - I might run it tomorrow evening to check it out exactly.

Sosa

Best of luck the w/e Gringo....

theboyblunder

+1 looking forward to the report - enjoy it!

Gringo78

Thursday: 3.9 miles easy at avg pace 8:08, avg HR 139. Sussed out the triathlon run course - its shorter than advertised - 6.2km rather than 6.5km so good to know that. Its basically 1.6m relatively flat, 0.75m uphill and then 1.5m mostly downhill. The uphill is tough - I reckon I'll have to back off on the pace by at least 1min/ml, possibly even 1.5min/ml. If you tried to only back off by 30sec/ml you'd be swimming in a fog of lactic and be a broken man before the top. Will make the time back up on the downhill though. Should be able to average around 6min/ml pace off the bike - 5:50p for first 1.6, then 7:30p for uphill, then 5:30p for downhill.

Sosa

Gringo78 wrote: »

Thursday: 3.9 miles easy at avg pace 8:08, avg HR 139. Sussed out the triathlon run course - its shorter than advertised - 6.2km rather than 6.5km so good to know that. Its basically 1.6m relatively flat, 0.75m uphill and then 1.5m mostly downhill. The uphill is tough - I reckon I'll have to back off on the pace by at least 1min/ml, possibly even 1.5min/ml. If you tried to only back off by 30sec/ml you'd be swimming in a fog of lactic and be a broken man before the top. Will make the time back up on the downhill though. Should be able to average around 6min/ml pace off the bike - 5:50p for first 1.6, then 7:30p for uphill, then 5:30p for downhill.

You have it all sussed out ( as usual )
Best of luck,i am sure you will do well.

Gringo78

Sosa wrote: »

You have it all sussed out ( as usual )
Best of luck,i am sure you will do well.

The run route is literally my back yard.....I've gone up and down that hill so many times.....it's a very good example of how much you might sometimes need to back off on a hill...to run a 6min mile pace up it would be equivalent of all out 800m race effort

Gringo78

Race Report maybe tonight, but in brief:

Awful Swim - 126th >19min (very rough, I basically couldn't swim at all)
Bad T1 - 108th
Good Bike - 45th - 33:06 - avg 34.5kph
T2 - even worse - 137th!
Run - 18th but must have overcooked the bike as was a poor run by my standards (avg pace 6:44 - terrible)
56th overall
Delighted to finish in a decent time and really loved it. I'll be doing more of these.

tisnotover

Good stuff for the first outing lad, glad to hear your going back for more !

I'd say the weather didn't help either, very warm today !

Gringo78

tisnotover wrote: »

I'd say the weather didn't help either, very warm today !

What didn't help was no sleep Friday night...had to bring little fella to hospital during night so was up for 30 hours straight without a wink lining out at the start....thought about skipping it but thought HTFU...had no breakfast and barely made the start....didn't affect my swimming but was not myself for the run.

tisnotover

Gringo78 wrote: »

What didn't help was no sleep Friday night...had to bring little fella to hospital during night so was up for 30 hours straight without a wink lining out at the start....thought about skipping it but thought HTFU...had no breakfast and barely made the start....didn't affect my swimming but was not myself for the run.

hope he's alrite lad.
jasus, fair play to ya for lining out, puts a completely different take on it.

Gringo78

Youghal Triathlon Race Report

Luckily I had picked up my number Friday night because for reasons above I barely made the start. Luckily I brought everything required with me and didn't forget anything.

Wet suit on and down to the sea....basically 375m straight out, around a boat and straight back in. Sea was rough and within a minute of starting I knew I was in trouble. Just could not swim, breathe, sight...half the time I did breast stroke as I swallowed too much water on the front crawl. Was so glad to get out of the water, hit the transition area at 19min and well down the field.(rank 126)

Slow transition T1(rank 108), but I suppose not bad for first attempt. Cycle shoes were borrowed and would be loose barefoot so had to put on socks which otherwise there would have been no need for.

Got going on the bike and started passing people. Had been worshiping what the hell I was doing during the swim but wasn't long before I was really enjoying myself on the bike. I think the 2 lead relays passed me on TT bikes and all the kit but other than that I just passed people. Ranked 45th on the bike and averaged around 34.5kph which I was well happy with (less than 100km road miles in training)

T2 was a needless loss of time...forgot to remove garmin from bike before transition so fumbled with it for a while there. Fumbled with another watch I needlessly had on swell. Got into the runners though and hit the road. T2 rank 137

Run: knew straight away I had no mojo and the run was going to be a slog. Twas 10 times worse than when I try to do a tempo on Mondays when I'm exhausted. Passed plenty people though and only one guy passed me on the uphill who was a guy I had passed early in the uphill. Hit 5:45 pace for the downhill home but for first 1.6 miles couldnt break 6min ml pace and I had no zip at that stage. Finished the run in 26:06 (6.2km), had lost far too much time on the uphill...I was really dead on the uphill, don't have splits to hand but remember being down to 9min mile pace at one stage. Run rank 18

Finished 56th overall in 1:21:21.

Overall, I was wrecked before I even started this so happy with way I did. Loved the bike, felt I was really motoring along but probably overcooked it. Was dissappointed with run but will take few tri's to get bike/run balance right. Swimming will need a lot of work but I have the whole winter. And I'll pick a lake swim next time!

Sosa

Well done gringo,the first time you do anything its a learning curve,you did very well

Krusty_Clown

Superb performance given the trials and tribulations of the previous night. Hope the young lad is ok.

Gringo78

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Superb performance given the trials and tribulations of the previous night. Hope the young lad is ok.

Thanks. Just got him out of hospital now and he's much better so I'm looking forward to a sleep in a bed finally!

theboyblunder

Just catching up onyour log now. Great debut under normal circumstances, amazing given the stress and sleep deprivation. Glad your boy is ok too. Congrats.

Gringo78

theboyblunder wrote: »

Just catching up onyour log now. Great debut under normal circumstances, amazing given the stress and sleep deprivation. Glad your boy is ok too. Congrats.

Thanks. Been laid low with whatever he had last few days so no training since. Will jump back into it tomorrow. Might be able to get a 5k race in on sept 19th

kennyb3

Gringo, only noticed the race report today- dont know how i missed it. Fair play to you esp after all that went on before. Hope your young lad is okay.

Gringo78

Think it's time to wrap up this log. No A races on the horizon and prob no marathons until 2012 (thinking of doing cork in 2011 as a pacer or else in costume for charity).

Gonna keep plugging away at the training trying to drop my tempo pace very gradually and be in good shape then in early 2011 for Mallow & Dungarvan 10 milers in Jan and Ballycotton 10 in March.

Gonna make another attempt this winter to get a treadmill into the house....that would make life so much easier

Seres

Gringo78 wrote: »

Think it's time to wrap up this log. No A races on the horizon and prob no marathons until 2012 (thinking of doing cork in 2011 as a pacer or else in costume for charity).

Gonna keep plugging away at the training trying to drop my tempo pace very gradually and be in good shape then in early 2011 for Mallow & Dungarvan 10 milers in Jan and Ballycotton 10 in March.

Gonna make another attempt this winter to get a treadmill into the house....that would make life so much easier

you have done the marathon , you have done the triathlon , what bout the adventure race ?! Gringos Training log v3 ?!

Gringo78

Seres wrote: »

you have done the marathon , you have done the triathlon , what bout the adventure race ?! Gringos Training log v3 ?!

I suspect marathon training v3.0 will appear before I do an adventure race but would like to do gaelforce in a few years time. For the moment though it'll be road races and the odd triathlon if I'm lucky!

Sosa

well done gringo,i enjoyed reading your progress througout the log.
Best of luck in your future endeavours.

tisnotover

+1 to above !

Must read back through your log to see how u got your tempo pace down, as like you I want to work on it over Winter.

Give us a bell if ure hitting any races, like the Waterford half ? A re-union with Sosa and yourself would be good !

theboyblunder

Gringo78 wrote: »

Think it's time to wrap up this log. No A races on the horizon and prob no marathons until 2012 (thinking of doing cork in 2011 as a pacer or else in costume for charity).

Gonna keep plugging away at the training trying to drop my tempo pace very gradually and be in good shape then in early 2011 for Mallow & Dungarvan 10 milers in Jan and Ballycotton 10 in March.

Gonna make another attempt this winter to get a treadmill into the house....that would make life so much easier

thanks for logging your progress. enjoyed following it.

looking forward to marathon race report 2011 done in a mexican bandit costume

Gringo78

theboyblunder wrote: »

looking forward to marathon race report 2011 done in a mexican bandit costume

Whats the world record for marathon in a bandit costume?

theboyblunder

Gringo78 wrote: »

Whats the world record for marathon in a bandit costume?

Not sure but id say achievable if this is anything to go by.

The bandit costume aint aerodynamic but it looks the business .

If you ever do it PM and i'll be first to donate. Might even be worth a trip to cork.

aero2k

You've had some year - well done on the log and associated performances, and good luck with those 10 milers. I'll be keeping an eye on your posts - I've got some unfinished business over that distance....