A work in progress

banner_phoenix

Well after much thought I have decided to officially move over to the dark side . After a few years on the AR(T) forum and getting absolutely nowhere with my running and picking up too many injuries (mostly my own fault), I have decided to expand my horizons. Besides someone needs to bring down the standard over here too, you're all way too good :eek:

I will still keep up the running and have a few events in mind but also want to include lots more cycling events, a duathlon and a sprint tri.

My main goals for 2013 are as follows:

• Duathlon - one (or more) in the Phoenix Park Series
• Sprint Triathlon - I have Skerries in mind as timing is good but if anyone has any other suggestions, I would love to hear them
• Ring of Kerry Cycle
• Marathon (already entered!)

Short term goals for Jan:

• Start swimming again as this is my weakest discipline (not that the other 2 are great either but I'd like them all to be equally crap )
• Learn how to fix a puncture so I can go for long cycles on my own (typical girl!!)

I realise I have a lot of work to do with those main goals but all are achievable with some hard graft. So I would appreciate any advice you have to offer as I turn to the dark side...

RacoonQueen

Jesus, not you.

Think I'll take up shuffleboard.

Dory Dory

Woo feckin' hoo!!!! Yay....we have another female to spruce this forum up. These boys are a mess....they leave their dirty laundry laying around and blech and....oh, wait....that'd be my hubby. (kidding!!!) Glad you've decided to take a walk on the dark side. Which marathon???

Solobally8

+1 Woohoo, delighted to see you over here too Best of luck with the triathlon training- you wont regret a minute of it.

banner_phoenix

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Jesus, not you.

Think I'll take up shuffleboard.

Ah I feel the love RQ and what a lovely welcome . What are you doing over in these parts anyway and when are you moving your log :cool:

Dory Dory wrote: »

Woo feckin' hoo!!!! Yay....we have another female to spruce this forum up. These boys are a mess....they leave their dirty laundry laying around and blech and....oh, wait....that'd be my hubby. (kidding!!!) Glad you've decided to take a walk on the dark side. Which marathon???

Thanks Dory for the nice welcome. Yup boys are messy people alright but as I still depend on them to fix my bike, I'm saying no more...yet
Berlin in Sept and I've paid 110 squids to enter it so I'm crawling it if I have to :eek:

Solobally8 wrote: »

+1 Woohoo, delighted to see you over here too Best of luck with the triathlon training- you wont regret a minute of it.

Thanks SB8, you know I will be annoying you with lots of questions

banner_phoenix

Mon Dec 31st

Plan: Cycle - 60 mins Turbo Session
Actual: 65 mins

Dusted off the the turbo and bike and on with the tv for some distraction. A good session which naturally justifed the river of booze that was about to come!
Distance: 30km - ended up with 65 mins as my OCD made me round up the distance :rolleyes:

Tues Jan 1st

Plan: Run: New Years 5km race
Actual: Cycle - 31.70km

I had really been looking forward to 2013 and putting behind my crappy running year that was 2012. So after that river of booze, I must have drank 5 pints of water before hitting the leaba. However I woke up feeling like crap and it wasn't just the hangover. Cue a nasty throat and ear infection - that's what I get for spending my Christmas with snotty kids (and adults!). So I wisely decided not to head to run and went back to sleep. Fairly gutted though and not the start to the year I wanted.
Woke up later feeling a bit better so I decided to head out on the bike instead. Wrapped up really well and off I took. I'll be honest and say I found it tough enough in parts and my fitness levels are shot from a poor Nov/Dec. It can only get better tho...can't it!

Happy new year to all.

banner_phoenix

Wed Jan 2nd

Plan: 3 Miles easy
Actual: 3.1

So glad to see 2013 and a clean running slate. Last year didn't go too well with several bouts of shin splints and a nice stress fracture to go with it. Running mojo was at an all time low for the last few months. This year will be different though as I reduce the weekly runs to 3 and bulk up the cross-training (there's a fine line between pma and wishful thinking!!). This was the main reason I'm moving to Duathlons/Tri. Oh and I put myself in the hands of a running coach too to help me out - no pressure there mate

Anyway I'm babbling! Easy run this eve which was great apart from the lack of fitness :eek: Jeez I'm lost so much; still a few more weeks of easy running and I will be back up in no time.
Now I've just to tackle the swimming tomorrow and I'm off the mark on all disciplines!

Younganne

banner_phoenix wrote: »

Wed Jan 2nd

Plan: 3 Miles easy
Actual: 3.1

So glad to see 2013 and a clean running slate. Last year didn't go too well with several bouts of shin splints and a nice stress fracture to go with it. Running mojo was at an all time low for the last few months. This year will be different though as I reduce the weekly runs to 3 and bulk up the cross-training (there's a fine line between pma and wishful thinking!!). This was the main reason I'm moving to Duathlons/Tri. Oh and I put myself in the hands of a running coach too to help me out - no pressure there mate

Anyway I'm babbling! Easy run this eve which was great apart from the lack of fitness :eek: Jeez I'm lost so much; still a few more weeks of easy running and I will be back up in no time.
Now I've just to tackle the swimming tomorrow and I'm off the mark on all disciplines!

Good luck with the new adventure, you can shine some light over here on the dark side as i'm afraid of the dark...;)

BTH

banner_phoenix wrote: »

Wed Jan 2nd

Plan: 3 Miles easy
Actual: 3.1

Now that you've relocated over here, we must insist that you speak the language of our people. Metric please

banner_phoenix

Younganne wrote: »

Good luck with the new adventure, you can shine some light over here on the dark side as i'm afraid of the dark...;)

Thanks Anne. I will admit to being slightly intimidated in setting a log up over here as there doesn't seem to be that many newbies and I haven't a bogs what I'm doing (i.e I will look stupid!). But I am hoping to learn lots from the experienced posters over here and we all have to start somewhere. Who knows, it might encourage other A/R posters to defect also (RQ, this is not in anyway aimed at you )

banner_phoenix

BTH wrote: »

Now that you've relocated over here, we must insist that you speak the language of our people. Metric please

Ah here, baby steps BTH :eek:. Let me master the swimming first and then I'll think about doing a parallel trial of KM and Miles peaking on Sept 29th in a little city called Berlin

Oi Ray, what are you thanking BTH's post for - convert A/R to kms first and then come back to me

RayCun

If you're going to Berlin you have to switch to kms. No mile markers there!

(and I'm doing my bit to carry the metric flag on A/R. It's good to know triathletes can do one thing properly )

banner_phoenix

RayCun wrote: »

If you're going to Berlin you have to switch to kms. No mile markers there!

(and I'm doing my bit to carry the metric flag on A/R. It's good to know triathletes can do one thing properly )

since I'm on their turf now I should probably give out to you for that statement...but I haven't made the full conversion yet so for now I'll laugh!

joey100

Seen you asking this question on another thread but thought be better to reply here. If your north county Dublin no harm in looking at Activ Multisport as a club to join, but smaller than some of the other clubs but good atmosphere.

Also have a look at Fingal triathlon too. It's done in the aquatic centre in May I think and seems to be a good race. Nice pool swim in the 50 metre pool too. Never done it myself but looking at it this year.

banner_phoenix

Thur Jan 3rd

Evil Swim Plan: 10x50m with 60 sec rest
Actual: 12x42m (21 metre pool constraint!) with 45 sec rest

First swim session and jebus but I hated this. First set I thought this is lovely and this session is going be a breeze :rolleyes:. 3rd set I wanted to quit, 4th I wanted to die, 5th I needed an ambulance...you get the picture . It took every ounce of will power I had to complete this session but I did.
The way I look at it things can only improve...I hope!!

Everything about my swimming is shocking but I am just going to focus on getting to 750-1000 consistently without killing myself and then worry about fixing everything else. Oh its going to be a loooonnnng January :eek:

banner_phoenix

joey100 wrote: »

Seen you asking this question on another thread but thought be better to reply here. If your north county Dublin no harm in looking at Activ Multisport as a club to join, but smaller than some of the other clubs but good atmosphere.

Also have a look at Fingal triathlon too. It's done in the aquatic centre in May I think and seems to be a good race. Nice pool swim in the 50 metre pool too. Never done it myself but looking at it this year.

Thanks Joey I appreciate the post, will check them out also. Again I had never heard of them!

Also thanks for the tip and I will look into this - i.e. check the results to see if I would be slowest person! So many options and now I just need to get training

banner_phoenix

Right after much faffing about and advice from lots of you I've settled on some target events. I needed a date in my head to aim for rather than some vague idea that I was going to do a tri. So here's the plan and the only reason I am making it public is that it makes it harder to back out of

Triathlon:

• Nenagh Sprint April 20th (Plan A)
  • Joey Hannon Try-a-tri April 28th (Plan B if my swimming is not up to scratch for a sprint)
• Swim Athy May 26th
• Athy Sprint June 1st

Duathlon:
Fingal Duathlon series (needed to move this plan up to cater for earlier tri start)

• Feb 2nd
• Mar 3rd
• Mar 30th

Then I swap over to marathon training for Berlin if all goes to plan


Thanks to all for the advice so far. I'm sure I'll have plenty more blonde questions to come!!

banner_phoenix

Fri Jan 4th

Run Plan: Easy 4 miles/6.4km
Actual: 4 miles

A lovely evening for a run by the coast and really enjoyed it. I'm loving getting back into running especially since I've stopped stressing about picking up running injuries and am more worried about my crap swimming :rolleyes:

banner_phoenix

Sun Jan 6th

Brick Session...

I headed to the park this morning with the idea of doing a brick session for the distances of a sprint tri. It was more out of curiousity and see the potential times for these sessions. SB8 had advised me of some potential wind and hills for Nenagh so I wanted to try match that in the park.

Bike: 20km - a good cycle but I was not pushing this by any means and spent most of it chatting to my cycle partner. Time was 50 mins but I'm not too worried as it was nice and easy.

A quick-ish hop off the bike, threw the bike in the car, changed shoes, watches, chatted etc. Lesson there is that I may need to practice transitions!!

Run: 4 Miles/6.4km - The first mile was hard, just not used to the jelly leg sensation and can't say I enjoyed it. Decided to head up the Kyber at about 1.25m to wake them up - it did the trick and the rest of the run was easier! 5km here was 28:38.

My first time doing this kind of session and I found it very interesting. The jelly legs off an easy bike ride worried me slightly but I know with practice and fitness, this should get easier. Duathlons will also help with this.
An awful lot of work to be done on my fitness but at least I know I can combine these with little training. Now I just need to add the swimming

Solobally8

banner_phoenix wrote: »

The jelly legs off an easy bike ride worried me slightly but I know with practice and fitness, this should get easier. Duathlons will also help with

Dont worry about the jelly legs- it's totally normal. You will soon get used to the sensation

banner_phoenix

Mon Jan 7th

Plan: Swim session
Actual: 60 min turbo session

I was meant to hit the pool but forgot about something I needed to be home for. So set up the bike and checked out what I had Sky+'d!
A good 60 min turbo session later and I had caught up on David Attenborough's Africa episode 1. What a stunning program and a great way to distract from the pain of the turbo especially those all out intervals
27.98km and I just could not be arsed rounding it up to 28km. Round up OCD be gone!

hollypink

banner_phoenix wrote: »

A good 60 min turbo session later and I had caught up on David Attenborough's Africa episode 1. What a stunning program and a great way to distract from the pain of the turbo especially those all out intervals

Wasnt the footage of the fighting giraffes amazing? I loved Frozen Planet and I think this series will be just as fascinating.

Enjoying the new log by the way

RubyK

You've settled in very well here banner, keep up the great work, and best of luck with the goals

madon

Good luck over here- glad you enjoyed your run and fair play with horrible swimming sessions!

jcsmum

So this is the dark side? Seems like you're fitting in just fine over here. I was just checking to make sure you were okay. :P

banner_phoenix

Thanks for the encouragement ladies. Any chance of joining me over here (jcsmum I already know your answer!!)

hollypink wrote: »

Wasnt the footage of the fighting giraffes amazing? I loved Frozen Planet and I think this series will be just as fascinating.

Enjoying the new log by the way

Yeah I loved that series too. I like the way they do the summary at the end of how they captured those scenes. They must have some patience!! The funniest scene was where the squirrel drops his food as in "oh s***" and legged it when he spotted the leopard coming his way.

banner_phoenix

Tues Jan 8th

Plan: Easy 4 Miles
Actual: 4.1 miles/6.6km

Hated the first mile of this but then settled down and really enjoyed it. Another fab evening by the coast and I love running in these cold, clear nights. Great for clearing the head

jcsmum

banner_phoenix wrote: »

Thanks for the encouragement ladies. Any chance of joining me over here (jcsmum I already know your answer!!)

Don't own a bike and can't swim, so.....................no.

banner_phoenix

jcsmum wrote: »

Don't own a bike and can't swim, so.....................no.

Ah really :eek: I was full sure you would jump at the chance!! You know those two things could be solved easily (although you should probably skip my next post!!)

banner_phoenix

Wed Jan 9th

Swim Plan: 12x42m
Actual: 13x42m (546m) flailing around looking like a gimp

Just in case anyone is in any doubt I hate swimming and I mean truely detest the flipping thing. This was worse than the last session and I didn't think that was possible! Trying to find one positive thing about the session but I honestly can't think of any.
My technique is shocking and I can't swim with my head in water (stupid fear thingy). I tried doing some lengths kicking only but I was barely moving an inch so I threw the swimboard out of the pool in a huff. Can anyone please help with some advice?? Are there any good drills I should do to get back into swimming?

I am looking to join a tri club this weekend and will hopefully attend some of their classes ina few weeks but any tips in the mean time would be greatly appreciated. BTW just to add quitting is not an option!

Dory Dory

I love your quitting is not an option attitude!

The first thing you must do while in the pool is to relax. Then, if I were your instructor, I would have you hang out in the shallow end of the pool and practice going under water - you could stand there (with or without your hand on the wall) and just drop under the surface of the water, or you could dive after a toy or coins I would throw for you - the purpose would be to get used to your head being immersed and to properly exhale under water.....and if you chose to dive for a toy/coins then you could also practice your underwater kick as a bonus.

Next, I would have you practice your kick with the kick board and try and figure out why you are not moving forward very well. I would want to make sure you are holding the kick board properly (nose slightly up out of the water)...and that you are pointing your toes........and that you are kicking from your hips with knees relaxed. I might also have you rollover on your back with your arms extended above your head and hands clasped together (hands facing out, not in) and have you try some backstroke kick.

Then I'd have you practice your stroke with a pull buoy. I love a pull buoy because it eliminates the kick (so you have less to think about) and it keeps you hips and lower body properly positioned. Then we'd evaluate your stroke.

Whew!! I think that's my very longwinded way of saying there really aren't any "drills" I would recommend at this stage and in this venue, but rather I would suggest you need to get some one on one sessions with a live instructor - and potentially an instructor who wil get in the pool with you to help with your body position and fear of the head thingy. And remember to relax....and also realize that you can stop and grab the wall or lane line any time you like, so there should be no reason you can't put that head underwater to exhale. With your stubborn and positive attitude, you can do anything!!!

Edit: another great tool to use for kicking is fins. Fins force you to point your toes, assist with proper technique and certainly will boost you forward. I would find out if your pool will allow you to use fins, then go for it.