Cycling is OK, probably the thing of note is that the HR is getting a bit higher than usual on the harder efforts. Power output is down a little, but I am also not really pushing it either. An effort and output that would usually give a 166-168HR is now giving 172-174HR. Pre Ironman, any thing over 170HR was making my eyes water. At the moment low 170's is just "pretty solid". The first few easier rides back post Ironman were pretty pathetic as far as output were concerned. while that did not worry me, I was a little surprised at how much and how quickly the basic aerobic fitness had fallen away. Just to show how my basic fitness has changed, the table below shows my last longer "easy aerobic set prior to Ironman - a little over 2 hours, average power 211 watts and average HR 124. The final column is the ratio of power to HR - just to quantify the bodies efficiency. The subsequent rows are the easier rides I have done post Ironman. The "2:02" ride is perhaps an aberration - it was on the road (the others are indoors), and it is really in a different training zone to the others, so perhaps should not be included. You can still see reasonably clearly that the power output has dropped off, and while it has come back quite well, still a fair way off what it did get up to pre Ironman. Given that it is actually a bit cooler now that at the end of February, the difference shown is perhaps slightly less than in reality. It will be interesting to see how this trend changes over then next few months, as I do work more on basic aerobic fitness.
Running is very low key at the moment. Prior to this week, it was a 15-20min run with the Dio Tri-squad and Friday morning "not sure I should be going this hard" intervals. I am hoping to do a couple of 20-30min runs this week also. Hopefully the weekly run volume will go from 50min to around 2hrs. I have started back doing weights, even though I tried to go very easy, I still suffered major muscle soreness after the first 2 sessions. Now I just have general aches and pains! Nowhere near as bad. Strength is already improving quite a bit - after 4 gym sessions!
This year I have become far more involved with junior athletes - especially as Triathlon coach at Dio school, and assisting with the school cycle coaching too. This is on top of what I do RRwith the athletes I coach personally and with the triathlon club. Coaching the younger athletes can be a bit of an emotional roller coaster ride I have to say. They can be absolutely amazing with what they can do and achieve and can be very frustrating with lack of focus and drive ("don't you realize how good you could be!!!"). It has also proved to be a bit scary!
Last Monday I was at the Auckland secondary schools Triathlon Champs - which was a great day of racing. Capped off very well with young Alex winning the senior boys race in a very mature execution of a well thought out race plan. My observations were that there are very talented athletes that can already go very fast at a young age. As you go through the age groups the athletes get better overall - ie have less weaknesses. The younger athletes tended to have a weakness. They are also a little less skilled at hiding nerves, and are a little unsure how to handle those nerves and why the heck they were there in the first place! It was great to see so many just going out and having a good time - especially the younger age groups!
Then last weekend I was away for the weekend helping with the "introductory cycling camp". This is a prerequisite to go on the schools "main cycling camp". So making sure that these young budding cyclists can clip in and out of pedals, start and stop OK, brake, and ride in close to a straight line. To be fair I was quite scared, and probably as nervous as I have been for any race! There was a good chance someone I was in charge of making a competent cyclist could send me off the road and down a bank! Images of broken bones and angry parents were swooping through my mind. In the end my nerves were only slightly frazzled and those that had the least skills to start with (could not ride a bike AT ALL) made the greatest improvements and were riding along quite nicely 24 hours after not being able to get on the bike and ride at all. End result - a quiet calm feeling of a job well down! Whew...
For the next month:
Sort out a routine that will get in more than two swims per week. Two good gym sessions per week, and a 3rd lighter session every second week. I want the overall intensity of training to be reasonably low. I will get back to doing the bike and run intervals quite hard, but make sure I have most of "my" training sessions done at an easy or very easy pace/effort. Cycling I will have a couple of bike classes and will do a couple of easy rides on top of that - even if they are quite short. Will try for at least one week with 5 rides. On the running front, I don't think I will be doing much, as I still need to sort out a niggle in my leg. It is OK, and I will build up to an hour, and try to get in two runs of 50 minutes to an hour (including the interval session) and a couple of 30 minute runs. I don't want to push the running until I have made some good progress on the strength and flexibility. But one week with 5 runs in it would be good too (2-3 of those runs are 25-35min).
No comments:
Post a Comment