Weekly Totals and Review, Dec. 6th Through 12th.

It was another great week of realizing more potential with some harder work.  The bike and swim numbers are a little down due to having a head cold, but the runs were solid.  With the Rocky Raccoon 100 coming up, running takes a priority whenever there's a choice to be made.

I'm now recording the comments as quickly as possible after the workouts and I'm finding a huge benefit from this.  It burns in the head what you need to remember for better results.  I've also elevated my lactic thresholds by around 10 BPM or more using some very simple techniques I want to talk about on my next podcast.  

Enough small talk.  Let's get down to the nitty gritty.  Each workout title is linked to a HR and distance graph on Suunto's website.  Click on them and get a good look at how it all went down.

Monday PM - 1 hour run, barefoot, treadmill, 6.15 miles.

Was feeling sleepy (which is a recurring problem) and then ate a spoon of honey and a slice of bread with guacamole and felt much better. @Mchristian called me and I got on the treadmill and knocked out 6.15 miles in 1 hour, barefoot. Had to run 6:27 pace at the end to get HR above 160. Flyin'!

Tuesday AM - Bike ride on rollers, 55 minutes, 16.06 miles.

Started off super easy and listening to the Marc Maron WTF podcast. Kicked it over to some crazy sh*t on Pandora after about 20 minutes and started ramping it up. Legs started burning pretty good around 153 BPM, so I ended it at 155. Worked on trying to get waterbottle out of the cage while moving, which was extremely wobbly. Felt like I had lost just a tiny bit of strength due to not biking as much last week.

Tuesday PM - Outdoor run, 6.34 miles

Took Roxy with me for the first 30 minutes and let her have fun and sniff it up in the dark and misty rain. Dropped her off and then couldn't elevate speed because stabilization muscles were "wobbly". Felt fine other than that. Got into the "pain cave" and just stayed in the front hall of that instead. 

Wednesday AM - 4050 yd. swim on a 1:29/100 interval

Set the timer on my Suunto to a 1:29 pace interval and swam at an easy/moderate pace. I settled in nicely after a while and was really enjoying it. Sprinkled chia seeds on my cereal for the first time before this and got a huge energy boost. Nice stuff!

Thursday - Sick with sinus infection

Friday AM - 1 hour barefoot run on treadmill, 6.95 miles.

I skipped a day of working out due to feeling a little sleepy and also a sinus infection. This run was especially nice, doing the "heartbreaker" method - warming up for 30 minutes and then ramping up one beat per minute for the rest of the hour.

Friday PM - Easy run, 7.1 miles, 1:10

Second run of the day, so went out at an easy pace. First half hour was with Roxy, then just easy after that. It was misting rain off and on and the Christmas lights in the neighborhood were cool to look at.

Saturday AM - 3 hour bike ride, 17.3 mph, 52.1 miles

I totally nailed the nutrition on this, and that's a big deal. I got it!
Breakfast - Ezekiel cereal with some chia seeds and honey.
Pre-ride - 1 banana.
Ride - 1.5 scoops of Perpetuem per hour and 17.5 oz. of Amy and Brian's Coconut Juice with some chia seeds mixed in.
Drank water when mouth was dry, drank coconut juice when lightheaded (needed the sugar), and ate Perpetuem when stomach felt hungry. QUIT LISTENING TO YOUR HEAD AND LISTEN TO YOUR BODY INSTEAD!

Saturday PM - 1 hour run, 6.5 miles, barefoot on treadmill

Just a moderate run, enjoying being barefoot.  Impressive cold front came through and I've got kids to watch overnight, so ran indoors.  Roxy is bugging me to run outside, but she'll have to sit this out.

Sunday AM Run - 9.53 miles, 1.5 hours, treadmill

Started out reading Lava magazine, studying the details of each page, then practiced feeling each part of the body, starting from the toes and then moving up. It was a nice moderate run, just getting in mileage at the door of the Pain Cave.

The HRM was going a little crazy at first. Nibbled on a mix of dates, pumpkin seeds, almonds, cashews, raisins, and cranberries.

Sunday PM - 1.5 hour barefoot run on treadmill, 9.39 miles

HR graph is incomplete because the watch finally ran out of memory! Not surprised with the volume of HR data I've been collecting.

Had a nice level of energy, so I knocked this one out earlier than usual. Talked with Morgan on the phone for the first hour, then jammed out to Incubus for the rest. This run puts me over 50 miles for the week and I'm done! 

The only thing I ate for the entire time was some chia seeds sprinkled in a water bottle that was 50/50 coconut juice and water.

Totals:

13:06 hours, 122.4 miles

Individual sport totals:

Running - 8:11 hours, 51.96 miles

Cycling - 3:56 hours, 68.16 miles

Swimming -1:00 hours, 2.30 miles  

Podcast - IronBaby 2010

 CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

  

   

Hey!  HEY!  Check out the audio from IronBaby 2010 - ZenTri's annual self-supported Ironman!  

Also in this show - An interview with Suunto's own Minister of Punishment - Bill Porter, and our first interview with our RAAM team. Yes, really! RAAM!  

Grab your earbuds and jam them hard in your head, because this is gonna get awesome and you don't want them to blow out. :)

Click Here to Listen!

What Limits Your Running Speed?

Hey, guys!  The next time you are out running, pay close attention to what factor is limiting your running speed.  Is it leg strength?  Is it oxygen?  Or is it form and core strength?

The next podcast is almost finished, with some great audio from two new individuals to enjoy!

The weekly workout update will be posted soon as well.  Gotta let each post sit and ripen a bit. ;)

How to Run Like a Freak on Nothing but Olive Oil and Honey

I ran 28.5 miles in less than 24 hours on nothing but 3 tablespoons of olive oil and honey.  And this was the last part of a week of running 54 miles total, with no soreness whatsoever.

What's the point?  The point is that there is no point... except to take what you think about nutrition and turn it on it's head.  Quit listening to what everything everybody else says and grow a pair and test the stuff out on yourself already!

Weekly Totals and Review, Nov. 29 - Dec 5.

I believe I hit a new PR for weekly miles run, all while getting back into the pool and going out of town for the weekend on a family vacation.  These are good signs for training for the Rocky Raccoon 100.  Let's check it out - 

Monday - 1 hour run, 6.26 miles

Nice evening negative split push-run, first half with Roxy. Felt sloppy at first, but then the energy started pouring on! Must've been the Hornet Juice in the water bottle. :)

Barefoot running on treadmill is paying off big time. I have a completely new form that feels better the faster I go. :)

Tuesday AM - 51 minute bike on rollers, 11.72 mi.

I transferred over my negative split running technique to the bike and I'm extremely happy with the results. I spent the first half hour warming up, watching some videos on the laptop. I then used music from stereomood.com for the second half while I increased my heart rate by one beat per minute.

My biggest problem on the bike for the past few years is the inability to get my HR up on training rides. This method seems to have fixed that issue. I can finally "break out" of low HR.

Tuesday PM - 1 hour run, 5.5 miles

1 hour barefoot running on the treadmill. This workout was a real bummer! I got hungry and ate a few slices of pizza before the run and paid for it big time. It made me super sleepy and I couldn't get my HR up for 45 minutes. Gotta avoid that type of food before workouts no matter what!

Wednesday AM - Swim, 25 minutes of 100's on a 1:40 pace - 1600 yards total.

This was an extra-nice swim, just getting to the pool and playing around. If I haven't been in a while, my first time back is always frustrating, so I set my expectations really low. I couldn't find my swimsuit, keys, was late by half an hour, and on and on. So, it's a huge success to just get there. I got that done, so I'm happy. :)

Wednesday PM - 1 hour run, 6.97 miles, no notes

Thursday AM - 55 minute bike, 17.04 miles, no notes (but looking pretty epic! :) )

Thursday PM - 1 hour run, 7.22 miles

Another night run, first half with Roxy, second half escalating negative split. Getting a lot faster. Starting to run out of neighborhood to run in!

Friday AM - 1 hour swim, 3700 yards

I decided to start getting back into the groove of a full hour of swimming. Set out doing 100s on a 1:37 pace, but that got a little too slow after 20 minutes. I bumped it up to a 1:30 pace after that and found a nice groove. Beautiful day, too!

Saturday AM - 1.5 Hour run, 9.5 miles

We spent the weekend at a log cabin in the Texas Hill Country outside of Wimberly, a quiet and remote place. (Video tomorrow) I wanted to get in a run before the family got up and training time disappeared, so I went running off into the night. It is hilly, and a bit of an extreme environment, so it was a blast. Did the whole run on a tablespoon of honey and a tablespoon of olive oil. Felt great.

Saturday PM - 1.5 Hour run, 9.5 miles

Emily joined me for the first part and we had a good jog. I used the same fuel, which worked fine, but it was much warmer and I got a little dehydrated at the end and feeling a little lagged.

Sunday AM - 1.5 Hour run, 9.5 miles

I couldn't sleep, so I went out for my morning run much earlier than usual - 4 AM. I had a great time and felt very strong after a half hour warm-up.

Sunday PM - 30 minute bike, 7.7 miles

I did a good job of getting on the bike and moving, but then found my legs were very sore, so I cut it short after half an hour. Ate half a peanut butter sandwich with just a tiny bit of honey for sweetness before I got started and I liked it. That might just become a habit!

Totals

Duration

Running - 8:33 hours

Cycling - 2:17 hours

Swimming - 1:21 hours

All - 12:17 hours

Distance

Running - 54.71 mile

Cycling - 36.53 mile

Swimming - 3.10 mile

Training Effect

Training Effect: 4 & 5 - 0 hours

Training Effect: 3 - 2:56 hours

Training Effect: 2 - 7:20 hours

Training Effect: 1 - 1:30 hours

Heart Rate Zones

Maximal 0:00 hours

Very hard 0:31 hours

Hard 2:14 hours

Moderate 5:56 hours

Easy 2:08 hours

Summary - I spent about an hour more working out than last week, and an hour more in zone 3.  I can definitely feel that zone 3!  I got much faster from it.