It's kind of a big deal

Thanks to Ti for this one. My neighbors, in particular, THANK YOU, Ti.

This weekend is my last BIG weekend before I taper for my A race.

Let that sink in....

You understand what I'm saying? You think I post a lot now? Wait until I'm not training X hours per week! You ain't seen nothin' yet.

I'm so excited about this. This was the first time EVER that I put so much effort into getting my training done for an earlier race. 

I've been working on my race plan that I have to get over to my coach. I'm really putting a lot of thought into this plan because last year I didn't do well at this race. No. That's wrong. I did EXCEPTIONALLY well for the amount of training that I put into it. I've already talked about how I was under-prepared (due to my OWN fault) last year. 

Or as I used to tell my coach.....I was going through a phase. Probably very similar to what a 12 year old girl goes through, complete with temper tantrums, foot stomping & pouting.

We don't need to go through all the ways I kinda sorta screwed up the race last year. The irony is that I screwed up and still pulled out a PR, so that's kinda cool.

Now imagine, if you will, what I will accomplish this year! I don't know. My goal is simply to execute well. The time will be what it will be.

Here I am, heading into 2 weeks of taper, and I'm struggling with some scheduling issues. It frustrates the hell out of me because this is the stuff that I have complete control over. 

I really need to get my sh*t together in the next month.

Besides these stupid scheduling issues, I think I have a pretty decent plan for my long training days to keep things interesting.

Swimming: My coach told me she wants me to start doing some 4000m swims. I'm game. Long swims will be nice. I'm also going to switch up my open water venues. Besides my regular spot, I'm going to hit up the OWS in Boulder and the Horsetooth swim. I've done these before. It helps me when I switch up locations and see some different people. 

(Speaking of swimming, TODAY I passed the 100 mile marker for the year. Not too shabby given that I couldn't swim much in May).

Biking: Here's the plan, Stan. I already know a certain someone who might ride with me. Hey! I'm not picky. Join me for 10 miles and call it a day. Having company for even a short time, breaks up a long ride. BUT, in addition to that. I might enlist the company of another person who shall remain nameless for the time being....umm....because I haven't asked yet. WHAT I'm trying to avoid is riding with a certain dude who is nice enough....and we're pretty equal on the bike, but I don't think I can handle him for more than an hour at a time. (Do you know those people with ridiculously whiny voices? That's him. Five hours with that? NOPE.)  Again on the bike, I think what I need to do is ride all over the place. Do some different routes to keep things interesting. BIKE tours. Rides like the Buffalo Classic. Best idea ever. 

The jury is still out on Tour of the Moon, mostly because I mentioned it to my Coach and she gave me the, "NOPE." I didn't tell her I was already registered. Fortunately for me, somehow I ended up with a super cheap registration, so it's no big deal if I miss it. I want to go back and tackle the 62 miler, but I don't want anything to interfere with my 70.3 training. 

AND....driving 3 hours to do a bike tour on my own....no matter how badly I want to do it? Not much fun.

See? I'm taking this stuff seriously and finding ways to keep me focused and engaged in the process. yay.me.

Running: Not really a problem. I mean. Come on. I've been running marathons and half marathons for a long time. I don't really have a problem with running by myself. 

So. Those are the thoughts of the day: Wrap up my last big volume weekend and figuring out ways to get through the next 4 months of training.

That's that. Enjoy your weekend!

The "want" to

I woke up today with a head full of steam.

Or something.

Made me wonder if I had weird dreams that I couldn't remember upon waking. I had two things that were on my mind when I woke up. The first had to do with friendship (sigh....YES....again) and what I'm doing with this whole triathlon thing.

The issue of friendship has become a really big deal to me this year. One of the things that I realized is that it's probably because as of August, my sons will both be out of the house. When you have kids, they take up every bit of your life. Their friends' parents become your friends...even if the only thing you really have in common is that your kids play on the same team.

That part is gone for me. The past year, I've found that these outside friendships (outside of my kids) are people that I REALLY LIKE. People who I don't have to put on a happy face for. They accept me on my good days and bad days. We have disagreements, but we stick it out.

These people, these friends, when I lose one, I really want to figure out what happened. I always take responsibility for my role in the failing; whether or not anyone else does. I mean, it takes two for a relationship to fail. I had a couple of friendships earlier this year that ended. I know. YOU've all heard about this.

For the most part, they were not close friendships. In one case in particular, it really needed to end.

But there was one. I kept going back over what happened. When it happened, I couldn't quite put my finger on what went wrong. I kept journaling about it. I noticed something. I went back, and I re-read some things that I wrote, and I realized that I think we were both trying to "force" the friendship....much like those friends' parents.....we weren't really compatible. We just shared some of the same interests.

I felt a lot better about the friendship ending when I realized this. Of course, there are people that I do things with like swimming races or long rides....and we get along fine, but we're not really friends. I can have that too. I don't have to be BFF's with everyone.

This other friendship wasn't like that. We were really incompatible. In fact, I wondered how we even managed to stay friends as long as we had, before the final meltdown in January.

It's just funny to me. How these things seem to work out.

Anyway, this impact of friends, lead me to thinking about this long course phenomenon that has been happening. In my groups of friends, I'm the only one who doesn't go long.

And recently, they've all been talking about getting out of long course. I can tell that this isn't just a being tired of training thing. These are people that I know. I can tell that they are truly burned out. These aren't people who are distance junkies or ironman addicts. They'll do a couple of 70.3's a year or an Ironman.

In other words, this is something they have never said before.

So, no. The world isn't ending. This isn't the biggest thing since sliced bread.

Because these are people that I like, I listen to what they are saying. I listen to their reasons for getting out of it. They are many of the same reasons why I haven't done long course in years.

It makes me re-assess things.

Am I really ready for the commitment of this 70.3 this year? Did I move too fast in signing up?

After so many years of leaving long rides (because they were riding 100 miles) and I only needed to ride 3 hours and so many years of joining them for their long swims (I can't turn down an opportunity to swim 2.4 miles.)

I guess it hit me that I'll be mostly doing this training on my own.

September and October will roll around, and I'll be getting up on chilly mornings heading out to the lake to swim. I'll pack up my bike and all my stuff I need for my long ride. And turn around on Sunday and get ready for a second round of brick workouts.

Am I really ready for the commitment of this 70.3 this year?

Then, I surprised myself.

And I answered, "Yes."

Yes, because somewhere deep down inside I want to do this.

I want to see what it feels like accomplishing a goal that has been almost 6 years in the making.  I want to see how I handle the challenge of being tired or sore and having to get out there for one more run.

What's my "why"?

Because I want to.

Hold on, Cupcake

I don't think I'm alone when I say that sometimes in training thoughts will pop into my head to help me through the toughest parts of a workout.

I'm not talking about training mantras that we can call upon. I'm talking about the random thought that I've never in my life said, but it will infiltrate my thoughts for that particular day.

Today was one of my key workouts of the week. Recently, I've made run and bike breakthroughs.

These breakthroughs are always mental. We are as slow or as fast as we give ourselves permission to be.

I haven't had a swim breakthrough recently. I've had to go easier than I would have liked in recovery. I haven't been able to attend masters. I still love swimming, but I had to take a step back.

Back to the "key workouts".

I had an open water swim on the schedule that was broken into intervals at 1500m pace. The 1500m pace has always been a thorn in my side. I typically go too slow, afraid of blowing up.

When I set up today, I kept thinking about my strategy. I'm fast enough of a swimmer now that I need to focus on all out sprinting the first minute or 100 meters or so to gain position and avoid getting caught in the crowd. One of my challenges has been that I don't go hard at the start. I just sort of plug along and do my "too slow" pace.

I wouldn't recommend this all out sprinting strategy to anyone who is new to triathlon or who doesn't have the swim as their strength. It can cause other problems, like an anxiety attack, going WAY too hard and then dropping pace significantly. It's a great strategy, but you have to manage it correctly and feel super comfortable going all out for a short distance.

But I digress.

I start out with my sprints and settle into a hard but sustainable pace. I have no idea how fast or slow I'm going, but I suspect that I'm moving along pretty quickly.

My arms were burning a bit from the all out sprint. Out of nowhere, the thought that popped into my head was:

HOLD ON, CUPCAKE

How awesome is that? It totally made me smile and got me to really focus on what I was doing, which, at the time was ignoring my burning arms and just pull hard.

It worked. My interval paces came in at 1:19, 1:18, 1:22. At those paces, I can not only hit my 22:00 1500m goal, but I'll also hit my sub 30, 70.3 goal. 

With that, I officially declare it as my new training mantra.

Feel free to use it yourself. 

If I see you at a race, you'll be sure to hear me yell it at you....especially, if you're a guy.

Training Experiment #2

Here's where things got really interesting. 

All of this is going on in the off-season. I can try things. If they don't work out, no big deal.

During the time that I was working through my electrolyte issue, I read this article. The article summarizes Dr. Rhonda Patrick's summary of research done on the effects of sauna use on performance. 

Read the article if you must, but I highly recommend that you take the 14 minutes to watch this: 

Among other things, sauna use POST exercise ( 2 sessions for 30 minutes per week) was shown (once again in men only) to increase blood plasma, oh wait....I'll just cut and paste from the article.

• Improved cardiovascular mechanisms and lower heart rate.
• Lower core body temperature during workload
• Higher sweat rate and sweat sensitivity as a function of increased thermoregulatory control
• Increased blood flow to skeletal muscle (known as muscle perfusion) and other tissues
• Reduced rate of glycogen depletion due to improved muscle perfusion
• Increased red blood cell count (likely via erythropoietin)
• Increased efficiency of oxygen transport to muscles.

WOAH, wait just a minute. Sauna use in MEN increases blood plasma, lowers core body temp, increases blood flow, reduces gycogen depletion.

Is this starting to sound familiar to anyone?

These are the issues that women are faced with in days 16-28 of their cycles.

F*CK ME. 

What if I could boost my own blood plasma....and yadda yadda during the luteal phase? Would it help my performance in hot training and racing conditions?

That was all I needed to start my own experimenting. 

(BTW-Don't try this at home, and if you do and get sick, pass out or die, that's on YOU. Not me. Take some personal responsibility.)

One of the parameters was that this needs to be done post exercise. Easy peasey. I can go right after a swim.

I started in the earlier part of my cycle. The first time in there I could only handle 12 minutes, and I got out. BTW: My sauna temp ranges from 190-200 degrees.

The next time, I was able to stay in 25. Then, 30 minutes. Unlike the study participants, I did this after my swims which meant 3-4 times per week.

It was actually pretty easy until I got to days 16-28 when all that stuff starts happening in my body. The very first day, I could only handle 20 minutes and had to get out. The next time, I was more prepared. I drank considerably more fluids during exercise. I drank more immediately before getting in. I also took in about 1400mg of sodium during 1.5 hours of exercises.

What happened? In days 16-28, I was able to handle the heat of the sauna.

That's all fine and dandy, but how did it affect my performance?  After using the sauna 3-4 times per week for almost 2 months, I had my first run in over 90 degree temps. It was an easy run.

I never even felt the heat. Keep in mind, I'm also fueling appropriately and according to the recommendations of Dr. Stacy Sims.

The next time, I had a hard workout in the heat. (Rule #1: Don't do hard workouts in the heat until you are acclimated).

What happened? I blew through the workout. 

I was so amazed that I had already acclimated without actually "training" in the heat. 

Even more amazing, it doesn't matter where I am in my cycle....not as long as I fuel correctly during the different phases. I still fuel the same way, but I feel better now that I'm using the sauna than before when I wasn't. I have MORE energy and can handle higher levels of workload.

You might be thinking, "Oh this is no big deal." IT IS A HUGE DEAL for men and women. 

Remember the benefits:

Endurance athletes often bonk when they have depleted their muscle glycogen stores. Hyperthermic conditioning has been shown to reduce muscle glycogen use by 40%-50% compared to before heat acclimation.

Participants in the study were able to run 32% longer than before their sauna experiment.

Exercise causes muscles to grow (called hypertrophy). Heat causes muscles to grow (hypertrophy). The two together cause hyper-hypertrophy. In other words, you're becoming a super-athlete.

oh.....don't be a lazy ass....watch the video. It will explain everything.

This is incredibly useful for men. As a woman, given the hormonal changes that occur during the luteal phase? THIS IS FREAKING HUGE. 

We can offset (to some extent) the effects of hormonal changes simply by using a sauna? Obviously, this is straight up my own hypothesis. No research has been done on women. All I can say is that I started 2 months ago, and I have been reaping the benefits with no plans on stopping. 

******

Between Training experiment #1 and #2, I raced a couple of weeks back and felt stronger than I ever have. 

Keep in mind, I'm also doing training specifically to help me with what were my own limitations. However, I firmly believe that I would not even be able to make it through those tough training sessions without making the changes that I did.

During my race 2 weeks ago, I could have pushed much harder than I did, and I could have really pushed at the end of the race. 

That's a feeling I have never had. 

I almost feel like I have a secret weapon.

Training Experiment #1

This post is probably going to be pretty boring to 99.9% of you. I'm writing it because it's important; not because it's juicy.

Until very recently, women were given the same guidelines as men in regards to supplementation during exercise. In fact, still, there is very little out there.

First, let me explain how I got where I am.

Last Nov, I ran a half marathon. I went into the half expecting a big PR. I did not get a big PR. I got a 2 minute PR. To say I was disappointed, doesn't even cover how I felt. At my running paces, I should have had a big PR. People who are a lot older than me, people who are much heavier than me, people who have been doing this longer than me.....they were running faster than me.

The good news is that the experience set me on a quest to find out what was going on.

I knew that the way I felt when I was running, wasn't right.

Was it a calorie issue? Was it a carbohydrate issue?

NO. I increased calories and carbohydrates. The end result was a 10lb weight gain that I'm mostly still hanging on to.

It was making me crazy. I started researching.

GUYS: This part will be really boring to you since it's focused on women. HOWEVER Part 2 might be of greater interest to you.

Fortunately, Dr. Stacy Sims had very recently published research findings specific for women. (FUCKING NOVEL IDEA if you ask me).

In a quick recap, this is what she found. (If you are interested in her entire presentation, comment below or email me. I have a copy and will send it to you).

Here are the key points:

• Women's bodies act completely differently in days 1-12 of our cycles versus in days 16-28. The hormonal changes have a HUGE impact on our ability to handle heat, process fat for fuel, etc.
• In days 1-12, women actually process fat for fuel better than men do. We also need to take in fewer calories during endurance events. 
• In days 16-28, women's blood plasma drops and our sodium levels are slightly above hyponatremia on a daily basis. This means we have to supplement our sodium intake significantly.
• During this time, we do not process proteins as well. It is recommend that we take in protein prior to endurance exercise.
• We do not utilize fat for fuel as well and need to take in more calories during endurance events.
• Finally, where men get a fat burn of almost 24 hours post exercise. Women get 2 hours. That's it.

There are more points to her presentation, but that's all I am going into at this point.

Reading this research was eye opening. It completely explained the problems that I had been having in races. Last year, every damn race was at day 21. There I was trying to do races of over 2 hours long in the heat, starting in a state of damn near hyponatremia.

I started testing the research on myself (this year). What I've found is that I need quite a ridiculous amount of sodium even in days 1-12, but in days 16-28, I need anywhere from 750-1100mg per hour, depending on the situation. 

What was the result? I'm no longer running out of energy. In fact, changing my fueling strategy along with some specially structured training, I am able to go hard when I need to go hard (primarily at the end of a race or at the end of a long training session).

I've never been able to do that before. I'd be completely zapped and would trudge along.

I used to think, "What is wrong with me?"

No wonder, I was struggling so much.

But there's more.......coming up next, something that the guys might find interesting.

Wordless Wednesday

Memories

There are a few of you, as in maybe TWO, who remember the first time I did Elephant Rock in 2005.

There I am.

Do you see the look of fear?

Actually, I felt pretty good about it, but I had no idea what "being in cycling shape" even meant. I hadn't trained for the ride; unless you consider a few one hours rides, here and there, "training".

This was the bike elevation profile:

Needless to say, I got my ass kicked that day.

A 35 mile ride, turned into an over FOUR HOUR event. When I finished, my legs were like jelly, and my butt hurt like....like.....maybe we shouldn't talk about it.

I did ERock again today, after missing it last year because I opted to do a tri that weekend.

Even though I've done this tour many times over the years, for some reason, today felt a little different. I was able to remember my very first time, almost every step of the way.

The first time I ever did ERock, Mr. Tea and the boys went to support me. Of course, in my overestimation of my abilities (which I was VERY good at doing), I told them that it would take me about 2 hours.

Three hours in....I had to call Mr. Tea and let him know that I still had about 10 miles to go. If you look at the map, I still had some climbing to do.

Today, I went right through that "checkpoint" at around 1:45.

The first time I ever did ERock, I finished in over 4 hours. Today, I finished in about 2:20.

I think (particularly for people who are new to multisport or running or cycling or swimming or anything) it's easy to think that people have a natural gift for speed or endurance in events. And that IS true in cases. I'm MUCH better on the bike and in the water than I am running.

But people want results fast. It's taken me 9 years to get where I am, and most of my gains have been only in the past few years. I'm not even a top age grouper.

If you really want to get really good at a sport or get fast or be a top age grouper, it takes a lot of work and dedication. In other words, it takes years.

When you first start out, you'll see improvement pretty quickly. Going from a 33:00 5K to a 29:00 5K can happen quickly. Going from a 26:00 5K to a 24:00....not so easy. Going from 10mph to 15 on the bike, easy. Going from 22mph to 26, not so easy. The list goes on and on and on.

The first time I rode ERock as a century....it took me 9 hours and 30 minutes to finish.

That's where "Enjoy the journey" comes from. If you're focused on the end result, you're going to miss out on all the good stuff, where the memories come from. You could have PR after PR; then hit a dry spell and not PR for awhile. It doesn't mean you can't get faster. When that happens, you need to make a change. You're constantly evolving as an athlete. Things that worked for me in 2008, don't work for me now.

When you get to the point, where you really are starting to slow down, that's when "enjoying the journey" because the most important. We all need to enjoy what we do for the sheer reason of doing something fun regardless of the outcome.

When you stop enjoying it, that means it's time for a change.