Lots of hard work was put in this week:
Monday- Was supposed to be an off day, but since the day before was Easter Sunday that ended up being my off day so I used Monday as a tempo run with hills. 7.2 miles in 47:30, or about a 6:40 pace. Legs did not feel fresh but it was still a PB for that route.
Tuesday-Swam 2,600 at lunch time. Mix of drills, some 100's on 2 min rest (coming in around 1:03-1:05) and 5x100' ind medleys.
In the evening did 1 hr hard on the trainer (Charmichael Training Race Simulation DVD). This is a 1 hr+ ride that has some sustained hard efforts, sprints, and hill climbing to simulate a 1hr race. Since I plan on doing more shorter faster stuff along with some more bike races this year I try to do this about once a week. I hate and love this DVD at the same time.
Wednesday: Swam 2,200 at lunch. Worked on pacing 100's, holding about a 1:20 for 100yd pace on my 'steady' sets.
Evening long run started out solo but immediately ran into a racing buddy out for a shorter run. We ran about 5 to 5.5 miles together in about 45 minutes. It was nice to have some company. Finished another 6.2 miles solo in the next 45 minutes for a total of 11.7 miles in 1:29 (7:36 pace). Was really happy how fresh my legs felt and easy the pace seemed.
Thursday: Swam 3,200 in 50 minutes in the pool. Pool was packed with a lot of slow 'wavemakers'. Main set was 1,2,3,4,5,4,3,2,1 hundred resting 10-50 seconds between. Even numbers were swum easy, odds were harder effort.
Evening brought another trainer ride. This time it was intervals with a short warmup followed by 2,4,6,8,6,4,2 minutes hard, resting 1/2 the time of the previous interval. This can be a kick ass hard workout, and never will 8 minutes seem so long nor will a 4 minute rest interval go by so quickly! This is my 3rd or 4th week in a row doing this workout and I am now doing it 1-2 gears heavier than the first time I did it and using 1 more level of resistance on the trainer so I know it's working.
Friday: Was told to run hills, 1hr. Went from the YMCA at lunch with a couple of guys to run Radio Tower hill. Pace was easy on the way to the hill, I pushed the hill (about 400 feet in 1 mile) and made it down the other side well before the other guys. Turned around and ran about halfway up the backside until I met up with the fellows on their way down and turned around and took it easy back home. 5.4 miles in 44 minutes, but that's with a lot of climbing! Legs were tired after this run and the week was starting to catch up. Profile of the tower hill (note, it's also a great power climb on the bike.):
Saturday: This is where things got interesting. Plan for the weekend was to mix my long ride in Saturday with the first leg of the Quad Games, the 100yd swim, then do my ride/run early Sunday. Threw my swimsuit and goggles in a small pack and headed out Saturday morning. Took it easy and did a nice 25-30 mile ride up to Edinboro University to the pool for the swim. Kept reminding myself that I had to swim yet and even though it was only 4 laps sprinting requires a lot of kick and my legs were already trashed from the week's efforts. Arrived at the pool/fieldhouse to find a huge volleyball tournament going on and no sign of anyone swimming. Double checked my registration papers to find out I was there a day early, the swim was not until Sunday! Headed home, dropped off my pack and went out to get another hour or so of riding in with some good hills. Had to be home by 1:00 so I cut my planned 4hrs short and got in 3:26 of base miles with some good climbs the last hour for almost 70 miles total.
Sunday: New plan was to drive the car up, swim, then come back and ride later in the day as I was tied up from noon until 5-6. Arrived to finally find the swim meet in progress. My session started at 10:30 and we were given a 15 minute warmup. During warmup my legs were definitely tired but I felt good otherwise. I used to be able to swim 55 or just under easily in meets. Often this was done as part of our 4x100 relay and often it was done shortly after swimming the 100 breastroke, so I was used to swimming tired. Two years ago I swam a :58 something so I was hoping for :57xx or so as I had actually worked more on sprinting in the pool the last few weeks. As soon as I hit the water for the first lap I knew I was in trouble. Had a good start but I had zero kick. I got to the first wall just behind the people in the lanes on each side of me, had a good turn but not much of a push off. 3 more laps of trying to kick with dead legs and I struggled to a 1:00.29. In the quad games format each second equals 30 seconds, so my time for leg 1 of the event should be around30 minutes, or just over. Not too worried though because I will be able to make up a lot of time on the bike and hopefully run this year. Was tired so for the rest of the day I took the kids to the park and we had a picnic and played on the swings and jungle gym and stuff for a few hours.
Now I get to enjoy a rest week before the PI Time Trials this weekend followed by a very hard training week leading up to the Jerseyman taper.
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