Reflections on Tuesdays

There is no single session that I’ve embraced more than the Tuesday morning ride. It’s always a challenge. I think this morning's session was my last one.

From chasing Michael Croft, Paul Morris, Pete McLean to Declan Hogan, David Thomas and Ian Depree in the ``old’’ days to Damo, Dingo and Lisa in the most recent past to keeping pace with Oli, Juan and the surging Robbie more recently, it’s been a learning experience. [There are many many others who’ve taught me a lesson or two over the years.]

Lisa made a comment to me about six months ago about how determined she gets NOT to be dropped - to find that little bit of extra something - when the group starts to inch away. It’s good advice and so I’m sharing it here. I try to use that to encourage me forward every Tuesday.

Most of the time I think we have more to give than we realise. Without a doubt that understanding is helped by experience. And besides, the idea of the session in my opinion is to hurt, at least a little – it’s meant to be tough!

I'm convinced that I can't get faster on the bike without training at a faster pace. Speed does help.

Of course, there are some mornings when I am energy deprived or sleep deprived or I simply can’t be bothered to hurt myself enough! That’s ok too - as long as it doesn't happen too often.

Timetrial Saturday

Inspired by John Mergler, Dingo and I set out to timetrial ride and run in Centennial Park yesterday.

We rode 43km, then ran 6k, then rode 49km and ran another 6km. It was a good set and I was able to run more than 1 minute faster on the second run. I feel as if I've recovered now from the marathon.

Ideally, we should have done another 50k and 6k .. however, it didn't happen. I'll be looking to repeat this type of session when we hit the road on August 9th.

My objective these past few months has been to boost my fitness as much as I could before we start to travel. I realize that training these final two months ahead of Kona won't be the same. I will though have more of a chance to focus on my swimming through August. And that's a good thing.

Running for the line!

And there's a new triathlete in the family!

It was a warm day, hot by the time he crossed the finish line. He also had to wait several hours for his wave to start. And yet, he showed no ill effects, racing in the Nautica New York City Triathlon on Sunday.

My brother, John, completed the Olympic distance race faster than he expected to do so with a very solid swim, a hammering bike ride and a fleet run.

The questions that remain unanswered: when will he race again? will he get a trial time bike? will he push it up a notch to a half ironman?

Awesome result John .. enjoy a few moments, and beers, before you resume training again!!! Take advantage of the good weather.

A long ride

With one pro, one potential future pro and one Tour de France staffer, we tackled our longest ride in months and months.

It was a cold but clear start to the day.

At the end, my speedometre read 185km .. I can't think of when I last ventured so far outside of a race .. and even in a race I would hope to have finished a few kms ahead of that point.

Better yet, we accomplished that distance in about 6:10 actual riding time for an average of just more than 30km/hr. And Ollie Whistler helped me drop the hammer twice during the session.

As good as the session was, the plan was to run 20km too. I couldn't.

My mistake: not drinking enough on the bike. By the time I got home I was a bit light headed and in very short order I went from standing up to simply lying on the couch. A rookie mistake.

But still 185km in the bank .. I'm very happy with my cycling is at the moment, especially given the wet and stormy winter we've had here so far this year.

3.10 Marathon PB!!!

I ran a steady pace and knocked three minutes off my previous marathon best at the Gold Coast event on Sunday.

I crossed the line in 3:10:38 and my legs are reminding me today that running on the roads is not the friendliest activity for them.

It's good to have the confidence of having run that hard up my sleeve as I head into full Kona training mode.

During the next month, I plan to focus on cycling and swimming. Cycling isn't so much of an issue except for the fact that the weather has been so lousy here that I haven't been able to ride much outside for much of the last three weeks.

More importantly I need to hit the pool at least every second day and am considering joining a squad if I can find one that fits with my work sked. The 5.30am squad just isn't on. It's not getting up early - it's the downtime between the squad finishing and starting work at 10.30am.

So a few sked issues to sort out in the next week.