DO WORK

Monday:

Completely Off! Just needed a day to relax and soak up last week. It wasn't required... I just felt it was the smart move at this point!

Tuesday:

Swim: Solid day today. Went back out to Southlake and my beloved Vasa Trainer. Good quality all around. I went for a 2000 yarder to open with hopes of digging deep the last 500. Things worked out pretty good and I hit some solid times. I also dug in pretty hard during those closing 500...whew!

Vasa Trainer: 4 x 20

(scy)

• 2000 semi-hard to open in 26:58 (clearing 500's in 6:52, 6:49, 6:40, 6:35)
• 1 min rest
• 200 stroke
• 300 free smooth in 4:09
• 200 stroke
• 300 free smooth in 4:11
• 200 stroke
• 8 x 100 cruise on 1:30 (1:17 - 1:19)

Total Swim Time: 1:01:00 / 4000 yards

Vasa Trainer: 1 x 25

Strength: Vasa Trainer workout pre and post swim plus a bit of core after the run today.

Total Strength Time: 0:20:00

Run: Awesome session back at the gym today. Mixed things up again with the Elliptical and Treadmill.... 40 min Elliptical / 30 min Treadmill / 10 min Elliptical. Everything felt cool. Nice way to add some volume without all the pounding!

Total Elliptical / Run Time: 1:20:00 / 3.7 miles

Wednesday:

Bike: Awesome day for a bike-run brick. Beautiful weather....nice 15mph breeze out of the Southwest...and a tad overcast! Temperature probably jumped to low 90's and that was nice.

Talked with Dave early this week and the focus "has remained" and will continue to remain on IM Florida...regardless of what my racing plans are from now until then.

With that in mind....I ran through a middle distance Ironman race sim today. Focus on pace and nutrition were top priorities. Take it out really slow and build through the ride to finally settle into Ironman Pace. Things worked great and quality couldn't have been better.

Total Ride Time: 4:00:00 / 83.4 miles

Run: Transition run went smooth. Took 2 min to transition and settled into a nice Ironman type pace. This was the first t-run I've done since Buffalo Springs and was nice to iron out the cobwebs. I didn't want to press things to hard so I just went with feel and turned it off after I felt like I achieved what I was looking for. There's still lots of training to go... Need to watch my efforts...keep it smooth!

Total Run Time: 0:22:00 / 2.9 miles

Thursday:

Swim: Today, I wanted to get back in the water with the Point Zero 3 Skin Suit by Blue Seventy. If I was going to do any type of racing this weekend, I wanted another session in this bad boy! So...I went down to the pool...put on my race day kit (shorts and tri top) and laced up the suit. I just wanted to get a feeling of how things would feel on race morning.... You never know how things will wear or ride unless you try them out in training...

Drove back over to Northlake in order to get some meters in. While I would prefer swimming meters every day...the heat and sun do take a toll. Today was somewhat hot but by the time I got to the pool, the sun seemed to have disappeared amongst the clouds...

(scm)

• 5 x 100 on 1:50 (1:27)
• 200 stroke
• 1000 free in 14:25 (clearing 500's in 7:13, 7:12)
• 3 x 200 on 3:05 (2:50, 2:51, 2:49)
• 200 stroke
• 100 free easy

Total Swim Time: 0:45:00 / 2600 meters

Bike: After the swim...I couldn't resist the weather change. It was so nice to see some clouds and wind. NO SUN! Sweet. I'll take a 20mph wind over the scorching sun any day.

Anyway...rode super easy and enjoyed the weather.

Total Ride Time: 2:05:00 / 40.1 miles

Friday:

Bike: I was really looking forward to today's ride. Unfortunately...my stinking shoes made that a little difficult. Before the ride this morning...I unscrewed my cleats and broke off a screw inside the carbon sole. Oh well....I guess the 8 thousand plus miles I got out of them were good enough. Now what do I do?

I had some old triathlon shoes laying around the house...so I did what I could to rig something together and off I went! I ended up stopping the ride a little early as shoes did provide some minor aches and bio-mechanical issues I wasn't really in the mood to deal with!

Will take another stab at the long ride Sunday! Hopefully I can hit the hour mark. If that happens...this will turn into one heck of a week on the bike...not to mention an awesome way to finish of this block of training. Next weeks a recovery week! Tomorrow is an easy 2 hour ride again with a solid swim before hand...

Total Ride Time: 4:25:00 / 85.2 miles

Run: After a nap...I headed up to the gym for a little treadmill action. Solid run. Some minor aches in the foot but now things seem to be OK... Have to maintain a careful step. Glad I am not racing this weekend!!!!!

Total Run Time: 0:45:00 / 5.5 miles

Saturday:

Swim: Back to Southlake and another awesome workout! Hit the Vasa Trainer easy before swim and hard afterwards! Today's workout was 1000 yard repeats.

Vasa Trainer: 1 x 25

(scy)

• 1000 leaving on 14:30, finishing in 13:50
• 1000 leaving on 14:15, finishing in 13:36
• 1000 leaving on 14:00, finishing in 13:25
• 100 free leaving on 1:30, finishing in 1:14
• 200 stroke
• 200 free leaving on 2:45, finishing in 2:32
• 200 stroke
• 200 free leaving on 2:45, finishing in 2:32
• 4 x 50 free easy

Vasa Trainer: 4 x 25...solid effort

Total Swim Time: 1:02:00 / 4100 yards

Total Strength (Vasa Trainer) Time: 0:15:00

Run: Smooth and easy Elliptical session

Total Elliptical Time: 0:40:00

Strength: Easy upper body session after Elliptical. Just some maintenance stuff...no hard efforts.

Total Strength Time: 0:20:00

Sunday:

Bike: Slept like 11 hours last night and didn't get the door until noon. On a good note....a wonderful cold front rolled in and dropped some beloved clouds and rain on us. A little wind out of the North cooled things off a bit, but the rain made it a tad humid. I'll take cooler weather any day though.

Legs were pretty sore during the first part of the ride. As a result...I kept the intensity down quite bit and just enjoyed the day. Wasn't really sure how much mileage but I was optimistic and thing paid off.

I ended up having a pretty solid ride. I would have rode a bit longer but a pretty good storm came in that literally made it dangerous to continue riding. Ended the ride with an extremely good effort on low perceived exertion which made way for more quality workouts after dinner!

Total Ride Time: 4:40:00 / 92 miles

Swim: A little pasta and fresh bread for dinner...and then headed over to the bathtub (24 Hour Fitness Pool) for a little late night action. Have I mention how much I can't stand this pool. Swim times across the board are always slower here!

I've been planning a large volume training day all week. Not wanting to force the volume...I just let things role day-by-day and new if I was smart...the day would come. Once I hit the water tonight...I knew today was going to be the day!

(scy)

• 500 free easy to open
• 25 x 100 relaxed effort on 1:30 (1:21-1:23)
• 200 stroke
• 2 x 500 pull w/paddles on 6:45 (6:30, 6:25)
• 200 stroke
• 100 free easy to cool-down

Total Swim Time: 1:09:00 / 4500 yards

Run: Ok...after the swim, I set my sights on one last workout. A short Elliptical -Treadmill-Elliptical workout was all I wanted. Well, I got it! 30 min on the Elliptical / 15 min on the Treadmill / and then 5 min to cool-down on the Elliptical

Total Elliptical-Run Time: 0:50:00 / 1.75 miles

Totals for the Week:

• Total Swim Time: 3 hrs 57 min / 15,443 yards
• Total Bike Time: 15 hrs 10 min / 300.7 miles
• Total Run Time: 3 hrs 57 min / 13.9 miles
• Total Strength Time: 0 hrs 40 min / 2 sessions

Total Hours Trained During The Week: 23 hrs 44 min

Notes for the week:

I couldn't be more pleased with the last 8 weeks. Outside of my foot...things have gone perfect! I can only hope that the foot issue doesn't plague my performance in Florida. With all the hard work I've laid out...I'll definitely be keeping all fingers crossed as the days get closer.

Next week I will be forcing the volume back down to 15 hours for the week. A couple reasons for this will be to absorb some of the "quality", and, "volume" I've managed to hit over the last couple months.

Now...while absorption is nice and all...I desperately need to hit the last 3.5 week prep period before going into my taper. If I can manage to execute correctly across this next month...I should put myself into a pretty good place both mentally and physically. Soooo....since top priority is hitting key weeks 7 through 4...I suppose I can force myself to take it easy next week.

Ok...that's about it! Going to start next week by taking tomorrow completely off and hit a nice and easy workout on Tuesday. Wednesday will be an important day as I am planning a race at the end of week 4....and using a 2 day taper to prepare for it. 2 days out...completely off...and then the day before...nice and easy hitting all 3 sports. Wednesday this week, I'll be looking at how I feel mentally and physically! I will have a better idea about the race around week 5...and more on how I feel Wednesday on Wednesday...go figure!

Ok...off to bed.... Congrats to Team Timex on awesome performances all around at Ironman Wisconsin!

Later

Mg