That having been said, I've missed some blogging, so this post will be long because I'm going to recap all of it here. Let's go!
Thursday's Workout: Bike trainer session
Summary:
- WU: 10 mins, mix of seated spins and jogs, just getting used to the trainer and getting blood to the legs
- Main Set: split as 95% steady state seated/105% +1 gear and max cadence/recovery spin in minutes
- 1/1/1
- 3/1/2
- 5/1/3
- 7/1/4
- 9/1/5
- Gears: B3/B4/recovery
- WD: 5 mins easy spin
- Total time: 60 minutes
Hit rate: 20/22 (90.9%)
My bike trainer showed up, so I figured I would put it to good use. Didn't have my speed/cadence sensor yet, so I really just played it by feel. I think I was definitely too slow on the cadence and could have maybe been better off working in lower gears at higher cadences, but that was hard to figure out without the sensors since I don't have an intuition for it yet. The sensors have come in since, so the next trainer session I do, I will be able to put these observations to the test.
The trainer session was a great reminder that riding can be a lot a lot a lot of pain. Sometimes I want to say swimming pain is comparable, but when the burning really fires up in your legs there's really nothing that actually compares. Trainer sessions are so mental in that realm. That's something I'm really going to have to settle down and focus on in order to become a stronger cyclist.
On a more technical note, the upper body involvement in biking always surprises me. It's just like everything else, your upper body is so important to keeping everything stable and energy directed the right way that you can't just assume it's not involved because it's not the key force driver. Will have to focus on simple things like my body position and keeping my shoulders relaxed as the efforts get harder, etc. I also really have to work on smoothness with my pedal stroke. I know that's hard when I'm in toe-clips instead of real cycling shoes, but there's definitely still room for improvement even given that so I'm really going to make an effort to work on that pedaling efficiency.
Friday AM Workout: CSP swim practice, IM day
Summary:
- WU: 400 free
- Pre-set:
- 4 x 150 kick/drill/swim by 50 IMO
- 10 x 50 swim @ 1:10/1:15
- 4 free, 3 breast, 2 back, 1 fly
- Main Set: 4 x
- 200 IM @ 3:40
- 150 free @ 2:30
- 100 IM @ 2:00
- No time for real warm down lol...
- Total Distance: 3300 LCM, 75 mins
Lindsey coached yesterday (don't quote me on the spelling of her name) and she was really sweet. Workouts are given orally, which hasn't happened to me since my high school days so my listening comprehension and memorization skills were pretty poor and needed some work. I swam in the faster half of the pool, but we were the awkward lane that was fast enough to be given the faster workout but not fast enough to finish it with time to actually warm down. The people in my lane were pretty cool though, mostly young'uns like myself. There were some hardcore triathletes around throughout the pool, one woman in my lane was going for a ride after practice, turns out there are pretty inspirational people to be found throughout this city.
As for the actual swim itself, the set doesn't look that bad but it was brutal. The combination of me having been out of the pool for a while and the pool being set in long course was just rough, especially on the fly. My quads were cramping up towards the end (probably from the trainer session the day prior) and I was not having a good time. I also have no idea if my lane was actually hitting the intervals. We wanted to make sure everyone was getting some amount of rest so the send offs got sort of arbitrary and I don't like the clocks at this pool very much, they aren't very clear and I just couldn't get a sense for whether or not we were making the intervals just barely or missing them by a lot. It was confusing and weird. But the workout was quality nonetheless so that was appreciated.
The other nice thing about swimming long course is that it forces you to be really cognizant of your technique. You can't hide it with the "oh but it only happened once this length" excuse and if your technique falls apart when you get tired, it shows at the end of the length and you really have to work on holding it together. I like that the setting of the pool is forcing the issue.
The other nice thing is I think practice really gets back at that whole issue of being surrounded by excellence. It's easy to want to complain about getting up at 4:15 AM so you can commute to a 5:15 AM swim practice, but when you are surrounded by others that are doing the same thing and some athletes who are taking bike rides or runs right afterwards, it seems like what you're doing is so small in comparison. Just being around other people who are committed to the same insanity that you are makes what you're doing seem normal instead of commendable or downright strange. And on top of that, when you really really want to quit on repeat 2 of 4, you can't, because everyone else is struggling through the same thing too. I love that. I can't wait to go back next week. Although freestyle is so not my jam.
Friday PM Workout: Outdoor base ride
Summary: 18.13 mi, 1:10:31, 15.4 mph, 577 ft gain
Speed splits by 5k: 14.8, 15.6, 16.0, 15.4
Hit rate: 22/24 (91.7%)
Took 3 laps of Forest Park, really struggled with that incline up on Skinker, but it's good that I'm getting practice with it. Cadence was sort of low on average (74 rpm; I don't look at that on my outdoor rides, trying to get a natural feel for it) so I'll have to work on that. I was going to go for a fourth lap but I decided that I didn't want to blow myself out in case the group ride today required me to be more on top of my game than I was feeling. My legs were pretty shot. It was nice to get outside and be forced to take some quick turns and avoid human beings and get the feel for some climbing and fast descending. The next time I take this ride I might try and do it the other way around to get some of that steeper climbing in and cruise down the Skinker hill and see which I prefer. In general I think the alternating will make me a better cyclist so it's worth doing.
Today's AM Workout: Short-mid ride w/ 8 AM Big Shark group (including my commute out)
Summary: 23.34 mi, 1:56:56, 12.0 mph, 879 ft gain
Speed splits by 5k: 10.6, 11.0, 14.0, 12.0, 13.5.
Hit rate: 23/25 (92%)
This morning I took my first ever group ride! There were only 4 of us, it was really chill, probably too chill, but the route was nice (and bonus very few cars in the morning) and the company was nice and I'll probably try this route out again tomorrow as the lead in to my brick. Not too much to say I guess other than that riding on the roads was less scary than I thought it would be (mostly because there are so few cars out on the road on a Saturday morning) and spending two hours out riding really digs into your appetite even if you don't go very far or very fast. At some point I would love to go out and try the faster 7:30 group ride but they are faster and that intimidates me so I don't know that I'll be taking that on until I have a little more confidence in my riding abilities.
One nice thing to note was that I was pretty solid on the uphills (learning to control the effort, realizing that I can climb slowly and keep effort in check and it's really key to longevity in the ride) and there was a ton of coasting down hills which was really nice and a lot of fun. I think the biggest take away from this morning was that riding can be a lot of fun and I need to try and find that and enjoy it whenever possible so that saddle time isn't just torturous all of the time. Also I needed the recovery session for my legs and that was pretty key.
In other news, Henry made me stretch last night and this morning after my ride, and that's definitely been doing me some good. I haven't had the will power to bring myself to do any core work yet, but baby steps I guess. As long as I'm hitting my sessions and stretching and recovering properly after them, I will accept my present shortcomings. We'll work towards putting the rest of the pieces in place as things continue on. I've also taken short 1.5 hr naps both yesterday and today to help keep me rested. Won't be able to do that once school starts next week so that'll be an adjustment. I assume caffeine will have it's role to play when the time comes.
As for the rest of today, I plan on taking a base run sometime in the afternoon (while Henry goes to the gym!) but it should be a fairly easy-moderate effort and I'm just gonna focus on coping in the heat. Things are off to a great start, I'm really excited about where this is headed! Yay!
Much love,
Jess
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