Timanfaya Dreaming

[Mr. Cleetus]

Awesome! Well done! l'll look forward to the report.

I've trained on the course some, but I've never actually done the race! I lived in southern California for a couple of years and went with some training groups up to train there, but I always had something else on at the time of the race - so I never managed to do it.

[IronGirl]

South Cerney Sprint Triathlon

14th Lady / 4th Lady Vet

A very early start, up at 5.30 and out of the house for 6.30 to drive to South Cerney. There are lots of lakes in that area including the Cotswolds Water park where I have raced before, but today I was headed for Bowmoor Sailing club. The motorways were clear and I was there in just 1 1/4 hours. The good thing about this is that I knew there was going to be a shop selling wetsuits.

I managed to try on a Speedo and an Ironman suit. I knew instantly when I got the Speedo suit on that it was just right, incredibly flexible in the arms and extra bouancy panels in the legs which is good for me as I don't have the best position in the water.

I was in the final wave of the day starting at 10am so I had loads of time to get my bike sorted out in transition.

Finally at 10am we were away. I'd got myself reasonably close to the front with the hope of picking up a good draft. The wetsuit was brilliant. I'd worried about the left shoulder starting to ache in a wetsuit, but not a twinge. The water temperature was ideal, it felt chilly when we first got in, but by the first bouy I was feeling warm. Although I've gone up to 1700m in the pool the longest straight swim I've done is 500m, so this 750m was testing my arms today. I was losing ground and felt like I was wizzing to the back of the field on the way back to shore. I was relieved to get out and I was surprised to see racks still full of bikes in transition.

T1 was hilarious, the worst I’ve ever done. The new wetsuit is so flexible it was bunching up around my wrists, I’d forgotten my usual Vaseline around the wrists and I ended up in a heap on the floor. Not good! The transition area was huge and there was a long run through a field to get to the start of the bike.

The first 1000/1500m of bike was down a rickety old track full of pot holes and gravel. Interesting on low profile bars. The bike course was pretty flat with a few undulations. I surprised that I was catching people and this inspired me to work hard. I felt my limited cyclo-cross experience helping me. I was flying past girls on the descents and minor technical bits (caught 4 on one roundabout. Lol!). However this was obviously my first time trail of the year and my legs were getting very heavy.

T2 was much better and enabled me to catch up a couple of places.

The run was on grass tracks around the lake and should have really suited me. However I was battling numb feet. Not sure if they were cold from the swim or I’d got the shoes on too tight, but they were certainly slowing me down. I did manage to hang on to my placing and actually caught a couple of girls.

I had a great time, didn’t stop grinning all day and yeah I’m loving triathlon again!

[Mr. Cleetus]

Welcome back to tri Well done! It sounds like a very solid race. Amazing how much time you can make up on the average triathlete with a bit of bike skill, eh?

[IronGirl]

[quote="Mr. Cleetus"]Welcome back to tri Well done! It sounds like a very solid race. Amazing how much time you can make up on the average triathlete with a bit of bike skill, eh?

[IronGirl]

Tuesday 90 min bike with hill reps

3 X 10 min hills in big ring

Felt a bit flat going out, but feeling much better for having done it.

[IronGirl]

Wednesday

2000m swim as
500m warm up
8 x 50
400 drills
400 steady
300 easy

30 min recovery run with Poppa dog around Bringsty

[IronGirl]

Thursday
Upper body weights session......legs lacking a bit of va va voom so giving them a day off!

Bench Press 4 X 10
Military Press 2 x 10
Lat Pull down 4 X 10
Bent arm pull downs? 2 X 20
Bicep curls 2 x 10
Front raises 2 X 20
Upright row 2 X 20
Tricep dips 2 X 20

[IronGirl]

Friday

2000m Swim as

500 IM
10 x 100 (Times starting to come down 1:40 to 1:42)
300 drill
200 easy

45 min Turbo Set

Spinervals 1.0
Hard work but has strangely done my legs good. Probably needed to get the blood flowing?

[IronGirl]

Saturday 1 hour run
Eastnor to British Camp

Went over to Eastnor to register for tomorrows Sportive. Spent a couple of hours watching Mountain Meyhem 24 hour MTB race. It was great to see some old friends that I havn't seen for years, odd how you loose touch when you're not training. The road Sportive is starting from the same venue, but now I wish I was doing the real thing. So next year some training maybe and get a Vegan team together. So far It's Mr I and myself. Mr I has done it before as part of a team of 4 (Team Redbull a pro MTB team) They were a bit serious! <you don't say!!> He said they expected a full on 25 mile time trial effort every 4 hours and I think they did about 6 laps each. Blimey! I think I'll squeel my way through the wooded bits but everything else I saw today was far easier than a lot of the cyclocross that I've been doing, so I'm up for having a go.

Early start tomorrow 8am kick off. Just made a batch of Vegan energy bars. Looking forward to it, a nice devious 75 mile hilly route.

[IronGirl]

Sunday Mountain Meyhem road Sportive - The Sunday Munch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqhWGVXCR_c

110km route + a detour of about 10km due to lack of signs! Over 1500m of climbing.

Had a great ride today. This was a very devious route that managed to link up lots of climbs in the area and there are plenty! So despite only being 120km altogether it did feel longer.
I was really glad that I'd been doing the hill reps for the last few weeks as they really helped.
The video shows a reccee of the route and my "hill rep climb" is @ around 1:57 to 2:32.
We did have some fun trying to follow the route today. The map they gave out was on quite a large scale and it was impossible to work out many of the back lanes. There were lots of signs, but many tucked away around corners or appearing very last minute on descents. They used a few lanes around Malvern that I didn't know, so despite being the local girl and proudly wearing my VC Sevale (Malvern) strip, I managed to get caught in a group of about 30 riders that took a wrong turn heading out.........how embaressing!
Again descending better today and managing to pull away from people on them. The guys in my cycling club used to tear their hair out with me and descents. One guy even offered to disconnect them for me as he belived it would save me at least 5 minutes on our hilly time trial. How nice of him! The guy that used to coach me for triathlon once rode a descent elbow to elbow with me and nudged me ever time I touched the brakes. Needless to say that really did not help! No I think it was riding cyclocross that finally helped me.
Rode further and harder than if I'd gone out on my own, so feeling very pleased with myself.
And a good practice run for "The tour of the Black Mountains" which is not far off.....yikes!

Oh just had a look at the Goody bag that I got today. Original Source sponsors of Mountain Meyhem make Vegan products. Nice one! http://www.originalsource.co.uk/

[IronGirl]

Monday R&R day

1700m Swim as
500 warm up
1000m steady
200 cool down

30 min recovery run

[IronGirl]

Tuesday 1 hour trail run

Worcestershire way from Crews Hill to Longley green and back
Out with BillyBob the dog who pulled me the whole way.

wednesday

1700m swim as
400 warm up
2 x 200m (3:30)
4 x 100 (1:35 to 1:40)would be happy with 30 x 100 on this! lol! Will get there.
8 x 50 (45 to 47)
100 easy
cut the set short, felt something in left shoulder. Turned out to be OK I'm just working harder but being a bit protective of it still.

40 min Turbo Session
15 min warm up
1 min - 2 min - 3 min 2 min 1 min intervals with 2 min rests If you think not y'aint doin it right!
10 min cool down

[IronGirl]

Thursday

1700m swim as
400 warm up
20 x 50m on 45 sec
300 cool down

40 min run
around ringsty Common with Poppa dog

[IronGirl]

Friday

45 min Turbo Set - Power sprints (fancied a change)

15 min warm up
(30 second hard flat out effort - 5 min steady) X 6
10 min cool down

My biggest problem on the bike is lack of power. It's the gym for my legs I think!

[IronGirl]

Saturday

3 hour run on the Malverns
North Hill to Eastnor and back.
Gorgeous day, sunshine and warmth - luxury warm weather training!