Left KC Wednesday morning and drove to Allen Texas just north of Dallas. I didn't want to overdo it by driving the full 11 hours so I picked a spot which was an easy chip shot away from The Woodlands. Shaughn Simmons ( of Strava KMF Man fame) lives in that area and we, along with his daughter, shared a great meal at local sushi place. We got to talk a lot about training and IMTX race/camp. I'm sure our conversation had all the charm of a 2x20' FTP session for her...but she suffered through like a champ! Thanks again Shaughn for a great start to my trip.
Arrived in The Woodlands and couldn't wait to get started. After being stuck in a car for two days and not having trained... I was itching to do something. I got changed and headed out for a quick run down to run course. The Woodlands is rimmed with trees (duh) and not the easiest place to navigate. After a few missteps I made my way to where I wanted to be.... Looked around a bit ... But with 112 mile ride the next day...decided to shut it down at about 4 miles.
It was a small group of campers. There were only 5 EN campers and a few from Team BPC out of Boston. The other guys would be doing there own thing...but we overlapped a bit. Coach P had us all meet in the lobby and went over the logistics of the next day's ride. It was nice to finally put some faces to the names. We'd all been talking through Strava and in the TX forum... So we knew each other a bit already. We did the quick meet and greet then headed out to dinner. Being such a small group made it easy to get to know each other and ask a lot of questions about our upcoming race.
The next morning we met outside the hotel at 7am. Waiting for us was one of our teammates from the area, Vic, who had taken the weekend off so he could do the SAG (Great guy and I can't express how much better he made the day for us). We'd decided since we were such a small group we'd ride most of the course together. The first 40 miles of the ride were mostly flat with a few slight hills. There was a bit of everything... Small hwy... Tree lined country roads...Residential. Coach P said the first 40's a warmup... You usually get a little bit of a tailwind which helps you keep a pretty good pace without working hard at all. He suggested taking it easy and making sure you're getting the fluid and food down.
Mile 40 is where the race starts... Time to get zoned into your power and focus on your pace. Ron Slack and I picked it up a bit through this section. He lead out and I just tried to keep him in sight... Which proved tougher and tougher! We all made a quick stop and headed out to the dreaded chip seal section.I was expecting something horrible... But it wasn't bad at all. I guess most of the rough spots have been repaired and it's in better shape than years past... Good news!
I was having tons of electronic problems during the day. I'd preloaded the course on my 510... But the screen kept freezing. My 920 kept dropping the signal from my PM. I have a big time love/hate relationship with these devices.
When the chip seal section was done Ron and I started to dig into a pretty close resemblance of race pace. We headed toward home at about 19/20 mph clip. The winds weren't bad at all... No heat... Little bit of rain. So... With the exception of seeing the course the ride did little to prepare us for what we'll be experiencing on race day when forced to deal with the elements... Bummer
Ron and I rode into the hotel with 115 miles on the day. Coach P had a mechanical and had to ride back with Vic... We saw him head out for a run just as we got back. I did the quick change and headed out for a run with the rest of the crew... Did a run down to the bridge overlooking the swim start and headed back after a 5 mile brick.
The forecast for day 2 was heavy rain. There was talk of canceling the ride in favor of the long run... But in the end we decided to figure it out over breakfast. We got lucky and our head meteorologist (Coach P) noticed some sort of blip in his Doplar radar that presented us a sufficient window for a ride. We chose a five mile loop about 5 miles away from the hotel. There was a store close by so if the weather turned on us we'd have some shelter. We got out there and did the first loop as a group... Then worked at our own paces. I did 2x25 (5) at 80,85 % then 2x30 at 72%... All told it was a 70 mile ride with some quality work. When we got back to the hotel it was raining pretty good and I decided to wimp out on the brick.
Sunday was long run day. We headed out of the hotel parking lot at about 7 and headed for the run course. We ran as a group while Coach P worked as tour guide. He showed us transition.. Where to park... Best place for morning drop off... Parking...everything you'd want to know. We ran the first 7 as a group... Then split off to finish at our own pace... In the end I did 13 with 6 between z2-3...but again....cool... No heat/humidity.
All in all it was a good camp. The weather was suboptimal, but we got to see and experience the course and will be much better prepared for race day.
Well said Ed! Looking forward to better weather race day. I have been sitting here for 2 days now without my bike. Airline lost it! Good news it should be at my house by 9am this morning. Although, as you know I still have about 3hr of cleaning it before I even think of a nother ride. Short run today in lue.
@ Ron... That sucks... although you might want to see if Coach P had something to do with it.. He might have arranged that because he knew it was the only way to get you to soak in all that work with the recovery he ordered!
@ Vic... To be honest I would have preferred it bad at the other extreme... Heat and humidity. I thought about staying another day when I saw the forecast... But wanted to get back home to the family. Enjoy that weather.... Go visit the Pig out there at Woodlane and get some riding in!
I'm glad everyone else saw that Pig at Woodlane. With as many times as I've ridden out there, and as bushed as I was at that point, I kinda thought I was seeing things.
@Ed - If you want to experience the heat as we get closer to race day, take a look at coming back down on the weekend of April 25. They have an open water swim in Lake Woodlands that morning, and a bunch of people turn that into a race rehearsal (I think that's one of our regular race rehearsal weekends anyways).
@Chris... Don't think I can handle that 12 hour drive again... but I will be hoping for some hot stuff around here. How's your son holding up...I haven't seen any updates?
Yep, they narrowed down the bacteria that caused this whole thing, and one of the antibiotics that they had started giving him right in the beginning on Saturday treats it. He was pretty far gone on Saturday, and likely wouldn't have survived the night as it turns out, if it weren't for a quick thinking ER doctor. The antibiotic is doing its job, and he's back to a point where he can stay awake for most of the day, and will probably get to go home from the hospital at some point this weekend. He's a tough little dude, and got mental toughness to spare, so I'm thinking I might introduce him to triathlons in the near future
I'm so happy Chris... I've felt the same way in the past when my son was little. He was very sick and my wife kept taking him to the Dr... they finally... exasperatedly told her to just take him to the ER. We were lucky that one of the top ear nose and throat guys was just finishing up a surgery and they convinced him to take a look. He spotted something no one else could see. If not for that serendipity... I doubt he'd be with us.... I'm happy for you guys... get him well...then get training... you got lots of work to do!
I'm playing a bit of catch-up, and I finally had a chance to listen to the podcast this week. The podcast talks about doing a shorter race right around now. Is anyone doing any races between now and IMTX? Anyone racing this weekend?
Comments
http://www.endurancenation.us/blog/camps/imtx-camps/2015-texas-race-camp-recap-wind-rain-train/
Great camp. Great great people. I can't wait to meet the rest of you guys race-week.
Left KC Wednesday morning and drove to Allen Texas just north of Dallas. I didn't want to overdo it by driving the full 11 hours so I picked a spot which was an easy chip shot away from The Woodlands. Shaughn Simmons ( of Strava KMF Man fame) lives in that area and we, along with his daughter, shared a great meal at local sushi place. We got to talk a lot about training and IMTX race/camp. I'm sure our conversation had all the charm of a 2x20' FTP session for her...but she suffered through like a champ! Thanks again Shaughn for a great start to my trip.
Arrived in The Woodlands and couldn't wait to get started. After being stuck in a car for two days and not having trained... I was itching to do something. I got changed and headed out for a quick run down to run course. The Woodlands is rimmed with trees (duh) and not the easiest place to navigate. After a few missteps I made my way to where I wanted to be.... Looked around a bit ... But with 112 mile ride the next day...decided to shut it down at about 4 miles.
It was a small group of campers. There were only 5 EN campers and a few from Team BPC out of Boston. The other guys would be doing there own thing...but we overlapped a bit. Coach P had us all meet in the lobby and went over the logistics of the next day's ride. It was nice to finally put some faces to the names. We'd all been talking through Strava and in the TX forum... So we knew each other a bit already. We did the quick meet and greet then headed out to dinner. Being such a small group made it easy to get to know each other and ask a lot of questions about our upcoming race.
The next morning we met outside the hotel at 7am. Waiting for us was one of our teammates from the area, Vic, who had taken the weekend off so he could do the SAG (Great guy and I can't express how much better he made the day for us). We'd decided since we were such a small group we'd ride most of the course together. The first 40 miles of the ride were mostly flat with a few slight hills. There was a bit of everything... Small hwy... Tree lined country roads...Residential. Coach P said the first 40's a warmup... You usually get a little bit of a tailwind which helps you keep a pretty good pace without working hard at all. He suggested taking it easy and making sure you're getting the fluid and food down.
Mile 40 is where the race starts... Time to get zoned into your power and focus on your pace. Ron Slack and I picked it up a bit through this section. He lead out and I just tried to keep him in sight... Which proved tougher and tougher! We all made a quick stop and headed out to the dreaded chip seal section.I was expecting something horrible... But it wasn't bad at all. I guess most of the rough spots have been repaired and it's in better shape than years past... Good news!
I was having tons of electronic problems during the day. I'd preloaded the course on my 510... But the screen kept freezing. My 920 kept dropping the signal from my PM. I have a big time love/hate relationship with these devices.
When the chip seal section was done Ron and I started to dig into a pretty close resemblance of race pace. We headed toward home at about 19/20 mph clip. The winds weren't bad at all... No heat... Little bit of rain. So... With the exception of seeing the course the ride did little to prepare us for what we'll be experiencing on race day when forced to deal with the elements... Bummer
Ron and I rode into the hotel with 115 miles on the day. Coach P had a mechanical and had to ride back with Vic... We saw him head out for a run just as we got back. I did the quick change and headed out for a run with the rest of the crew... Did a run down to the bridge overlooking the swim start and headed back after a 5 mile brick.
The forecast for day 2 was heavy rain. There was talk of canceling the ride in favor of the long run... But in the end we decided to figure it out over breakfast. We got lucky and our head meteorologist (Coach P) noticed some sort of blip in his Doplar radar that presented us a sufficient window for a ride. We chose a five mile loop about 5 miles away from the hotel. There was a store close by so if the weather turned on us we'd have some shelter. We got out there and did the first loop as a group... Then worked at our own paces. I did 2x25 (5) at 80,85 % then 2x30 at 72%... All told it was a 70 mile ride with some quality work. When we got back to the hotel it was raining pretty good and I decided to wimp out on the brick.
Sunday was long run day. We headed out of the hotel parking lot at about 7 and headed for the run course. We ran as a group while Coach P worked as tour guide. He showed us transition.. Where to park... Best place for morning drop off... Parking...everything you'd want to know. We ran the first 7 as a group... Then split off to finish at our own pace... In the end I did 13 with 6 between z2-3...but again....cool... No heat/humidity.
All in all it was a good camp. The weather was suboptimal, but we got to see and experience the course and will be much better prepared for race day.
I have been sitting here for 2 days now without my bike. Airline lost it! Good news it should be at my house by 9am this morning. Although, as you know I still have about 3hr of cleaning it before I even think of a nother ride. Short run today in lue.
53 days to go!!
Hate to say this but you guys missed some BEAUTIFUL weather down her by about a day.
@ Vic... To be honest I would have preferred it bad at the other extreme... Heat and humidity. I thought about staying another day when I saw the forecast... But wanted to get back home to the family. Enjoy that weather.... Go visit the Pig out there at Woodlane and get some riding in!
@Ed - If you want to experience the heat as we get closer to race day, take a look at coming back down on the weekend of April 25. They have an open water swim in Lake Woodlands that morning, and a bunch of people turn that into a race rehearsal (I think that's one of our regular race rehearsal weekends anyways).
I'm so happy Chris... I've felt the same way in the past when my son was little. He was very sick and my wife kept taking him to the Dr... they finally... exasperatedly told her to just take him to the ER. We were lucky that one of the top ear nose and throat guys was just finishing up a surgery and they convinced him to take a look. He spotted something no one else could see. If not for that serendipity... I doubt he'd be with us.... I'm happy for you guys... get him well...then get training... you got lots of work to do!