DS 2017 Micro - IMMOO version
Coach P,
Hope you are well given the changes at EN. Glad to see you are training hard again on Strava.
Happy to say I am healthy at the beginning of my build to IM Wisconsin. Both ankles are 'tight', the left achilles tendon is residual from 5/2016 (IMC build), the right ankle is sore from a single run 4 weeks ago when I rolled it on a pinecone - twice. Aside from long mornings of warm up, I am 100% functional, running and biking pain free.
Fitness is ok. My JOS was ended by a ski injury. I did 4 weeks of OS in April, then 5 weeks of GF in May. I completed 85% of the prescribed wko for IM week 7 last week. I am sitting in week 8 of the IM plan, testing now. Today I sit at CTL 81, TSB -25. My typical body comp issues remain. STL ramp rates 5 to 7. I peaked at CTL 99 last year before IMC.
I am 9lbs away from my IMC/IMAZ race weight of 180lbs . Hoping to do better this year.
Having been through the EN IM plan three times before, I will be able to shift wkos around without much difficulty. The only addition to the plan is to add some upper body strength this year - focusing on lats/back/core. Two reasons, I feel a general lack of power in the water when my form is good, and secondly to stabilize my aero position. This means I would need to remove some time from the plan - was thinking of this instead of one swim and/or one short run during the week, and 30-40 min from the Saturday long run. Curious your thoughts on this.
Thank you,
DS
Hope you are well given the changes at EN. Glad to see you are training hard again on Strava.
Happy to say I am healthy at the beginning of my build to IM Wisconsin. Both ankles are 'tight', the left achilles tendon is residual from 5/2016 (IMC build), the right ankle is sore from a single run 4 weeks ago when I rolled it on a pinecone - twice. Aside from long mornings of warm up, I am 100% functional, running and biking pain free.
Fitness is ok. My JOS was ended by a ski injury. I did 4 weeks of OS in April, then 5 weeks of GF in May. I completed 85% of the prescribed wko for IM week 7 last week. I am sitting in week 8 of the IM plan, testing now. Today I sit at CTL 81, TSB -25. My typical body comp issues remain. STL ramp rates 5 to 7. I peaked at CTL 99 last year before IMC.
I am 9lbs away from my IMC/IMAZ race weight of 180lbs . Hoping to do better this year.
Having been through the EN IM plan three times before, I will be able to shift wkos around without much difficulty. The only addition to the plan is to add some upper body strength this year - focusing on lats/back/core. Two reasons, I feel a general lack of power in the water when my form is good, and secondly to stabilize my aero position. This means I would need to remove some time from the plan - was thinking of this instead of one swim and/or one short run during the week, and 30-40 min from the Saturday long run. Curious your thoughts on this.
Thank you,
DS
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Really excited to hear about your body composition. Single digits to your goal weight is a fantastic place to be. Keep it up as it will be harder to adhere to good food as your body gets more more tired.
I have totally become obsessed looking for pinecones! Unfortunately, I live in a pine tree forest here in WA, so as you can imagine I am more or less in a constant state of fear.
My run is the least well developed at this point. I run tested this morning resulting in a VDOT 45/ave HR 168. No improvement in VDOT as it was only 5 seconds faster than when I tested 5/11/2017. This despite nailing most of the run wkos during that interval. In comparison, at the end of 2016 OS my VDOT - before Achilles tendonitis happened - I was VDOT 54 at ave HR of 163 on a treadmill 5K. No doubt the ankles are playing a role, but not obviously prohibitive. During today's test, no pain whatsoever. But I sure was sucking wind. HR toped out at 180. Cant remember seeing that since 2013.
I have access to an elliptical at the gym, not home. I have a treadmill at home, which I have interpreted as the best option for building endurance without shelling the legs by running on concrete.
I tested at FTP 270 Tuesday, my all time high is ~290, I seem to be on track there. I don't have a swim TT until Saturday's big day, but based on my last few swims, I am predicting I will be close to my best time ever.
Another way to look at it is to go back in to see what your pace from your last few races would've given you as a vDOT. You can use the calculator to set the distance to 26.2, and then drop your race time in. My guess is that it's not that far off of something in the mid to upper 40s! Consistency will be key here as we balance smart running with cross training like The elliptical.
onwards!
~ Coach P
Touching base. Presently healthy - ankles holding up, pinecone injury healed. Body comp coming along - 8lbs away from my historical fastest weight of 178. I might get lower this year using my wife's program, we will see. Biggest win is the swim: I was able to hit a new T pace max on an OWS last week. My biggest weakness now is boredom on the long bikes, especially trainer rides. I don't know how the other guys kill it on the trainer for 3-4 hours. I start going mad at 2 hours! My run volume is good, 32-36/week the last 3.
I did a VO2 max test at my wife's office just for fun, which was interesting. VO2 max was 55, anaerobic threshold happens at HR 130 at which pace I burn ~800-900 cal/hour apparently. Have you any experience with this type of data? Obviously, running while eating that much poses a GI challenge that is probably impossible, but I am wondering if it is worth testing eating that much on the bike (or the first half of the bike)? In years past I have tried to get 400-500cal/hour in on a standard IM bike leg.
I need to move the schedule around a bit for a wedding, so planning to swap week 14 and 15, so will do the camp work 1 week early. Otherwise, Im on track.
As for the testing, it really depends on the equipment and the protocol. When I have done that type of stuff before so much of it was dependent on what the subject ate (was breathing out) that it wasn't useful to use it as a tool to determine how much you should eat but rather how hard your body is working at those levels.
Rather than using the test as a guideline for what you should eat, I prefer using the sweat test to confirm your fluid intake is good. We complement that with the calories based off of your lean body mass which should be sufficient. Ideally you aren't finishing any of those longer rides wanting to eat an entire pizza. If that's the case, then we need to up the calories during the ride… But I would rather that be your guide than a single test. Make sense?
Overtime, repeat versions of the test will start to show you where you are becoming more efficient. Has your season progresses, you will see that Efficiemcy improve both in duration and move up a little bit in terms of intensity. But that's really it, it's not super practical the way you want to use it.
I swam a PR RR today, 1:05. I'm pumped. The EN/Mike R swim plan is paying dividends. I am finishing camp week tomorrow with the 2 hour run. Will put me over 1000 TSS for the week.
I fly on Wednesday for a 5 day family wedding/reunion. No bike access, unless I drug my wife and sneak out to do it. Truthfully, probably no access to swimming either. My plan was to swap camp week (15) with the run focus week (14). Thoughts on my edits for week 14?
M: Off - due to camp (or insert swim here?)
Tu: AM swim, PM: Bike threshold + some extra ABP time
Wed: VO2 run
Thurs: Hill/Z2 run
Fri: Long run
Sat: Short run
Sun: run (?)
Thinking I can hit a 40 +mile week. I fly home Sunday, so can launch into week 16 the next day
DS
I defer to you, my only recommendation is that you don't significantly exceeded your weekly run mileage target.
Despite living in a house 200yards from a nice CA beach with a metric ton of beer in the fridge, I was able to hit my run volume. Actually exceeded it by 3-4 miles (with Z1 mileage to accommodate an older family member who came with me) - 45 miles. Most I have ever done in a week. Feeling good. Really good. CTL hovering at 100 due to no swim and bike in a week. No idea if that is worth knowing or not.
Due to a scheduling snafu, I have tomorrow off. Plan to capitalize with a lengthy bike ride + brick run instead of the swim, to make up for some of my time off the bike last week.
As I am prepping for the run sim and RR in the coming weeks, I need some advice. I have noticed two things 1) my average heart rate on the long bikes is LOW (120-125). That is 10-15 beats lower than I saw in all 3 of my IM bike legs to date, and I am holding NPs based on a recent (week 12) FTP test x 3-5 hours which is basically the same in those prior IMs. 2) My ave HR on the long run is substantially higher (145-150) and I feel reasonably well at the end of the run (says 2 separate 2 hour 15 milers). I would like to test my mettle at IMWI, be less conservative, to see what I can do. What would you suggest?
- Add wattage to the bike NP, to get the HR up into the 135-145 range, and then follow run pacing based on HR?
- Keep my NP as it is and accept that my HR will be 20 bpm higher on the run rather than try to keep it the same as the bike AHR
- Change nothing, shut up, and follow the plan...
I know what you mean, I think the first step is to work on some of those long ride to run transitions were you run a few miles at that bike heart rate and just see what speed that gets you. You might be surprised.
I have experienced the same change on the bike, but when I run at that heart rate I'm actually still pretty zippy. You'll be surprised how your body gets into a groove and a heart rate and can do some good work there. You could also just be getting a lot stronger on the bike.
Let me know.
~ Coach P
I am carrying a ton of fatigue at the end of week 17. Still waiting for the inspiration to hit the ABP today. Fatigue of 181, -46.1 TSB. CTL 124 (highest ever).
Two more data points this week:
- Race run sim: 18mi in 2:30. The initial 6mi I ran to an average HR of 135 (with a 160' climb and descent) netting 8:23/mile. Mile 6-15 I ran to an AHR of 148 - while running I capped it at 152 - these HRs are more typical for me, but the pace was faster than typical (8:10/mi). The final 3 miles I ran to AHR 155 (cap of 158), but pace slowed to 8:24s. Overall I felt pretty good, like I had not yet really hit the line at mile 18 (but close to it).
- Long ride Saturday: I purposely did this on trainer road so I could monitor my NP and HR closely. If I cut out the WU and CD, I rode NP 206 x 4hr, AHR 132. This NP falls on the high side of my training rides to date (range 188-212), and actually felt fine (except I hate the trainer with passion). Then a brick 6mi run - first two at AHR 138, remaining 4 at AHR 146 - netting a 8:21/mi pace. Felt very solid.
Bottom line, I think my target NP should be ~205-208 based on my AHR for the RR. Likely my initial efforts (with NP 188-200) were too low, thus the low AHR. Then run as prescribed, 6mi at bike AHR, letting it drift to 150ish.
Have been trying to design some time goals based on my perceived abilities to date. Thinking sub 11Hr race and a sub 4Hr run.
Jenn Edwards here stepping in as Coach P makes his way back from an AWESOME IMMT performance. Sounds like you're getting your race effort dialed in nicely and are ready to bring on the taper.
Cheers! -Jenn
So...totally...ready to taper. Like right now.
No question in there, good point. I have a hard time formulating the question "how should I pace the bike". I know there is a metric ton of material written in EN on this topic, but still I struggle. I have done rides during this IMWI build as low as 188 (0.67) and as high as 212 (.74). My 6mile runs all seems to be the same after (RPE, pace and AHR), the only difference is my AHR on the bike.
Last year Rich made me a believer after plugging these things into BBS only to find out we are playing with about 15 minutes on bike time between the limits of the NP range. But that is still 15 minutes! And this is IM#4 and I am hoping to see what I am made of after 4 years of ENing it. When it comes down to picking that number, I still feel unsure.
My history here is a discrepancy between training long runs and what happens on the IM course. Last year in the lead up to IMC I was easily throwing down 8:15-8:30/mile pace in the RR and long runs, only to clock 10:30/mile paces on race day. Now I am faced with a similarly challenging bike course and trying to decide that final NP target.
The race times are of the Christmas wish list type. Not emotionally attached, just one more "thing" to keep my chasing it out there.
The way we keep you in check is to follow your heart right number that you know and trust. As long as that heart rate is below or out that number, then I am OK with you riding an aggressive normalized power.
overall we want to make sure that you're still able to work in the second half of the bike which is where the separation starts to happen. Early on you'll probably have to make a couple choices on race day to back off and sit behind people because it's not worth trying to pass them. Even though I was biking 22 miles an hour on race day, I did that several times in the first two hours. But I never saw those folks again in the second half when I was still strong!
an hour ago I realized I am working this weekend. This is most frustrating because I make the schedule! I distinctly recall drawing out my tri schedule in June, blacking out this weekend for the big RR2, etc, and somehow someway I hosed myself.
sigh.
There can be no 100 mile bike rides on open roads unfortunately. Depending on the luck of the draw, I might be able to pull off lsome ong trainer rides, but I cannot be more than 30 minutes away from work until Tuesday at 7am.
I am pretty sure I cannot withstand 14-18 hours over the weekend on the trainer. That would break me.
Do you have a recommendation?
should I adjust week 19 at all?
Overall, I am feeling ok. Legs are pretty fatigued, but not as bad as after week 17.
Thanks for everything coach. This build has been really good. Per your request, my ride plan: https://endurancenation.vanillacommunities.com/discussion/23727/ds-immoo-race-plan#latest
Thanks for the support and wisdom leading into IMWI. It was a good race for me. Lots to be proud of and lots to work on.
I have signed up for Boulder, and intend to hit at least one 70.3 en route.
We are also likely moving into a new house Dec 1, so I think that will significantly impact an attempt at a NOV campaign. I am thinking of doing run durability until JOS, then taking off from there.
In the BBS thread I started, you had eluded to caution until one can run the IM marathon to within 15 minutes of a stand alone marathon. Of note, I have actually never run a stand alone marathon. Pretty much the only reason for that is Coach R's standard advice since I have been on the team (prior to that I never did endurance sports). So I am curious your take on this matter - do you think it wise to do a marathon if for no other reason but to provide a gauge for your IM efforts?
~ Coach P
So, I am toying around with the first half of 2018 schedule in my down time. Since we do not do TSR anymore, here is what I am thinking:
Octish-Dec 26: Run Durability plans 1,2,3 + swim
1/1: Full OS + swim (adding swim so that I do not need to do a swim camp)
Mallorca in 4/2018 for a volume bump, start IM plan on return
5/8: St George 70.3 (shake out race)
6/10:IM Boulder
Sound right?