First RR IMAZ.....
Finally time to share my first RR experience, did this Monday and one of those life weeks, anywho:
Ended up working late (until midnight) Sunday before RR so I did not wake up and drink any calories about 2am, hopefully next RR, but did eat two Clif builders Bars about midnight.
Woke up 6, 2 cups coffee, two water bottles water only, oatmeal about 8, on the bike 0930.
No PM for me....yet, so went with HR, rode first 90 minutes easy just rode along, zone 1.....so boring, tried to keep focused and in the moment but admit it was hard. When I could finally ramp it up to zone 2 the rest of the ride flew by......
Nutrition: 5 water bottles + one 16 oz. water bottle (2 with 3 scoops Perpetuem each, others one scoop Heed each)Drank the 16 oz plain water first 90 minutes. Power bar bites one package, and 2 gu's.....total 1500 calories, worked out about 250/hr. 3 caps, one every 2 hours.
Felt strong and thought nutrition worked for me, but ended up getting off to pee 3 times....crazy! It was 40 degrees when I started the ride so hence only one S cap every 2 hours, by the time I was running it was close to 70 degrees.
Kept the Garmin running for all pee stops and water bottle changes and at 6 hours, 103 miles, 17.2 mph, avg hr 129.
Transitioned off the bike, downed cup water and one gu, started jogging easy, legs felt okay and started out about 10 minute mile, I live in hilly area so it is hard to keep pace sometimes and I went by HR mostly, just ran pretty easy for an hour, last 30 minutes got headache that was more distracting than anything, tried to stay in the box.
At one hour, 4.55 miles, hr avg 135.
When it was all said and done, felt much better than I expected, ran around with two year old and after he was asleep walked the dog for about an hour. Iced my knees a couple of times, woke up Tuesday a little tired but no more than after long weekend of work, etc.....
All in all this RR was the best in terms of a confidence builder....I am really excited to finish my first IM, and now feel like it is really going to happen.
So my questions are: 
- More S caps or less water? (did not weight myself before and after...oops)
- Was my headache from too much salt? How could this be with three pee stops on the bike?
- My avg HR on the bike was zone 1 for me so maybe I can push it a bit more?.... per HR for IM after 90 minutes easy zone 1 can go to zone 2 which is 130 and greater for me, or is the fact that I felt so good an indicator I did it right?
Comments
Stacy - a few thoughts. Your headache might be due to the physical strain of holding the aero position for six hours. This tightens the neck muscles, eventually causing swelling and pinching on nerves which can lead to "tension" headaches. I find I need to actively focsu on benind my head forwards frequently if I'm riding aero for more than about 2.5 - 3 hours.
As to salt, there is plenty in the Perpetuem and other foods you are taking in. When I'm riding in your neck of the woods, unless the temp is over abut 82-85, I find I don't need any extra salt on my RRs I do in the Glenwood/Basalt area. I use perpetuem and hammergel as my calories.
Did you go a little too easy? Probably, but that's a good thing for your first RR. If you are considering pushing it a little more on #2, try two things: Start your increase in effort after about 1 hour, not 1.5, and gradually increase the effort level by NO MORE than 1% each hour after that. Doesn't sound like a lot, I know, but after six hours, it's a big deal. The fact that the run felt easy shows you did leave a little on the table, but again, that's the idea for the RR: the race itself requires that the first six miles of the run feels too easy for you. You've got the right idea pacing wise. For RR # 2, you can try to lift the pace a teeny bit on the secnd half of the run to see how THAT feels.
The main thing, this RR shows you ARE ready for Tempe - its just fine tuning from here on out.
@Al: so thought about my not holding tension on my ride yesterday and found myself needing to drop my shoulders away from my ears too, now I have something new to focus on which is always good, thanks. I am lucky to never get headaches and wow,they are a menace, and a headache at the line I might be crawling......happy healing, you are an inspiration!
@Paul: Perpukeum and Heave.....awesome, have decided I cannot stand Heed and neither does my mtb riding hubby so I gave it away........bought a canister of Ironman perform to replace Heed since that would make my life easier race day if I could handle it, usually have no prob with Gatorade so we'll see next RR.
Perpetuem not the best but I did not like the taste of Infinit...at all, any other thoughts for liquid nutrition besides Perpuke and Infinit?
And more water or perhaps perform at transition, may stash bottle in the woods too.....you think one gu?
@Patrick: strong work following the debrief of the uber smart guy, like the "yeah what he said", happy training post accident.
@ Chuck - If you are racing/training on the bike with power, then I meant something like: do the first hour @, say, an IF of 0.68, and then each hour, gradually build so you are doing about 0.73 by the end. Depending on your experience - if you are new to racing IMs or racing witht power - you may want to start lower, like at 0.65, and finish no higher than 0.7 or 0.71. When in doubt, go easier, but keep the range of 0.65 to 0.74 as your lower and upper limits. With HR on the bike, it's a lot harder to have an objective measure. Do NOT use speed; that will vary even more than HR, depending on wind, slope, nature of course (stops/starts/turns). Your *perceived* rate of exertion will of course go up, and may go up out of proportion to your increase in power. That is, in the 6th hour, an IF of 0.72 may feel like a one hour session at 0.84! Best to trust the power readings, and not the exhaustion in your legs at mile 100. You will be surprised how well you can run, even for 3+ hours, after feeling wasted getting off the bike, as long as you keep those power readings within the range our coaches prescribe.
Also, I disagree with Paul that too much sodium can't hurt you. During that fateful attempt at a RR ride, I was taking 2 Thermolyte caps an hour (~330mg sodium) plus the 650mg sodium per hour in my Infinit. I was not drinking enough water. Too much sodium and not enough water in the gut will pull water out of your system to equalize osmolality making you more dehydrated. My performance was suffering and I think that contributed to it. I didn't pee once in 5 hours on the bike. Contrast that with having to pee 4 times in 4 hours yesterday where I was trying not to let that happen again (zero Thermolyte, extra water). I'm hoping to find a middle ground on the next RR towards maybe peeing twice or three times max.
"Tru dat". If your kidneys are working well (I assume all of ours are), excess sodium intake which makes it into the blood stream will also pull water out of our system. For these reasons, I don't use extra salt tabs (over what's in the standard nutrition) unless it is "hot", which for me is somewhere north of 80F
Monitoring weight before and after long workouts to learn fluid needs correlated to enovironmental conditions is a key measure of the RRs, and long runs and rides, and can help one understand salt needs, even without a true "sweat test".