Week 6 Weekend Ride Thread
How did your rides go this weekend?
Getting coffee'd up and hydrating before 112/6 brick, trying to run down a couple guys leaving 15' ahead of me. I'll report the numbers when I get back. About 3.5 to 4hrs climbing Sunday after a 6 mile run first thing in the morning.
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I had worked hard on the Wed ride and paid a little bit for it on the Thursday run. Decided to sacrifice the Friday run in the name of getting a better ride today. Whether coincidental or causal, I cannot say, but I hit things today. Hit all of the FTP intervals (though it took some mental mojo!) and ended up with 0.80 IF for the full 4.5 hours.
I also tried out Perform as sole calories today. Found it's too concentrated for me without additional water. Definitely will use a two bottle solution on race day. (water and Perform)
Rode on 165-175 cal/hour. I'm a relatively small guy (as you know) - Is that likely to be ok to go with and just have a gel or two handy in case? That's about 1 20 oz bottle of Perform per two aid stations (or less), assuming 10 mi intervals or so. I've successfully done two halves this season on ~300 cal total on the bike.
Well today is over thank GOD!!!! With 1 hour and 4 minutes of FTP work today it wore me out. Set a new PR for me though. 100 miles in 5:06, Pnorm 186, IF 75, TSS 283, RPM 89, Ave Speed 19.6. This was all on the new cogg I put on last night for Wisc.....An 28-11. Going down the hills is awesome!!! No more spinning out at 35 more like 45 and above and climing the hills is a different story...LOVE IT!!!! We then got back and felt good so strolled out for a 6 mile run all at 8:34 pace or better. Not sure what got it to me but please show up in race day. Recovering now with ARM from Max Muscle. Lost 4.2 pounds. A little humid out today.
Details of ride in blog below....FT{Ps werent nice to me
Had a tail wind on the way home (when's the last time THAT happened) that got me home in 2:45, which was good due a family obligation. Tried to make up a bit for it by running with a bit of focus rather than just mailing in a half hour run.
Reverse split the run:
Mile paces (6:55= MP)
7:40
7:22
6:50
6:21
plus a little more to get home. :-)
On yesterday’s ride, I frequently wondered how people train like this year after year. I have a huge amount of respect for them. As of right now, I have no desire to do this again. I really wish I loved being on my bike for 4.5 hours, but I don’t. I can do the 2.5 hour runs no problem, but the long biking is not fun to me. I remember my first year training for a HIM that the 3hr bikes seemed really long, and now they are manageable. Does that happen with the 4.5 hour bike rides eventually? Thankfully, my last two long rides will be on the IMWI course!
We are struggling with the heat issues here so the tempo ride was difficult 95 w/ 90% humidity it was very difficult to perform at my targeted rate.
Thurs: 70 mile ride w/ intervals able to FTP 200w; because I shortened the ride I did "Just the work" on the ride. It was very intense; no "noodle" time. Hit the road running. Then Tempo 80% remainder of the ride. Painful near the end lots of mental coaching near the end. Straight to work.
Finished the weekend with a Sprint Tri and Long run here's how it went down:
Saturday: Local Sprint tri: Swim 800meters:17.5m rollers; 5K (16:10; 53:11:24:40) These are slow times for me but given the training these past 2 weeks my legs feel like logs. Swim: Focused on my box, counting strokes, staying smooth: Bike FTP 183 avg speed 19.6; FTP usually is closer to 200 but legs seemed shot: Run: Red-lined it on the gas; 85-90 cadence 8:01 pace again slow. On the bike: Focused on cresting hills, peddling down hills, going hard on turns keeping my speed (that's uncomfortable for me)
Sunday: My plan was an 18m run. . However that was not how the day turned out. Left early due to heat. 2.5hrs 13 miles later (95%humidity; 90 degree) all water fountains turned off in parks (I don't know why); no place to purchase water (hence the running thru parks part which will be amended); dehydrated-seriously considered knocking on random persons door to get water. I carry water and had refilled partly at church via mile 4 just to play it safe. Turned up snake eyes when I passed the house for 2nd lap and headed inside, legs cramping. Took gels as well. Man vs Wild had a show on how to drink your own sweat. . . but I missed that episode. Ready for the heat advisory crap to end.
I'm finding it difficult to gain confidence in my training with experiences like what happened today. Factors like the heat over the past 5 weeks (record setting here of 93-107 every day) that impact my ability to train hard or the output vs effort. Believing in the training and effort when the training numbers are down ie FTP or pace on the run (I'm thinking of the data about heat and how it effects performance regardless of fitness).
Thanks Kelly
Kelly,
Great call pulling the plug on that run! Related, but the last hour of my Saturday ride was a disaster. I rode 112 in 5:06 (mostly flat course), but turned 56 in 2:28. Was on pace for about a 4:54. But I didn't eat enough for breakfast, didn't drink enough in the second half of the ride, and last hour was B A D!! Bailed on the run, was dizzy driving home, and I had lost about 8-9lb. At a ton the rest of the day but could still feel the effects of it on my Sunday ride...flat, not much gas, tried to ride ABP but turned in about 78-79% for a 2:45 ride.
My point is that making bad decisions on a big workout like this can really affect downstream sessions. You made the right call!
I have no idea how you folks are dealing with the heat! I went out Sunday evening for a quick 5-6 mile run. I lost 3.5lb in 45' and it wasn't even very hot. I can't imagine dealing with the heat you're having, for days and days.
Might have been hydration/heat. I didn't use the bathroom the entire time, took in 144oz of fluid, and came back about 7 pounds lighter. It was very humid, but only about 88 degrees. I did have to start the ride (first hour) in the basement due to some life stuff, and it's like a sauna down there, so maybe that...
Could have also been calories. I think my during ride nutrition was ok, but I've been running a large-ish deficit in the week leading up to the rides. I grabbed some extra calories half way through and felt a bit better, but I also grabbed some extra water at the same time, so who knows.
Either way, the day ended in an hour of limping back home, lots of cramps, etc. Sunday's ride was kinda wrecked because of it too. Not exactly the confidence boost I need right now.
Either way, I'm going to take today a bit easy and just try to heal up.
Rode one of our hilly ride courses on Saturday - 7100 feet of climbing in 79 miles. Don't have the numbers with me but we worked the entire course - 5.5 hours of riding (think TSS was 330+) - only one section, right at the end, with about 5 miles of straight road with no major hills. Hot but worked hard to keep up with hydration and nutrition at the low end of the spectrum - 125-150 cals/hour. Really good ride. Sunday APB not bad for first 2 hours and more difficult the last hour. Even though not on the IM course, practiced looking for free speed wherever I could find it! Brick run was miserable - even put on a fuel belt for the 30 minute run - can't wait for heat relief - supposed to be here tomorrow.
I know there is a thread on cadence going on right now which was interesting timing. I spent part of my APB time playing around with cadence - I tend to like riding at a lower cadence but practiced some riding at an easier gear while keeping the watts where they should be ... thinking ahead to having fresher legs on the run. Too hard to tell the effects given the heat of the day but I'm going to keep working on it.
I did 3 loops at the Columbia OLY course Sat (75 miles). Each loop usually takes me about 1.5 hours... because so much of the 2 and 3rd were Z2 riding I finished in 4:45 instead of 4:30. When riding hills I still have a hard time hitting my target watts on the intervals, but I really try and didn't do any coasting unless I was hitting 35mph. I got off the bike and tried a 30' run - not great, took some walk breaks... but I managed. Followed the ride with lots of stretching. Got home and stretched and iced the foot and rolled the calves.
Sun I rode with a friend on a course of his selection and decided to just try to keep up on the hills - he's a good climber. Happily the legs felt fine. The first 1/3 had some great climbs - a few short and steep and a few gradual ones that went on forever. All in all, though, the course was flatter than I would have preferred to prep for IMWI, but it was nice to have company for a change. The PNorm for the entire ride was slower than Z3 but I was definitely pushing.