Everything was ready last night. Including have the bike pointing out the door. But, this morning, it never materialized. You see, I'm officially brainwashed. It's not that bad, really, it's not. It's just about the numbers. At least, just for now. I'm sure that at some point, I'll be able to put my bike on a ...... road.
was planning on doing today's 'biggest yet' wko outside. woke up to 33* and frost on this pretty spring morning. Not really that cold, I used to put in 3-4 hours in on much colder mornings in Jan, Feb, early March, just bundle up like an eskimo and go into that denial place. You know the talk..."my toes don't hurt'', ''my fingers will be fine'', ''that snotcicle will thaw and miss my mouth'', ''wait, is that a snotcicle hanging or the tip of my frostbitten nose falling off''....
Then, I went back to 'Bench Press' mode. See, I had work to do. It's about the numbers right now.
I'm not racing my buddies right now. That will come. Right now, I'm only racing that guy in the mirror. The one waiting for me down in that cave. 2 mirrors. One in front, that is beside the SportsCenter box, and one beside me so that I can race the Me.
Pick the bike up out of the foyer and head downstairs. But, not before I slap on my favorite T and an old IM running cap. Gonna need to channel that IM 'stud' reminder to get thru this workout. Might be the toughest one of the year so far. And I was on my game this morning, just knew it was a big one.
So what. I got a big goal to knock out in November.
wu 2.0
2x 20's (4') at 96% and 96%. stayed low so that I could attack (rather than survive) the VO2 work. also, popped Pnorm up on the screen. I think Rich mentions this. Allowed me to drive the Pnorm up by staying at or above w watts. Focus: Watts vs Pnorm vs Cadence ..... don't let 1 of the 3 sag to the point that the others suffer.
10' VO2 work using 1' ON & 1' OFF. seemed like cake after 40' of FTP work.
5' hi cadence lo resistance cooldown.
great workout, will run this afternoon.
Hey Florida. I'm gonna PR on you. By a ton. Nothing personal. Yeah, I know, you're pancake flat compared to my LP race. I really don't care, it just happens to be you that's in my way this season. No excuses.
@Chris- I don't know how you do it but great job in the cold! And love the smack talk re: FL. I'm going to PR too... (Its my first IM so that will be easy) Did you see my message about the camp in the FL group discussion?
Well, I was struck by reality, fear and practicality and decided there was no f'in way I could do the intermediate Sat. bike so I humbly will return to Beginner, where I belong! (Thurs. VO2 difference in Beg vs. Int. was fine, but Sat. was insane) I still had a hard time with the Sat. Beg. but got it done.
2 x 12' X4, 2 x 15' Z3: 12'@.992 IF, avg cad 83 12'@.94 IF, avg cad 65 (Starting to lose it here!) 15' @ .809 IF, avg cad 66 15' @ .805 IF, avg cad 67
Brrr...PSA: Spring has been delayed by one day!....a bit chilled on the bike this morning (33)...windy too!(NW 9-10mph)....was gonna switch up and ride inside but it was sunny so convinced myself it would be okay....and (after a cold start) it was....2hrs. 36miles..including 2x20min. Zone 4 HR with 4 min. spinning recovery and 10x1min. Zone 5 sprint-ups with 1 min. spinning recoveries....remainder of time high Zone3 steady state riding. 18mph avg./155 avg. HR/ 86 avg. cadence. Tired.
@ Kim - Smart move on switching back to your original plan. Looks like you hit the workout and you'll be stronger for it. Better to do the appropriate workout well than to bite off more than you can chew.
@ Chris - Good job. IMFL better be ready for you b/c you're going to be ready for it.
I hit the bike workout this am but it really hurt the entire way. After WU, did 2x20' @ 260W (94% IF) then 10x 1'ON 1'OFF @ 330W (119% IF) and 170W (62%IF). Just never felt good but got it done. Then I tried to run a little. Heel no good so I stopped after 1/2 mile. Went for an EZ swim of 1500 yds. Time to ice the heel.
I just did the bike workout for today. Felt like puking at the end.
2 x 20' @ 1.0, 1.0 (196 watts) then 10 x 1' / 1' @ 235 watts. Was going to do the brick run, but decided to forget that and just do the full run-second later! Enjoy your Saturday!
Interesting workout. Another one that was tough-looking workout on paper, but somehow it came together…for the most part.
Overall 75' @ 225 watts, IF 0.923. Short warmup of 10' easy then it was supposed to be 2x20(4') @z4. However, I had a short 2.5' "interruption" from one of my daughters in the first interval resulted in a slightly different profile of the z4 work:
I took 30 sec out of the aerobars at the 10' mark of the second interval a minute out at the 15' mark. Overall I was feeling okay although the power numbers weren't stellar.
And then straight into 8' of z5 time, structured as 4x2'(2'):
AP: 296, 294, 288 (fail), 297
HR avg: 165, 165, 167, 169
HR max: 175, 179, 177, 181
Cadence avg: 92, 93, 91, 93
The z5 was super-hard today and the third interval was a fail, power-wise. I just couldn't get the power up and the HR was spiking badly. I made up the lost time from the "interruption" with 3.5' of z3:
Somehow, after what was a pretty mediocre bike, I ended up smoking the brick run. No idea how that happened. Even the first half-mile was pretty quick. Given the massive tailwind on the outbound leg I was pretty worried that the return would be a disaster. But it turned out just fine and I was able to keep the pace up.
Overall 5.11 miles in 33:55, 6:38 pace. Current z3=7:07 and z4=6:58.
I got the bike done today....and was really dreading it, to be honest.
Gameplan was to go .95-.97 for the 2x20, and then do some descending VO2 work (along the lines of the VO2 'mess with your head' discussions recently).
The ride ended up being a total of 1:31, 131 TSS, IF of .931. The breakdown was: - Standard 10' + 3x3(1) warmup - 20' at .984 and .981 (cadence of 84 and 93 respectively) - VO2s were 2.5, 2.5, 2.0, 1.5, 1.0, 0.5 all at 1.2x
It actually wasn't as bad as I expected. In fact, I was able to hit the last 30" VO2 pretty hard. One thing I have been doing lately is, after the 10' on "ON" work, I go as hard as I can for as long as I can --- usually no more than 20-30". For the past few rides, I have been able to hit 650-700W for at least 5 seconds. This afternoon I could only get it to 510W for 10"....guess my legs were pretty much done.
No run due to kids' soccer games so I think I will add fifteen minutes or so to tomorrow's run.
Got the run in this afternoon. z3 out, z2 back. starting to feel a little lighter on the run. That's either because the legs are getting stronger, fitter, holding form longer, or whatever...
Amazing what losing the sweats can do for the feel of a run. Glad to see the warmer afternoons coming around.
Really happy with both of today's wko.
Now, 1 more day til we check off another completed week.
With two goals in mind (get through the VO2 phase unscathed, and build up enough Z3 riding to ride well at AmZof in May), I tweaked the bike today and did 2 x 20 (4) Z4, followed by 2 x 15 (2) Z3. Held 0.98 for the two Z4 intervals, 0.83 and 0.84 for the two Z3 intervals.
Off the bike, I hit the treadmill for 10' at about 6:25 pace, and 10 minutes at about 6:45 pace. I've been finding that my treadmill runs have felt much easier than my outdoor runs (even though I'm typically running on the treadmill at 1.5-2% grade), so I ran the 6:25 stuff at a 3% grade. Really able to feel the impact of pushing my hips forward, and driving through the hips. I'm feeling like I'm on the cusp of a breakthrough in running. Fingers crossed!
So continuing my Hack the OS Hack and Hacking from Coach P's OS Hack and advice...today was a long FTP type run...and got in 11 miles at 7:14 pace...after a couple of warmup miles in miles 3- 4-5-6 were @ 6:55-7 ; miles 7 & 8 eased off at 7:20-ish , then miles 9-10-11 were @ 7:05-7:08 (started to tire a bit).
Looking forward to a hard rest day tommorrow.
btw my Hack (in order to be prepped for the AC half marathon on April 1st..without abandoning the VO2 phase of the OS is to 3 Bike sessions Tues & Saturday do the planned Saturday rides..Thursday do the Tues. Ride. For RUN- keep the Wed. VO2 work. On Sunday do longer FTP type run- up to 90min. with some 2-3 miles of hard running. Friday is by feel- either do the planned Sunday longer FTP intervals or just run easy 45min. and Monday off.
Question: When/if you run with a Garmin...and you come to an intersection/stop for water or sumpthin like that....do you...a.) use the pause function on your garmin so it pauses automatically, b.) stop your garmin and restart when you begin running again, or c.) let your garmin continue running?
Despite the switch to DST I got my run in early today. Not a bad effort to wake me up. The workout called for z4 intervals of 800, 1600, 2400 with mile recoveries but that seemed complicated and I changed it to mile repeats with 4' recoveries.
Overall 8.79 mi in 1:00:00 (6:49 pace). Two stops for tunnels. Current z4=6:58, z3=7:07, z2=7:24.
Mike- Great job with the running. I'm sure that breakthrough is around the corner!
Nice runs @ Matt & Joe.
Good run (for me) today!
10:02 Target Pace 2 x 1/2mi, 1 x 1 mi, 2 x 1/2 mi @ 9:32, 10:00, 10:16, 10:02, 10:46 (slight incline heading back made a noticeable difference on that last .5!)
Then 2.25 @ 10:42 pace (Target 10:29)
Overall pretty close to targets and since the return had the incline, I'll call it even. Run followed by 60mins at dog park watching Maggie run around. She's a 6mo golden retriever but I swear she has some greyhound in her!
Joe, I always leave the Garmin running. I'd rather not take the risk of forgetting to turn it back on!
Had a good 10mi run on the treadmill today, watching Toy Story with my son on his bike next to me. 10mi on the treadmill is a long time! Funny, I was originally going to do a much longer Z2-3 set, but was having real difficulties focusing, and decided I might do better doing the prescribed workout after about 4 miles, so I knocked out 3 x 1mi (4') at around a 6:25 pace. Felt pretty good during, but boy are my legs screaming now! Definitely looking forward to no bike/run tomorrow!
Good work, all! The consistency of JOS is awesome.
btw my Hack (in order to be prepped for the AC half marathon on April 1st..without abandoning the VO2 phase of the OS is to 3 Bike sessions Tues & Saturday do the planned Saturday rides..Thursday do the Tues. Ride. For RUN- keep the Wed. VO2 work. On Sunday do longer FTP type run- up to 90min. with some 2-3 miles of hard running. Friday is by feel- either do the planned Sunday longer FTP intervals or just run easy 45min. and Monday off.
This is an interesting hack. I'll have a HM at end of April and was thinking of starting to add some mileage on Sundays to prepare. Why did you do this hack versus just adding some time after the normal intervals on Sunday?
Regarding the Garmin, in my case, I use autopause function when I know I'll be hitting red lights.
Enrique....two things to know/consider...first I was doing the OS Bike Hack which meant I wasn't scheduled to do the longer FTP intervals on Sunday...a 4th bike session was planned.....and second- wanted to preserve the VO2 work during this phase of the OS....however I felt weeks plan(s) as written....didn't have a sufficiently long workout to provide the prep I needed for the HM....I looked at the HM Hack which basically provides a long run build up of 6 weeks...well I had a good long run 2 weeks ago (just prior to starting the VO2 phase) and just said to myself that I essentially started the HM hack long run then...and planned to follow that for the next 4 Sundays until race day...which meant I had to drop that fourth ride....
The only question was...for me...and I posed this to Coach P....should I try to do that longer interval workout on Friday? The concern is that becomes 6 straight days of Hard Work (granted alternating between bike and run)...and would that be too much.
I will play Friday by feel...could be anything from a day off, easy run, or Z4 intervals....
The other thought/alternative is to keep Friday as an easy day alternate the Wednesay plan run with the Saturday plan run.
It is also worth looking at Coach P's Hack schedule...as he just PR'd at the Cape Cod Half Marathon....of course he is a monster and you have to take that into account
OK, so it has finally hit me..I'm a week behind you guys and have pretty much floated through the OS up until this point. Not sure if its the time change, some loss of sleep, or just accumulated fatigue, but I'm feeling less than perky these days. I'm hitting all my workouts but outside of my training time i'm feeling a bit more fatigued than usual.
My goal over the next few days is to get a few extra hours of sleep to "catch Up"...
I like the VO2 but I am amazed at how much it saps your energy later in the day. Focused on getting ready for this weekends 2x20 plus 6' ON...that's gonna be killer...
@Nate. Yeah. The increased intensity has thrown a small wrench in my routine.... A little achilles tenderness. Not too much of a fatigue feeling, but this small toll on my foot is probably due to the change to VO2 intensity workouts. I'm RICE'ing and taking a day off here and there from running to make sure not to aggravate it. It's not getting any worse thankfully. Keeping my fingers crossed for a healthy completion of the VO2 block.
Comments
was planning on doing today's 'biggest yet' wko outside. woke up to 33* and frost on this pretty spring morning. Not really that cold, I used to put in 3-4 hours in on much colder mornings in Jan, Feb, early March, just bundle up like an eskimo and go into that denial place. You know the talk..."my toes don't hurt'', ''my fingers will be fine'', ''that snotcicle will thaw and miss my mouth'', ''wait, is that a snotcicle hanging or the tip of my frostbitten nose falling off''....
Then, I went back to 'Bench Press' mode. See, I had work to do. It's about the numbers right now.
I'm not racing my buddies right now. That will come. Right now, I'm only racing that guy in the mirror. The one waiting for me down in that cave. 2 mirrors. One in front, that is beside the SportsCenter box, and one beside me so that I can race the Me.
Pick the bike up out of the foyer and head downstairs. But, not before I slap on my favorite T and an old IM running cap. Gonna need to channel that IM 'stud' reminder to get thru this workout. Might be the toughest one of the year so far. And I was on my game this morning, just knew it was a big one.
So what. I got a big goal to knock out in November.
wu 2.0
2x 20's (4') at 96% and 96%. stayed low so that I could attack (rather than survive) the VO2 work.
also, popped Pnorm up on the screen. I think Rich mentions this. Allowed me to drive the Pnorm up by staying at or above w watts. Focus: Watts vs Pnorm vs Cadence ..... don't let 1 of the 3 sag to the point that the others suffer.
10' VO2 work using 1' ON & 1' OFF. seemed like cake after 40' of FTP work.
5' hi cadence lo resistance cooldown.
great workout, will run this afternoon.
Hey Florida. I'm gonna PR on you. By a ton. Nothing personal. Yeah, I know, you're pancake flat compared to my LP race. I really don't care, it just happens to be you that's in my way this season. No excuses.
@Chris- I don't know how you do it but great job in the cold! And love the smack talk re: FL. I'm going to PR too... (Its my first IM so that will be easy) Did you see my message about the camp in the FL group discussion?
Well, I was struck by reality, fear and practicality and decided there was no f'in way I could do the intermediate Sat. bike so I humbly will return to Beginner, where I belong! (Thurs. VO2 difference in Beg vs. Int. was fine, but Sat. was insane) I still had a hard time with the Sat. Beg. but got it done.
2 x 12' X4, 2 x 15' Z3:
12'@.992 IF, avg cad 83
12'@.94 IF, avg cad 65 (Starting to lose it here!)
15' @ .809 IF, avg cad 66
15' @ .805 IF, avg cad 67
2mi on TM in 21:15.
Followed by penne and Mom's meatballs.
Brrr...PSA: Spring has been delayed by one day!....a bit chilled on the bike this morning (33)...windy too!(NW 9-10mph)....was gonna switch up and ride inside but it was sunny so convinced myself it would be okay....and (after a cold start) it was....2hrs. 36miles..including 2x20min. Zone 4 HR with 4 min. spinning recovery and 10x1min. Zone 5 sprint-ups with 1 min. spinning recoveries....remainder of time high Zone3 steady state riding. 18mph avg./155 avg. HR/ 86 avg. cadence. Tired.
@ Joseph - Nice job braving the cold. Tough.
@ Kim - Smart move on switching back to your original plan. Looks like you hit the workout and you'll be stronger for it. Better to do the appropriate workout well than to bite off more than you can chew.
@ Chris - Good job. IMFL better be ready for you b/c you're going to be ready for it.
I hit the bike workout this am but it really hurt the entire way. After WU, did 2x20' @ 260W (94% IF) then 10x 1'ON 1'OFF @ 330W (119% IF) and 170W (62%IF). Just never felt good but got it done. Then I tried to run a little. Heel no good so I stopped after 1/2 mile. Went for an EZ swim of 1500 yds. Time to ice the heel.
2 x 20' @ 1.0, 1.0 (196 watts) then 10 x 1' / 1' @ 235 watts. Was going to do the brick run, but decided to forget that and just do the full run-second later! Enjoy your Saturday!
Interesting workout. Another one that was tough-looking workout on paper, but somehow it came together…for the most part.
I got the bike done today....and was really dreading it, to be honest.
Gameplan was to go .95-.97 for the 2x20, and then do some descending VO2 work (along the lines of the VO2 'mess with your head' discussions recently).
The ride ended up being a total of 1:31, 131 TSS, IF of .931. The breakdown was:
- Standard 10' + 3x3(1) warmup
- 20' at .984 and .981 (cadence of 84 and 93 respectively)
- VO2s were 2.5, 2.5, 2.0, 1.5, 1.0, 0.5 all at 1.2x
It actually wasn't as bad as I expected. In fact, I was able to hit the last 30" VO2 pretty hard. One thing I have been doing lately is, after the 10' on "ON" work, I go as hard as I can for as long as I can --- usually no more than 20-30". For the past few rides, I have been able to hit 650-700W for at least 5 seconds. This afternoon I could only get it to 510W for 10"....guess my legs were pretty much done.
No run due to kids' soccer games so I think I will add fifteen minutes or so to tomorrow's run.
Amazing what losing the sweats can do for the feel of a run. Glad to see the warmer afternoons coming around.
Really happy with both of today's wko.
Now, 1 more day til we check off another completed week.
Great work everyone!
Off the bike, I hit the treadmill for 10' at about 6:25 pace, and 10 minutes at about 6:45 pace. I've been finding that my treadmill runs have felt much easier than my outdoor runs (even though I'm typically running on the treadmill at 1.5-2% grade), so I ran the 6:25 stuff at a 3% grade. Really able to feel the impact of pushing my hips forward, and driving through the hips. I'm feeling like I'm on the cusp of a breakthrough in running. Fingers crossed!
I did my run this evening. 1 mile warmup, then 30 minutes @ 7:39ish then 30 min @ 7:57ish.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/156676567
So continuing my Hack the OS Hack and Hacking from Coach P's OS Hack and advice...today was a long FTP type run...and got in 11 miles at 7:14 pace...after a couple of warmup miles in miles 3- 4-5-6 were @ 6:55-7 ; miles 7 & 8 eased off at 7:20-ish , then miles 9-10-11 were @ 7:05-7:08 (started to tire a bit).
Looking forward to a hard rest day tommorrow.
btw my Hack (in order to be prepped for the AC half marathon on April 1st..without abandoning the VO2 phase of the OS is to 3 Bike sessions Tues & Saturday do the planned Saturday rides..Thursday do the Tues. Ride. For RUN- keep the Wed. VO2 work. On Sunday do longer FTP type run- up to 90min. with some 2-3 miles of hard running. Friday is by feel- either do the planned Sunday longer FTP intervals or just run easy 45min. and Monday off.
Question: When/if you run with a Garmin...and you come to an intersection/stop for water or sumpthin like that....do you...a.) use the pause function on your garmin so it pauses automatically, b.) stop your garmin and restart when you begin running again, or c.) let your garmin continue running?
Despite the switch to DST I got my run in early today. Not a bad effort to wake me up. The workout called for z4 intervals of 800, 1600, 2400 with mile recoveries but that seemed complicated and I changed it to mile repeats with 4' recoveries.
Overall 8.79 mi in 1:00:00 (6:49 pace). Two stops for tunnels. Current z4=6:58, z3=7:07, z2=7:24.
W/U 10' @6:36
4x 7' @z4 – 6:29, 6:29, 6:32, 6:27
(4' recoveries – 8:00, 8:08, 7:52, 7:29)
"Remainder time" – 6' @6:30
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/156850746
Nice runs @ Matt & Joe.
Good run (for me) today!
10:02 Target Pace
2 x 1/2mi, 1 x 1 mi, 2 x 1/2 mi @ 9:32, 10:00, 10:16, 10:02, 10:46 (slight incline heading back made a noticeable difference on that last .5!)
Then 2.25 @ 10:42 pace (Target 10:29)
Overall pretty close to targets and since the return had the incline, I'll call it even.
3 cheers for Mondays off!!
Had a good 10mi run on the treadmill today, watching Toy Story with my son on his bike next to me. 10mi on the treadmill is a long time! Funny, I was originally going to do a much longer Z2-3 set, but was having real difficulties focusing, and decided I might do better doing the prescribed workout after about 4 miles, so I knocked out 3 x 1mi (4') at around a 6:25 pace. Felt pretty good during, but boy are my legs screaming now! Definitely looking forward to no bike/run tomorrow!
Good work, all! The consistency of JOS is awesome.
This is an interesting hack. I'll have a HM at end of April and was thinking of starting to add some mileage on Sundays to prepare. Why did you do this hack versus just adding some time after the normal intervals on Sunday?
Regarding the Garmin, in my case, I use autopause function when I know I'll be hitting red lights.
Enrique....two things to know/consider...first I was doing the OS Bike Hack which meant I wasn't scheduled to do the longer FTP intervals on Sunday...a 4th bike session was planned.....and second- wanted to preserve the VO2 work during this phase of the OS....however I felt weeks plan(s) as written....didn't have a sufficiently long workout to provide the prep I needed for the HM....I looked at the HM Hack which basically provides a long run build up of 6 weeks...well I had a good long run 2 weeks ago (just prior to starting the VO2 phase) and just said to myself that I essentially started the HM hack long run then...and planned to follow that for the next 4 Sundays until race day...which meant I had to drop that fourth ride....
The only question was...for me...and I posed this to Coach P....should I try to do that longer interval workout on Friday? The concern is that becomes 6 straight days of Hard Work (granted alternating between bike and run)...and would that be too much.
I will play Friday by feel...could be anything from a day off, easy run, or Z4 intervals....
The other thought/alternative is to keep Friday as an easy day alternate the Wednesay plan run with the Saturday plan run.
It is also worth looking at Coach P's Hack schedule...as he just PR'd at the Cape Cod Half Marathon....of course he is a monster and you have to take that into account
Hope this makes some sense.
Good luck with your workouts leading up to that HM.
My goal over the next few days is to get a few extra hours of sleep to "catch Up"...
I like the VO2 but I am amazed at how much it saps your energy later in the day. Focused on getting ready for this weekends 2x20 plus 6' ON...that's gonna be killer...