Planning training for the 2014 season

The first objective of the year is completed, yay! I'm still super-happy about my 03:59:19 at the Rotterdam marathon. There's a lot of year left though, and a lot I've signed up for (have you seen the 2014 race calendar panel over there on the right hand side?).

Need to take a rational look. What's practical. I've withdrawn from the Eton 10km swim - I still intend to do one, but i need more than 5 weeks training to prepare (particularly seeing as there's Mallorca 70.3 in the middle!). I also decided not to do today's Thames Turbo Triathlon - there's no need to race a hard sprint when I'm still only a week after the marathon. Instead I went for a ride with Mrs on our "3 Hills" route - first time for a year. Loved it.

Our "3 Hills" ride (Staple Lane, Crocknorth, and Box Hill)

I enjoyed having a training plan for the last few months, even if it was just out of a book. I like not needing to think about what needs to be done. However, I don't feel ready to get a new coach. Maybe next year, maybe never, but not right now. So, what's the plan?

The plan is: write your own plan. Here's the plan.


Swimming:

Brett Sutton wrote a piece on swimming for the Buccaneer Race Team. In essence, the message was: "Want to get better at swimming? Well then swim more."

So, let's just swim some more then. I bought a book called For Swimmers 365 Main Sets a while ago by Ironman swim-master Andrew Starykowicz. It's basically just what it says on the tin. I'm going to start from set one and try to do 2-3 per week. That's easy - I just schedule them in, and do them.


Cycling:

My main races this year are both quite hilly - Ironman 70.3 UK in Wimbleball with its (in)famous "52 hills in 56 miles" or whatever it is (I think the bark is worse than the bite to be frank), and then Ironman Wales in Tenby - where I'm determined to ride better than last time. So I need to ride up hills, and ride them regularly. I'll be racing Wimbleball on my road bike and Tenby on my tri-bike, so I need good miles on both.

I should be able to get mid-week miles just by commuting whenever I can, and then a longer ride at the weekend to/from a parkrun or round in the Surrey hills. I'd like to revisit the Ride London 100 route ahead of this year's event (I was lucky enough to get a ballot spot), the Hell of the Ashdown route, and there's scope to make our 3 Hills route into a lot more than three hills.

When the weather is bad, or the time is unhelpful, I could do well to remember that I have a turbo-trainer, I don't need to be outside to ride. This is important, it takes away the barriers to missing sessions. Additionally on a turbo trainer you can focus on cadence, power, and never getting any respite! No traffic lights in the kitchen...


Running:

Running is trickier. The marathon training had me running 4-6 times per week, and my highest weekly mileage ever. I can't sustain that on top of everything else. Running breaks you down. The long run is important - one of the Pfitzinger & Douglas training principles is the value of the mid-week long run. I should therefore work in a run home from work during the week to compliment the weekend long run - or maybe a couple of runs home per week and free myself from the need to run long at the weekend all together.

The main thing is that each session is quality. It needs a purpose. When I'm approaching the shorter races I should be running fast, and when I move towards Wales I should drop the pace a little and work on endurance. I also need to learn to love the hills! Throughout I'd like to get back to running hard and fast parkruns. It's OK running them as recovery runs, but I miss just running as fast as I can, and that's a quality session in itself. I think 3 runs per week should be about right - and, importantly, a sustainable volume.


Gym:

I've really enjoyed hitting the gym regularly - I feel stronger and more resilient. This makes me better able to accommodate training without getting injured again. The guided strength and conditioning sessions seem to be working so far. Twice weekly visits to Ben and Josh at Athletic Edge will remain. Monday and Thursday mornings seem to work. Swimming in the evening after a gym visit in the morning seems to work well for me - active recovery and hopefully eases the DOMS a bit (and man those guys are the kings of DOMS).


Periodisation and specificity:

This is where it gets harder. It's impossible to peak for every race, particularly if you've signed up for a lot. You need to build and peak for your main race. Training is also normally divided into micro and macro cycles, e.g. 4x 4-week blocks making a 16-week block, with each 4th week reduced in load to allow a little more time for recovery and accommodation (absorbing the training so you actually get faster as a result).

Specificity is ensuring your training is relevant. My training for Rotterdam was all on the road and didn't contain many hills - that's because the race was a fast flat road race. Wimbleball and Tenby are both hilly on the run, so I need to learn to love the hills in training. Likewise for cycling. I'm not worrying too much about swim specificity, other than I'll need to get open water and wetsuit swimming in as often as I can - this has been a failing in the past, and I think partially responsible for my frustrating swim-start freak-outs (see both Ironman Wales in 2012 and Ironman 70.3 Zell am See/Kaprun in 2013).

Up to Wimbleball I'll work on faster mid-distance training, and then build up the duration afterwards ready for the big fella in Tenby.


Putting it together:

What are my A-races? For A-races I want to be peaking and tapered (fresh, from a de-loaded week). I should be champing at the bit, raring to go! I've done both these races before and I certainly have much more to give.

• Ironman 70.3 UK, Wimbleball, 15th June
• Ironman Wales, Tenby, 14th September

What are my B-races? For B-races I want to treat race day absolutely as if it were an A-race, however I won't worry so much about a full taper before hand. It's more about real race experience and sorting my technique, and less about pulling about a top (for me) performance.

• Ironman 70.3 Mallorca, 10th May
• Blenheim Triathlon, 8th June
• London Triathlon, 3rd August

What are my training races? Training races are just to get experience, try out my race day strategies, and have fun. I won't taper for them and won't pay too much attention to the results. These are the "everything else" category. The only one of these that needs care is the long course weekend. This is an Ironman on the Ironman Wales course (near enough) but split across three days. This will be hard effort, and the marathon will take time to recover from even if I run it at Ironman pace (i.e. very easy).

• Electric Run, 26th April (A fun 5km at night with loads of glowing stuff and music!)
• Clapham Common 15km, Race 3, 1st June (Happy Birthday to me!)
• The Long Course Weekend, Day 1 - Swim, 11th July
• The Long Course Weekend, Day 1 - Bike, 12th July
• The Long Course Weekend, Day 1 - Run, 13th July
• Hampton Court swim, 20th July
• Ride London 100, 10th August
• Marlow swim, 24th August
• Thames Turbo sprint triathlon, Race 4, 25th August
• Clapham Common 15km, Race 4, 31st August

And then there are the wild-cards... These races are on the "would like to" list. Not confirmed or entered. I'd really like to run an ultra with my Mrs at some point! These don't really feature in my thinking right now.

• RRR, 18th October
• Thames Turbo marathon, Richmond Park, November

...and there's so many other things!


The plan:

As it happens, the timing works out perfectly - it's almost as if I'd planned it (I hadn't).

I'm going to go for two macro cycles - one for Ironman 70.3 UK, and one for Ironman Wales. There are two four-week blocks from now until Wimbleball, then after a recovery week there are three four-week blocks leading up to Ironman Wales. The B-races come at the end of build periods, and have de-load weeks afterwards. This is ideal.

Build up to Ironman 70.3 UK, started today!

Build up to Ironman Wales, starts with a recovery week after Ironman 70.3 UK

I like the idea of doing a race simulation two to four weeks out. A popular technique is to complete the number of miles, but in kilometres. Simulate the race entirely, including fast transitions and fuelling, but don't suffer the fatigue of going full distance.

For the 70.3 that's 1200m swim, 56km bike, and 13km run - those distances are short enough to go pretty hard and really enjoy it. May 31st looks like a good time for that - the weekend before we'll be at Wimbleball Lake checking out the bike course - unfortunately you can't normally swim in it, otherwise that would have been ideal.

For the full distance it's 2.4km swim, 112km ride, and 26km run - a bit more of an undertaking, but training should mean the distances are achievable with some good effort. It's an ideal kit and nutrition test. The more you treat it like the real thing, the more it will help. I could get a really big weekend in right at the start of my final block - I'll be relatively fresh after a de-load week. Pencilled in for 17th August.

There's more work to do to plan each block. I'll do that at each at the start of each, based on the experience, progress, and real-life (damn you, real-life!). Given block one starts tomorrow I guess I'd better plan that now...


Block one, 2014 weeks 17 to 20:

Block one, week one: Need to take it easy, this is about getting the right sessions done and building good habits. Set the plan and stick to it. I need to remember I'm only one week post-marathon - I'm feeling fine now, but I will probably find hard efforts, well, hard. I'd like to get started on the 365 main sets too. Real life is difficult this week, very busy at work and my 5th wedding anniversary on Thursday.

Week one - Monday done!

Block one, week two: I'm on a training course all week this week so as long as I can stick to mornings and evenings I should be OK, however bike commuting is off the cards (remember you have a turbo trainer and a lot of The Wire to watch...). I enjoy a little training during these times, it helps clear my head and be able to focus in the classroom. The end of the week will be hard, Mrs and I are crewing for Louise at the Thames Path 100 (boy, can that girl run!).

Week two

Block one, week three: In Mallorca from Monday. Looking forward to riding the 70.3 course a few times ahead of the race. This week will be about cycling and swimming, I'm not so concerned about running. The race is on the Saturday, so Sunday will be a lovely day off in the sun.

Week three - rocking it in Mallorca, can't wait to see/ride the bike course

Block one, week four: A de-load week at the end of my first block. The aim here is to keep the number of sessions up, but the intensity down - not stopping completely but taking the opportunity to recover well.

Week four, de-loading ready for the next block

And then...

There's loads of other stuff to consider - kit, nutrition, race plan, etc. I could plan for hours. Let's see how this first block goes.

Ready to race!

I started training again on June 1st, a little under 3 months ago. I started from zero, with an accelerated version of C25k (the famous "couch to 5km" plan). I had a few events planned (London Triathlon, Ride London) and they came and went and I was happy - but I wasn't racing them. My plan was to not care about the time, enjoy the experience, take away the pressure and get fitter and faster without injuring myself again.

I'm trying hard to take that relaxed attitude into the Thames Turbo Sprint Series Race 4 tomorrow, but it's really tough - I really really (really!) want to smash it and race hard. It's one of my favourite races, I've entered all the ones I can over the last 3 or 4 years. It's excellent to have a benchmark race to judge your current performance against.

Race history highlighting best and worst performances

So what's happened in the 90 days since I started again? I've made an effort to record every session in the excellent Training Peaks portal, and they provide powerful analysis tools.

It's particularly important to make sure that you don't ramp up on overall duration and run distance too quickly. I seem to have built up evenly with a good continual improvement over the first couple of months (before the races started getting in the way).

Ramp up of overall duration and run distance over the last 3 months

All good so far - but what about the cumulative training effect, including cycling, swimming, and strength training? By analysing all the data from my Garmin 910XT, Training Peaks can work out how fit I am, and how ready I am to race.

This is what 3 months of improving fitness looks like

The blue line is Chronic Training Load which has ramped up nicely over the period. As training gets harder and more intense I would expect to see that climb, then level off/drop a bit, then climb further, and repeat that pattern in line with periodisation of training (e.g. three harder building weeks, followed by an adaptation week, repeat). At this stage, a gradual measured climb is fine - it means I'm getting steadily fitter.

The pink line is Acute Training Load and represents how hard specific sessions or events have been. You can see the two big spikes signifying the London Triathlon and Ride London. It'll be interesting to see what happens tomorrow - it'll only be a short session (I hope!) but should be as high an output as I can sustain for the whole time, and therefore be a significant acute load.

The Orange line is Training Stress Balance and can be considered as a my freshness level. See the dip after the spikes in acute load - when you work hard, afterwards you're less fresh. The aim is to go into a race with a strong overall fitness balanced by a good level of freshness. Note that despite increasing chronic training load freshness does not drop - able to handle more work without losing freshness means fitness improving.

I am still much less fit (and much more heavy) than last year - but I'm certainly not going to let that hold me back. I think I'm ready to smash out a sprint without fear of injury now. My prediction is that I should be able to get a really good swim and bike done (maybe a PB swim, and possibly close on the bike), but I'll drift back on the run as I'm really not at all run-fit right now - estimated finish time 01:11:00.

Now it's rest for the rest of today and we'll see what tomorrow brings!

2014 will be another year of iron!

I try not to think too much about the long term plan too much. I know I want to to race more and get better/faster/fitter, but at what distance or event I'm fairly sanguine. My approach is to relax, go with the flow, and see what I end up signing up for. I kind of let my subconscious get on with it while I watch from the sidelines. As a result it sometimes gets carried away before I can get it in check - but at least I know I'll always have a full calendar.

I entered IM 70.3 UK 2014 a while ago, and a few minutes ago also entered the full distance IM UK 2014. It looks like 2014 will be another year of iron! I'm also fairly convinced that in September my inner event-enterer will be signing me up to IM Wales again too. Glutton for punishment? Certainly. I have unfinished business on both of those full distance courses. They were my first, I was young and naive. I loved the experiences but made many rookie mistakes. I can go a lot faster. A lot faster.

Oops, I did it again

Also for 2014 there's Hell of The Ashdown to do (missed that this year due to ITBS woe), Ride London, a bunch of Thames Turbo sprint triathlons, the Virgin Active London Triathlon (really enjoyed the Olympic Plus event this year), and probably much more. I shall certainly be entering the Ultra Race London Ultra 50km (when entries are open, no news on that yet but I assume it'll be going ahead), I'd really like to run further too (Mrs is getting the bug for ultra-running, it's infectious). I really fancy a 50-miler, one day maybe longer (but probably not next year).

There are also the little "someday/maybe" side projects that swim around my head. I want to do my London run-derground over winter to make training a bit more interesting. I also fancy riding LE2JoG (Land's End to John O'Groats) again - I've done it before but spread over two weeks. I fancy trying it in 4 or 5 days. Maybe a little project for Easter. Added to that, there are so many parkruns still to do; so, so many more parkruns!

There's plenty to do first though - Thames Turbo sprint series race 4 is on Monday, IM 70.3 Zell-am-See-Kaprun is next weekend, with the Valencia triathlon the week after that. The following week is the ITU World Series final in Hyde Park, we got some grandstand tickets for the Women's race on Saturday and the Men's on Sunday - and Mrs even managed to secure a spot in the open sprint race so is racing on the famous course. I decided 4 consecutive weekends of racing was probably one too many for me so I shall be on cheering and photography duty.

There's nothing quite like a packed calendar!

Race Report: 2013 Virgin Active London Triathlon

I've got a lot closer to Virgin Active and the awesome Team Freespeed guys and girls since Mrs was announced as the winner of the "Be Team Freespeed's 12th Member" competition last month. It's all been a bit of a whirlwind actually! One of the main parts of the prize was to race as part of Team Freespeed at the Virgin Active London Triathlon.

We couldn't fit the race into our calendar last year, but had competed in the Olympic distance the year before. We enjoyed it, but had pretty tough days with a sudden hot weekend really taking it out of us, particularly on the run. Added to that it was our first Olympic distance triathlon, and it had seemed like a very long way indeed.

Last year in a fit of excitement I signed up for the Olympic Plus event - this is an Olympic distance with a double-length bike leg, so 1,500m swim, 80km bike, and 10km run. I stuck to my plan to race this, whilst Mrs would be taking a VIP spot in one of the Olympic waves, all decked out in Freespeed livery.

Due to her prize-winning obligations we needed to be around the expo all weekend, and with my race starting at 06:30 on Sunday we decided to get a hotel for Friday and Saturday night.

With the car packed with all our stuff I drove to work Friday morning. Mrs came up after she finished and we drove over to the ExCel exhibition centre in Docklands, scene of the weekend's activities.

ExCel exhibition centre is really very big indeed

Friday night we relaxed and took it easy. Saturday I went over to meet my good friend Mike who was volunteering at Wanstead Flats parkrun, so I ticked another parkrun off the list.

You won't miss Mike, resplendent in his parkrun volunteer hi-viz

Meanwhile Mrs was hanging out with Team Freespeed at the expo and when I returned I bumped into her as she was rushing out of the hotel with her bike - she was going to stand in for some VIP relay entrants who couldn't race. This is one of the responsibilities of the team, to get involved with the celebs on the Saturday's VIP waves.

Mrs in the dockside wetsuit removal zone

She swam and biked a sprint distance before handing over to someone from Cosmo magazine who did the run. One of the other Freespeed guys got in a relay team with Olympic gold medalists - women's boxer Nicola Adams and gymnast Louis Smith!

In the afternoon I went to get my machine ready for tomorrow's adventure

The last remaining "103" sticker from my Ironman adventures - good times, but time to move on

Mrs gave me a VIP hospitality pass, so I hung out there for a while and met a few of the Freespeed guys - they're all lovely and I felt very welcome even though I was a total hanger-on!

Magic cardboard gets you past the exceedingly large tattooed gentleman on the door

A good view from the VIP balcony!

In the evening we joined them for a meal at the local Italian where we met some of the sponsors. Under the guidance of team boss Richard Melik, Freespeed encourage deep long-term relationships with their sponsors, and this really shows. There are some really good personal relationships, and they're a well supported group. It was great to meet some new people, some I'd been friends with on twitter for a while, and also some new faces. Duncan and Liz, owners of The Tri-Life, were there too. They remembered me from the Wimbleball trianing day last year, and Mrs has been working with one of their coaches, Richard, for a little over a year now.

Carb-loading - if you can't enjoy a pizza in the middle of two race-days, when can you?

Sunday morning rolled inevitably round and the alarm went off at 04:30. Thankfully as we were so close it wouldn't take long to get over there otherwise it would have been an even earlier start. Breakfast was some salami and cheese slices. I really didn't fancy a carby breakfast, even though I was racing, so just went on feel. I did nibble my way through a Clif bar before the start as I set up in transition.

All ready in T1 - feels like it's been a very long time (probably because it has...)

Gameplan for the day was: Get through the swim; smash the bike; jog round the run. This is my first triathlon since coming back from injury, so remaining strong and not hurting myself is the prime objective. I'm not fit enough to be competitive right now, so relax, and enjoy the ride.

The swim: 1,500m, 0:33:09, 61st out of 129

Bike racked, wetsuit on, and into the start pen for the briefing. The 06:30 Sunday wave is the only Olympic Plus wave, so I was in some very capable company - including Team Freespeed's Richard Hobson (1st overall), Matt Molloy (2nd overall), Declan Doyle (4th overall), Catherine Faux (5th overall, 1st female) and Alison Rowatt (11th overall and 2nd female). Very very capable company indeed! We stepped carefully down the stairs and out into onto the dockside. Support was fairly thin at that time in the morning, and we made quick passage into the water.

Despite thinking "I really must go for an open water swim soon" all the way up to this event, I hadn't. This was the first time I'd even put my wetsuit on since IM Wales last year! I've gained a few kg since then, but thankfully the zip still went up. I positioned myself on the inside so I could swim straight down the line of yellow buoys, and towards the back as I was a bit nervous about my capabilities and confidence. I haven't swum that much at all lately.

We started, and almost immediately I was in trouble. The old feeling of rising panic came on, and my arms and legs went tingly and weak. The guy in front of me set off by doing breaststroke slowly, and with lots of other people around and no recent "argy-bargy experience" I couldn't get around him - or make any real forward progress at all.

Very frustrating, very annoying, and (sadly) very predictable. I eventually regained my composure (as I always do, in the end) and by the time we'd made the first turn I was moving up the field (again, as always). I found I kept getting boxed in though, and couldn't find a way round moving road-blocks of athletes. In retrospect I should definitely have got some in-wetsuit training done, and I should have had more confidence in my strength and started nearer the front with people more my speed. I'll chalk it up to experience. Not too bad in the end, plenty of people behind me, time for a little bike ride.

Transition 1 (swim to bike): 07:19, 101st of 129

My T1 was slow, but that's fine. My mental plan said "take as long as you need", and I was determined to follow the plan. My wetsuit came off quickly, and I walked the couple of hundred metres to my bike. I know that coming out of the swim my heart rate spikes high, so I Just wanted to relax and be calm as I set off on the bike. Mrs was in transition too, allowed in to rack her bike for her lunchtime race, so she came and chatted to me - a lovely surprise, and a nice addition to the race experience.

I even stopped for a sit down and to put some socks on - what's the rush?

The bike: 80km (50 miles), 02:29:13, 38th out of 129

I love the bike leg, and even though I wasn't aiming to place highly I had already decided to go for it on the bike. The course for Olympic Plus goes out west from ExCel, past the Tower of London, and right up embankment to the Houses of Parliament where there's a turn point. This route, taking in so many famous landmarks, and the opportunity to ride on these roads flat out with no traffic to worry about was part of the reason I picked the distance. It didn't disappoint either. Coming out of the swim far down the field meant that I had a lot of people in front to pick off - part of the fun of being a good cyclist and poor swimmer is the first part of the bike is great fun! I flew past people, keeping my cadence high and setting my sights on the next person.

Giving it some, as best I can at current fitness/fatness levels!

The Olympic Plus was three laps of this route, and on the second lap at the ExCel end there were starting to be cyclists form later waves. They weren't going as far so had a turn point that was closer. This led to congestion (all be it manageable) at one end of the course, and then the far end still owned by the Olympic Plus wave. I pushed hard, noticing I was a gear down in some places on lap two, but preferring to keep my cadence high rather than push a big gear. I didn't take any food at all on the bike, and just drank water. Let's see if I really can race on a much higher fat:carb ration than I have before. With 8 months on an LCHF diet (Low (usually!) Carb, High Fat) I should be well adapted.

I didn't get overtaken at all on the first lap, I lost a couple of spots on the second, and by the third there were more waves on the course and I couldn't tell who I was in my race. I stuck to my guns and pushed hard on the return leg of the third lap - I knew my run would be poor, I was under no illusions about that, so wanted to see what I could do on the bike.

I was very happy with my position, and was within 30 minutes of all the Team Freespeed guys and girls. Given 6 months without cycling at all, and then only a couple of long rides since picking it up again (a "3 hills route, short" of about 80km, a "3 hills, normal" of 90km, and a 110km ride while Mrs was racing the Shock Absorber last weekend). That's barely enough training to have made any difference at all. I think if I can get some good time on the bike then I might be fairly competitive next year.

Transition 2 (bike to run): 04:40, 100th of 129

Again a nice gentle transition with no stress. No Mrs with me this time unfortunately, but I took the time to make sure my shoes were well fitted, wiped my face with a small towel, and even gave my glasses a quick clean! Them it was off out onto the run course to show off the IM Talk tri-suit (bit disappointed it fits again now, it was too big by the end of last season!).

Run: 10km, 1:02:10, 116th of 129

I set off with the aim of keeping my cadence as high as I could. I knew I would be slow, and people were streaming past me, but i was mentally prepared for that so didn't let it get me down.

Lavatory provisions were pretty poor (or I didn't notice any of them) so I had to avail myself of some bushes on the first of the three laps! The course has changed since last I ran it, now three laps that wind around a bit more rather than four laps with a long desolate out and back section. I was very slow, but apart from walking through the water stations and drinking some water, I ran the whole way. I didn't feel hungry, but I felt like something was depleted - though no where near the feeling you get before "bonking".

The going was tough in the 06:30 at Docklands! Kia-Kaha!

I decided to top up on the second lap with a gel from the Maxifuel stand. The lemon and lime flavour tasted vile - I'm just not used to such concentrated sugar any more - but it hit the spot (mentally or physically, I'm unsure) and by the second half of lap three I was able to pick up the pace a bit.

I finished in possible the slowest 10km I've ever run - BUT (and it's a big BUT, that's why it's in capitals) - the furthest I've run this whole year before this race was 5km, and I'd only run 5km twice without stopping, so it really is early days. I had to keep the effort down (minimise risk of injury), and from that perspective it was a success.

All done!

FInal placing: Olympic Plus distance, 04:16:29, 72nd out of 129

Mrs was at the finish line waiting with a big hug. What a fantastic event - I'd done it, my first triathlon of the year. Can I say I'm "no longer injured"? Probably, yes, but have to make sure I don't get carried away. It's so common to bounce back too hard and get all excited and just injure yourself again. I have a few races coming up and with care I'm sure I can get through them all.

Pretty good bling too!

All in all it was an excellent weekend. Mrs raced well too, and it's fair to say we've both been massively re-infected with the racing bug. The Team Freespeed group were brilliant, I can't wait to meet them again - thank you for letting us hang out with your crew!

Richard and Jenny, with the adorable Leo and Noah

Mrs after her race, rockin' the Freespeed kit!