Posts Tagged ironman

Sport Testing: My new form of racing

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Endurance Nation, Ironman Training, Testing, Training Tips on August 1, 2010

One of the key elements of training is testing. Every 4 weeks or so, it’s good to test yourself in your rest week in each sport to see if your training is making you stronger. It’s a good way to test your training plan to make sure you’re getting the most out of it. That’s one of the key philosophies of Team Endurance. Test yourself, push hard, and set goals for yourself to use your training plan to improve your testing numbers.

This past week, I did my first series of tests, and I really needed it. The testing was awesome and something I recommend to ALL athletes out there. I surprised myself quite a bit with the outcomes. Particularly since I’m not racing, these tests give me feedback as to how far I’ve come. What I’ve also realized is that if I push myself harder then what I think is mentally possible, I can surprise myself with my capabilities.

Bike Test

My first test was on the bike. I did a 12:30 warmup followed by 4×30 spin ups with 1 minute rest after. I then did 3×2 minutes zone 4 (Z4) hard with 1 minute rest in between. Seems hard, right? That’s just the warmup. I then did 2×20 min interval (with 2 minutes of rest in between). This is HARD AS YOU CAN GO but last the full 40 minutes. That’s not easy to do mentally because you’re trying to push hard, but you also have to be reasonable. Anyways, I recently purchased an iBike power meter, and I was able to measure my watts. I have a feeling the watts were overestimated, as my FTP watts for the 40 minutes were 271 watts. My W / kg was 3.6, which was way better than what I was expecting (hence the belief the watts may be overestimated). However, in my ride yesterday, my wattage was significantly below this, so we’ll see what further testing brings. My experience on my rides with my power meter over the next few weeks should help me figure this out.

Run Test

My run test was two days later, and I was actually pretty pumped for this. I had to do a 15 minute warmup or so that consisted of 4×30 seconds at 5k pace to get used to running hard, and then a 5k for the test followed by a decent cooldown. The 5k is hard as you can go so that you finish strong and then walk. I’ve been dying to know my 5k time for a while, but I could never justify a race because it’s just not long enough. So now I have the excuse. I ran HARD, and halfway through, I was averaging 5:55 pace, and I’m thinking, I can do this…I can keep it under 6 minutes. I did, and I ran a 18:24, or 5:56 pace for 3.1 miles. This test surprised me the most. I was hoping to break 20 minutes, and I shattered this goal. I didn’t think that time was possible. I was stoked.

Swim Test

The swim test was a day after the run test, and this consisted of a 5ooM warmup of kicking and swimming, followed by a 1000M at race pace. It’s pretty boring swimming 1000M in a pool, but I’m used to it now, and it’s surprisingly pretty easy for me given my training. I swam hard and could of gone probably a bit harder. I did it in 15:52, which was about 1:35/100M. Not bad for an ironman swim time goal, but I’d probably want to go a tad easier than that. But it gives me something to build on.

What these tests established was that you don’t have to race to test your rate of improvement. I like to be competitive with myself, and these tests are the best way to do it. Now I get to work hard for several weeks to see if I can improve these test results based on my training. Trying to improve…hmmm, that’s a good motivator So here are my results that I can hopefully improve upon in 4 weeks, if that’s possible (note my heart rates - I don’t understand why I can’t get it higher. I’m hoping I can learn to keep my heart rate higher for longer periods)

Bike: FTP 272 LTHR 151 W/kg 3.6
Run: Pace: 5:56 LTHR 165
Swim: Pace: 1:35/100M

LTHR = lactate threshold heart rate

bike test, en, endurance nation, ironman, run test, swim test, team endurance, testing, train hard

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Team Endurance: my savior

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Endurance Nation, Ironman Training, Training Tips on August 1, 2010

Been a long time since I blogged and quite a lot has happened. Aside from work, the girl, training hard, etc…, I think the most important thing I’ve done with regards to training in the last few weeks was join team endurance. As you can tell from recent posts, I’ve been putting in a lot of hours. I’ve been doing this solo, and I’ve been tired and bored. Yes, it’s difficult, but it’s more difficult for me at least when I’m not part of something bigger and following a general training philosophy.

Insert Endurance Nation. Endurance nation is a community of people (400+) who train for half and full ironman races. They’re regular age groupers trying to make the most of their time. The team/business is run by two very awesome coaches on both sides of the nation, Rick Strauss and Patrick McCrann. It’s not cheap. It’s $99 a month, but with what you get, I think it’s worth it.

The most important element of team endurance is the training plans. They analyze your season based on the races you tell them you’re going to do , and they put you on one of their training plans. These training plans are in season 7, so they’ve been pretty well refined and I can trust that I’m in good hands. That’s critical because when a plan tells you to take a day off, you usually feel strange doing that. It’s important to trust the philosophy, and that’s a big deal when you think about their philosophy – it’s completely different than anyone else’s out there. But given how much people talk about their success following it, it’s hard not to trust experience.

Most importantly, they give you the option to ask for Macro feedback (e.g this plan isn’t working for me, or should I insert other races into the schedule) as well as Micro feedback (e.g. this week, I’m on business travel and can’t bike so what should I do). It’s good getting advice from some very experienced people when these situations come up.

So what is this philosophy. Well, the coaches realize the importance of life and that this tri thing is a hobby, but an important hobby. So they say, work HARD in every workout that you do, but do less hours. That’s right, LESS hours. Essentially, make the most of your time. In typical periodic training, 4-7 months before an Ironman, coaches recommend 5-7+ hour workouts to “build a base”. I understand that and get it, but to me, I found I struggled quite a bit with trying to do that and “live” the rest of my life. Team Endurance believes instead of working out easy for 6 hours, work out hard, and really hard, for 3 hours. Then, when you have to do the same even in a long course race, you do it at 70% of what you’re used to, it will feel easy, and the extra few hours won’t matter.

That brings me to the second thing you get with Team EN. A community of people who are following the same plans, are bought into the philosophy, and are willing to help you and talk to you via the Team EN forums. These forums are rich with tons of information, and anytime I’ve posted something, I’ve had a response within hours. AND the coaches almost always respond as well. Plus, you can email the coaches anytime and they’ll provide feedback. This community then comes out strong at your events. At each Ironman, there’s near 30 Team EN athletes. That’s an awesome support network during the race.

Here’s an article written by the coaches on active.com. It’s not specifically about Team EN, but as you can tell from their advice on 140.6 strategies, they’re quite different than the norm. I’m sold on their philosophy. I had one hard week under their plan, then a rest week with testing. This week is back to the hard stuff again, so we’ll see what I have to say about em next weekend

If you have any questions about Team EN or are interested in joining, comment below. I’d love to help you out with it!

en, endurance nation, ironman, team endurance, testing, train hard

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A brutal three weeks in the bag

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Cycling, Ironman Training, Running, Swimming on July 9, 2010

Base 2 – DONE! It certainly wasn’t easy, and per my last post, it could even be thought of as hell, but I completed my base 2 and feel like things are getting, wait for it…EASIER!

Ok, easier is relative, but after putting on a lot of miles over the last three weeks, I feel like adding an hour here or there really isn’t too bad. My body is recovering faster, and although I’m suffering from recurring blisters and constant hamstring pain, I’m getting through the workouts. I keep training at this level because I know in an Ironman, I’m not going to feel 100% through the entire race, so training tired is critical.

See below for a weekly recap of what I did the last three weeks. The big workouts were a 6:30 workout on the Saturday of the 6/28 week (5 hour bike, 1:30 running) and a 6 hour workout during the Saturday of the 6/21 week (4 hour bike, 2 hour run). The moment I was most proud of though was getting up the Sunday after the 6:30 workout and doing a 3 hour workout (1:10 swim and 1:50 bike). It shows I can workout tired and still perform. I also ran to work once each week (18 miles round trip) and biked 1-2 times per week.

I’m in a rest week now, which is SO NICE! My body is recovering. It’s strange to workout about 8-9 hours in a week and consider it resting, but when you see the mileage / time above, I think you can understand why. During these down weeks, I try to get in a few tests to see how I’m improving. Last night I did my swim test and lowered my 100 meter swim time by almost 10 seconds. WOO HOO!!!

I do a test that includes a 10 minute warm up, primarily kicking. I then do 3×300 meters with 30 seconds of rest in between. Then I just swim to get in more time. I average the three 300 meters together to get an average 300 meter time, then divide by 3 to get my average 100 meter. The reason for this is to get my general average 100m for pacing when I do my swim training. The key is to not just do these tests on a 100M because it would be much faster and not factor in any endurance. Also, the 300s have to be within 10 seconds of each other or they don’t count. This prevents you from killing yourself on 1 or 2 of them and sacrificing the other. I did this test when I started seriously swim training earlier in the year, and I was at a 1:41 100M. Not fast at all. Last night, I was at 1:32. A noticeable improvement. Something is going right in the pool

The issue I’m debating now is whether to shorten my run mileage from the 30-40 miles a week I’m doing to about 25 and add another 2-3 hours on the bike. I know my bike is the weakness, and I also know that no matter how much work you put into running, the marathon of your first ironman is going to be hell. Given these things, I’m thinking of trying to get in two long rides a week, one of 5-7 hours and one of 3-5 hours depending on my weekly requirement. I’ve even thought of doing some of this on back to back days, with the 5-7 hours being aerobic and the 3-5 being slightly harder with a few more hills. I’ll try it out this next (and final) base period and see what happens.

For those of you training, I hope it’s going well!

base, base 2, cycling, ironman, long ride, marathon, training, tri, triathlon

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Hell week

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training, Workouts on June 28, 2010

I begin the peak week of my second base period, and I’m in for a doozy. Assuming all goes to plan, I will have worked out more this week than any other week in my entire life. Crazy when I put it that way (and maybe a tad too dramatic).

I will workout 16 hours this week. I’m going to do a lot of heart pounding anaerobic (or at least, more than aerobic) working out over the next three days. I’ll then swim in the ocean on Thursday with a co worker, and shortly after jump on the bike for one-legged biking drills. I’ll follow that up with an easy swim on Friday before the Saturday doozy: a 7 hour love affair, 5 hours with the bike and 2 hours negotiating with myself to complete a painful run. Finally, I’ll end with a 2-3 hour workout on Sunday, consisting mostly of a swim, but probably some more riding as well. I’m hoping to get 4-5 bike rides in this week. It’s my weakness, and I need to start treating it as such. So here’s how it breaks down

Monday: 30 minutes strength, 1 hour muscular endurance on the bike
Tuesday: Run to work – Fartlek style, Run home – Zone stepping
Wednesday: More bike pain, in the form of 3, 3, 3s – which are 4 x 3 minute intervals in some hard gears. I’m determined to build this leg strength
Thursday: Ocean swim at Corona Del Mar followed by 40 minutes of those lovable one legged drills
Friday: More strength training tied in with an easy swim
Saturday: I’m taking it home with this one: 5 hours of low heart rate, pure aerobic love on the bike followed by more zone stepping on the run. Hopefully some run goals will make that two hours seem shorter than the 2 this past Saturday
Sunday: Another lap swim, most likely focusing on upper body strength with an aero position trainer ride to continue to get used to the “lounge chair”

And that’s about 16 hours my friends. In base 3, i get up to 18 hours for the peak week, and in the three build periods, I’ll be hovering around 15-16 hours each week for 3 of 4 weeks of each month. So this is pretty much the norm for the next five months. I promise you that July 5th is gonna feel damn good. a DAY OFF!!! WOOOO

I’ll try to post more workout summaries, and even attach my garmin workouts for those who want to upload them. I find that Garmin is one of the best motivators – nothing like a beep/vibrate to push you along. Have a great week!

base, hours, ironman, pain, tired, training

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The internal negotiation: the mind is powerful!

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Cycling, Running, Trail Running on June 26, 2010

This week, I came across a great line on the Slowtwitch triathlon forums. It was someone giving advice to a person preparing for his first ironman. In his advice, he said, “Your negotiation with God might begin in your 1st mile, but will likely pass in 3 or 4 miles if you have hydrated/eaten correctly”.

I laughed at this. Because I know how painful it can be running off the bike. However, I didn’t really understand it until today. I did a four hour ride and a two hour trail run. The trail run was in El Morro canyon off PCH in newport. I didn’t realize this, but there are some SERIOUS hills there. We experienced 1700 feet of climbing, which forced the not too common run/walk…A LOT.

It was hot out. I took a break from the bike to drive with my buddy Cale to the trail run, and I was feeling good. We started off on a quick downhill followed by a steady ascent and then another descent. About 1 mile into it, we reached these very short 10-15% grade hills. The type that aren’t too bad if you did not ride your bike for four hours before. Well I got to the first one, started up, and nearly passed out. And not, hey, i was kinda tired, I may pass out. I was dizzy and had to instantly stop. Cale was still talking to me and I was nowhere near him. I walked up to hill where Cale was waiting for me, took a gu, drank some water, and carried on.

I got to another one of these short intense hills and the same thing happened. At this point, that quote popped into my head. On any other day, I’d have no problem with these hills. But after grinding away my legs on the bike for four hours, these were intense. At that moment, I was negotiating, not with God, but with myself. Can I move? Can I finish this run? Or will I quit? I hate quitting. And what about Cale. He drove me here. I don’t want to make him leave and cut his workout from 2 hours into 15 minutes. I could sleep in the car. But it’s hot. Is that a snake? Look at the beetle. Maybe I could just sit down here. Or sleep here. Would I get bit?

Seriously…all that when through my head in about 3 seconds. I didn’t know what to do. I negotiated with myself…take a few more steps. One foot in front of the other. You never know what might happen. Just get up this hill, get to another downhill, see how you feel. I did that, and things went well. Got to some steep inclines, slowed it down, drank from my WASP, and pushed on. I won the negotiation. I was able to pull myself out of the rut, and once I got about 30 minutes in, I was ok. I didn’t know how I would last two hours, but just over 2 hours later, Cale and I came off the trail (i did leave out the fact we got totally lost and ended up going on a 10% hill or so that last over 2 miles – it was miserable. We were conserving water – that’s how lost we felt. But once again, we figured out).

It’s scary how powerful the mind is. How we must negotiate with ourselves constantly. How some of us convince ourselves to turn back and others convince ourselves to move forward. I think there is a lot of value in applying this to life – to work, training, family. Think positive. If things get tough, turn the impossible into small possible steps. There’s usually a way, just negotiate with yourself to find it!

biking, ironman, Running, running off the bike, Trail Running, wasp

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Ironman Training has Begun

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training on June 5, 2010

The two months in between my half ironman and the start of my ironman training was incredible. I actually didn’t realize how great it was until I started training again. I had some more time to enjoy my weekends. My body recovered. I could spend time with my girl and family. I even spent an extra weekend in Hong Kong while on business travel to hang with one of my college roommates. Well, that time has come and gone, and the real work has begun.

The past three weeks have really been a struggle. I forgot what it was like to train long hours while working a very busy job. And these training hours are starting to get long. I just finished a 14 hour week (that I completed in 6 days since I’m leaving for Stockholm tomorrow at 4AM and lose my Sunday), and that very long difficult week is going to start being the average or even the low end of what I’ll be doing for the next few months.

I’m in a constant mental battle as to why I’m doing this. With each long workout and as each week’s hours cumulatively build, the workouts become a mental battle of quitting versus pushing. Today, I worked out for 5.5 hours, and from the 10 minute mark, I was wondering how I was going to finish. I just kept pushing on. With workouts like that, I end up doing them slower, but I get the time in and I feel like I am victorious against that part of my mind that tells me I can’t, that tells me my body won’t do it. As these workouts build, I can only imagine that battle getting fiercer, but I’m determined to win it. And with each victory, I really feel accomplishment. Even if it is only a workout, there’s something special about overcoming fear, anxiety, and exhaustion. I realize how much more I can do when my mind says it can’t.

My base is building (when i say base, i mean my base level of endurance – the number of hours I can continue to workout). I’ve decided to take these base periods and build distance, and then take my build periods and work on making those distances faster. I enter a step back week now of about 8 hours of training, and I feel like I got over that big hurdle of getting back into training. I think my body is slowly adjusting, and I’m hoping I’m in slightly less pain in the weeks to come.

One thing that really is keeping me going is my girlfriend Adrienne. After just the first of six main training periods, I’ve realized how lucky I am to be with someone who supports this hobby of mine. If there’s one person who bears the brunt of my complaining and who I’m definitely sacrificing some time with, it’s Adrienne. I’m thankful for her support through this process. Her understanding of my desire to do this is great, and despite the hours of wah wah wahing she’s heard from me in the past few weeks, she just ignores it and provides compassion. Thanks Adrienne! You are awesome!

With that, I’m off to Stockholm. I hope to get back to this blog as my travel schedule dies down. After this trip, I will have flown nearly 60,000 miles since March 6th. Crazy, huh?

On a side note, I love June gloom. It was so cool this week in my AM workouts. I loved it. As the heat of summer rises, I’m interested to see what my body can handle.

Here’s a summary of my mileage/hours for my first three weeks. 37 hours in 20 days – not too bad. Base 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 (in order of 10-12-14 hours approximately)

base, fully employed triathlete, girlfriend, gloom, ironman, june, support, training

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Is a healthy addiction, healthy?

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training, Life on April 2, 2010

It’s been nearly a week now since my half ironman. As it’s set in what I actually did, I come back to this feeling of, “WHAT AM I DOING?” I work full time, and lately, considerably more than full time. I have a great girlfriend. I have a family. I have an awesome puppy and two cats. Friends. I have interests…AND I’m training hours and hours and hours. And starting the week of May 17th, I will begin the Ironman journey that is going to make this last race feel easy. That thought is scary. If I was busy before, imagine what the next 8 months will be like?

The last 6 days have been great for learning about myself and my addiction. Yes, I think I have an addiction. Despite being tired and having fairly extreme exhaustion in my legs, I wanted to get out and workout nearly everyday this week. I would say I was even compulsive about it, often feeling kind of down for not being able to get out there. And this is week 1 of rest. What will week 4 feel like?? (Side note: I rode my bike for the first time today. 16 miles in about 50 minutes. Is it weird that I worked out for 50 minutes and I felt like I didn’t even workout? I’m doing a 10 mile run tomorrow, and I think, this is an easy workout? What happened to me in the last year? I think this is good, but I’m starting to realize I’m not normal. I like being not normal…)

I try to think of why is it that I feel compelled to workout when my next even is nearly 8 months away. I come down to a few reasons:

Vanity
Health
Stress relief / Emotional Pain Relief
Competitiveness

When I look at those four reasons, I think, are those good reasons to do this? Let’s go through them.

Vanity – Hmmm. I guess it’s cool to have a good body. To be defined in my muscles. To have a six pack. But seriously, who gives a shit? When I have kids, working out is going to come behind work / family, and although I think I’ll maintain a healthy life style, I will certainly never be as fit as I am now. And will it matter? Does the joy of raising kids and having a family outweigh the feeling of being fit? But I keep coming back to the fact that I care about vanity. I wish I could admit that I do not, but there is something about the feeling of being fit, not necessarily the feeling of looking good in a mirror or to others. By the definition of being anorexic, I almost thing this is a form of anorexia. It’s not that I want to be super skinny, but it’s a general fear of gaining weight. Instead of eating very little, I eat what I want, and I work out more than most people feel is humanly possible (for at least a person who works full time). And people think it’s great what I do. Is it? Is a healthy addiction, healthy?

Health – Of course it helps to exerise to improve the heart. I enjoy life and I want to live longer. I want to be the 60 year old doing half ironmans. I want to enjoy life even at 100 years old. A lot of people say they don’t want those extra years. I do. I want to keep learning and enjoying life till the day I die. But I could also probably live as long working out 4 hours a week. At some point, is my active lifestyle going to impact my health. I have more recurring pain in my legs than ever. It hurts nearly EVERY time I go up and down stairs. I don’t think health qualifies, although it’s a good excuse.

Stress Relief / Emotional Pain Relief - When I was going through my divorce a year ago, I could say that I worked out to deal with pain. When things are tough at work, I like to run to clear my mind. I love biking to work because it feels stress free for those 30 minutes before and after work. In a car, there’s really not a lack of stress, especially in Southern California. However, as I train for these endurance events, it’s not about relief. No way is a 5 hour workout about stress relief. It’s about something else.

Competitiveness – Of all the reasons mentioned above, this is the one that seems the most likely. I’m ultra competitive. But I am at a stage in my life where I don’t like competing with others. Since this is a hobby and not a full time gig, I don’t think it’s right to compete with others. Everyone has their own circumstances, and it’s not right to say that we’re all fully dedicated to something and therefore training is comparable across people. But damn, I love beating my times. I am tired as hell when I get up, but when I put on those running shoes and head out the door, I love knowing that today I can try to run faster than last time, or longer, or even different. I love getting in the pool and trying to work on my stroke so that when I do my swim test every month or so, I can try and get better. I don’t think I’m completely normal in this category because I have this inner competitiveness that pushes me to do things I didn’t know were possible.

Sidebar: when I was a freshman in high school, I started playing golf. My parents told me to pick a sport (to keep me out of trouble I’m sure), and I chose golf since I lived on a golf course. Well, here, I was competitive with others since all high school players were comparable (for practice time, etc…, although some cared more about school than others). So I worked hard. I mean harder than probably anyone in high school. I golfed before school, after school, in my room (putting/reading) at night, all day on weekends. I got a net for my back yard so I could hit balls at night. I was driven to shoot lower scores. I love numbers (I’m an analyst). So when I can be competitive and see measured results, I’m in heaven. Well, when anyone told me I couldn’t do something, it just pushed me to prove them wrong. When everyone told me I wasn’t going to make varsity because I cussed out my JV coach (longer story here), I worked harder. I beat everyone my sophomore year except one guy. By senior year, I was top in my county, and one of the top 10 juniors in California.

Through golf, through my sister telling me I wouldn’t do well in school, through some of these adverse moments in life, I never got down. Something in me, that competitive spirit turned these negatives into positives, and I motivated around it. I do it today. The Ironman for example. This is competition against myself, since one year ago, I felt there was absolutely no way I could do one. Well flash forward a year, and I’m proving myself wrong. I have a long way to go, but I think this is my main reason for working out. If this energy was in something else, like drinking, video games, drawing, whatever, I’d find ways to excel in it. Fortunately, this addiction is healthy.

So I think healthy addictions are good. But only if you channel it constructively. By that I mean to not obsess and be ok when I have to rest, be smart about the limits so I know when I need to stop, and make sure that trade off decisions of giving up time with others are made by the loving person inside, not the competitive animal that lives within.

addiction, competitive, healthy, ironman, irvine, training, working out

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Race Report: IM California – Oceanside 70.3

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training, Race Reports, Triathlon on March 28, 2010

I must admit that writing this report the day after is going to be a more positive review than yesterday when I questioned why the hell I do these events. I also had a HUGE sense of fear for competing in Ironman Arizona given how difficult this event was. When I woke up today, I couldn’t wait for IM AZ training to start. But for now, I’m on hiatus till May, with maybe a little strength work and fun rides/runs mixed in.

But back to the yesterday’s event. IM California 70.3 was much harder than I expected. The reason was the elevation climbs on the back that were unexpected (more unexpected because I’m an idiot and didn’t study the elevation chart), and these climbs really took the strength out of my legs for the runs. I accomplished my goal of under 5 hours, 30 minutes (barely), and i came in 94/240 in my field, with 74 DNFs (so really, 94/304, but that’s not the official stat). I’ll recap each event and then list my takeaways at the end

Pre-Race: Up at 4AM, ready by 5AM and not that nervous. Got to the race, parked, rode my bike to the start (and it was quite cold at about 5:15AM). Got to transition, found my spot, setup. Funny thing here is that I had to pee SO BAD. The type of pee where if you don’t go soon, it feels like you may have to pee blood because of the pain build up. Well, the bathroom line was about 40 minutes long, so I decided to pretend like I was doing a warm up run down the rocks of the harbor, and when I got to the end, I unloaded. I seriously think it felt better than having a first born child. After I got this out, I went back, setup my transition, put half my wetsuit on, and as the first wave went off, I got into the restroom line for my second potty trip.

Pre-Race2: Yup, last wave, so around 7:20 AM, I did potty trip #3. Fortunately, I saw my family and girlfriend right before I was ready to go out, as well as Zsolt, Cale, girlfriend’s Mom Marian, and Matt. It was very cool to have a mini cheering section!!!

Swim: As I ran down the chute to the swim start, I was excited. Not nervous at all, which is strange given how nervous I was for my last tri. When I got in the water and swam to the wave start line, I immediately realized I was in a bad position. I was behind two guys, sort of like a triangle, and two guys behind me. But there wasn’t enough time to find a better spot. When the horn went off, the two guys in front of me kicked me in the head, and then the guys behind me swam over me while hitting me. Not the ideal start position. I tried finding a good swimming lane while I got hammered over and over. After about 300-400 meters, I found that lane. From here, I got into my rhythm, my heart rate slowed, and I was truly starting the IM 70.3. After we made the turn around the last buoy and started our way back to the transition zone, we caught the slower swimmers from earlier waves. This made sighting a challenge because now I not only had to look where I was going but also the fastest way to get there without swimming over other people. I think I swam quite a bit extra distance as a result.

Sidenote: it’s extremely frustrating that some people who do these triathlons do not sight! I can’t tell you how many people swam diagonally across me as a result. Even one guy swam across me BACK STROKE! If you’re going to do a triathlon, read up on sighting! It will save you extra energy as well as the frustration of those around you

T1: Ok, so after 34:46, I came out of the water. I slowly ran to my transition spot. I mention slowly because I was tired. I had cramped trying to get on the ramp out of the harbor, and my shoulder hurt pretty bad from bumping into people on the swim, and that didn’t help in trying to get my wetsuit off. I thought I handled T1 ok, getting out in 4:03, which isn’t bad for those long IM transitions. I was quite amazed at how far you had to run to get out of transition. They said 75 yards per length, so 150 yards total per transition. That’s about 1/10 of a mile. The one thing I could of done better in T1 was not clipping my shoes into the pedals. I ended up getting behind two bikes coming out of transition that were almost walking with their shoes clipped in, so I picked up no time by being able to run clipless out. Then I struggled to get my feet into my shoes. For an event this long, I think having the shoes out of my pedals may be better.

Bike: Let’s just say that I wish my bike was stronger. The elevation climb was only 2500 feet, but it felt like 10,000 because the hills were sudden, short and steep. Sudden is my fault for not studying the course before the race, but I couldn’t overcome the short and steep. The first hill was an 11% grade for about .75 miles. I’d say 1/3 of the people were walking their bikes up the hill. This came at about mile 31. At mile 35 or so, we hit hill 2, which was about the same distance of 8% grade. Hill 3 came a few miles later and was nearly identical to hill 2. This didn’t account for the steady incline that accounted for miles 30-44. For those reading, you could say what goes up, must come down. I agree, but what hurt me was that I didn’t really expect the bike to be so difficult on the legs, so I used a lot of energy on those hills that really came out of my run. My legs even cramped at one point. Plus, the wind was opposite it’s normal direction, so although the last 12 miles we had a tailwind, all of these inclines were into the wind, making them that much more punishing. If I could do it again, I think I’d do a little more hill training, and do more running after hill training. More importantly, I needed to take in more calories on the bike. The 100 per hour was not enough, and I had no salt replenishment. My body was covered in salt by the end of the race, and that’s not a good sign.

The bike course was beautiful. I just was in a lot of pain and didn’t get a chance to enjoy it as much. I wish I could do the back side of Camp Pendleton for fun because it was truly gorgeous. Here’s the bike course:

Here’s the elevation chart (note the elevation increases aren’t great, but they’re sudden, and that made it tough):

My Cheer Squad

Gun to my Head

T2: After 2:58:06, or about 19 mph, I came into transition. It felt good to get off the bike. I was worn out and ready for it to end, but a half marathon remained. Here was the debate – socks or no socks? I loaded my bike, and said screw it, I’ll put on the socks. And this decision may have cost me about 5 minutes on my run. I never trained in these shoes while wearing socks, and I know the golden rule is to never do something different on race day than you’ve done in training, but socks make everything better, right? Not in this case. I was blistered by mile 5, and it was PAINFUL! The type of blisters I could pop the same night. So in transition, I took the extra 30 seconds to put on socks, I grabbed my Clif Bloks and Gu and ran out. Both the Bloks and Gu fell out of my pockets before I exited transition. Thank you Zoots for making crappy pockets in your tri jerseys. Total T2 time of 2:39

Run: The run splits are below (and note it’s 12.6 miles because my Garmin didn’t kick up until .5 miles in). These don’t account for the pee break I needed at mile 1 or the 20 seconds at each mile for walking through the water stations. The run wasn’t too bad, but as you can see, as the blisters settled in, each step got progressively harder and my time slowed down. There were so many times I wanted to stop, but I just forced myself to never stop running, even if I had to slow down. Just keep going. At one water stop, my legs cramped pretty bad, and this was the sign that if I did start walking, my day may be cut short. So I just took each painful step forward, gutting it out until I finished. You can see from the run videos below that the stride wasn’t too bad, it just hurt. And as you can see from the finisher video, I really wasn’t in a hurry to get across that finish line!

Total run time of 1:45:33. Run Splits (see how it got a little harder as time went by)

My total time was 5:25:05. As I posted in my race strategy, the only really disappointing time was the swim, and fortunately, although I missed it by about 15%, it only accounted for 5 minutes. So I like to recap what I learn from these events, and this one is not different. Here are my main takeaways:

The Ironman Arizona is going to be HARD. I knew it would be hard, but once I have half the distance as an example, I realize truly what’s in store. I will need to seriously train, and really build a good base of miles on the bike and run. Yes I would like to do it in under 12 hours, and 5:25 + 5:25 = 10:50 does make 12 hours seem possible, especially since I wasn’t thrilled with my time. But the key will be to finish. This race hurt so bad at so many times that the thought of dropping out happened constantly, and I haven’t had that in a race before. I can only imagine what a full Ironman is like. So I will train with more bricks and more endurance, building a base before I build speed.
I’m going to do more ocean swimming. I haven’t swam in the ocean since my last tri in October, and the wetsuit felt very strange for the first 500 meters. I plan on doing more ocean swims this summer simply to get used to the feel of a wetsuit
I’m not that scared of the ocean anymore. I was deathly afraid before my last tri, and yesterday, it felt great to be out there. This is all about conquering fears, and I’m slowly breaking down barriers
Transitions are important, but an extra 2 minutes in transition to get your head right is worth it in an event this long. Next time, I’ll spray sunscreen on too so I don’t end up with the sun blisters that I have this time around
Races are fun, but I think I enjoy the journey more than the end. To truly master something, you have to enjoy the journey, and I’m thankful that a race is just part of that journey
Do not break habit. Running in shoes with socks that I’ve only run in without socks is NOT a good idea
Learn more about nutrition and what my body needs. Train that way and take in more calories on the bike. Buy salt replenishment pills

So thanks for taking the time to read my race report. If you have any questions or want to know anything about the race, feel free to comment below! Happy training!

Second loop of the run:

Across the finish line:

My photo set on Flickr

70.3, hills, IM california, ironman, nutrition, oceanside, race, race report, salt, training, triathlon

2 Comments

Race Strategy: Oceanside 70.3

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training, Race Strategy on March 25, 2010

Less than 48 hours from now, I’ll be half of Ironadam. Well, not really. Like 13.1 + 13.1 <> 26.2, I’m sure 70.3 + 70.3 <> 140.6.

Either way, I have a long endurance event to complete very soon, and I’m eager to have the experience. Here’s my strategy:

PreRace: Transition opens at 4:45. I plan to get there around 5:30 since I have an hour to setup before it closes and another hour before my wave starts. Therefore, I’m going to get up at 4 AM, eat a granola bar, have some cereal, maybe have some muscle milk, and go through my usual 4 potty breaks before leaving the hotel. 15 minute drive, so I’ll leave around 5 AM.
Transition setup: the rules said we cannot clip our shoes into the pedals and slide them in the first leg of the race. That sucks, but I’ll clarify this with the rules official tomorrow at the expo. This definitely impacts my transitions strategyI plan on having one towel, a bucket of water to wash my feet in very quickly to make sure no rocks get between my feet and the shoes, race belt, sunglasses, gels, bloks, water, cytomax, and running shoes.
Swim: When the swim starts, I’m going to just try to avoid the chaos, but I’ll be aggressive as long as I don’t use up too much energy. Since I’m starting in the last wave, I don’t know how many people will be going slow from previous waves. I guess we’ll see. My goal is 30 minutes here, which equates to about 1:33 / 100 meter. I don’t think that’s unreasonable since I’ve been swimming a lot. My stroke has improved since my olympic distance tri where I did 1:36 / 100 meter. To be honest, even if I was a lot slower, 10 seconds, that’s only about 2 minutes 30 seconds more, so not a big impact on overall time. I plan on getting into a consistent groove and making a nice swim without a lot of hard grinding. I’m surprisingly not that nervous for the swim.
T1: Pulling off my wetsuit as I run to transition, I plan on doing this in under 2 minutes assuming the in/out of transition isn’t too long. Wet suit off, race belt on, sunglasses on, helmet on, shoes on, bike and go. And this time, I won’t let my GU and Bloks fall out of my pockets
Biking: 56 miles is no easy task, and due to the late start, we may get a little bit more wind then the other waves. Hopefully it’s not too bad. My goal here is to do 20 mph. I don’t know if that’s reasonable or not since I haven’t done this bike course, but my training dictates that if I didn’t have to stop, I could pull that off. I plan on having a heart rate in the mid 150s, and I’ll save most of my energy for the hills in Pendleton and try to maintain a cadence of 100 for the first 5 miles. Goal here is 2:45, but I’m expecting something between 2:50 and 3 hours
T2: So the big debate is do I continue to go sockless? I’m bringing socks, but at this point, I plan on using my Zoots shoes and hoping for the best. I may even slip the socks into my back pocket in case it gets bad on the course. I hope to do this also in less than two minutes. Run in, park bike, helmet off, bike shoes off, running shoes on, grab more GU, GO….
Run: This is where the race will get interesting. It feels like it will be over, but there’s a half marathon left. However, running is my strong suit. I was explaining this to a friend this week. Because I’m about 50 percentile swim, 50 percentile bike, and about 30 percentile run, then I end up being about 25 percentile triathlete because a lot of people are terrible in one sport, awesome in another, and mediocre in the third. I tend to be mediocre at all three but upper third on the run, but then again, I need more races to test my skills. My runs off the bike have all been under 7:30 minute miles. I’ve even had a number of them less than 7 minute miles. BUT, I’ve never had to swim before the bike, and I don’t know what that will do to my legs. I’m shooting for 1:45 minutes, but my goal is 1:40. That will put me at mid to high 7 minute pace. I think I’ll maintain a low 160s heart rate and really try to push it the last 5 miles. We’ll see what happens
T3: CELEBRATION! Drinking, eating, looking forward to days off ahead, and a little massage at the resort before a wonderful evening with AK

That’s it. I guess we’ll see how it goes. Good luck to everyone participating. I hope for good weather, good competition, and a nice challenge.

70.3, ironman, oceanside, Race strategy

4 Comments

Ironman California 70.3 in a few days

Posted by Adam Ainbinder in Ironman Training, Time Constraint on March 24, 2010

It’s just a few days until Oceanside half iron, and I’m starting to get nervous. I was fine until last night, and then I noticed I’m not sleeping as well, my stomach is turning a bit more, and I’m starting to think about a swim with 2500 other people. Plus, there’s that thing about trying to meet goals – why do I do this to myself???

My training was going really well, but work really picked up and I found it a struggle to find time to be with family, handle life’s duties, work, and train. In the weekly summary for this year below, you can see that I was sticking to the plan until the last week of February. I had to go to Greece for a management meeting for work, and I lost both weekends, which is where I usually get about 60% of my weekly training time from. Why I lost BOTH weekends is another story (thank you German airports – you SCREWED ME/US).

I tried to pick it back up last week before tapering, but I definitely lost some of my fitness. I can handle the distance, but the speed at those distances that I was becoming accustomed to was much more difficult. I feel comfortable in finishing, but I think I need to lower my expectations for what time I can achieve. Prepare for the worst but accept the best!

The one thing I’m really looking forward to after this weekend is a much needed break. I’ve been training pretty hard since last March when I started training for the July 2009 SF Marathon, and I’ve been going nonstop since. That’s over a year of training without a break, and a huge ramp up in the winter when most people take time off. After this race, I’ll be working out, but not really training. I hope to pick it back up in May/June when I start the long road to Ironman Arizona! I hope to have more time at that point to really detail my progression towards Becoming Ironadam.

If you have any interest in checking out the official Ironman event on Saturday, click on the link above. There is also an athlete guide that breaks down the rules, the places to park, the course, etc… I’m the last swim wave, starting at around 7:40 AM. Transition closes at 6:30 AM, so that may be a long hour If you have any interest in meeting up with me after the race, send me an email/text and I’ll let you know where we can meet! If time permits, I’ll follow this post up with my race strategy before Saturday.

One last note: in that athlete guide, check out the rules in biking related to passing, drafting, etc… Gnarly! I wonder how much those are enforced. 20 seconds to pass…20 seconds if passed to move back…no clipped in pedals for transitions. I guess I hope I don’t get penalized for anything (imagine sitting in a tent for 4 minutes)