Sorry for the lengthy period of radio silence. Lots and lots going on in the "real" world (no need to get into the details in this space) so haven't been focused on the adventure/triathlon world--at least from a blogging perspective. That said, I have been doing my best to get ready for my 11/19 dance at Ironman Arizona. I'll use this blog to update you on where I'm at as well as kick-off another cycle of regular updates.
Swim
As you might recall I came back from Nepal and hopped into the pool only to find a whole bunch of pain in my right shoulder and radiating down my right arm into my bicep. I tried to work around it for a while but ultimately wasn't able to do any real swim training and indeed the pain kept increasing and got to the point where sleeping in certain positions was challenging.
Diagnosis was a "winged scapula" with probable nerve impingement leading to some mechanical issues in my right shoulder and ultimately a nasty case of bursitis. Cortisone and about 3 months of PT has me back on track and why I still feel a bit of funkiness, I'd say at this point my shoulder is at 90%+ and I'm generally able to swim and sleep pain free!
Of course, the lack of training is a bit of concern as I basically was only able to swim less than 10,000 yards/month in the May-August period. In September, the PT seemed to have helped enough that I was able to record 16,300 yards, which while light, was pretty good given all the travel and other things going on in September.
Last week I had my first "real" Ironman swim week as I was logged 10,500 yards over 5 swim sessions, three in the open water with the longest being 3,200 yards at a 68:30 IM pace. That pace is pretty surprising frankly, but I'm not going to get too excited over it as I always swim well with my wetsuit in the salt water of Stone Harbor's back bays. Still, its a good sign, given everything thats gone on, I'd be happy to do anything under 80 on race day--for sure.
Bike
As you know, the bike has always been my real strength and I haven't had any major barriers to putting in the miles. Still, I must confess that the quality and quantity of my bike training has been lagging. Frankly its been hard to motivate when I haven't been able to swim and my run is how it is (see below). No excuses--but it is what it is.
In September I had a reasonable month despite traveling the last 6 days and logged 823 miles including several over 80 and one 100 miler. This past week was very solid as I rode a respectable 305 miles including a long ride of 112.4 miles. I won't be in peak shape at Arizona, but a continuation of this effort throughout October and early November should create the opportunity for an OK bike (5:45ish).
Run
What can I say besides yuck. My knee is really bad now and in need of replacement. It really has limited my run training this summer to just 8-15 miles/week with no runs over 10 miles. All of it very slow. Last month I put in 77 miles (including a few hikes) and logged 25.2 miles last week including a 14-mile run/walk a la Galloway. Again, it is what it is and thats bad. The IM is going to really hurt and it will be a struggle to get significantly under 6 hours on game day--although I'm probably going to need to figure out a way to do so if I hope to qualify for Hawaii (which I hope to do, even while I know its very unlikely...)
Time
In September I put in 76:50, which is pretty inadequate 8-12 weeks out from an Ironman but I did have a very respectable week last week putting in 29:24.
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I'm on it now. I'm going to try to cram five hard weeks in a row in and then kick back into a two-week taper and see how it plays. Not ideal but its the best I can do given this late date. I've also gone on a stricter diet regime with no alcohol and limited "bad" foods. I've dropped about 8 pounds over the first 12 days of this effort (undoubtedly some of it was retained water from lots of carbs) and I hope to get my weight down to the low 170s by the time of the race--I'm 182 right now. This isn't ideal of-course, but again, its the best shot I have. I just have to hope my body holds together over this 50 day period. The first 12 days are so far so good.
Onward and upward!
