Updated Trailing 4-Week Average Training volume Charts

Here are my trailing 4-week average training volume charts which depict 2022 training volume relative to 2019-2021.  2019 was the year of my last IM (Arizona) where I KQed.  Also that year, Anders and I went on a couple week mountaineering expo to Bolivia, and that impacted training volumes.  2020/2021 were heavily impacted by Kona....

First, for the swim....

  2022 is my biggest early season swim training block in my 22 years of doing this.  You can see that I've consistently been between 10-13k yards/week since late January.  In fact, only 3 of the first 16 weeks has seen me doing less than 10k/week.  My focus was replicating the first half of 2021 with an earlier ramp and you can see that I have executed this approach.  The 2020 numbers were greatly impacted by CoVid:

I've been in "Bike Monster" mode beginning in 2019 post Bolivia (June) and you can see the big bike volume I've consistently put in.  2021 was especially a big early season effort and so far in 2022 I've exceeded that by a fair amount.  11 of my weeks have been 300+ miles and 3 have been above 400 miles/week:

On the run I'm continuing to track 2021 and am in the process of trying to slowly ramp up.  2019 volume was inflated by my Bolivia training and 2020 by CoVid:

In terms of total training time, I obviously put in a huge effort, especially in the early season.  this year, I've been especially consistent.  My last 4 weeks and 6 of the last 7 have been above 25 hours/week.  In total I've been above 25 hours 11 times and 30 hours/week 2 times.  I've only had 2 weeks were my training time was below 20 hours with my low point this year being 16.2 hours....

So far in 2022, here are my weekly volume averages:

Swim: 11,020 yards

Bike: 325 miles

Run: 7 miles

Time: 25 hours

 

2022 Phase 1 coming to an end.

 So far in 2022 I have been primarily focused on a lot of swim/bike Z1/Z2 training focused on really establishing a strong fitness base and helping to get my body composition near what I want it to be for my main races this year--principally Kona.

I think mission accomplished so far.  I have been consistently hitting significant swim/bike volume this year and have, in the last 2 weeks started to ramp up my running investment (coming right after my latest Euflexa injection cycle).  I've also been putting some more time, especially this past week, into more PT/weights/stretching.  Here is what the last four weeks have looked like:

It's not often that I have 4 weeks all above 25 hours, let alone in such a tight time range!

Looking ahead, I'm going to start sharpening up my swim and bike a bit with some harder efforts.  I'll also bring down my overall volume, especially on the bike, but steadily increase my long ride and hopefully get my first century or two under my belt in June.

My first race is a local spring in mid-May and then I'll focus on Eagleman70.3 in mid June.

Also going out to St. George to watch Anders at the WC in early may!

Last week

 It m might not seem like it but I actually dialed back on Saturday and Sunday--took 2 days in a row off from swimming (had to skip today because pool was closed--wasn't my original intention).  Had a hard first five days this week and then cruised through the weekend on the bike.  Began the ramp on my run this week--I'm very slow but am getting a bit faster and longer....

4 weeks to my first race of the season....

Swim: 10,500 yards

Bike: 308 miles

Run/Walk: 14.3 miles

Time: 25:39

Check out this little vid I did of Anders and my early days!

 

Rolling along--beginning of the run build....

Another strong week in the books:

Swim: 13,000 yards

Bike: 335.6 miles

Run: 2.0 miles

Time: 25:14

The thing that's new here is the run volume is actually running vs. hiking/trekking/climbing.  I ran 2 miles and averaged 11:11/mile--pretty pathetic I know but it was my first actual run in almost 8 months.  More to come!

Here are the updated Trailing 4-week average charts:

My swim continues to roll along--I'm pretty sure this is my strongest first 14-15 weeks of any season and I'm comparing favorably even to the big build I did last season.  Interestingly, you can begin to see the impact of CoVid on the 2000 numbers....

I've been building my bike volume back up after the "dip" (down to 250/week) coincident with Judy and my vacation.  Averaging over 300 miles/week over a four week period is a lot of bike volume in my view....starting to ride outside now!

My run continues to mirror last year and I hope to begin building my average volume above 10 miles/week as we roll into May.  The ramp in 2019 was of-course all the training I did to prepare for our 2019 Bolivian expedition...

4 week training time average back up above 25 hours/week, which is probably more than I can sustain but the chart below shows I'm frequently hammering away at that level this time of year...

Just going to keep on keeping on!

Swim break-through!

 So, I've been using a 2,500 yd time trial as the principal gauge of my swim fitness.  I think this is a good distance because it's longer than a half-ironman swim, but yet is something I can do fairly regularly.  I've done 16 of these so far this year.

Also, a couple of weeks ago, some friends in a masters group had me tweak some things in my stroke to try to get more distance per stroke.  It feels a bit awkward but I was able to slightly lower my time in late March.  This morning I was able to take a big step up.  Very psyched!

Below is a chart of my last 3 best times this year.  I swam 43:39 on 2/20 with my old stroke.  My first TT with the new stroke on 3/28 saw me 3 seconds faster.  This morning I swam 41:59--a full 4 seconds/100 faster.  Here's how these three swims compare:

Note how on 3/28, the new stroke changed the key swim metrics.  While my overall time/speed were very close, I took over 5% fewer strokes with the new stroke.  Thus, my distance per stroke was also up over 5%.  However, my strokes/min fell by the same 5%.  So basically, my longer stroke was cancelled out by my slower cadence.  I think the total work I was creating was about the same.

This morning my strategy was to try to keep the stuff below the water the same--making sure I push past my hips; but upping the pace of my arm recovery above the water.  I was able to go about 4% (4 seconds/100) faster.  It was driven by a 8.5% increase in cadence.  However, my dps unfortunately fell by 4.5%.

I think this indicates that my faster stroke resulted in slightly less (about 3-4 inches/stroke) glide at the top of my stroke.  I think I might need to try to push just a bit harder (up the tax on my aerobic system) and maybe back off the cadence just a smidgen.  Another tweak I'm going to want to play with is to get slightly more front quadrant by slightly delaying, relative to my recovery arm position, my initiation of the  pull.

I've also indicated my objective of getting to 40 minutes and one way I might be able to get there: 31.3 spm @ 2.00 yds/stroke.  I've surpassed that cadence this morning so I think my principal goal over the next week or two is to really emphasize dps at say 30-30.5 spm...

Below, you can see how these 16 tests have trended since the beginning of the year.  Given that I have the new stroke a bit under my belt, I plan to do maybe 4-5 more TTs this month:

another solid week--body feeling like it can handle it....

 Body felt a little better this week.  I did take an "easy" day on Thursday:

Swim: 11,050 yds

Bike: 340.3 miles 

Run: 4.7 miles

Time: 25:36 

Also set a new 2022 2,500 TT PR at 43:36.  I've been experimenting with a longer stroke and finally am getting my cadence up high enough to swim at the speeds I was swimming at in February:

2/20/22

43:39

31 spm

1.85 yds/stroke

13.5 strokes/length

3/28/22

43:36

29 spm

1.95 yds/stroke

12.8 strokes/length

Now ab going to try to up cadence back into low 30s while maintaining yds/stroke near 2....

March 2022 in the books!

Another solid month here, early in 2022!

Swim: 50,550 yards

Bike: 1,337 miles

Run: 33.5 miles

Time: 106:04 (hours:minutes)

As it turns out, March was my biggest swim month to date, eclipsing my former biggest which I just set in January.  Also,  March was also my 5th biggest bike month which means that 2 of my top 5 swim and bike months, and 1 of my top 5 training time months happened so far in 2022:

I was in the most pool most days in March.  I missed the first three days and the last day of March, but swam 24 of the other 27 days, including 13 days in a row.  I also worked a bit with some Masters swimmers at my YMCA and have been able to reduce my stroke count from 24/25 per 25 yards to now where I'm locked in at 22 per 25 yards.  This was a little awkward at first but I was able to clock at 43:33 2,500 time trial without an excessive effort this week.  This is in the 72-73 minute IM range.  I expect to get quite a bit faster over the next three months as I tweak-up for Eagleman in mid-June.

Also got my coVid booster booster today....arm is a bit sore....

Onward and Upward!