1st week May totals

 I had wanted to race down in VA this past weekend but social obligations, including Mother's Day, took priority.  Instead I had a pretty big training week:

Swim: 8,000 yards

Bike: 344 miles

Run: 12 miles

Time: 27:03

As I mentioned in the last post, the biggest change is the modest increase in my run training...

onward and upward!

April/Run Build Updates

 Hey folks--sorry for being silent for a while.  Lot's going on professionally, personally, and triathlon wise!

Biggest news is I had the privilege of going out to support Anders at the St. George 70.3 this past weekend.  He killed it--really impressive race management!  Also got to see a pretty epic Sanders/Long battle at the front--very motivating.

I have two updates for you in this post.  First, is a summary of my monthly training volume through April:

On balance, I'm where I want to be given the limitations of my left leg.  I'm now beginning to ramp my run as I just completed my latest cycle of knee injections.  My swim volume was off mostly due to travel and other logistics.  April/May are hard swim months as I transition from indoors to outdoors.  By June, I have full access to open water swimming and I would expect in June to push upward again.

I had planned to race this weekend down in VA but social obligations are knocking me out.  Not to worry, I've now decided to go all in on doing Eagleman70.3 as my first Tri of the season--should be a good checkpoint on the way to Kona.  As such, I've started an Eagleman running ramp where I'm running twice a week (best I can do given the pain) and adding a mile each week.  I started at three miles and the first time I run easy and the second time I run at that distance a little less easy and try to improve.  Then I jump up a mile and repeat.  Here is my progress through the first five runs so far (pretty weak I know but this is the best I can do given my knee....

Onward and upward!

Training Volume Update

 Sorry for the radio silence...lot's going on!  Judy and I went down to Florida for 17 days in March to visit my Mom, watch Anders race at Challenge Miami, and experience a bit of a vacation, or whatever passes for such in this CoVid world.  Nice to see both my Mom and my Sis and to cheer Anders on to another great 70.3!

Training wise, in March, the trip, and especially the 2,500 miles of driving we did, had an impact on my training volume but it was still a pretty solid month.  My swim was a principal area of progress as I was actually able to do a couple of open water swims and I equalled my best month ever in terms of swim volume.  My run, of course, continues to be my biggest liability, but I am slowly beginning to ramp it. Here are the last 3 month volume totals:

Swim (000 yds):

Jan:    12.1

Feb:   42.8

Mar:  47.0

Bike (miles):

Jan:  1,400

Feb:  1,287

Mar: 1,039

Run (miles):

Jan:   10.3

Feb:  13.8

Mar:  19.0

Time (hours)

Jan:   94.9

Feb:  101.0

Mar:  81.0

Here are my cumulative volume over the the first 15 weeks of the year as compared to my prior two Kona years (2012, 2014):

First, the Swim.  Here you can see the major emphasis I've been able to place on the swim so far this year.  I'm up about 50% over 2012 and nearly double the volume of 2014.  I'm routinely getting in the pool 5 days a week now, so all good. Off to a good start!

The bike is a similar story.  You might, in looking at the monthly totals above conclude I've been backing off a bit but in reality, January 2021 was my highest volume bike month ever.  I continue to put a lot of (relatively low quality) miles in--more than double where I was in 2014.  I'm anxious to move as much of it as I can outside and beginning to up the intensity!

And then there is the run.  As you know it's baby steps given my knee but basically I've managed to get my weekly run volume up to about 5 miles/week.  I know, not very good, but thems the facts!  Basically, I'm about 10% of what I used to do....pretty sad so far!

And finally, my aggregate training time.  So, even at 63 years, I'm continuing to put the time in--averaging over 20 hours per week so far.  That said, the Run is definitely the hardest on your body (especially mine) and so it would be surprising in one sense if my total training time wasn't up...

Anyways, I'm on it as best as I can be at this point.  Onward and Upward!

February and Last Week

 I backed off just a pinch last week (with exception of swim):

Swim: 15,000 yards

Bike: 268 miles

Run: 3 miles

Time: 23:28

February ended up being a pretty big month.  Here is how the totals for 2021 compared to last year and 2014 and 2012 (the Kona years I have data for):

So, I'm obviously hitting it pretty hard (for me) in the pool.  Combined with a big December 2020, my swim is where it typically is around June or so, good news there.  Another strong bike month, but all in- doors and relatively low intensity.  I'm looking forward to getting back outside this month.  I continue to take it very easy on the run--although I did run for the first time on the Alter G anti-gravity tread-mill and I hope to run as much as 4 miles in another session tomorrow.

I also looked at my top 5 volume efforts over the last 10 years by discipline and I was pleased to see my February swim made it as did last month's bike:

Besides my on-going challenges in my left calf, I'm definitely putting the work in early in 2021--hopefully, I'll get to race off of it at some point this year!

SOLID 4-WEEK BLOCK IN THE BOOKS

 Since I returned from driving Jen back to Kansas in mid-January I have been heads-down grinding out a lot of base volume.  Getting back into the pool and continuing lots of indoor cycling.  My Run is still pretty much on hold as I continue to rehab the lateral part of my lower left leg--complications of my bad knee.  In any event, last week was my highest training time investment this year and completes a very strong 4-week block--no really an IM build kinda block as I'm not hitting the intensity hard yet as I find that easiest to do when th weather gets better....

Here is a summary of the last four weeks:

week 6 totals

 Added in comparisons to 2014 Kona build (as I was back from Argentina by this time that year).  Same trends as last week.  Missed a couple of swims becAuse pool was closed due to two snow storms.  Went out and walked 5 miles--left leg still a bit tender (but getting a little better with my PT) and I'll end to go slow on the run for a while.  This is pretty heavy training (albeit, low intensity) for February.....

2021 Volume Goals