Cedar Island 5K Swim

Did this swim race today for the 5th time.  My expectations were modest (just hope to not be more than 3-4 minutes slower than prior years) and I felt tired (bigger training week this week).  However, at around 12:50 I was in the water, which felt perfect (my Garmin had it at average of 70.6 degrees).  There was a fair amount of wind out of the South and blowing right into the longest stretch of what is essentially a big rectangle. This would prove to be a factor.

Turns out there were 251 starters (that finished--I don't know if anyone dropped out).  I started by the dock to the right of the course as we looked out to a white barrel that marked the 1st of 4 left turns.  Familiar swimmers in this race included my three training partners Midge, Dan and Bonnie.  Also in my Age Group was Dave Hirsch, who I've swam against a fair amount and he has beaten me by significant margins each time (in 2022 he was almost 4-minutes faster than me).  But he's had shoulder surgery and is likely not fully recovered as I swam faster than him in the 1.2-Mile Bay Swim earlier this year.

Rowdy Gaines, the three time gold medalist, sent us off.  And a controlled chaos soon ensued.  While I love this race, I do not like the 1st 100-150 yards.  First it's a mass start and I would say at least 2/3rds were there to go fast (whatever that means for each swimmer).  I basically kept my head up and navigated around swimmers and tried to avoid getting pushed into the docks on my right (blind) side.  That said, I experienced no significant drama and soon made the 90-degree left-hander  to the South and into the wind and a fair amount of chop right into us.

About 200 yards into the race I look over and I see Midge!  I can tell she sees me 2 and we start swimming next to each other.  It's a rough swim but we are likely getting a small tidal push (tide into the wind makes it choppier) and the first 500 passes in 7:51.  As we approach the 2nd turn buoy, I pick it up a bit and Midge follows not too far back.  The 2nd 500 is in 7:21(1:28/100).  We're moving!

As we head East, Midge pulls along side me and when we hit 1500 with a 8:19 500, she starts stretching it out.  Also, we were now into a modest tide against us.  I didn't think I should try to match her speed so I ducked in on her feet and was able to cruise along there for a good 500+ yards.  Our 4th 500 was our slowest at 9:02 (tide clearly having an impact).  Around this time, Hirsch came cruising past on someone else's feet and I made the relatively quick (and frankly bold) decision to bridge up and over to Dave's feet.  Thankfully this worked and I dropped in on Dave's feet.  Dave's a very strong swimmer, even with his on-going shoulder recovery, but his kick (while drastically better than mine) is much less pronounced than Midge's kick so it was a bit trickier to follow Dave.  The next two 500s at 8:28 and 7:27 per 100 I was either on Dave's feet or towards the end I was next to him after needing to avoid some other swimmer traffic.  At 2,100 yards (roughly half-way) I was at 34:21--a 68+ minute pace (vs. my 63:31 CR here).

As we headed to the final 4th turn buoy I decided to roll the dice and see if I could put some distance between Dave and I and I upped my swim cadence and I think we also were now getting a tidal push.  In any event, the 7th 500 passed in 7:11.  I did begin to slowly inch ahead of Dave.  At the 4th turn I was about 5-yards or so in front of him.

When I rounded the turn buoy, about 700-yards from the finish (and this is oh so familiar as I have swam this stretch probably 50 times in practice) I see three guys swimming abreast about 7-10 yards in front of me and I decide to try to bridge up to them and maybe break away from Dave.  I go to about 98% for about 15 seconds and I'm able to drop into their wide draft.  I eased back on my effort a little bit with this assist.  I looked back a couple of times for Dave but couldn't see him.  We were flying now and getting a nice push and we hit 4,000 yards with a 6:20 500 (1:16/100).  About 150 yards out I feel a bump to my right (blind) side and look over and see Dave!!!!  5-alarm fire! However, upon further review it wasn't him but a younger guy with the same wetsuit. 

I didn't know it wasn't Dave so I literally went 100% full-tilt. I could feel "Dave" falling behind and I hammered it all the way to the finish, even passing 3 other swimmers.  The last, what turned out to be, 122 yards went by at a 1:20/100 pace and this includes climbing up on a ladder and going about 10 feet to the timing mat.  I put in a pretty significant effort but I seemed to recover pretty quickly--much quicker than back in July with the 1.2-mile swim.  Anyways, here is how 2024 compares to my prior 4 races:

So, I'm very happy with this race.  It was my second fastest time but when adjusted for different course lengths (if you believe my Garmin is that accurate) this year was my fastest pace per 100, just slightly faster than 2022.  My percentiles were lower in 2024 than in 2022 and as I compare to specific people from 2022 to 2024 it does appear that 2024 was a faster course than 2022.  

None-the-less, I'll gladly take it!  I ended up being just a bit faster than Dave and Midge and I was also a few seconds ahead of Fabrizio for the 2nd race this year.  This is amazing to me because I train with Midge and Dan a lot and they are both better swimmers than I.  I think I just got lucky and also clearly had a good day for these two swim races this year.

Here are some other stats from the race:

July Monthly Training Totals

 Continuing in the theme of catching up--here is what July looked like versus the first 6 months of the year--first the Swim:

So, you can see in July I was able to get back on track after having to do a lot of travel in May/June to help my bother and mother after my Brother's car accident.  Went nearly 43,000/yds in July which is basically where I wanted to be at in July.  Unfortunately, missed a bunch of time in August, so this will drop down quite a bit again but at least I was able to climb to this level in July!

For the Bike another relatively low month and frankly, not nearly enough quality miles as well.  For me in mid-summer, I'm quite a ways off in fitness terms from where I have been in past summers--especially when I've been building for a fall Ironman.

As for my run/walk, I continue to plug along in the 25+ miles/week with no more than 8 miles run/week so far this year.  Not that much, but my new knee feels great and I'm thinking about pushing here in the fall and seeing if I can knock my 5k time down a bit more.....

I continue to de-emphasize PT/Weights but am planning to return in the October timeframe:

Finally, my overall training Tim, I've been in the low 90 hours/month since adopting my summer routine.  A lot of this drop off has been due to my PT deemphasis but also the drop in bike mileage has also played a role.   My swim/run time have remained steady to up over the last few months....

I'm certainly not in the best triathlon shape but I feel pretty good, I'm relatively lean and enjoying some modest success with my racing and generally enjoying my training and racing so all-in-all, I'm pretty content with where I'm at so far in 2024!

OK time to catch up a bit--First Update: Swim Race tomorrow!

 Ok, I'm way behind but now have the time to begin catching up!

Firstly, I'll highlight my next race which is the Cedar Island "5k" swim.  It really is more like an Iron distance swim of around 4,200 yards.  Here is a summary of the 4 prior times I've raced this race:

As you can see I have generally been improving relative to the field in this swim through the years.  It is a very competitive race with now 250ish people entered.  While I did not race last year due to a wedding I had a great race (for me) in 2022 swimming around the 70th %-tile overall and 80th in my Age Group.

I'm not in the same swim shape I was in August 22, when I was deep in my Kona prep but I hope to break 70 minutes this year and if I could get close to 65/66, I'd be thrilled.

Here is what the 2022 race looked like:

So it would seem last year was about 90 yards short of an Ironman swim.  This could be a function of buoy placements and my swim path but also due to inaccuracy in my Garmin (and the fact I've used different watches through the years.  In any event, the average distance I've recorded over these 4 swims has been 4,181 yds so pretty close to the 4,200 yards (2.4-miles) that I think of the race being:

MORE TO FOLLOW SHORTLY!

 

2024 Race #4/Mid-July Race Week Post #2/Major (for me) Swim Test

Tim Kerr Charities 1.2-mile Bay Swim,  July 13, 2024,  Avalon, NJ

Water Temp: 61 degrees/Surface Water was relatively calm

141 total swimmers.  25 in my 60-69 yo Male Age-Group--the largest of any Age-Group!

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Background

I have to confess.  This race meant more to me.  Not because it was some big prestigious race (although it's important to me).  Not because now I'm trying to be the best open water swimmer (I'm not, nor could I be).  

The reasons why start with my love of open-water swimming, especially with my 7-Mile Island Ladies Swim Team (of which I'm a proud invited member).  Further, I envision a life where I can swim like this (maybe shorter and slower) into my 80s, so races like this give me a chance to see where my swim fitness is at.  I think it's important to apply relevant yardsticks to things that are important to you--keeps you on your toes (or in your wetsuit, in this case).

Leading up to this race, my swim this year has been generally poor, and also more inconsistent than I remember.  My volume hadn't been that much (although I did my biggest week, +30%, the week before this race) and I think the shift of focus to rehabbing my knee and reestablishing a modest ability to run has shifted the focus away from both my swim and bike.  In my first triathlon, I had a 750-meter swim where I was about 20-seconds slower/mile then past races/my expectations.

During the summer, my best gauge of my swim fitness are my 3 or so 2,000-4,200 open-water swims with my team mates each week.  All of this swimming together breeds familiarity and when our abilities are closely matched we really push each other from time to time--not always of-course, but frequently we do!  Through this I have ready, 3X/week feedback on where my swim is at.  Those comparisons were also not good.

So, the consensus feedback was not good.  I hoped that my recent bump in volume and a couple of good days I had in the week prior to the race might indicate that I was capable of a breakout performance, but the betting odds against that would have been large.

The Race

This race is put on by race director Midge Kerr as part of the Kerr Family Charities.  It's a 1.2-mile open-water Bay (inter-coastal) swim in Avalon, NJ.  It is essentially three sides of a rectangle that starts around 21st Street and finishes at the Avalon Yacht Club.  This race is part of a 4 race series of competitive swims over the summer that Midge produces.  They are all great events.

Midge sets the time of the race each year to benefit from the natural tidal currents that predictably flow through the race course.  Of course, you can't predict the exact tidal benefit and in practice it varies quite a bit from year to year. 

This was to be the 6th time for this event, and amazingly, the 6th time in a row, even through CoVid (outside events ok with masks!).  The race is very popular and Midge limits sign-ups such that there has been a de-facto limit of about 150 swimmers.

My objectives for this race were all centered around turning in a performance that comparatively indicated that my swim fitness was solid, where I would expect it to be, and that my triathlon swim earlier this year was something of a fluke, or at least before I got into good swim shape.  Given that, I wanted to look at the following comparisons:

        1. My overall place, relative to the field as a whole

        2. My Age Group place 

        3. How I compared against the top swimmers who swim in the race each year

        4. How I compared to Dan Fabrizio, who is one of my frequent training partners and who, from a historical race performance perspective, is one of my most closest matched competitors.  Dan is a good swimmer.  He was a lifeguard in his earlier years and is 5 years younger than me.

Here is what the race course looks like:

So you can see that its pretty simple with just two left turns to navigate.  The numbers indicate 500-yd segments....

So here is how it came down:

Dan was in front of me 3-4 people as we lined up for the traditional time trial start (vs. a mass start).  I figured I would start 5 or so seconds after him.  However, when he jumped in there was some confusion as someone swam up and wanted to get on the dock.  The net of this was my swim start was delayed (as it turned out I started about 20-21 seconds after Dan, although that fact would seem to elude me during this race.)

When it was my turn I jumped in and was immediately impressed at how cold the water was.  Turned out it averaged 61 degrees, which is a bit of shock after being in 85-degree sunshine with a wetsuit on!  I could see where Dan was (I know his wetsuit) and was surprised to see that he had veered left--out into the channel (above my red line at the start) and I immediately thought this was a tactical error as I hugged the straighter more direct line by the docks.  I also immediately noticed that I felt great and I decided to ramp it up much more quickly than I normally do in a longer open-water swim race.  In the first 10 seconds I concluded that my competitor was making a mistake and that I felt great--I was pumped and really started pushing it.

Very quickly, probably just half-way to the first left turn (200 yards or so) I had pulled even with Dan.  To my further advantage, we are both left-side breathers, so I saw him but he couldn't see me.  Looking ahead I could see that Dan's line was much more crowded from early starters than my line.  What's not to like about this scenario?  I could literally feel the confidence surge through my body.

As we hit the first turn I veered wide around a mass of folks hung up on the turn.  I knew that Dan would have to swim through that.  As I rounded the buoy I really upped my pace and after about 50 yards looked back and could see that I had opened up a nice gap to all behind me.  As I looked ahead, I could see I was 50-100 yards behind the next swimmer s so I was in no-man's land and just decided to focus in and swim as strong, but comfortably as I could.  I hit the first 500 in 7:55, which was a 1:35/100 pace.  As I looked at my Garmin and registered this, it was just another piece of really great news as the first section of the race course has little tidal help so I knew I was back down near 1:30/100, which is what good looks like for me!

After a bit I looked back and I could see one swimmer had separated from the pack and was now chasing me down--yep it was Dan.  He was about 20 yards back but he seemed to be tracking on me.

The next 500 went by in 6:31 (1:18/100) as the tidal push began to kick in.  I could tell Dan was closing on me but I felt very good with what was going on and shortly after the 2nd, and lazy 2nd left turn I hit the 3rd 500 in 6:07 (1:13/100).

It was also about this time that I felt Dan's hands hitting my feet and indeed we would hit each other many times over the last 600 yards or so.  I kept looking back trying to keep Dan behind me but the reality (in my opinion) is that he is a better swimmer than me and finally he was able to go right of me (by the docks) and come up even with me.

This was both a negative and a positive.  As I mentioned, we both breathe on the left so now he could see me and I couldn't see him--a real negative.  However, the course subtly turns to the left so I knew I could try to keep forcing him right and maybe he would have to relent to avoid swimming into the docks.  This meant that we bumped into each other many (30+) times.  I have to confess there were a few f-bombs dropped during this.

Finally, about where it says "Cornell Harbor" on the above map I decided to cede the lead to him and jumped on his feet.  I was absolutely 100% critical at this point--I could not go any faster and I gambled that I could stay on his feet to the end and then get up the ladder after him and cross the timing mat within the 5 seconds that I thought I needed to stay within (really 20 but I didn't know that). I went through the 4th 500 in 5:46 (1:09/100).

The last 100 yards were pure agony but then we reached the dock and I slammed right up behind Dan as he climbed out and I followed quickly behind him and passed the timing mat probably 2-3 seconds behind him. Here I am on the dock, absolutely gasping for air:

So I ended up beating Dan by about 18 seconds and further I managed to finish 2nd out of the 25 guys in the 60-69 YO age-group:

Here is a summary of my 6 races in this event through the years including how I've compared vs. Dan (won 3 of 5 years) and Sotire (another one of my training partners):

So you can see (if you study the chart for a few seconds) that this was a really strong race for me.  Further, I was about 8% faster than last year and the top swimmers in both years averaged more like 6% faster, so I even gained relative to the tip of the spear...

I'm elated with this race.  So fun.  Epic battle. And despite all my focus on rebuilding my legs post knee replacement, I can still swim!

Onwards and upwards!

PS--isn't crazy there were so many old guys in this race!  Largest Age Group!

MId-July Duo Race Week Post #1

Ok, this first blog post on last week is to just summarize my training volume.  Post 2 will be on the 1.2-mile open water swim race and Post 3 on the Sprint Triathlon I did this past weekend.  Without getting into any details, I had a great racing weekend--at least in my opinion---check back over the next couple of days for my breakdown of those two events.

Back on the training front, with a Saturday LC open-water swim and a Sunday Sprint Triathlon, I elected to back off just a bit Thursday-Sunday, training -wise.  Specifically,  I didn't swim on Th/F and really dialed back my bike on F/S as well as just did easy, short walks on F/S.  Here is how the week's training volume shook out as a result:

Swim: 7,300 yards.  While I missed one swim and a second (Sprint Triathlon) was really short, I still hit a pretty solid swim volume number.  Today is 7/15, and I already have more swim volume in July then I did in May/June.  July will likely be my biggest swim training month in 2024.....

Bike: 186.4 miles.  This is about 50 miles too low given where I'm at fitness wise but reflects the mini-taper I did above.  I plan to heavy up on my bike volume this week....

Run/walk: 26.6 miles.  Pretty solid week distance-wise although with the triathlon on Sunday, I elected to do no running prior to the race this week, so with the exception of the 5k I raced yesterday, this was all walking.

PT/Other: 25 minutes.  Just did a short stretching session--continuing to deemphasize this aspect of my training and will continue to do so until October/November.

Total Training Time: 20:57.  I actually trained a bit more Mon-Wed but backed off as I outlined above in the back half of the week.  I may (40%) do a swim-race this Saturday but even if I do, I plan to bump my training time up into the mid 20s this week.

Anyways, super-pumped with how things are going this year.  I've raced 5 times this year at this point (2 Tris, 2 Runs, 1 Swim) and all of them have been really strong given what I was trying to achieve!  Details on race 4, a 1.2-mile open water swim race up next!

Last week and its time to race!

 Last week was my largest swim week as I registered 12,920 yards (prior largest was 10,000 yards), so that was a big jump.  Felt good throughout and am seeing some signs of progress in terms of my swim fitness.

My bike was low as this was 4th of July week and I was focused on spending time with the family--173 miles this week.  My run came it at 25 miles and my total training time in right on 21 hours--pretty modest week but given the holidays, a good place-holding week on the run/bike, with some good progress on the swim.

Tomorrow (Sat 7/13) is my first swim race of the year--a 1.2-mile open water swim and then on Sunday I'm toeing the line on my 2nd triathlon of the year--the Stone Harbor Triathlon...I'll be posting reports on these early next week! 

2024: Half-way Training Volume Update and Grades

With July making its debut, we are about half-way through 2024 (49.7% if you are measuring with days vs. months).  Here is a summary of my training volume to date as well as a general grade I've given my self for each of the activities so far in 2024:

SWIM         Grade: C-

My general volume goal was to get where I'm easily hitting 10k/week by July.  While, I don't feel that's a problem for me to do now, the reality is that my actual monthly volume has been quite a bit below that.  I was on track through April but with a lot of travel/life obligations (and cold water) my volume fell off quite a bit in May and only marginally recovered in June.

Beyond that, I'm quite a bit slower this year than I expected to be.  I've only had one triathlon and no swim races so my actual race data is limited but that race in May was about 20 sec/100yds slower than I've typically been at this point in the season.  I can also see that in my group swims (which are finally starting to ramp up) that I am relatively slower than my training partners so I know that one race was likely not a fluke--It's clear I'm slow so far this year.

I believe the causes are 1. lack of volume; 2. lack of intensity; 3. age; 4. mechanics(?).  I'm trying to address the first two (swam 3200 yds yesterday) and hope to see some improvement over the next couple of months, but I wouldn't be surprised to see this as a problem for the balance of 2024.  If it continues to be slow, I'll plan to put a focus on swimming in early 2025.

In the meantime, I give myself a C- grade on my swim.  Not very good at all but still good enough to get the job done in my only triathlon to date....

BIKE            Grade: B-

I'm generally targeting about 1,000 miles/month but have fallen short over the last two months.  The weeklong trip to Minnesota to help my mom and brother really impacted May.  June bounced back a bit but not nearly as much as I'd like.

I'm riding pretty well despite this lack of volume and I had a solid bike split in my only triathlon of the year to date.  I need to work harder on my bike, perhaps a bit more emphasis on intensity vs volume so the above volumes are not necessarily that bad.

Work to do and improvements to make.  I give myself a grade of B- for the year to date.

RUN/WALK            Grade: A

The most encouraging development of 2024 has been the progress of my run.  I'm now 18+ months out from my TKR and feel like my knee has settled into the "new normal".  My original goals for the year were to try to get to the point where I could run 2-3 times/week 2-3 miles at a time and have that be a very doable, enjoyable experience and then from a competition pov I wanted to break 30 minutes again for 5k.

I've been sub 29-minutes in my two open 5ks and I did a sub 31 for a 5k in my only triathlon of the season. More importantly, I'm now running a couple of times a weekend the last few times these have been 4-4.25 miles, which I cruise relatively easily at a low 10 minutes/mile pace.  I feel really good when I run and I have zero leg/knee issues--glorious!!!!

It may seem illogical that I'm giving myself an A grade for the element of the triathlon that I'm least competitive in but relative to my expectations at the beginning of the year, I'm way ahead of where I thought I would be.  The hard work I did in PT from October '23 through April this year is really paying off!  In fact, I still seem to be improving week to week, which at the age of 67, is not something I expected to experience again!

Note:  most of my run/walk mileage continues to be walking/trekking as my biggest run week so far is just 8 miles.  I've had in the back of my head a soft ceiling of 10 miles running a week, which seems like the right course for me to take now. 

PT/WEIGHTS                Grade: A

I'm also giving myself an A for my PT/weight work that really extends back to October.  Basically for about 7 months I've averaged about 20 hours/month devoted to this and it has really paid dividends!  My range of motion and flexibility for my new left knee is every bit as good as my original one on the right.

At this point, the rehab phase of my recovery is now officially over.  You can see the big fall-off in time I'm devoting to this training, especially in June.  Going forward, at least for the summer, I'd expect this metric to settle in around 5 hours/month.

TOTAL TRAINING TIME:              Grade: A-

I'm giving myself an A- for my training time investment.  The softness in swim and bike volume is the reason it's not an outright A.  Frankly, I was probably training too much through April as 120+ hours/month is probably too much for a 67-year old.  I remember thinking in April that I was at risk for developing serious over-training symptoms.

However, with training in the low-mid 90 hours the last two months, my body feels like it can readily absorb this load and that its high enough to keep me in the kind of fitness I want to maintain at this stage of my life.  I'd also note, that a big part of the fall-off in May/June is the roll back of my PT time.

I'm expecting a little more swim/bike time going forward and will continue too aim for 110-120 miles of run/walk per month and my guess is my training time the next couple of months will come in around 100 hours/month.

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All in all, I'm very pleased with how the season is unfolding.  After no racing in June, July will bring 3-4 races with 2 triathlons and 1 swim race already teed up.  Onwards and upwards!