The Team....

At a Christmas party yesterday someone told me that they enjoy reading this blog (and that I had inspired him to start working out, which is nice!) but that he couldn't quite work out who all the characters are, so I promised him this update - here goes.....

First, and most importantly, my lovely wife who puts up with all of my crap; supports my crazy training and is the most wonderful Mom to our two lovely daughters.    Ladies and gentlemen......  "She Who Must Be Obeyed" ("SWMBO"):

SWMBO - for anyone who is wondering, the name comes from the late John Mortimer's Rumpole of the Bailey books

Next up, of course, is "The Puppeteer" - my wonderful coach and all round good egg Stacey Richardson http://www.tristacey,com/ :

Finishing strong!



 Next up!    That would have to be "The Snitch" - fellow victim of The Puppeteer, friend and awesome short course triathlete.  She's heading to Nationals next year!  The name comes from her propensity for ratting me out to The Puppeteer if I don't train properly, eat a doughnut or otherwise stray from the path!

Get out of my way!

While on the subject of fellow victims and awesome triathletes, here's the recently introduced "Compass" looking far too happy as she competes at Ironman Florida a few weeks back:

Looking waaaaay too cool considering that she still has a full 26.2 mile marathon yet to run!

Now onto some the invaluable folk who help keep me running, both literally and figuratively.

First TRX expert, fitness trainer extraordinaire and good friend Kim....   The Dominatrix:  http://www.simplyfitraleigh.com/


She may look as if butter wouldn't melt....  but she can punish you!


OK, waaaay too many ladies, so next let's introduce the guy who keeps our bikes running and makes sure that they fit us properly....   Matt, "The Surgeon"....    http://www.carycyclesurgeon.com/

Sure he's not as cute as the rest of them, but he's cool!

Who else?   Oh yes, Holly....   "The Beast", who does deep tissue massege.  Unfortunately I don't have a picture, but you'll have to take my word for the fact that she's five foot nothing and about a hundred pounds of pure evil!   http://www.lavenderwillowmassage.com/

Finally, at least for now, the latest addition to the stable.....  "The Slut":

Love!.....



Introducing..... "The Compass"

OK, so it's been a while since I introduced a new charachter to the blog to join She Who Must Be Obeyed; The Puppeteer; The Snitch: The Dominatrix and The Beast (unless, of course, you count The Slut, but she's made of carbon and doesn't really count) so it's time to introduce......   ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls.....     her sense of direction and spatial awareness are legendary on several continents.....   I give to you......    wait for it.......   The Compass!

This is the first time that a blog character has come up with their own name.   I really didn't want to allow this too happen, but in this case "The Compass" is perfect!

The Compass is another one of The Puppeteer's athletes who, in real life, goes by Lindsay and, let's just say, she has quite the reputation for getting lost on rides and generally not being able to find her way out of a paper bag!    Other athletes quivver with fear when they hear that they have to ride with Lindsay.   Most pack extra food and a tent and the sensible ones bid goodbye to their loved ones knowing that they are going to be gone some time and that it may be weeks before they return.  Extra life insurance is advisable and sales of flares and GPS tracking events have skyrocketed locally.



The way The Compass sees life.....

 Well, the day finally had to come and on Sunday I was scheduled for a 2.5 hour ride with The Compass and The Snitch.   Being a sensible fellow, I volunteered to plan the route and ensured that it would commence at my house.   Somewhat surprisingly The Compass found the house with the aid of a GPS app on her phone and made it on time.   Her reputation was soon validated though when, after coming in for a chat before we set off. she was unable to find her way out of our kitchen!   Not a promising start....

Thankfully The Snitch and I were able to tie string to the back of the Compass' bike and prevent her from going too far off the beaten path and we enjoyed a nice (but chilly) forty plus mile ride around the north side of Falls Lake, up to Creedmoor and back before spending some time back in the kitchen chatting with SWMBO, drinking coffee and trying to warm-up!



The compass, smiling because (a) she's relieved to be back in the warm, and (b) she's completely incredulous that we completed the ride in less than three days and that no helicopter assistance was required.....

Joking aside, The Compass is a lot of fun and I hope that The Puppeteer schedules more joint workouts.   She's also an awesome athlete, having recently finished her first Ironman event in Florida!
Welcome to the blog Compass!

Where's My Tutu?

Step aside Vaslav Nijinsky; move over Rudolph Nureyev; get out of my way Mikhail Baryshnikov.....   there's a new sherif in town!

Our girls are very keen dancers and every year at around this time they have a parent participation day at the dance studio.....   and today was the day!   I went along to support our youngest daughter, but primarily to take a few photos and have a good laugh at SWMBO's expense but I was soon drawn into the class!   I was pleasantly surprised to find three other Dads in the same position.

No, not this position.....



This was basically a full lesson and it started with five minutes of really good stretching.  Needless to say most of the Moms were more flexible than tha Dads, but I think that I might have been the most flexible Dad.  It's not saying much, but score one for me!   It turned out to be a lot of fun and a good workout - there's no doubt that ballet is a serious athletic endeavor and I can see why it is becoming a popular cross-training option!

OK, so I didn't actually wear a tutu, but it was fun!   OK, actually it was fun apart from the part where SWMBO accidentally kicked me in the "unmentionables!

Just to prove I was there......

SWMBO working the pole bar!

The Simple Joy of Walking

As you might have read in a previous post, I tweaked something in my right calf during a track workout at UNC Chapel Hill about a week back.    It was pretty painful for a couple of days afterwards, but things have been loosening-up pretty nicely.   I managed an easy run on it on Saturday and all was fine except the hills.   Despite this, The Puppeteer has me taking things easy so that I can fully recover and has scheduled a couple of walks over the past few days to keep things loose (thankfully I don't feel it at all on the bike).

The weather has been beautiful - crisp and sunny - and I have really enjoyed just heading out for a walk - without any training goal, target pace or HR objective - something that I don't do very often.  

I have spent a lot of time on these walks just enjoying the scenery and feeling thankful that I can walk out of my door and pretty quickly be in rural Wake County or even in local neighborhoods and enjoying places like this:

The covered bridge in Barton's Creek - decked out for the holidays...



It's also amazing at how much more you notice when you slow down a little (and when all of the leaves are off the trees!).  I discovered a nice little trail system that I can make good use of - a series of short interconnected gravel paths through the woods:

Finally, in addition to our resident wild Tom Turkey, who is still hanging out and still chases me occasionally (see post from earlier this year) it's nice to see so much wildlife.   I see whitetail deer almost every time I run (and generally think of them as a pest because of the damage they cause in the yard).  I had an unusual encounter on Saturday though and can only assume it's because someone is feeding them....     As I was walking I could see four whitetails just off the road perhaps 100 yards ahead.  Two does and two juveniles.  I'm used to them either running off or watching cautiously as I pass by and was fully expecting "the usual treatment".  This time, however, all four started walking towards me as I approached.  I slowed down and, to be honest, became a little cautious as they got closer - even a doe can give you a pretty good butting if she chooses to!   It was pretty apparent though, that they were in fact being friendly and they came within literally just a couple of feet.  I might have been able to pet them if I tried.  Beautiful animals, even though they are a pest - just hope that they don't turn up in our back yard!

The best news of all is that my calf is feeling pretty good again and after my bike workout tomorrow and swim on Wednesday, I hope to be back to my scheduled run workout on Thursday.

Chain Whips, Cassettes, Gears, Cogs and Compasses...

Now that The Slut is here I'm converting my road bike back to a straight "roadie" by removing the aerobars and, possibly, making a few adjustments to stem length etc. over time.   I hope to start doing more climbimg and hill work, so I also decided to change the rear cassette to a 12/27.   For the uninitiated, the "cassette" is the set of gears on the rear wheel in a derailleur set-up and 12/27 refers to the number of teeth/cogs on the smallest and largest gear within the cassette.  By increasing the number of cogs on the biggest gear I will give myself a few extra options when contending with steeper gradients.

I also have my Zipp 808 race wheels currently without a cassette, so the plan was to buy a new 12/27 cassette; put it on the road bike and put the current road bike cassette onto the race wheels.

It was a fun little project that included degreasing/cleaning both the existing cassette and the chain.  Here are a few snaps....

SRAM PG 1070 12/27 arrives!



Ooooh!   Shiny!

The exisiting cassette before removal

Inserting the cassette removal tool

Chain whip and grips in opposite directions

It's off!



Building the 12/12



Looking good



On the bike

Cleaning the chain

Cleaning the old cassette

Cleaned-up and ready to reassemble on the 808

Ready to go

Zipp 808 with cassette installed - it looks fast!



Next step was to try out the new cassette during a killer one hour interval workout on the trainer yesterday - quite the sweatfest!   There were a few "clicks" on some of the gears, so will be making a few adjustments before taking it for a full 50 mile test ride on Sunday with The Snitch and a new character in the blog to be revealed soon.........   "The Compass"!   :-) 





Back in the Saddle..... and Right Back Out Again!

Since I did the Outer Banks Half Marathon in mid November I have been on a hiatus from serious training.  A few weeks of downtime; resting tired muscles and, yes, becoming a little slack on nutrition.

The plan was to start training on Dec 1st (Thursday), but work travel got in the way, so we delayed until this weekend.

Yesterday I went for a 32 mile ride on The Slut.   First longer ride on her and it felt pretty good.  I could tell that I hadn't done any longer rides for a while, but I was happy to be out on a sunny (but chilly) morning and to get some more "saddle time" to get the feel of riding the new bike.  The ride was scheduled by The Puppeteer as "easy/moderate", so I stayed "on the small ring" and kept high cadence over a rolling circuit around Falls Lake.   Also tried to spend as much time as possible on the aerobars.   It was pretty windy, so tough to make any judgements about how fast I am on The Slut, but I can say that I felt faster than when on my road bike when "cruising" at low effort/high cadence and that she also seems faster when free-wheeling and descending.  Fun!

This morning there was a group run workout scheduled at UNC in Chapel Hill.  Another chilly morning (judging by the way The Snitch was dressed you would think it was fifty below!) but The Puppeteer and coach Marisa Carter soon had everyone warming-up with some laps before we worked on wall drills and high strides as food for thought during the workout.

Scene of the crime...

After another few 400 M laps it was time for the drills.   200/600/1200 ladders with The Puppeteer leading and calling splits and Marisa videoing and looking at run gait.

The first 200 felt pretty good until I finished, when I could feel my right calf slightly.   Nothing to worry about - just keep going...    Unfortunately by the time I was about 300 m into the first 600 I knew that I was in trouble - my right calf felt like a brick!   I had to stop and walk in.   I stretched out a bit, but it was immediately clear that my day was done, so I had to watch as most of the others finished their sets.  

I'm bummed!   As I type this a few hours later it's still very sore and I'm limping pretty badly.  Ugh!   Not a good way to start the new training season!   Ice; compression gear and rest are the prescription.   Hopefully nothing too serious!

Post workout stretches....  The Puppeteer shows that she still has it despite recent foot surgery

Lili Fernandez stretching 'em out

I put this one in as it shows The Snitch gassing in the background while everyone else stretches!  :-)

That's better Snitch....   stretching with Marisa.   Nice gloves! 

Race Calendar 2012

Well next year is an Olympic year, but since (for some obscure reason) the British Olympic Committee seem to have favored Alistair Brownlee over me, I had to decide on some slighlty more local events!

    

I will write up my feelings about the 2011 season and my broader objectives for 2012 soon, but in the mean time, here's my provisional race calendar.   Things look a little different this year as I have had a rush of the blood to the head and decided that I would like to run a full 26.2 mile marathon next fall.   This means that I will focus on shorter (sprint and Olympic distance) triathlons earlier in the season before switching to a run focus later in the year.

March 18th.            Tobacco Road Half Marathon

April 7th.                Cary Duathlon (short course)

May 6th.                White Lake Sprint Triathlon (revenge for last year's debacle!)

June.                      Continue to look for a sprint tri.   
                              100 mile organised bike event.  Possibly Habitat for Humanity ride

July 14th.                Triangle Sprint Triathlon

August 4th.             Stumpy Point Olympic Triathlon

September 22nd.    Outer Banks Sprint Triathon

November 11th      Outer Banks Marathon

These races will, no doubt, be supplemented with various road races as dictated by The Puppeteer!

I'm looking forward to a great year and, with The Puppeteer's help, to continuing to improve my performances in 2012.  Target top 25% age group every event!

The Gobbler 5K 2011

Thanksgiving morning found us in Nags Head on the Outer Banks, which could mean only one thing....  time for the family to run the OBX Gobbler 5K, put on by the Outer Banks Running Club! 

I knew based on how the house was shaking overnight that it was going to be windy, but holy crap it was blowing hard!  The air temp was low 50s, but the wind chill made it feel much colder, so everyone layered-up and grabbed hats and gloves and delivered a large quantity of good natured whining about how they could have stayed in bed!   We met up with a bunch of friends at 7:30 am and headed over to the start area for an 8:00 am start. 

The Gobbler is in it's third year (we've managed to be at every one so far) and is very much a family friendly event that encourages walkers etc.   Timed race, but no timing chips - just a fun family morning with lots of coffee, hot chocolate, sausage biscuits and pumpkin bread!.  Never-the-less there are always some super fast people running in the 15 min range, and this year was no exception.   The field has grown to 600 and this year the race sold out about a month in advance.

Some of our assembled crew....   The Dominatrix and family also ran, but she was too fond of her bed and didn't make it to the start in time for the photo!

The race started pretty promptly at 8:00 am - no inflatable starting arch this year, as it would pretty soon have been heading out over the Atlantic somewhere!   I was going to run with my girls, but we had people running and walking at all sorts of paces, so after running with some of the gang at a very easy pace for the first half mile or so I deceided that I could stretch out a bit.   The course is essentially an "out and back" and was "with the wind" on the way out, but straight into a headwind on the way back.   I felt surprisingly good (I guess the two week training hiatus played a part!) and after running and chatting with Wolfgang (another triathlete) for a while I ran in alone at a nice comfortable pace.  I was very surprised, given that I had gone very slowly at the start and chatted along the way, that I crossed the line in 24:02.

They even had finishers medals this year!

We stayed a while afterwards for the raffle and some goodies before heading home to get ready for what we termed our "redneck waifs and strays turkey day dinner at the beach"....   five families and more food than you can imagine.  I say we earned it...   yum!

Ahhhh..... Rest!

I'm in the middle of a two week "time out" from training after my end-of-season half marathon last weekend and, I have to say, I'm enjoying re-charging my batteries a little before the madness starts again!

The Puppeteer preparing me for another season....

I met with The Puppeteer yesterday to go over race plans and objectives for mext year; off-season training and so on.  We are going to ramp-up the intensity a bit - great session and more on this later when plans are finalised.

So...   another week off ahead of me and it ties in nicely with the Thanksgiving Holiday.   I'm going to run the Nags Head Gobbler 5k on Thanksgiving morning, but will be doing it with the kids, so no stress there.  Will also hopefully go for a nice long (but leisurely) bike ride on the coast this week.

Hope I don't look like this when December first rolls around....

Race Report - Outer Banks Half Marathon

This was the race that got me back into "getting fit" a couple of years ago and, therefore, is indirectly responsible for getting me into this ridiculous triathlon thing!   Two years ago, when it was the first half marathon I had done for well over 20 years, I was happy to just finish in 2:19:39 - or 10:39 pace.  
Last year I finished in 2:11:33 - or 10:02 pace (I was coming off a pretty nasty cold for this one, and wasn't feeling my best)

Things have changed and I'm happy with my progression and that my aging legs are still up to the task....

This year my objective was to break the 2 hour mark (having run 2:02:xx at the Tobacco Trail Half Marathon back in March) and I'm pleased to be able to report that I ran a new personal best (at least, the best since I was in my twenties!) of 1:57:37 - or 8:59 pace.   I'm very happy!

At this rate if I keep running for another ten years I'll be running olympic qualifying times...  OK, maybe not!  :-)

SWMBO and the kids were tied-up this weekend with all sorts of "stuff" this weekend, so I drove to the coast on my own on Saturday morning and headed straight to the expo. and packet pick-up (I'm a bit paranoid about this stuff).  After spending an hour or so looking around and chatting I headed to some friends' house to watch some football and chill out for the afternoon.   Despite a nice offer to join them for a dinner out, I opted to stay in and cook for myself and was happy to be in bed and reading my book by around 9:30 pm.  I slept well!

The alarm went off at 4:10 am and, after getting dressed (remembered the Body Glide this time!) and gathering my stuff together, I had my now traditional race morning breakfast of 2 coffees; bagel with cream cheese; banana and one bottle of Ensure.   This seems to work, so I'm not changing it.

The OBX course is point-to-point and I elected to leave my car at the finish and catch the shuttle to the start.  I was soon parked at Manteo high school and enjoyed the sun rise over the ocean as we drove back over the causeway and in to Nags Head.

It was a mild morning (perhaps 50 degrees?) so I quickly dropped my gear bag off (to be collected at the finish); did some dynamic warm-ups and then went for an easy jog up and down the beach road to get loosened up.  Sometimes this feels like a bit of a chore, but this time I felt very good - no creaks!

I ran into my friends Liz and Michelle and chatted a while and also into Jon, an ex-collegue, and his wife.   Lots of pre-race banter!  OBX is a staggered start and, based on estimated finishig time provided when I registered I was placed in corral B, along with Jon and Liz.   The A corral went off promptly at 7:00 and two minutes later we were underway.

My race plan was to try to run even splits of around 8:45 to 9:00 pace and not to worry if the first mile was a bit slow based on the scrum at the start and getting my legs under me.   As it happened, I shouldn't have worried as my legs felt good and there was plenty of room.   I ran the first two miles with Liz (who was going to race using Jeff Galloway type run/walk intervals) and the splits were:   8:24    8:32

Definitely a little too fast, but I felt good that I had already got a minute or so "in the bank". 

Liz slowed to do her intervals and Jon joined me for about a mile and we deliberately slowed the pace before he left me at around mile 3.5.  The next three splits were:  8:43   8:47   8:47

Much better and nicely "on pace".

Form here on out I didn't run with or see anyone I knew.   I felt good as we ran through the Village at Nags Head and knew that I was still holding a sub 9 minute pace (you need to average 9:10 to break two hours).  I glanced at my Garmin occasionally but tried not to worry about it too much and to just enjoy myself.  the next three splits were:  8:56   8:51   8:59 - again, nicely even and within the target zone.   Took a gel at  mile five and would take another at mile ten.

Around mile nine I could feel myself tiring a bit and this is the point at which you cross the causeway and bridge on to Roanoke Island.  There was a reasonable wind from the SW, but it wasn't too much of an issue.  When I hit the bridge (the only significant hill on the course) I focused on keeping a fast cadence and was soon enjoying the view from the top.  The splits here were (as would be expected) a bit slower:  9:05  9:07  9:08, but I knew now that if I could keep the pace at sub 10:00 for the last few miles that I would break two hours.  Legs were tired by now, but I still felt good.  The last two full miles into the town of Manteo were 9:11 and 9:05 and I pushed a little of course at the finish line to 8:42.

Yeah!  I did it.   My Garmin said 01:57:37 and this was confirmed to the second in the official race results that were published later.   8:59 average pace for the race.

After chugging a Gatorade and some water and eating a protein bar, I enjoyed the finish line festivities and spent a while hanging out with Casey, Liz, Michelle and a bunch of other ladies while enjoying the free beer.   It was great to see downtown Manteo looking so good after it was hit so hard by Hurricane Irene recently.  A special shout out to Liz, who also broke the 2:00 barrier and to Meg, who rocked a 1:45 to finish third in her age group.  

Celebrating with Casey and Meg at the finish....   (Meg on beer seven out of about thirty!)

A fun day and a really well organised race as always.  A shout out to Jim Snyder and the guys at Outer Banks Sporting Events and a big thanks to the many volunteers.

....and a couple more photos (thanks Casey!)

Hanging with the Raleigh ladies

With Liz, Casey and Meg

Bike Fit!

I finally got some new Speedplay pedals for "The Slut" last weekend (that's the name SWMBO has given to my new Cannondale Slice 3 Ultegra for the many of you who probably don't read my drivel on a regular basis....) so now it was time to get properly fitted.

I called Matt Lodder - the Cary Cycle Surgeon http://carycyclesurgeon.com/Home.shtml and made an appointment for today.  Matt did a great job fitting me for my road bike back in February and is a wealth of knowledge about "all things Bikes".  I had absolutely no hesitation going back again for this one.

Fitting for a tri or time trial bike, where you (in theory at least) spend all of your time in a more aggressive "aero" position is a little different to being fitted for a road bike with a completely different frame geometry (this is 58 cm frame), but one thing that hasn't changed much this year though, is me!  I may have lost a few pounds and, hopefully, gained a little flexibility, but my "vital statistics" are basically the same, so this gave Matt a good head start over my last fitting, where he started by taking all sorts of body measurements and making me do all sorts of exercises on the floor!

After reviewing my (loose) goals and objectives for next year we got to work.  Here's The Slut set-up on the trainer in Matt's workshop and ready to go, with Matt about to make some starting adjustments.

First thing to look at was saddle height.   I knew that we had to take a litttle off the length of the seatpost based on a few quick test rides that I have taken.  Carbon framed tri bikes don't have "round" tubes, so there isn't limitless ability to simply slide the seat post up and down.   Soon enough I was holding my breath a little as Matt was cutting the seat post with a hacksaw blade specifically designed to cut carbon.

I'll spare you all of the details, but to cut a long story short, we spent the next 90 minutes playing with all sorts of adjustments and fine tuning until we had things right.   The seat was moved back on the seat post so as to create the correct relationship between my knee and the bottom bracket;  as a result the handlebar stem was shortened slightly (we might add back to this a little over time);  the aerobars were adjusted and so on.

Here's the result...    as you can see, I don't have the flexibility to ride in a very "flat back" position - I'm quite "rounded"  (OK, OK, I'm a freakin' hunchback!), but then again, so was Lance Armstrong relatively speaking and he seemed to manage OK!  There's a 6 cm drop from saddle to bars, which I guess is "respectable" for an old geezer like me.

Please note that that isn't my gut - it's a baggy tee shirt!

I can't wait to get The Slut out on the road and put her through her paces!