Diary of an Ironman 13 weeks to Kona

I have spent the first half of this week getting over the sore legs from the Gold Coast marathon last Sunday. I have been a bit flat.

I’ve managed to get in three one hour swims. I really like to keep the consistency going in the swim. Each swim made my legs feel better, but the times were still showing the effects of the marathon.

I’ve started building my bike hours. This week I’ve squeezed in nine hours of cycling. Culminating with a 100km time trial yesterday. This is the first of our time trials for this season. A chance to set a bench mark time on a new course. The general consensus after yesterday’s TT was, it’s an honest time trial course. It’s more undulating than our old course which has been closed to cyclists for road reconstruction.

It’s only a forty minute drive from home and it’s already country. The course is between the towns of Walloon and Rosewood. Basically redneck country. We were suprised at the amount of trafic in the area on a Sunday morning. We had no problems as the road is wide enough and the people out driving are generally church goers or horse people taking their horses off to do whatever they do with them.

I’ll get straight to the point. My wife spanked me in the time trial. She beat me by 1min 35sec.

No excuses, a spanking is a spanking. She hasn’t stopped grinning since. It’s not that bad, she’s one of the best cyclists in the world in her age group. In fact I’m happy for her, it’s been a good shot of confidence at the right time in her preparation for Hawaii. She was riding her new Felt time trial bike from Pedals Plus. She feels it’s faster than the borrowed P2C which she borrowed for her qualifying race in NZ. I’m happy it feels faster, it would be no good around here if it felt slower???

I messed up my time trial a bit. Firstly by not having enough fuel onboard (I underestimated how long it was going to be from leaving home to actually finishing the ride). Secondly, I paced it badly.  Girls are much better at pacing than the guys. I’m sure testosterone has a hand in this.

I was fooled by the power figures I have been producing on the windtrainer, into choosing too high a power output to time trial at over 100km. The figures I chose would have been fine for a 40km or 60km time trial. But I was left short of fuel and power over the last 40km.

We do these things to learn. Lessons which cause some pain are often the best learned lessons. Learning to use the Power Tap (from Pedals Plus) takes a little time. Learning from each outing can make the use of this tool much more effective. I was very close to estimating the correct levels to aim for. I possibly only missed it by 5%.

Overall it’s been a great week. I’ve recovered fairly well from the marathon. I’ve fitted in 3 x 1hr swims, 9hrs of cycling and one 30min run. I finish the week in good health.

Three of my athletes raced over the weekend. Pete Jacobs finished second in Roth in a new PB time of 8.02 and two of my on-line athletes from Ireland raced in the Swiss IM. Brian Heffernan finished in 9.54 and John Holland, finished in 12.38. These guys have to train in shocking conditions compared to us Queenslanders, we do have a beautiful climate for training in south east Queensland.

Yesterday at Walloon as we started out time trial it was six degrees c. and still conditions with a fog hanging around. This is mid winter and about one hour direct inland from the sea. By 10am we were in t-shirts and shorts. The Irish guys have often had to go out and train in 30-40kph winds, drizzling rain and 3-5 degrees c. By time they get to the start line, they have already done their Ironman.