The Road to Kona

Nice!

admin — Sun, 13 May 2012 19:03:13 +0000

Had a nice run today. I had assumed the weekend would be a wash-out because we had guests. However they left early today so the chance arose for a run; I took it. I ran the Ursvik 10k loop at a moderately impressive 44:45. Felt good throughout and now have a little more confidence in my running. I am way off track with my plans for the year though…
Not sure what I’ll get done tonight. I’d like to get out on the bike but don’t see it happening.

Three Days

admin — Thu, 10 May 2012 11:35:10 +0000

I didn’t get out on the bike on Monday but the chance arose on Tuesday. I reluctantly headed out from work at 4 o’clock and headed for my usual three churches lap. The wind was up, the average speed was down and I didn’t feel all that well. I battled with the wind and my mind for the guts of three hours to arrive home exhausted, tired and somewhat demoralised. 82km @ 28,6km/h.
Wednesday was a little better if not a little rushed. Family time ate into my training time so I ended up driving to the track – something that I don’t want to make a habit of. Once there I did 15×400 on 2:00. Most were in 1:21 with one at 1:19, some at 1:20 and one in 1:22. Happy with the pace considering my legs felt heavy from Monday’s ride.
Last but not least -well, actually it is the least- I did a 36 minute lunchtime swim: 10 minutes steady crawl, 8×33 kick/66 crawl, 10 minutes as 33m Hard / 8 seconds rest.

Now – the question remains; will I get on the bike trainer tonight?

Same again…

admin — Mon, 07 May 2012 11:44:57 +0000

…and by that, I mean a catch up post.

My last entry was after a 15×400 track set. Since then I did a little training and a lot of ‘resting’. Went swimming as planned on Thursday and did the planned set: 400 w/u, 50-100-150-300-150-100-50. Did the pyramid two full times and got to 300 on the third set. Backed up and ended the week with the Sollentuna hill interval set. 5 laps sitting except for the last lap. Lap times were 4:25,4:32,4:44,4:47,4:42. Room for improvement from both a speed and consistency point ov view. See next week what we get.
The weekend was the usual family affair with the hope for an opportunity to train. This weekend’s excuse was the fact that we had guests on Saturday.

I started the week with a short lunchtime run: 36:13, 8,11km, 4:27/km, 149 av. HR.
I might get out on the bike for 2 hours tonight… I also might not!

Track Set

admin — Wed, 02 May 2012 22:05:13 +0000

Hit the track tonight. Headed out the door at eight o’clock with no real plan other than to be at the track. I didn’t feel a running groove on the way down so I took an easy option and decided to run a set of 400s. After running three pretty conservatively I decided I’d go for fifteen.set was:
15×400 on 2:00
Splits were 1:20, 13×1:24, 1:16
Very happy with my pacing and my fitness; I found the set very easy. Next week I’ll keep the same pace and try 20. Then I’ll try to get the speed up a little. I’d like to be in the 1:18 region this year.

Tomorrow is swimming and perhaps something else if I get the time. Friday will be two bike rides. One fast one during lunch and a longer one after work. Then comes the weekend…

Catch up

admin — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:45:37 +0000

I got quite a bit of training done over the past few days.
29th: I got not on the bike for the three churches loop. First time on the road bike this year and it felt like it. My pulse was low but I couldn’t really get any more power into the pedals – this is a symptom of adaptation to the road bike. I’m hooping I’ll get a vast increase in speed over the next week or two.
75km, av speed 29,8km/h, av HR 136
Churches loop in 1:08@ 31,7km/h

30th: Swim 3,8km of steady swimming. I swam in the 2XU tri shorts and suspect and hope that they have a drag effect. My 100s were 3 seconds off my normal speed…

1st: Short spin on the bike with Magnus. 45km at a little under 28km/h. Better than the alternative, which was not going out at all.

This week -and weekend- I’ll throw a bit of quality work down. Also running needs to be bright back into the picture again. Like always, keeping three sports going is proving difficult.

Safer from Ninja attacks…

admin — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 19:09:29 +0000

…didn’t train in the traditional sense of the word today but did some Mr Miagi style Karate training that should protect me from the Sundbyberg Ninjas. Some may say that Sundbyberg doesn’t have a Ninja problem, but I would argue that this means that they are even more of a problem… they are so well trained that you never see them.

Anyway, rambling aside, I painted the fence – 6 hours of work.

One of Two

admin — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:21:48 +0000

First training session of the day complete – and it didn’t go as well as I hoped. We were supposed to do a fast 60 minute loop on te bike and headed out at 11:00 to do just that. One wrong turn, a close call with my face meeting the road and 1:28 later we arrived home totaly depleted of energy. Last tiem either of us had any food was 07:30 and the pace showed the effect of this.
Data for the ride was : 41km in 1:28 @ 27,6km/h
Swim set for tonight looks tough. 10min w/u then 50-100-150-200 etc… for 48 minutes.

#####

Skipped it. Decided to sleep instead… Should be doing so in 4 minutes!

30 Minutes

admin — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 19:41:23 +0000

I don’t usually consider registering a training set unless it is at least 40 minutes long. This rule is applied with one or two exceptions. The first one is my semi-regular Kista 30 minute swim loop. It is only 30 minutes and I count it because I believe it counts!
The format is as follows:
10 minutes – Stead swimming. Focus on and experiment with technique.
12 minutes – 6 x (33m Kick, 66m Easy Controlled Crawl)
8 minutes – Steady->Mod-Hard Crawl.
All non-stop.
I have no actual data to say that this set works, however I feel like I have done something great after it; for the moment, that’s enough for me.

Sore

admin — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 10:51:09 +0000

Feeling quite stiff today. I’ll skip everything except swimming tonight.
Here is the plan:
Repeat 100s as follows…
#1: Acceleration
#2: Threshold, with one loop per length
#3: Threshold, with one touchdown per length
#4: Just Threshold
21:10-21:25 med 30 rest
21:25-21:40 med 20 rest
21:40-21:55 med 10 rest
Should be ok!

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Swim done. Bloody difficult. Tired.

Weekend Zero

admin — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 11:09:55 +0000

As is now becoming the norm, I had a zero training weekend. By Friday I had hit my minimum, so I was not too worried that the expected should happen. The next three weeks will -or should- show an increase in volume and a slight reduction in intensity. The plan is to try to get 6 hours a week, keeping the really hard stuff similar to what it is now. Once I can handle that, I’ll then start to add more intensity into the mix. The result should be a 6 hour week that pushes me to the limit but not over.

I started the week with a moderately hard turbo set: 5 min w/u followed by 6x(6 min hard, 2 min recovery). I think I managed to hold myself back enough not to ruin the week yet go hard enough to get a good 36 minutes of intensity. After frying myself a couple of weeks ago with the 2x(7×2) workout I’m beginning to think a PM may help indoors…

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Unplanned run tonight. Unplanned in two ways. Firstly, and least importantly, I didn’t really plan to run. Secondly, and more surprising, I absolutely did not, nor would not plan to do a 3x3km interval set. It was Fredrik’s choice though and that was what we did.
First set was @ 3:55/km
Second was @ 3:51/km
Final one was @ 3:47/km
These are the longest interval sets I have ever done and I’m now sitting in bed with my calf muscles loaded up with tiger balsam… There may be pain tomorrow.