Coming Together

    My new work schedule has me starting at 7:00 am, so my morning workouts are effectively over. There is no way I am getting up at 4:00 am to get in an hour on the bike before work. I miss my morning workouts though, and I liked being able to do two separate workouts a day. Now though, I can get in longer afternoon workouts without it cutting into my sleep any more than it already does. Tuesday, I hit the pool and swam 2-1/2 miles in 1 hour and 40 minutes, not too bad, and it was a good feeling swim. Thursday I was able to swim for 70 minutes, focusing on technique and skills, get home and cycle for an hour, also focusing on technique. Friday I had an epic swim, 1-1/2 miles in 55 minutes, which is my fastest swim to date, and it felt f'king great. I followed it with an hour on the bike doing a gearing/power pyramid: 20 minute warm up, then increasing one gear at a time 3 minutes hard, 1 minute easy, up 4 gears, then back down, for 2 sets. Saturday, my workout was forestalled by a medical call so I didn't get started til 8:30 in the evening. I did another pyramid set, followed by an intense core workout. This morning, awakened by my pager at 7:30 for another medical call that was cancelled the moment I got to the station, I was up early so figured it was a good morning for an endurance cycling workout. Two full hours of high cadence, decently high gears. An interesting point of cycling indoors; since there are no down hills, no coasting, just constant pedaling at a steady state cadence, 60 minutes is the rough equivalent of 90 minutes on the road. Another interesting point, and one I have tried to take advantage of over the last few months; doing two workouts, separated by a mere 12 hours or so, is actually very much like doing the same amount of time all at once. In other words, an evening ride of 1 hour, plus a morning ride of 2 hours give the body the similar benefits of riding 3 hours in one fell swoop.
    I am pushing my swimming and cycling up a few more notches lately. My swimming has had a few monumental leaps lately. One improvement has been my stroke count. Last year I was taking 16 strokes per length, I have shortened that to 12 to 13 strokes. That is a 20-25% increase in efficiency, which is huge. To break it down, that saves me roughly 210 strokes per mile, or 8 laps, or nearly 1/4 mile worth of energy expenditure. Swimming is all about efficiency. I am eager for the water at the Cove to warm up enough that I can resume my open water swimming, I will be interested to see how long it will take me to swim the 6 laps that will give me 3 miles. I think I may need to invest in a waterproof stop watch.
    My cycling, although at this point, nearly all indoors, has improved as well. I consistently pedal at a cadence of 88 to 92 rpms, which is a good, steady cadence. I am working on my power, which brings my cadence down a bit, but I need to be able to grind at lower gears for long periods in order to to fulfill the cycling leg and get off with enough juice to still run. It is slowly coming together. Slowly. If my knees hold out, I will be fine.

Recovery Sandals

    Recovery sandals. Weird concept? Or practical piece of gear? I have actually been putting some thought into this, as well as researching the pros and cons. I spend a lot of time on my feet. A  LOT  of time. My job has me standing and walking on concrete for a goodly portion of my 8 hour day, then to get off work and cycle or run, is a bit brutal on my 52 year old legs. I know my job slows my recovery time, and may very well limit my ability to train as hard as I need to. I know that my job very likely contributes to some of my knee and foot aches. Sure, I wear comfortable-ish shoes to work, but at the end of the day my feet and legs are tired and achy. I don't know if there is any way around this, but I do think there are ways to lessen the impact. I have been trying to come up with both comfortable work shoes, and good recovery sandals for post run/cycle/work. My research into recovery sandals has led me back to an icon from my hippie chick youth: Birkenstocks. Funny how things can go full circle. But in my research, along side the usual suspects like Nike, Adidas, and Under Armor, the name of that classic hippie sandal kept popping up. There were several extensive articles written by marathoner journalists who did test trials of the classic Arizona sandal, and the reports were glowing, to say the least. Last summer I was eyeballing sandals for work, since my work area is inclined to get rather warm in the heat of summer, but couldn't find any that I felt would have been comfortable for the standing and dashing about that I do. Why I never thought of Birkies I don't know. I was devoted to my first pair, back in the day, and rarely wore anything else. To this end, and for the sake of my feet, knees and legs, I do think that my next investment in gear will have to be a pair of Birkenstocks, because I know that recovery as well as just day to day maintenance and care of my body, is every bit as important as how hard I train. Hippie Chick, here I come.

Down Time, For a Day Anyway

    The last few weeks have been stressful at work. My first reaction is a desire to train extra hard to burn off the stress. This is actually counter productive, as I have found out. I have reached a point of exhaustion that has made me lose some of my motivation. To this end I have allowed myself to actually take all of yesterday off, and skip my long swim this morning. This does put me at war with myself, but I know it is for the best. I will do a bike to run session with some core work this evening, and tomorrow I plan on getting Joshua out on the road for my Silverton to Salem to Woodburn to Mount Angel run. I was hoping that the B.O.B. group (Butts On Bikes) would be doing a ride down at this end of the county, as they have done several times in the last month or so, but not this weekend. Oh well, that lets me go on my own schedule. I do know that if I want to ride with a clear conscience I need to hammer down on the chores today. But, as mentioned before, my motivation level is a bit low today. It is amazing just how much stress can effect energy levels. It is draining at a level that far out paces the fatigue I can feel from a hard workout. I have done so much over the last two years to reduce the stress in my life, and have been successful to a degree. I imagine that there is no way to rid myself of as much external stress as I would like to, these days work related stress is par for the course for the vast majority of the population. We all skirt around the fear that we will lose our job, so we do more and more, never asking for compensation. On the absolute plus side of the chaos at work, the biggest change for me will be my work schedule. Beginning monday I will work 7:00 to 3:30-ish. I am elated about this. Yes, I will miss my morning workouts, there is something gratifying (and slightly self-righteous) about getting up at 5:15 am to get in a pre-work training session. But now I will be able to get in some true endurance work on a near daily basis. I can get to the pool early enough to get in a long swim in the afternoon, instead of making a special trip on saturday. Now, if I want to swim saturday, I can make it just for fun and have my darling little grandson in the water with me. I will be able to take my bike with me to work and head straight out on the many excellent bike lanes in and around the Portland area instead of risking life and limb on the scenic though narrow, winding, log truck strewn country roads that I have in my neck of the woods. The same goes for running. My biggest problem with running is that there really is no safe place to run where I live, so I limit myself to the treadmill and occasional trail run. Also, once I get home I hate turning back around and leaving the house, my dogs give me very sad eyes when I do that. With the new schedule I can get in a good training session and still get home at a normal hour. Once the weather warms up I can only imagine the fabulous swims I will be able to get in at The Cove. Yes, the last few weeks have been stressful at work, and I imagine the stress will remain for a time yet, but at least I will have the benefit of being alone in the building for over an hour in the morning, and escaping early in the day. The positive far outweighs the negative. Now, if I want to get in my ride tomorrow, I need to get my shit in gear today. Yardwork here I come.

Practice Makes Perfect

    Thursday was another break through swim for me. It is no secret that I have struggled with my kick, and seem to sink like a stone. I have known that very likely, if I could find the absolute perfect alignment and balance, that I could at least address the "sinking" issue. Finally, on Thursday, I think I found the sweet spot. I swam 10 laps with the pull buoy and hand paddles as a warm up. Then, some strange urge made me decide to set aside the pull buoy, which has been my flotation crutch for a year and a half. I have used the wetsuit shorts as a means to keep my hips up and allow me to understand kick mechanics, and this let me learn a proper 2 beat kick, one beat for every arm stroke, but I still wasn't floating on my own. Also, the wetsuit shorts didn't give me the correct alignment because my back would start to ache after a mile or so. Not so very bueno. Anyhoo, back to the sudden urge to go float free. I kept the hand paddles, I didn't want to focus on anything but body alignment and kick. It worked. I am not sure how, or why I could manage to swim lap after lap without any of my previous floaty things, but I did. No, I did not swim fast, I intentionally swam at an easy pace, concentrating only on body alignment and kick. I didn't even count laps. After about 10 laps of swimming with the hand paddles I left them on the pool side and swam free of all accoutrements. I admit, it was not as easy-breezy as swimming with the pull buoy, it takes a lot more focus and concentration, but I know that is a practice issue. I am sure that anyone watching would have likely thought "Geez, she is soooo slow," but in my head I was having a jubilant party. This was such a milestone in my swimming that words cannot express just how fabulous it felt to finally feel like a Real Swimmer. I was absolutely elated! I know it is likely that I will never develop a strong kick, and honestly, I don't need to. As an endurance swimmer, and triathlete, the rule of thumb is that the legs do very little work, and are better left to draft behind the body, lessening drag, and lowering the energy expenditure. This is one reason I have focused so intensely on upper body strength in my swimming: less energy cost, and saving my legs for later in the race. Also, and this has been a justification for me to not have to swim without a flotation aid, is that my wetsuit makes me so buoyant that sinking legs are suddenly a non-issue.
    But I want to swim correctly, have good alignment, and a proper 2 beat kick. I always have wanted this, but was just so frustrated at my inability that I took the easy way out. Okay, maybe not easy, since I have spent a lot of hours, and a lot of miles focusing on form, strength, and endurance. Maybe that is just what I needed, the time to develop the other aspects to the point where it all, finally, clicked into place. I know the work is not over, it has barely begun. But now I am really eager to get back to the pool and continue to practice alignment, balance, streamlining, kick, and stroke technique. The best way to be a faster swimmer is to be an efficient swimmer. I am still looking ahead, and fretting a bit, about having to do a 5K swim in under 2-1/2 hours. I know I can do it, but I want to really and truly know I can do it well under the allotted time. That will be a huge stress relief, as well as another milestone. Practice makes perfect.

Never Enough Time

    I realized that I am letting my strength training slide a little bit. It is not easy finding the time to do all that needs doing. I am increasing the duration of my endurance workouts which seems to cut into my strength training time. In a few weeks my work schedule is likely changing to an early time frame, so I will get off work by 3:30 or 4:00. This will cut out my morning workouts, which kind of sucks, but on the plus side this will give me time to actually put in long workouts in the afternoons. I have been wondering just how I was going to start fitting in 2 to 3 hour bike rides, 1 to 2 hour runs, and 2 hour swims on a regular basis. Now I will have an extra hour or so every evening, so that may work out well. I will go from smaller workouts twice a day, to longer workouts once a day. So I will still likely be working out until 9:00 at night, just getting an earlier start. I am going to carry running gear with me to work, and throw my bike in the rig a few days so I can ride directly after work while the light is good and I am in town where there are safer routes for me to ride. Yes, I prefer riding in the country, but out my way there are no street lights, nothing remotely resembling a bike lane not even a shoulder to ride on, blind curves and hills, and plenty of logging trucks, dump trucks, and big 4 wheel drive trucks waiting to "accidentally" clip an unsuspecting cyclist. I do plan on hitting the back roads for my longer rides, the 50 to 100 mile rides I will be doing soon enough. But for now I will fit in shorter rides in town after work as often as possible, weather permitting. So much planning to do, so much time yet to be spent, it is mind boggling. And here I sit, wasting time on the computer when I could be working out!

Long Grind

    One aspect of training that I have begun implementing is one long, hard session in each discipline every week. Yesterday was swimming, today was cycling. Today was the Long Grind workout; slower cadence grinding a big gear to build muscle endurance. This is where I need to put in some serious time with my cycling. I can keep a high cadence in a lower gear, that is something I have worked hard on, high cadence. Now that I can keep a high cadence for a long time, I need to work on power. Hence, the Long Grind workout. This will be a once a week addition to my training regimen. Today was a solid 2 hours, I will build that to 3 hours soon enough, then four, then, well, you get the idea. Once again, "Power is work over time." I will say, my legs felt great. One beauty of the crappy weather we enjoy here in the beautiful Pacific Northwest is that there is no shame to indoor workouts. I have made great use of my roller stand all winter long, this has trained my legs to spin for long periods with very little pause. Hopefully this will translate to being able to spin long and hard once I am actually out on the roads again. Very soon I want to get out and do a 50 mile ride, I know I can do it easily enough, but I want to really push myself, and  mix up some fast easy spinning with some good, hard grinding. There are several cycling groups that do regular rides out this way, and I may try to hook up with them now and then, but I prefer to go solo. Solo, I have better control over how far and how fast I ride. In a group I am likely to let myself get too competitive and I don't think that is optimal at this point in the game. Neither is having to slow down for others, or be distracted by idle chit chat, or others needing to stop and pee. I will likely start with the same ride I did a number of times last summer: Silverton to Salem to Woodburn to Mount Angel to Silverton. It is a nice loop that is about 50 miles. There is also a bike route from Champoeg Park to Willamette Mission Park that I believe is about 50 miles. Those will be my short rides soon enough, as I start aiming to do Century rides every few weeks.
    As I look ahead at the time and distance I will be having to commit to, instead of feeling dread, I am feeling elation. One thing that is certain, I love training. I have never found anything I am so thrilled to commit time and energy to, except for when I was raising my children. This is how it should be, I am enjoying the journey. The outcome is not nearly as important to me as is the pure pleasure of the journey itself.

Long and Slow

    Yesterday was my long swim, 2.5 miles. I was not happy with my speed, I seemed to be swimming slower than usual. I blame it a bit on too big of a breakfast too close to my swim time. I will say, they were epic, gluten free, high protein pancakes topped with peanut butter and banana, so totally worth every excessive bite, but it was too much before a hard workout. All that aside, I swam slower than I wanted, but realized that if I couldn't go for speed, then I would work on technique, and power. "Power is work over time." The only way to get faster and stronger is to swim and swim and swim, all the while focusing intently on technique.
    As I swam I thought about the mindfulness of swimming. That is one thing I truly love about swimming, you have to remain mindful, and in the moment. You cannot let your mind wander too far afield. You can't zone out like you can while cycling and running. You have to remain conscious and conscientious of every stroke. When the mind wanders it is too easy to let technique falter, and that is an instant recipe for slowing, fatigue, and failure. Swimming makes me mindful of every nuance, or at least to attempt to be mindful of every nuance. Swimming is so much about subtle movements. It is far more tactile than running or cycling, as my body is totally enveloped in the medium I am moving through. At times I swim eyes nearly closed, feeling the water slide around my body, feeling the pressure against my arms and hands as I reach, grab, pull, and stroke my way through the water, whether it be at the pool or in The Cove. The moment I let myself become distracted by anything else I can feel my stroke become short and choppy, my body does not rotate as far, my rhythm begins to feel off, and the water feels somehow thicker. I think this is especially true on long swims, when the mind is more likely to stray, and fatigue becomes a more viable threat.
    Yesterday, despite feeling slow, I focused my energies on making every stroke count. I thought about my body alignment and position, and made a few subtle changes to help me streamline even more. The funny thing about making subtle changes, it can cause me to have to make changes elsewhere. Yesterday I was working on keeping my shoulders pressed down, this helps keep the body parallel to the surface of the water, but also makes the body ride just a little deeper underwater. This in turn made me have a little trouble rotating my head for breathing. It was a peculiar feeling, almost as if I were too submerged.
    I also swam several laps trying bilateral breathing, alternating which side I took a breath on. Honestly, this sucks. I have the damnedest time breathing on my left side, it makes me feel as if I am going to drown. I will try to make myself do this for a few laps every swim, but that is going to take a monumental effort. As I was heading out to the parking lot after, I did have a funny thought, one great thing about self coaching; when the coach tries to make me do something I really don't want to, I can tell the coach to "fuck off." I mean after all, what am I going to do, fire me?
    Despite being slow, it was a good, solid swim. I do need to work on speed, I need to be able to swim a 5K in less than 2.5 hours. I would prefer to be able to do it in 2 hours. All I need to be able to do is consistently swim a 40 (or less) minute mile. That is 35 laps in 40 minutes, I can, and have, done that often enough. I just need to be able to always do it.