Double workout? Of the multi sport variety

So two a days for me are nothing new, I mean I've done them in running, I've done them in cycling, I haven't done them in swimming nor would I really want to, let's be honest here.  But what I haven't done however is two a days that consist of back to back workouts in different disciplines.  This morning I figured it probably was as good a day as any other to get off my ass and go do a bike run workout.  It's been tough trying to juggle the single discipline races (Velocity SR, Mothers Day 10K, possibly something in the Calgary marathon weekend, Tour de Bow) as well as the big one (IMC) and I'll be quite honest, I've been piss poor at juggling my responsibilities.  To the point where I would almost say I'm not juggling them at all but rather just kinda tackling each one and hoping it will all come together.  Unfortunately that's really an awful way of going about it, so I started actually kinda following a plan for these two weeks to see how it would go.  Yesterday's swim was longer than originally scheduled by the plan, but Lisa thought up of a brilliant workout which will probably do me good.  Today's ride was supposed to be aerobic followed by another aerobic run

Sorry for the blurry picture but the workout was 2 sets of 20 repeats 30 seconds on 30 seconds rest at 120% of FTP power.  In a simple way that's essentially how many watts you can push for an hour.  So finished this, probably could've pushed a little bit harder but hey it was a good way to see how the legs would feel after a ride going into a run.

The run was then just a nice easy jog at around a 8'30 pace for 3 miles.  The cool thing was I was done both of these slightly after 7:30 in the morning.  What did you get up to this morning. 

I think I'm going to make a post about some foods that have started to become staples in my training, and the cool thing is this isn't even something that is only for those that are doing athletic pursuits, for example Muesli is a super easy breakfast that you can make and just chuck in the fridge and eat as necessary.

~Cheers

Finals Seasons? More like slacking season

Day 1:
Of finals season and its already not going great, I mean today it was a case of it being up and down.  The goal of these next two weeks is to hopefully do well on finals, but also set myself up for a couple solid weeks of training to springboard into race season.  I'll be posting a little bit more about that later. This morning I thought hey I have time to go do a swim so I should probably do a long swim right.  I always seem to find myself with my back against the wall with a giant swim plan staring down at me. Today's was a nice 3000 meter swim

1000m general warmup (500 swim, 300 kick, 200 pull)
It's kinda interesting because I still remember when I first started swimming and even something as short as 50m left me completely destroyed, but hey now I've managed to drag out the amount I can do before I feel absolutely spent.

This was followed by a kick pyramid that was meant to help improve my kick in my swim. Now the ironic thing is that coming from a cycling and running background, my kick should be really strong, but the weird thing is that my kick in my swim is probably not as strong as it should be given that I have relatively strong legs.  However doing 10x50's on a pyramid (1:10, 1:05, 1:00, 0:55, 0:50, 0:50, 0:55, 1:00, 1:05 and 1:10) left my legs completely done.  Like the 50's were bordering on me going full out for 50 seconds and just barely making it back to the wall and sometimes not even making it.  So this drill will probably become a staple of my workouts in the coming months to make sure that I'm keeping up the powerful kick.

The kick pyramid was followed by a set of pull intervals because I want to see if I can pull more water because I think the technique needs a little bit of work, but it should come with time.  I'm pretty sure if anyone saw me swim when I first started they would be appalled with how poorly I swam.  The intervals were done on 1:40 and that was pretty much pushing me to the limit, sometimes past it and it's definitely going to be a goal to hit the 1:40 times, but hey nobody ever said this was going to be easy right?

500m cool down..... that's all nothing more nothing less.

I have a lot of respect for pros in any type of sports, be it running, cycling, swimming etc, there's just something smooth about the way they go about stuff.  Like if you watch Kenyans run, they're just unbelievably good at what they do, and the same is for swimming.  I remember studying for an exam and just being horrendously distracted looking at swimmers because they just kinda glide through the water, one can aspire to be like them.

Hopefully I will get back to blogging again about how training is going, and update our race schedule, I think most of Jess' and I sched has been finalized so that should be going up soon.  I really should get back to studying.

~Cheers

Thoughts on cycling

Everyone has probably heard somewhere or someone talk about the benefits of cycling, what it does for your body, the environment, but there are some pretty compelling statistics health and environment aside why you should ride your bike more. 

If you have a chance, check out this TedX talk from Dr. Allen Lim who is actually one of the people that I really look up, just the thought process behind why he does stuff is amazing, and I'd be honored to have him as a coach, not even from a personal performance perspective, but just the way he goes about stuff.

But let's look at some crazy things. You bike as a kid, everyone bikes as a kit you lean on a trike, get a bike with training wheels and then some day you get them taken off and chances are you'll probably fall/crash.  You'll do that again when you get a road bike. 

Rant about parking

So here is a completely non-athletic related post, and I'll keep it short.  In Calgary we have that new Park Plus system that replaced the meters and now there are just zones and they're said to add about 20% of space I think is what the City claims.  The only problem is that people don't know how to park in these zones.  If you are the car at the front of the zone, please pull as far as forward as you can, if you're the last one, please park so that your car's tail is at the rear post.  This lets people park in the zone and have the number of cars it was meant to accommodate.  This morning I came upon a car that was parked smack dab in the middle of a two car zone..... and lo and behold you can't park there.  Sure it doesn't help that I drive a long truck, but common guys, learn how to park Calgary...... end rant.

I get the age old adage of function over form....

But I mean if the function is right on track, the form really shouldn't lag behind a whole lot but that doesn't seem to always be the case, I mean companies like Garmin have made some pretty big strides. For example their first triathlon watch was HUGE

I mean common, look at that thing..... it's MASSIVE.  So Garmin went away and came out with an improved version the next go around

But let's be honest here, this thing looks more or less the same, they did improve functionality as well as battery life.  The third time around their engineers actually go the message and they started to slim it down

The new one is on the left so you can see that it's definitely better.  So they're getting better at making a watch people will actually want to wear, because it doesn't really how great a product you have, if it looks like shite no one is going to wear it/use it.  The last go around, they've slimmed it down as much as they can and it actually looks pretty good, much like all of their current generation watches

Old, Newer, Newest.  So Garmin has done a really good job of making something that needs to be big at least reasonable, and the ones that don't need to big (the straight up running ones)

A big thanks to Ray over at DCrainmaker, who I'm pretty sure all of these pictures belong to him, at some point and time probably before someone tampered with the watermarking.

However Polar has just released a new watch this morning and holy crapola it looks AMAZING

Common Garmin why can't you make something with a little bit more red, or even blue if it doesn't fit with your color scheme.  I love black, and I lover silver, but would it kill you guys to put a bit more color into your produce, like make the Garmin lettering blue..... or something. Alright there's my rant, it's done, happy weekend guys.

~Cheers

One cannot ever have enough backpacks

So I like backpacks, and have a few different ones and each one has a little bit different purpose.  Like I have a small one that's a messenger bag for throwing a water bottle, magazines and maybe some food.  When I was biking into work though it was tough because to get a bag to fits all that you need (which is quite a bit) while not being bulky on your back so you look like a turtle.  The other thing that sucks when you have a messenger bag and it's just sliding around on your back (which is why they invented that cross strap to prevent that).  So this week Shimano threw their hat into the ring with a new range of bags that covers everything from mountain biking to commuting to a bag that will hold a hydration pack.

So here is where all the fancy marketing talk comes into play from the boys at Shimano, hopefully what they say will happen does happen because they talk a good game.  The idea behind all of their bags is that it's lightweight, it fits to your body well and there's no flappy stuff.  They call this ACCU3D technology, essentially what that means each part of the backpack is meant to mold to your back.  Anybody who has run with a backpack will know that what kills you is the fact that you've got something that's bouncing around on your back more than anything.

These are the blurbs describing each one directly from Shimano themselves

The ROKKO daypack is the ultimate all-rounder. Able to handle weekend rides in the hills as well as weekday jaunts in the city. This lightweight 12l daypack is hydration system ready and Shimano branded reservoirs will be separately available. 

The TSUKINIST collection – a blend of tsukin (Japanese for commuting) and cyclist- is designed to meet the bicycle commuter’s specific needs. These spacious bags (20l and 30l) with a breathable back panel are packed with smart features such as a separate padded laptop section, a Smartphone pocket on the shoulder strap and a bright colored rain cover

The OSAKA messenger bag is the perfect partner for any urban ride. Named after the metropolis that SHIMANO calls home, OSAKA messenger bags embody the lively, modern vibe of the city. The 25l and 35l messenger bags provide a streamlined and stable fit and feature a unique quick adjust system, a deluxe organizer panel and a padded laptop compartment.

The bag that I'm most excited for is the Osaka as well as the Tsukinst, mostly because I'm a huge fan of bags that have a million and one different compartmetns for throwing your crap into.  the Tsukinst is really good with that, so much so that you can even throw a pair of shoes into there

The Osaka is no different, still has those pockets as well as a padded area for your laptop

The other thing that's similar across the entire range of these bags it he material that they use to make it is a little bit stretchy, it is waterproof but lacking taped seems so water could still get through (on that note I wonder if you can manually tape seams).  They also have compression straps on the Tsukinst to make sure you can get it to fit snugly against you, while the Osaka has tabs for you to pull and adjust it.

The straps are still padded, and you even get a nice cross strap to prevent your bag from flailing about.

How much will this set me (you) back?
The Osaka will be available in 25L (~$125) and 35L (~$155) versions while the Tuskinst comes in two different sizes: 20L (~$125) and 30L (~$155)

I can't wait to see these bags on the market and may just have to get one for myself, they look gorgeous on or off the bike

~Cheers

An appropriate time for coke

So I don't really drink pop anymore, it's got a ton of sugar, and really the only thing that I can think of when I look at it is the obscene amount of sugar that's in there.  I remember when I was younger and playing badminton, we had a nutritionist that would come in year after year and tell us about how we should eat, why we shouldn't do certain things, but the biggest thing I ever took away from that was just how much sugar was in there.  You don't really realize how much sugar is in there until you just measure out in plain white sugar, then you kind of have a holy crap moment.  However with that being said and coke being awful for your body besides sugar, there does seem to be one really good time to have coke.

That time would be when you are completely zonked on a ride/run/athletic activity of some sort.  The amount of sugar, caffeine and fizzyness lets it hit your system in an instant which is great to get you back out on the road, make sure you eat some actual food with it so that you won't just get a huge sugar rush and then just crash. Another way to help with this is to make a half and half mixture so that you dilute the sugar but still allow enough to hit your system to keep you going.

All of that however is really irrelevant if you actually remember to bring food on your ride (unlike what Brian and I did on yesterday's ride).  If you make sure you eat enough than you will never bonk and let's be honest that is much better than having to dump a crap ton of sugar in your body in a short amount of time, so be nice to your stomach, eat properly, don't drink coke unless you need to, your body will thank you.

Hope you guys are having an awesome week, happy riding/running/swimming.

~Cheers

It's been a while

So I know it's been a while since I last wrote on here (well really either Jess or I wrote on here) but we've been kinda busy with a crush of midterms that seems to have come quite a bit earlier than usual this year.  The worst thing is that I don't think it'll end any earlier, yay for classes that have two midterms.

So whats new with the two of us?

Well the major plan for training has started and it's been easing into it for her.  I've been trying to get my body up to fitness for probably the past 4 or so months.  Swimming is unbelievably hard, I have no idea how I actually was a reasonable swimmer as a kid because honestly it feels like some days I'm just a lead anvil in the pool.  Cycling is back on track after being without my bike for something like 2 months.  Trust me it's an awful feeling but I'm just glad that in the end they made everything right and I finally have my new bike.  Running has actually been non-existent, it's the thing that I'm worried least about but I really should get back into the habit of running more, just to make sure I still remember what it feels like to suffer out there on my feet. 

What do I have planned for the blog?

Well at the top of my list is a review for TrainerRoad, because it's going to be a HUGE factor in getting me ready for the first race of the year which is coming up in a little bit under 3 weeks.  What I can say is there should be more details coming up on that very soon. 

I've also got a pair of Vibrams that I picked up over New Years that I've been meaning to write a post about but really just haven't gotten around to it

Lastly I'm going to show you some pictures of my bike...... (hopefully before it has to go through another replacement, because I've honestly been trying to do this since the first bike I've had and it's really not work because I am now on....... number 3.

~Cheers

Keep warm and see where you're going

So chances are you've probably run during the night/early morning or still do.  Chances are also likely it's not particularly warm during these times.  The solution? a cap that has lights built in.  New Balance have done exactly that, and this is good because it should keep your head warm as well as let you see just exactly where you're going. The Tri-Viz hat is going to be a little bit heavier than your typical hat, but it's got four LED's to light your way.  During the winter it's also nice because you'll be able to see the patches of ice that are going to make you slip which isn't fun.

That hat will probably set you back around 30 bucks, but hey I'd give that to see where I'm going and not eat it on an early morning late evening run.

~Cheers

You know how people say mind over matter?

Well there's probably a pretty good chance that that's true.  I know it sounds kinda funny because you think well if my body can't do this, there's no way to will it to do it.  Well it started when I was thinking about how on earth I was going to tackle a super long 3.8km swim within a couple hours.  So I set out a plan to add 50 meters onto the consecutive distance I could do. 

Then I was talking to Lisa who has inadvertantly become my swim coach (among others) and she said 150's? Don't do that, those are shit distances (her exact words, I kid you not).  She said do 200's.  The first thought that went through my mind.... 200's are double what I can do right now in one go without feeling like I'm going to die.  So next day hopped into the pool and was already dreading having to do 200's (6 of them to be exact).  But just got going and you know what the funny thing was?  I actually kinda enjoyed the 200's and it was definitely a huge breakthrough workout.  This week I started doing 400's and didn't die as much as I though I would.  So here we are, at the end of January and I've reached my goal, then exceeded by quite a bit.  So what's the moral of the story, well set the bar higher than you think you can do it, but just by a bit.  Chance are you can do it and it's a whole lot less hard than you thought it would be.

~Cheers

Want to get a decent discount on a Garmin Forerunner

So it's the new years, and you probably have some sort of new years resolution, get fit, go run, race or something like that.  You've probably seen at races if you've been in them that hoards of people have Garmin's and everytime you pass the start line you hear everyone starting their watches and then when you hit the mile marker, everybody's watch makes kind of a chorus of auto lap sounds.  Well here's your best chance to get a Garmin for a decent chunk of change off.  If you purchase a Forerunner 210, or 610 with or without the heart rate monitors you can save 50 bucks.  You can also purchase the Forerunner 70 which is not gps-enabled but is actually pretty scarily accurate.

So that means you can get a running watch for around 150 bucks for GPS enabled ones (the 210, w/o HRM) or you can get the FR70 for around 70 bucks to track all your running and heart rate metrics.

Hit up the link here to get the form and all the details

~Cheers

P5....simply faster?

Cervelo is releasing a new bike in a couple days, it looks kinda sexy and HELLA fast

 

That is such a small frontal area

That is enough bike oggling to satisfy me, so nowwwwww back to work

~Cheers

How you take a picture of a freestanding bike

I've always wondered how some photographs get taken of bikes, because there's no bikestand behind them, or anything like that, it's like there is literally a bike that is freestanding there, much like this.

And I wondered well that's actually really amusing, there is nothing, well makes for an amazing picture.  However then I stumbled on a really amusing picture.

So that's how it's done, well there's a little bit of a chuckle for you to get you over the mid week hump

~Cheers

A new and brilliant way to put on screen protectors

So if any of you guys have put screen protectors on anything you know it is a giant PITA (pain in the ass).  Thankfully some brilliant individual somewhere at PureGear has put these on and realized our frustrations, and has created this new application system.  It's called the Pure-Tek Roll-On Screen Shield Kit. 

If you've ever put one on you'll know that dust can magically appear on your screen you can have a nice clean screen and then a little hair of dust flips you the bird and slips under your screen.  Or you get this air bubble underneath and you think "oh yeah I can massage it out.... no problem".  In reality chances are you'll probably make an even bigger mess of it. Or lets say the screen applicator gods smile upon you and bless you with no dust, and no air bubbles. You'll probably have it slightly off line. It's one of those, there are three, you can pick two: Clean applicaiton, no air bubbles, perfectly aligned. 

So this is where this roller thing comes in, you clean your phone, put it in the tray of the packaging, follow instructions, roll on protector, perfectly aligned, no bubbles, no dust, VOILA.

So how much would this magical thing cost you? 20 bucks.  That's actually even cheaper than some other screen protectors that are much harder to install than this one, check out their website here.

~Cheers

Why sponsorship makes sense in cycling

So for any of you guys who follow some professional sports such as football over in Europe or cycling or the likes you often see that there is some kind of sponsorship going on.  In cycling, it is pretty much completely funded/run by sponsorship money and in the past few years there's been a little bit of a crisis in terms of sponsorship. I think a lot of companies think that sponsorship isn't worth it but I have a little bit of a story from my recent travels to Mexico.

There are two pretty big teams in cycling right now, one is at the world tour (essentially the first division) called Movistar.  There's also a second one that's at the professional continental level (kinda a devision 2) called Europcar.  Now both of these are title sponsors and if you watch cycling you hear about them or see them at the races. 

So when we got down there lo and behold what did I see? A Europcar storefront for renting cars.  And I mean I didn't rent a car there but because of the brand recognition, if I had to I'd probably go with them if I didn't see anyone else I knew like Hertz or Budget. I kinda knew that Europcar was pretty big on car rentals down in the Carribean, South America, Mexico region so it wasn't a huge surprise. 

Movistar on the other hand, I knew nothing about, what they were, where they were based, what were big markets.  But when I saw hey they do cellphones, it'd probably be the first one I go for.  Once again because I recognize it, and if they're sponsoring a pro level cycling team, they're probably at the very least a little bit dependable.  

Now I'm not a fan of either of these teams, but I see them when I watch races.  And chances are you'll probably see them too if you watch, so the thing that companies have to realize is that your sponsorship goes a lot farther than just your own fans, it goes to pretty much anyone who follows cycling so the rate of return ends up being quite high, and you reach a global audience. Because I see them, and even though I may know nothing about them, just the fact that you've seen it before can be a motivation enough to go with that company. 

Hopefully companies will understand this and see the value in it, and maybe we'll stop having problems with teams folding (like the Women's teams) or even pro teams that just suddenly have sponsors disappear. 

~Cheers

What's in store for 2012?

So now that the new year is almost a week old, what is in the cards for Jess and I in the new year?

Well I think this year I'm not going to be running any marathons, mostly because I think it'll put other training too far back, so I'm probably going to be just running 10k's and maybe a half marathon, but I think I'll just work on some speed work, because I'll need that for 2013, where I have another target coming up

Jess and I should start our training in earnest next week, I've just been running lots this week and I'll be honest I really do enjoy running, and I haven't noticed how much I miss it since I stopped.  While I was down in Mexico I went to go do beach intervals, which are surprising if you think about it. I ran for .1 mile, but I could be totally gassed doing such short intervals, you just have to push harder.  As for people who are always wanting that little bit extra speed, intervals are a great way to add extra speed for what is essentially a little bit of work.  Just make sure you give yourself enough rest.

Running on ice/hard packed snow is actually surprisingly fun because you have enough traction on your feet, but if you push off a wee bit harder your feet will slide a little bit, it's a lot of fun.

I will definitely need to start swimming lots more because that is definitely my week point, but it's super hard because I always feel like I'm going to die any minute if I don't get a little bit more air.  So I'll keep you posted on my flounderings in the water

Cycling is going to need a lot more work than it did last year, and so far it's not looking good mostly because I've been bikeless for the past month now, and it doesn't look like my bike will be coming anytime soon, so here's to praying that my bike will come soon so I can start getting in the base miles, otherwise the first few months are going to suck....MAJORLY.  Speaking of which I have a team camp in May which should be interesting because it's going to be the most mileage I'll have ever done.

That's about it, we might do some shorter races, a tune up race before IMC but it looks like it's going to be a lot of training this year.

~Cheers

Another Year.....so what?

So another year has come and gone, and 2012 should bring some pretty sweet happenings for Jess and I.  Mostly because we're going to be going to Penticton at the end of August for a pretty big race and I'm not going to lie, I'm a hundred percent scared. But lets do a look back at the year past first and what happened.

At the beginning of the year, the plan was for Jess to run the Calgary Marathon with me.  Unfortunately injuries hit and that plan got derailed for her, but no matter I would push through.  It would turn out to be a faster time than last year (by 30 minutes) but I'm always going to wonder what could've been on that day had I not been feeling crappy and sick.  You're always left with what ifs, could haves if a performance doesn't have everything come together like it should.  I'm happy that I shaved a certain amount of time off and I felt fresh, so I would go and target San Francisco 8 weeks later.

During the summer I managed to put in some consistent training and you really do feel the difference when you put in solid consistent training.  I think I'll try to do consistent two a days when I get back to strict running, and none of this swimming biking running malarky.  But then I went down to San Francisco to run the marathon there.  I have to say there are very few things that I can think of that I dislike more than having to drag my ass out of bed to go race........at 4 in the morning. It was still pitch black when I walked out the door, and probably for the first hour of the race, cool thing was that I got to run across the entire golden gate bridge on the road (although I probably got a little bit too excited here and this is where the marathon goals started falling apart.  I had a lot of fun on possibly the worlds hilliest course, but honestly at the end I was just done I had nothing left in me.

After that I put in some decent time on the bike, I wish I could've done more but you have to juggle everything.  Hopefully I'll be able to build on what I did last year, and put forward a good solid 4 months before I head off to team camp which should be kinda interesting.

In the last four months of the year, I picked up floundering, and honestly I was just hoping to build up as much of a base as possible so that when I start swimming again I won't have to go through that process again.  I'll be quite honest I'm poor at swimming (at best) so that's going to be the biggest obstacle between me and a successful finish at ironman.

So that's pretty much all I did athletically this year, I'll post one later on this week about goals/targets for this year.  Thanks for reading again.

~Cheers