I've really come to appreciate a lot of the things that Gordo Byrn has to say. Gordo is a pro triathlete (3rd at IMC last hear) and finance guy who has become a real thought leader in the sport. His book, Going Long, is more-or-less The Bible of long course training. There are certainly other protocols out there, but ones similar to his are very common. The protocol I'm following is nearly textbook Gordo. I often wonder if other methods would have worked for me - e.g. more higher intensity work and less volume. My gut tells me no, simply because I don't think I would have been able to stay healthy and consistant if that was the case. In addition, I find that higher intensity work is much more mentally taxing than the lower-intensity higher-volume stuff. It doesn't take too many reps of doing something that's relatively short but very painful to start to have trouble motivating for it. Volume might not be as exhilerating, but it's also not as expensive.
Anyway, Gordo has a blog, either of his thoughts or as responses to the various reader questions he gets. About every other posting, I find something in there that really resonates with me. From today's post there were two things:
"Whether we are talking about weight loss, financial health, race fitness, or education -- we all overestimate what we can achieve in the short-term and underestimate what we can achieve in the long-term."
and
"Remember that our minds will always search for an EXTERNAL cause of the challenges that we face. Individuals that are able to make continual progress adjust their INTERNAL responses to external variables.
When I ask questions of my self/athletes/friends that are designed to help consider this point... the most common reply is absolute silence. There are very few times when we are open to considering change. Even when I have "known" that change was required, I have always tended towards trying "harder" within my existing patterns."
Both of these statements nicely button up both my past experiences and what I'm learning as I go along in life. I find it amazing how hard it is to push against your own (or others) biases, even when confronted with clear evidence that those biases may not be correct. It's much easier to rationalize why such facts to apply to you or to just ignore them altogether...
A few days ago I was bitching about Saturday's weather forecast. Late Friday night the weather report made it look like the real rain wouldn't start until noon or so. I had planned to switch my long day to Sunday, but decided to try to get my swim done early and then try to get most of my ride in before the weather got too bad. Deb and I got up early and swam in Greenlake, which worked well. I raced home and got my bike stuff together.
So I get everything ready and open the garage door just as it starts coming down hard. I stared at it for about 60 seconds and knew there was no way in hell I was going out there. It's one thing to get rained on half way through a ride, but leaving in it is much worse. Esp without a full rain setup. Mostly I'm still pretty PTSD from Jan/Feb/March still.
Anyway, I had 5 hours on the sched so I decided to see what I could get done on the CompuTrainer. No Media Center still, so I just put the music on shuffle and went at it.
Bike Protocol:
1hr easy
3x (45min 190-210w / 135bpm, 15 min cruise)
5x5min big gear > 230w
5x2 min standing
Remainder cruise
Run : 1 hour, whatever I can manage
So I shortened the 1hr easy to 30 mins just to get rolling. Fast forward 2 hours and I'm starting my third 45 minute set. My wattages for the sets were running low-to-mid 190s and I was hanging high 130s/low 140s on the HR but basically by this time i'm slumped over my aero bars contemplating barfing and/or crying. I'm completely serious here. I pushed through the 3rd set at 189w, then go through three of the big gear sets before I totally fell off a cliff. I'd gone through two sweat towels plus my shirt and a ton of calories and fluids. There was a lake forming on the mat under the bike. I was a mess.
I ended up doing 4:15 on the bike, but this is just a glaring example of how much harder CT is than outdoor riding. People always wonder why trainers are harder and have all these theories about mental stimulation, etc. Bullshit, it's just plain harder. Even with a fan, I think you do get some added heat stress. But by the numbers, this workout should have been cake for me (only ended up with a TSS of 200, last weeks ride was 300, IMAZ was 230), but that was possibly the hardest bike workout I've *EVER* done. I think I know why, too. I think when you're on the road you're constantly getting "micro-rest". That is, the little bit of your pedal stroke you soft pedal or little bit of downhill or tailwind or corner or whatever. But on the road you've got momentum and I think that's the difference. Trainers don't model momentum properly. If you're not putting watts on the spindle, you slow down quickly.
I got some more fluids and changed into some dry clothes and got out running with in 30 minutes or so. It was still raining pretty solid, but I really don't mind running in the rain. The run actually wasn't too bad. I didn't outrun any Kenyans, but I did OK. By the time I cooled down from my run and soaked in the bath a bit, I felt fine. I was pleased with how I bounced back, I guess that's 9 months of fitness talkin.
Afterwards, Deb and I went and grabbed some sushi, which has kind of become a post big-day tradition, at one of those conveyor belt sushi places that just opened up in Juanita. The only thing that could be better would be if that conveyor belt dropped the sushi straight into my mouth, alternated with miso soup, green tea, and Sapporo. That would be perfect.
So fortunately it looks like the weather for this weekend and the following week should be good. Oh, Deb and I signed up to be volunteers at Ironman Coeur d'Alene later this month. So I'll get to go back to Spokane and see the family and support some friends racing as well. Nice!