Our first event, the Portsmouth Duathlon is Sunday.  Having received a very nice email from the organisers I was dismayed to read that I was required to register, collect my timing chip and rack my bike at 07:15am.

Now I don’t mind getting up early, and in fact during the week I get up at around 05:30am for work every day, but I fail to see what advantage there is to starting this event so early in the day.  Upon closer inspection of other events it appears that almost every triathlon race starts at the crack of dawn.

Perhaps this is so the lycra clad warriors do not scare the general public (who are sensibly still asleep at this time).  Perhaps it is because triathletes are essentially masochists, and getting up early is just another way to punish yourself.  Perhaps it is because a lot of events do not take place on closed roads, so starting early is a good way to avoid traffic issues.

Whatever it is it is too damn early.  

Rant over.  I am off to search out some triathlons that start in the afternoon.

So, its been a while since my last blog post, and the training is going well.

Am still really suffering with shin splints when I run, but despite this I have managed a record 5k, covered off a 10 mile run (all be it at a far from rapid pace) and pushed through the pain barrier on a 10k that I ran last week with Bushy.

Swimming is also going well, with a couple of 2k swims under my belt.  I am also loving the cycling, and seeing my average speed on the 40k plus rides slowly increase.

With only a week to go until my first event of the year, the Portsmouth Duathlon (5k run, 15k bike, 5k run) I have been sent over to Berlin for work.  I simply adore Berlin.  The city is amazing, the food (essentially consisting of bread, sausage and very very nice beer) suits my palate immensely and the weather here is superb.  All this is not going to have a very positive effect on my training though.

Still who cares?  The whole idea of this crazy Ironman adventure is to complete an Ironman race, not panic about missing training sessions and obsess over the fact that I am drinking too much high quality German lager, eating too many pretzels and doing absolutely no training what so ever.  Not to mention the shisha pipe (don’t tell my Mum).

So that’s that then.  No real training this week (am tapering for my event) and am making sure to load plenty of carbohydrates nice and early ahead of the Duathlon at the weekend.  All this is straight out of the Triathletes training manual and so fits in with my training plan perfectly as far as I can see.

Anyway gotta go now.  Have an afternoon of work to do, then may well venture out to sample a few steins of Berliner.

Aufwiedersehen

Last weekend my wife and I went out for a walk with our 11 month old baby.  Nothing unusual in that, except that rather than push her in a pushchair I used a Manduca to carry her on my back.

I am used to carrying the baby with the Manduca as we used it often when she was small.  During those early days she was carried on my front, only weighed around 10 lbs and I loved the experience of having her close to me whilst being able to have my hands free fore drinking beer and cooking BBQ (which is what I spend the most of summers doing).  Now she is bigger she can go on my back like a sort of baby backpack (fortunately still leaving my hands free for drinking beer and BBQ) 😉

The only challenge around this is getting the Manduca comfortable for her and for me, which requires tiny adjustments to the multitude of straps and buckles.  Eventually getting this right, we set off.  Now I am not saying that my baby is by any means overweight, but she is a fairly big 11month old and must weight about 2 stone (28lbs).  By coincidence, this is almost the exact amount that I calculate I am overweight.  “So what” I hear you say.  

Carrying her around has made me realise just how much excess weight I am carrying, particularly if I am going to compete in triathlons for any reason other than just to finish.  Bearing all that in mind, I am still not intending on doing anything drastic with my diet.  I will eat more healthily, train more and hope that the weight reduces slowly.  My first Tri is not until May, leaving me plenty of time to try and reduce my weight a bit.

Or alternatively I could just do all of my training with the baby strapped to my back, and then when I compete without her connected to me I will have the effect of being 2 stone lighter.  Not so sure my wife would agree with that though, and the baby might get bored of all the training!

I have been very unsure on how to target my training, and keep switching between two different mindsets.  To put no finer point on it, out of the three triathlon events running is by far my weakest.  

I have always been a strong swimmer, and feel like I can maintain a decent front crawl pace forever.  The only things that stops me from swimming is that after an hour or so I just get a bit bored.

Likewise cycling is something that I seem to find it very easy to get better at.  As I have been riding the road bike I feel that my fitness, and average speed have both improved very quickly.  I really enjoy putting the miles in on the bike, and cannot wait for better weather so I can put in a few long rides without freezing my Jacob’s off.

Running, or more specifically long distance running has never ever been a strength.  Even when I played football twice every weekend I was never able to run long distance without getting tired very quickly.  Now I am old (er) running now causes me knee, shin and foot pain even if it is only a relatively short 5k.

So back to these two mindsets (outlined below)

1) Train on your weakest discipline, whilst maintaining the other two so they all become equal
2) Train up your strongest disciplines whilst trying to make steady progress on the weaker

Now I am more than sure that neither of these options is absolutely right, and if I engaged a coach they would probably advise something different.  This whole Ironman journey is all about discovery for me, so I am going to try and figure things out for myself.


As a result I am going for option 2 at the moment, and working on my swim and bike fitness whilst going for an occasional run (when my aches and pains allow me).  Swimming is zero impact and as such does not aggravate my legs like running, and I also find that Cycling is much easier on my aging limbs.  Also I figure that a fast swim and cycle time will stand me in decent position just to endure the run as best as I can.  Even if I am overtaken my faster runners I will be happy that I am out of the swim and the bike quicker than most, meaning that finishing even an Ironman will be just about getting through the run stage.

I am also hoping that as I lose weight and get generally fitter the running will become easier and I will slowly be able to cover greater distances with less injury.  It is also my intention to get properly fitted for some running shoes, and possibly have some run training to help me stay injury free.

So there we have it.  Concentrate on the swimming and cycling for the moment, get some properly fitted running shoes and hope for the best.

TTFN.

James

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Having followed the 5:2 diet for a week (essentially eating only 600 calories for 2 days of the week) I jumped on the scales this morning with high hopes of seeing a bit of weight loss.

As I waited for the digital readout to register I held my breath in anticipation, only to see 15st 7.4lbs on the display.  This is EXACTLY the same as what I weighed on  Monday last week, despite the fact that I had eaten only 600 calories on Monday and Thursday last week.  So why might this be……………….?

Well it may have something to do with the fact that the only exercise I did last week was one swim and one 5k run.  Or it may be that my weekend diet consisted of a Pizza Hut, some delicious homemade fajitas and enough booze to kill a man at a party for my wife on Saturday, and then a chinese on Sunday.

So the lesson here is that though you may fast on two days, you cannot eat like a pig on the other 5.  Must try harder this week.  That being said I am away on business for most of it, meaning my chances to exercise are limited and my choice of food is mostly what you can get in restaurants.  Excuses excuses  🙂

Having stayed away from running for a while (due to the shin splints) I decided to take part in the Southsea Park Run.  There are Park Runs organised all over the country, they are 5k, happen every Saturday, are great fun and best of all they are free to take part in and have timing so you can track your progress.

My previous PB over 5k was over 30 minutes, and as I jogged down to the start on Southsea Parade thoughts of beating that were the furthest thing from my mind.  Mostly I was just hoping I could run 5k without any shin pain.

Arriving early I spotted a guy in a Pompey Triathletes top and struck up a conversation with him about joining them, the training they do etc.  I have decided to join after hearing how much he enjoys training with the group. More on this in another post.


So bang on the stroke of 9am we set off along Southsea Esplanade, and as usual with these Park Runs a lot of people went ahead of me.  There was a strong breeze blowing directly into our backs which definitely helped, and much to my surprise when we reached the half way point I felt good.  Turning around the cone and facing into the wind was a different matter.  It genuinely felt like I was travelling at half the speed I had been on the first half of the run.  

Pushing hard for the last 500m, and even breaking into a sprint (well as much of a sprint that I can manage) for the last 50m I crossed the line, ecstatic that I had absolutely no shin pain throughout the 5k.

With the Park Runs you get your results sent to you via text once they have calculated all the results, and at about 1pm today I was delighted to receive a text with my time of 27:34 finishing in 97th place, a full 3 minutes faster than my previous PB.

Perhaps this running business is not so bad after all…………….

Just back from my evening swim session.  Swam 1000m in just under 30 mins, which isn’t too bad for me.

Needless to say I am absolutely whacked now though.  I remember being tired after swimming when I was 10 years old, and I was a lot fitter in those days.



Still with the shins still hurting me swimming is good recovery, and also as I am going to target sub 30 minutes for my 1500m swim in the Swanage Tri in August, the more time I can spend in the pool the better.

Time for some room service, a couple of episodes of Breaking Bad and then some sleep.

TTFN

So……….I suffer from shin splints when I run.  I am sure that a lot of runners get this; however with me it seems that any time I take a step up in distance or effort it’s guaranteed to sideline me for a few weeks afterwards with shin splints.  So what do I need to do about this you may ask???

Well firstly I have been performing stretching and foam roller exercises to try and recover quickly.  Secondly I have been staying off of running, and thirdly I have been having a little think.

According to some research conducted in America, you exert 3 – 4 times your bodyweight through your feet on a 10 mile run.  So somebody who weighs in at a rather portly 217 lbs (holy crap that looks like a lot when written down like that) is exerting somewhere between 651 and 868lbs of force through my feet when I run.  That is 62 stone in weight, or 395kg (for all you Europeans out there)

Essentially this is rather a lot, and it is not surprising that I get shin splints and any manner of other injuries when running.

If I can get down to 13.5 stone, or around 190lbs then I reduce the force through my feet to 570 – 760lbs, which is a huge drop.

So that’s the skinny (if you pardon the pun).  Time to lose weight.  I have decided to adopt the 5:2 intermittent fasting routine of dieting because its easier for me to fast on two days and eat reasonably well on the others than it is to commit to a consistent calorie deficit.  Mostly this is down to my working schedule, and also down to laziness.

So, fast days for me will be Mondays and Thursdays.  I have done my first fast day today, only eating a lunch of around 600 calories and it has been a lot easier than I expected.  I am going to set up a new area of my blog to track weight loss as this may be something that others are interested in over time, and will also be good to look back on.

Anyway must dash as have been in the car for the last 4 hours driving to Leeds and Breaking Bad on Netflix is calling my name.  

I went out for a run after work with my colleague Dan.  Dan hasn’t run for years and is keen to get into it.  We did just under 2 miles of run / walk to ease Dan in, and all was good.

Then I decided to do a few more miles at a quicker pace just to keep my miles for the week up.  After another couple of miles I was struck with shin pain in both shins.

I have had this before, and it hurts.  Am still not sure what causes this, but I have a guess my supreme lack of lower leg flexibility is something to do with it.

Anyway being the sensible man that I am I decided to carry on for a couple more miles (I had to get back to the car somehow) and then after an 45 mile drive home I have pulled on my attractive compression leggings, drunk a couple of beers and decided to post this.  My shins are still hurting me, but the beer definitely is helping.

Fingers crossed that leaving the running until Saturday’s Park Run will be enough time to recover.