Are you ready?

Tiger asked me if I was ready for an upcoming race. I know it's really a rhetorical question because ultimately you are only as ready as your training allows you to be. Think about that for a second. You may have re-think your training if you aren't meeting your capabilities and/or goals. Haha, or even easier, redefine your goals to meet your training, I guess that would sort of be cheating though, wouldn't it? Anyway...

The time has come..

For speedwork. A synopis of the season so far: Nov/Dec: do 'whatever' training, hike, bike, run a bit, rest, just do whatever. Jan/Feb: structured base training. Acclimitize and adapt to the rigours of real training. Mar/Apr: similar to Jan/Feb but with a strength focus. Build strength through lots of hill repeats on both run and bike. May/June: maintain strength through occasional hillwork, add speedwork.

My thinking behind this year's philosophy is that every 8 weeks, I'm slightly changing the stimulas in an effort to achieve a higher degree of fitness.

Recap of the week:

Swim: 2k (!) there is a story here.
Bike: 2 hrs on the trainer + 167k
Run: 76k
Mon: easy 2k swim
Tues: a tough day. 2 hours outside doing hill repeats on the bike, followed by an hour run doing yet more hill repeats.

Wednesday, I rush through work to make it the pool on time, I have a 10X 400m set planned and just want to 'get er done'. Pull into the parking lot, turn off car, go to grab swim gear... doh, forgot it at home. Doh doh doh. Missed swim workout #1. Ran and biked instead.

Thur: midweek 17k run with 4X6min hard with 2 min rest. Easy bike spin for an hour. Hacked finger preparing dinner had to go to hospital to get stitched up. Nasty, gross picture at end of post. Tough workout followed by less than optimal sleep left me bagged on Friday...

Fri: missed swim workout #2 due to stitched up finger. Did an easy 9.5k run on trails. Bailed on bike workout.

Sat: ride with Cliff. Did 113k ride that featured some time trialling. The first one was a short 10k with a very nice tailwind. Totally smoked it in 13:15 for an average speed of 45.1 kph. The second TT was 13k, against a semi ridiculas headwind, on a crappy road with the added bonus of driving rain. Wheeeee! Time to HTFU. 23min, avg speed 35 kph. Owie.
Later, ran an easy 7.5k

Sun: ran 22k in 1:45. First half zone 1, second half zone 2.

Ok, here's the pic I promised. Be warned it's a tad on the gross side. Scroll down if you really must see it.



.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.




Looks like I get a few more days off swimming..