Training Review - Week 19 - May 6 to 12

Monday - I purposefully took the day off work to go for a "long" bike ride.  My initial plan was to go for another 50, or maybe 56, but a couple of texts later and somehow I was signed up  for doing 80. Had a few rough patches, around 40, 60 and 75 miles, none of which were major and all smoothed out after a couple of miles. But bearing in mind that my race distance is only 56 I don't need to worry about the second or third and the 40 mile one was fairly minor. That has come a long way since January where my first rough patch would show up at about the 15 mile mark and I would be ready to throw my bike in a hedge.


Only down side is that at some point I lost the magnet for my cadence sensor, so no pedalling data for this ride, or any other until I get a new replacement.


So where do I start with counting off the scores for this one:
Longest bike ride ever - 81.2 miles, (previous was 56 miles).
Longest time ever for a single exercise session, (previous was 4hours 41 of running / jogging / walking Edinburgh marathon in 2011).
Most climbing on a single ride 4,234 ft. (previous unknown but Strava says I have never been over 4,200 in a whole week before).
Fastest long ride ever? 16.0mph for moving time, 15.4mph including a couple of short stops. Bit of a fudge this one as it means discarding a lot of faster rides up to 26 miles. And a lot of my 40-56 rides have a much higher proportion of climbing in them than this nice flat route.

And since that didn't kill me I went to swimming at night as well.

Tuesday - At the 3 mile point on this run I passed my run total for the whole of 2012 of 251.8 miles. 

Felt pretty good on a nice warm evening running on the flat. Did just over 7 miles in an hour, which is pretty much my intended race pace for Aberfeldy. Doing this the day after my long ride and feeling fairly comfortable was really good.

Also 10min core session, 10min stretching session and plank 65 secs.

Wednesday I planned a run in the gym, but events got in the way and I had to rush home from work instead. I did to my 10 minute stretching session but nothing else.

Thursday was a cinema trip to the new Star Trek movie. But the times worked out so I could run on the treadmill first. Did 3k in 25mins again. Then I also had a quick go on the bike for a cool-down spin.

Star Trek Into Darkness was awesome. I can't explain how awesome without spoiling it for anyone who hasn't seen it though. So go and see it NOW! 

Friday I had a proper rest day.

Saturday I went for an easy solo ride on my road bike. I picked an out and back route that happened to have a massive headwind on the first half. I felt really empty on the way out, which was probably partly due to the massive breakfast I had in the morning and still trying to digest it. After the halfway point I felt much better and pushed on. I also did all my odd numbered miles on the aero bars and sat up more comfortably for the even miles. The aero position is pretty hard on my back and neck. Definitely need to do more of this. Took 53 mins going out and 42 coming back. Part of that was the wind, part of that was the effort level, part of that was my breakfast.






Saturday afternoon I went and picked up my awesome new Team GB Oakleys from Optiko in Union Square.


Then in the evening I did my plank for 65 secs and then a 10-min stretching session.




Sunday I went out to Knockburn Loch for the first time this year. I did an easy 8.5 mile run first and was going at about race pace, which is pretty good considering how hilly the route was and how easily I was going. Then I went in the water for my first open water swim of the year. Then I got straight back out again. I am not dealing well with the cold since my bout of hypothermia and the intense pain in my toes and fingers was too much. 

Plank for 70 secs. Core session. Stretching session.

Overall for the week I am slightly under some of my planned targets. But the targets for this week were massive, and I am pretty happy with what I have done. Missing Wednesday's gym session put most of the dent in the numbers and I only missed it for something outwith my control.
So targets for last week (Week 19) were:

Swim >1 mile. Bike >120 miles. Run >20 miles. 3 short core and 3 short stretching sessions. 

Actuals were:
Monday - 81.2 miles on the bike in 5 hours 16 mins.

Swim with TPT, 1,650m in 55 mins.

Tuesday - Run 7.2 miles in 60 mins. 
Core session. 
Stretching session. Plank 70 secs (P-70s).

Wednesday - Rest day. Stretching session.

Thursday - 5k treadmill run 25 mins. 3.8mile exercise bike in 12 mins.

Friday - Rest day.

Saturday - Bike 25.6 miles, 1 hour 35.
Stretching session. P-65s.

Sunday - Run 8.5 miles in 1hr 16.
O/W Swim, 25m!
P-70s.
Core session. 
Stretching session.

Result - 

Swim 1 mile (1,675 m). Bike 110.6 miles. Run 18.9 miles. 2 core and 4 stretching session.