Norwich 100 2012

A light weeks training due to the Norwich 100 today.

Monday - 9.06 mile cycle

Tuesday - 9.14 mile cycle

Wednesday - Went for my first full open water swim session. Swam one lap of the 1600m course in around 50 minutes. You only get an hour on Wednesday swim time so I will have to head up to Fritton Lake on a Saturday to swim the full Iron man distance.  Big stress relief though knowing that i could make the 2.4 mile swim within the cut off time now.
Also did a 4.28 MTB ride

Other than being a marshall at Norwich Park run on Saturday that's it training wise.

Sunday - Norwich 100 - http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/130599131

My first century ride done today. This was my first goal when i quit smoking & began cycling about a year ago.

Here's how the day went.

5am wake up, coffee, porridge & two slices of toast for breakfast.
6.50am met Matt then headed down to the start.
Straight forward at the start, just handed over our entry cards & got a map. Then off to the start line and away with the 7.10am batch.
Stopped for our first break at Hindringham. Think it was aound 30 miles.
Hit a few cheeky hills between there and the halfway point at Sheringham.

There was a mandatory 20 minute stop at Sherringham high school. Cup of tea & Tuna sandwich there to tide me over, Was sick of eating gels already & felt like i would throw up if i had another. I don't think all the jelly babies & energy drink I'd consumed so far was helping either. Decided to stick to water as much as poss on the second 50.

Good coming through Cromer & Mundesley, quite a few people out cheering us on. Matt even saw his dad at Cromer. Sat on the back of a group from Mundesley to Happisburgh so that all went quite easy. Was feeling really strong till this point.

Our next stop was planned at 75 miles, Horsey Mill. Struggled for 5 miles prior to this with neck ache, bum ache & leg ache. Pulled in to Horsey Mill looked round and couldn't see Matt anywhere. I'd been chirping away to the rider behind me thinking it was Matt for the last few miles. Wondered why he had gone quiet. Matt had also been struggling & I'd accidentally dropped him. Think we both must have hit our walls on this section.

A 10 minute lie down, drink & an ice cream for Matt we were sorted. The next 20 miles went really quick with no problems. Stopped at Recruiting Sergeant, Coltishall so can Matt could let his wife know what time we'd be in.

My wife & daugther actually made it to the finish line this time so we saw each other as i came over the line. Medal, water & 100m certificate handed over, job done.

Coming into the finish

Well done old chap

So, two more weeks and it's my next 100. The Boudicca 100 then a week later my first open water Triathlon at Fritton. Exciting month ahead.

Ironman plans have changed this week & i have decided for my first i want to do the proper branded event. Will do the Bolton one if it's there again next year. http://ironmanuk.com/ironman-uk

Not much else to report. Bought some arm warmers & a waterproof watch for the swimming. Apparently the Tri-Anglia kit has arrived so I should be all kitted out with club gear soon.


Happy training

Facebook Group - The Ironman Journey
https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/287319678021088/

Fatman to Ironman forum

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/forum/forummessages.asp?dt=&UTN=191464&last=1&V=1&SP=

My charity page
http://www.bmycharity.com/clearseaz

Weight loss & PB's

Was just wondering what i was going to write this week & thinking not much has happened, this is going to be a dull one. However, the more i thought the more i realised there has been some pretty funky stuff.

Lost another 2lbs so now down to 14st 1lb. Also only one month to go for my first years stopped smoking anniversary.

Monday - 37.09 mile  Bike ride - http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/125121913

Tuesday  - 4.16 mile run - http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/125539015 - felt pretty good. Now up to 45 minutes. Getting a bit of pain down the outside of my right shin though.

Wednesday - 1 hour swim. This was a groundbreaking session. Was intending really going for it with the front crawl but lost my nose clip on the second length. So, wasted 5 minutes messing about trying to find that, i didn't. Thought I'd carry on with front crawl anyway & too my surprise i did OK. Good hard blasts from the snout before i took a breath stopped me from snorting water the main problem I'd had when first learning the stroke.

Managed 64 lengths. 40 of which were front crawl, 8 of which were in a row. ;-) Would have gone open water swimming but a last minute late work meeting scuppered that plan. Hopefully next week

Thursday & Friday -  rest days.

Saturday - smashed my park run time by 53 seconds. New PB 24.39. http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/127200713

Then went out for a cycle ride with Matt, Jim & Karl. Three of us are doing the Norwich 100 next week so this was going to be our last biggy before that. Planned 64 miles.
http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/127202417

10 minute break at Cromer

Turned into 70 miles. Felt good though & it looks like i may have got my seating position right now. Although after attaching my new bike bag today I had to move the seat again.

I also cycled up Gas Hill in Norwich for the first time. Jeez it's a beast. Doubt I'll be entering Gas Hill Gasp this year, was nice to get the notorious climb under my belt though.

Sunday - Have had a rest day from everything so i can do some house stuff. Cleaned up my Ducati as well so i can sell it. If your interested here it is. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270982000011&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT

Be sad to see it go but i only use it to go to work and back. I'll be better off cycling or running in.

Results from Wattisham Triathlon (cant remember if i posted them before)

http://www.wattishamtriathlon.co.uk/pdfs/results2012.pdf

1:16:20 overall I'm assuming the swim & bike time includes T1 & T2
Swim 10.43
Bike 39.55
Run 25.41

Coming up

Norwich 100 next Sunday. My first century ride. Really looking forward to it. Weather is supposed to improve as well. 18 degrees & sunshine (believe it when i see it).

Quick well done shout out to RafikiD on the runners world forum who popped his Triathlon cherry this weekend.

have a great week, happy training

Andy


Facebook Group - The Ironman Journey
https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/287319678021088/

Fatman to Ironman forum

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/forum/forummessages.asp?dt=&UTN=191464&last=1&V=1&SP=

My charity page

http://www.bmycharity.com/clearseaz

Wattisham Triathlon 2012

Not a bad week considering the crap weather we have been having. Was feeling a bit fed up with the bike riding after last weekends disaster. Anyway, get over it & move on we must !

Quick run through of this weeks training then i will give a report on yesterdays Triathlon.

Monday - Open water swim - 30 minutes. Bike went in for a service
Tuesday - 3.77 mile run http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/122652445
Wednesday - 1.03 mile swim - 28 out of 66 lengths was front crawl !
Thursday - 8.87 mile bike ride http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/123519943
Friday - rest day
Saturday - Wattisham Triathlon
Sunday - Waveney 1 Triathlon Marshaling

Starting to enjoy running a bit more now that the shin splints are not as bad. Found wearing the compression socks after the run has helped. Knee feels numb still after my fall a month or so back. May have to go see the Doc about that.

Zogg goggles arrived & used them for the first time on Wednesday. They are brilliant and well worth the extra money. I did start to get a bit of a headache towards the end of the session though as they seemed to be sucking my eyes out my skull.

The Tri bag arrived (good little thing), the saddle bag didn't, grrr, hopefully here before the Norwich 100 as you cant get a lot in the one bag.

Open Water Swim

Got my wetsuit from Tri Harder who came down to Whittlingham open water centre on Monday. Went with an Aquasphere suit. Basically wanted the cheapest as I've still got a bunch of weight to lose so didn't want to spend a fortune. Will wait till I'm where i want to be weight wise before splashing out a few more bucks. Still, pleased with the buy & does the job.

We were only allowed to swim for 30 minutes due to the temperature of the water. 11 degrees. Loads of advice & help from the more experienced people which was nice. Needed help zipping the wetsuit up as it is quite snug. Getting in the water wasn't too bad although feet felt like they were being stabbed by 1000's of needles. Took a while to get used to putting my face in the water. The cold took my breath away every time i did it.

I think one lap was about 150 metres. Did the first one breast stroke & it felt like it took me ages. Also felt like i was swimming through mud due to the resistance wearing a suit. Second lap started doing some front crawl as i was able to get my face in the water. Had a bit of a mare with direction & kept veering off to the right when my face was in the water. Will need to work on that. Apparently i should have a look forward every few strokes. Another bloody thing to remember.

I removed my false teeth prior to the swim in case they fell out. Didn't fancy paying out for a new set again. Enjoyable despite the cold. Next session will be on Wednesday. Worth pointing out how clean & tidy Whittlngham open water centre is.

tropical waters

sort of front crawl

That's enough of that !

wheres my tooth?

Wattisham Triathlon - 400m Swim, 20K cycle, 5k run - 1hr 16mins for me
http://www.wattishamtriathlon.co.uk/

So, this was yesterday. Venue was an hours drive away, on the plus side, the start time was 1pm. Registration between 11 & 12. Arrived at Wattisham Airfield in good time. It is a active military base so collected security pass & directed to parking. Brought back memories of my basic training at Bassingbourn as these bases always look the same.

Got to registration and found my number (21) turned out that slower swimmers were going first, unlike the East Coast Tri. Shit, means everyone will be watching me flounder about in the water. Turned out not to be the case thankfully. So, got my goody bag, T-shirt, Gatorade, banana, couple of book marks & stickers. These were for SSAFA which is where proceeds from the day were going. http://www.ssafa.org.uk/ Girls marked me up with my number then off i trotted to transition.

Racked my bike laid out my stuff (towel on top) hid my bike computer in my cycle shoe & forerunner in the other cycle shoe. Race number on belt, helmet, gloves & sunglasses on handlebars. Job done. Even had flip flops this time so felt well prepared.

Swim started bang on time. 2 lengths, then under the rope & so on 6 times. Surprisingly numbers hadn't turned up so there were gaps of more that 30 seconds. Three people hadn't turned up before me so i had a 2 minute wait. Meant i didn't catch anyone on the swim though which was handy. Nobody caught me either despite my breaststroke either. Chip around my ankle didn't feel very secure so i was stressing a bit about that falling off, even though it didn't.

Havent got my spilt times yet so unsure how long the swim took. anyway, out the door to the bike. All going well apart from putting my stuff so far under my bike i had to get down on my knees to reach my shoes &socks. Gels into back pocket, socks on, helmet on, gloves on, shoes on, remembered computers this time though ! Garmin edge is jammed in the toe of the shoe, grrrrrrrrrrr. Must have lost a minute faffing round trying to get that out. Forerunner put on as well. (some big learns from T1 again)

Out on the bike, went great, caught up with at least 6 of the earlier starters. Averaged around 19mph again. Wind was a bit of a mare particularly coming back up the runway.
Here's the route http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/124337981

T2 went smoothly, no dramas so straight out for the 5k. Legs were like jelly this time & took a good mile before they felt OK. Coming up to the finish line was good. It was about 100metres up an avenue with spectators either side cheering you on. Apart from my wife & daughter who had somehow not managed to find the finish line! Rock music playing you in then an announcer calling your name ' & here comes Andy Baxter of Tri Anglia' over the loud speakers which was a nice touch.

Got a few pics but as this was a military base spectators were restricted to around transition & the finish.

T1 before Garmin drama

Charity the day was about

You still with me, longest blog yet.

Spent this morning marshaling at Waveney 1 Triathlon. Myself & Arleya were on mount/dismount duty. Quite remarkable how many people didn't understand the instruction don't mount your bike before big yellow line on the road, that I'm pointing at. lol. I guess you get caught up in the moment. Was interesting seeing the different types doing their thing.

Quite a few people really struggled to get their bare feet into the shoes that were already clipped on the bike. I'll stick with putting shoes & socks on & then running to mount area. Seems a lot less complicated. That being said, there were also some very impressive mounts and dismounts at break neck speed.

Arleya busy marshaling

If your into the Strava app, I've also started uploading activities it.
here's the link http://app.strava.com/dashboard



Triathlete Blogs

Couple of new blogs to share from members of the FB group 'The Ironman Journey'  Well worth a read

http://www.runwalkcrawl.com/

http://iamamamil.blogspot.co.uk/#!/2012/05/are-you-smarter-than-12-year-old.html


I think that's about it for this week. Have a good weeks training.






Facebook Group - The Ironman Journeyhttps://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/287319678021088/

Fatman to Ironman forum
http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/forum/forummessages.asp?dt=&UTN=191464&last=1&V=1&SP=

My charity page
http://www.bmycharity.com/clearseaz

Giro d'Italia begins

First of the grand tours has begun then. Doesn't seem that long ago that i was watching Tour de France in 2011 & planning my training for the Norwich 100, which is now looming.

Good start for Brit, Geraint Thomas who picked up second place in the stage one Time Trial

Not a great deal to report this week from a training point of view. No events either.

Got a few niggles going on which don't seem to be easing. Aching shoulder, knee & shins. Perhaps i need to reduce my training time over the the next few weeks. Want to be as close to 100% fit when i do my first Century cycle ride.

Next Saturday I have Wattisham Triathlon - http://www.wattishamtriathlon.co.uk/

Then marshaling on Sunday with Arleya at the Waveney 1 Triathlon for Tri-Anglia.
 http://www.tri-anglia.co.uk/waveney2-triathlon-race-details
We are looking after the cycle mount & dismount area, something new, should be fun.

Tri-Harder event at Whit lane tomorrow so should hopefully get my wetsuit sorted out. Will be able to have a 30 minute open water swim as well despite the cold weather.

Training

Monday - 41.32 Bike ride - http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/119541829

Tuesday - 3.49 mile run

Wednesday - 1.55 mile swim - This is a new overall distance PB for me & I also managed 6 x 25m in a row lengths of front crawl.

Thursday - Bike clean up

Friday - Ate a smaller sized Pizza

Saturday - 3.11 mile run & 35.55 mile bike ride - Bike ride was a nightmare. Was going to go to Overstrand but 2 minutes from leaving the house realised i should have put tights on instead of shorts. Then the Garmin map i had downloaded didn't work properly. Bum started aching after 20 minutes. Gears started playing up & grinding noises started coming from the bottom bracket.To top it off, despite a dry day forecast, it started bloody hailing. So, cut the route short. Rolled in to Norwich & noticed the seat was sliding about, explains the bum issue.

First time i have been totally pissed off on a bike ride & cut it shorter than planned. I guess i cant complain having one bad ride in nearly a whole year.

On the plus side. Fritton Lake Park run was great. 2 laps of cross country. Sorted out by the Active Outdoor Sport guys so as usual, top notch organisation. http://www.parkrun.org.uk/frittonlake/course

Sunday
1.01 mile swim & 3.26 mile walk

Other Stuff

Even if your not interested in doing an Ironman event but just want to get fit or even doing a shorter Tri, you should invest in the Don Fink book, 'Be Iron Fit'.
Just reading the technique part on swimming has helped me this week. I even felt myself start to glide through the water occasionally.

I will now also be planning my training in 'time' rather than 'miles' as Fink's rationale behind this makes obvious sense. Also will be concentrating more on training within the appropriate Heart Rate Zones. Not as technical as it may sound when explained in the right way. I can plan all the training sessions including intervals as per Finks training plan in Garmin Connect & download to Forerunner or Edge.

Ordered a few things this week, more expense. some Zogg predator flex swim goggles, a smaller saddle bag as i keep catching my leg on the one i have now. Also bought a bag that fits to the cross bar and handlebar stem.

Blog should be a bit more interesting next week as it will include two Triathlon events & some pictures.

Happy Training

Facebook Group - The Ironman Journeyhttps://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/287319678021088/

Fatman to Ironman forumhttp://www.runnersworld.co.uk/forum/forummessages.asp?dt=&UTN=191464&last=1&V=1&SP=

My charity pagehttp://www.bmycharity.com/clearseaz

Giro d'Italia Fantasy league

Just a quickie update as the Giro d'Italia begins tomorrow

Just for fun I've set up a fantasy Giro League.
Simply log in and select your team. (It's easy you don't need to know anything about cycling) then enter it in "Fatman to Ironman" league using the code
04123121

http://www.velogames.com/gdi12index.php

Quick menu update on the blog as well. If you look to the right hand side there is now a menu so you can navigate to day one of my journey, or anywhere else for that matter.