Italian training

Managed to slip out of the country last week for a cheeky high vol week in Italy on a Steve Trew camp. Great group of people as usual. My lats are still recovering from a little more swim volume than normal, thanks to Dan from Swim4tri who was also out there coaching at the camp. Pleased to be able to hit a solid week of training with fairly minimal recovery from IMUK.

Nice to be back in the UK again though, and its made me realise how close the next race is... Kona is two weeks tomorrow!

Metabolic Testing

Last weekend saw my first metabolic testing since January 2007 in Christchurch just before Epic Camp – it was long overdue! I did a bike test with Pete Byworth from www.vo2fortri.com – I’d highly recommend him: he knows his stuff when it comes to sports science, is a cyclist, and has done metabolic testing on something like 4000 people – age groupers and elite athletes alike. Critically, he can give you lactate threshold/anaerobic threshold (and associated power on the bike) from which you can work out where you should be training and racing. You can choose to test on a bike or on the treadmill. The results were pretty much in line with what I had expected, but provide a much more precise baseline from which I can retest in the future to see how everything’s going. The test also carried power data, so this means I can use my new powertap a lot more effectively! The other bonus is that unlike a test I had done quite a few years back, blood isn't taken for lactate readings, its all done by gas exchange (COs, O2 balance), so there's no sore fingers or earlobes etc! Hope this has been phased out from most testing!

We did the test at Swim For Tri’s HQ in Liverpool Street (also where I do Endless Pool sessions), but Pete also does testing in Canary Wharf at The Cycle Doctor (Kev’s place – www.cycledoctor.co.uk). Its becoming a bit of a triathlon mecca down there at Cannon Workshops in Canary Wharf with Kev’s tri/bike shop, another Swim for Tri Endless Pool and even a yoga centre. The Docklands have got it good!

Following the testing on Saturday morning, I went and joined in a local sprint tri run by tricoach and ironman addict Mike Shaw (coach and founder of www.triperformance.co.uk) down in Raynes Park – great fun, and a bit of a change to the normal. Luckily I still managed a quality long run afterwards, and topped the week off with an overdistance bike plus run on the Sunday. This week’s been more of the same, with a little consolidation on the mileage.

Here’s some photos from the testing – apologies for the low quality, but they were taken on Pete’s phone. Luckily the low quality hides the fact that I am DRIPPING with sweat! Managed to form a large lake during the course of the testing – always attractive! ;)

Exciting riding on Park Lane

An eventful few weeks... apologies for radio silence. Still 'easing' back into training, being careful not to overdo anything, but generally seem to be coping fine. Running still seriously capped, and orthotics on their way, and there's even a (more dedicated) core programme and a splash of aquajogging going on, so hopefully I will remain injury free from now on! So why am I not at the pool at this time in the morning? Mainly as there's a rather large chunck of my right palm missing, and quite a lot of skin from my right knee, hip and elbow now being used as new road surface on Park Lane after being wiped out by a The Big Bus Company last night. Ouch. Right hip has swollen up nicely. But I got away lightly - could have been MUCH worse - nothing broken :) Bike a bit messed up and will have to see how the swelling goes for training etc this week.

Swimming's got a bit of a lift in terms of technique - started twice monthly sessions at the endless pool with Swim for tri. Noticed the difference already - turned my Tooting 5km swim from a wallow into something resembling swimming again. My stroke seems to deteriorate quite quicly without fairly regualr attention - and video analysis and one-on-one seems to be doing the trick right now. Hoping that with some work and more coaching, I might be able to make some real gains on the swim.

But off to Idaho this week for IMCdA. Rather unfortunate timing for the race for me all in all; we'll see what the weekend brings. Agreed with Steve that this one is NOT for racing! If hip allows, I'm just just going to try to train through and fingers crossed do the swim and bike (there's NO WAY I want to just watch it - that would drive me insane!) - I really want to try out the new orange Trek TTX in race conditions too. Trip should be fun even if I'm not racing as I'll get to meet a few of my team mates from Timex - will be good to put names to faces, having missed the team camp back in the Spring.

And I've managed to omit the fact that I've been running some Timex ironman clinics at Pure Sports Med (with the support of PSM and Serpentine) - the last one of which is tonight - 6:30, Threadneedle St, Bank. Let me know if you want to come along. Ironically this one is on injury prevention for ironman athletes - you'll be glad to hear that I am not giving the talk!!! Three specialists from PSM are presenting and it should be really interesting. I'll certainly be taking notes!