Good Week!

What doesn't Kill you makes you stronger? The past couple of days have been rough after our epic day on Friday. Saturday i was tired but we got the work done. Justin and i had a 90minute ride out to the race course including some intervals, then to help out with the Lavaman Kids Triathlon. I had a great time helping out and handing out awards but i was certainly very tired and fatigued. We had an open water swim session, with good hard intervals, i was very flat. A little run to finish the day off with a few strides and drills. (*lil wayne on the ipod got this run done!)

Since the race was just a "workout" i will keep it short. Felt rough after this week, nearly 30hours pre race to make sure i was good and tired. Not your typical training through a race but we weren't in Hawaii to race Lavaman so i had to log the work. Finished 5th or 6th, felt flat on swim, blew up a bit by first buoy, hit the bike hard (could have used wheels and helmet with headwind), and by hit the bike i mean i kept the pedals moving and didnt look for a ride home; the run felt good but my legs felt like cement blocks, made a wrong turn near resort, so i loged some extra time. The course was tough and challenging on lava rock and off road with the finish on sand. I just kept telling myself 2more loops of Baldwinn Park (*Maui 800mloop) and its and easy day. It's not everyday you get to race "Macca" in one of your weekend "workout" races. I am pretty happy with the race considering the volume and intensity we had this week, wheels would have been nice, but with how tired my legs were it didn't matter . Justin and i road home from the race for a cool down, 30miles in headwind and it turned out to be miserable. You know your training alot when your Olympic Distance end of the week training race, is the shortest session of the week.

Tomorrow is an easy day, and then this week i will get one more big week in before heading home. Congrats to the team for tearing it up! Thanks to the Coach's for actually making me race, i wasn't originally happy about racing a World Champion and an elite field being this tired. My roomate Justin heads home today to get ready for New Orleans 70.3 , i want to wish him the best of luck, and thanks again buddy for your left over Nutrition Products! (Lucky Guy had todays race off!) The feet are up and its icing time soon, we have already watched 3 episodes of CSI and i don't think i have gotten up once.

Epic Day in the Wind

2 days out from Lavaman Triathlon and the taper begins. We started the day with a 1.5hour Kona Masters Swim plus a Coach Paul set to keep us busy in the pool. Then it was off to ride the Hawaii Ironman Bike Leg and the wind was howling. Justin road strong today, and we battled a bad head wind for the first 57miles and we weren't to happy. Then Coach Paul decided since we were racing in 2 days we should do a zone 3 tempo out to Hawi and back to Kawaihae with the nasty winds it was 38miles of tempo riding. Justin and i basically looked at each other and bit our lips. For the remainder of the ride, we were hoping for some tail wind but things shifted slightly and we weren't as lucky as we thought but it was still good. By the time we got back it was 117 miles(188kms) and i had a slight rough patch with a flat and some wheel rubbing but all in all it was a strong day(* as you can see in the picture i blew a leg somewhere). Tomorrow we have 3 workouts and are helping with a kids triathlon in the morning(*awesome!). I am hoping to wake up and see Sundays Race is deleted out of training peaks for Sunday but i won't hold my breath. Maybe Lava java instead of Lavaman? Anyways tonight was some good recovery starting with a contrast shower, followed by 40mins of elevating the legs while i talked to Carley on Skype, a black bean burrito and an epson salt bath later on. Rest Well!

Energy Lab

Today was a good day, with a open water swim session and a 2hour building run that we ran over 18miles on the Ironman Race Course. Tonight was a much needed ice bath to get ready for a big day including a masters swim and a good steady ride of the Ironman bike course(112miles).

A couple pictures below of Coach Paul at Kona Masters Wednesday night. The feet are up and the picnic is packed for the ride. At least if i ever race in Kona i will know the course inside and out.

Kaloko Climb

Today was a good day in Kona. To start the day we did a 3hour ride including a repeat from the Queen K up to Kaloko Road and up to the top of the mountain. The start of the climb is pretty relaxed till you hit Kaloko road, then its about 7miles up from there taking you to 5,000feet pretty fast. There are some steep climbs with the last mile being around 17%grade. I took king of the mountain honors but Justin Climbed well too for his size and gearing. I was really trying to hit Lances time he did after a 4hour ride and i was near however i am going to change up my cassette next week and give it another crack. Its scary how fast Lance is after doing this climb after a long ride and preseason, i hope he recovers from his crash so we can see him in the tour.

After a fast descend to the near by high school track we started into a track session of 8x800m. It felt a lot easier than 8x1mile(we did last week), however i could feel the climb for sure. We all ran fast and then we had a long cooldown spin back to our homestays.
Tonight we met up with the Kona masters squad for a good session followed by a lot of drill swimming, we thought it was going to be recovery 1hour45minutes later and seeing the stars it was time to leave.( who ever spread the rumor it was an easy workout that wasn't funny!) Off to bed.

Kona

Finally in Kona, after a trip on Monday from Maui. It was supposed to be a fast trip but Justin's bike box wouldn't fit on the plane so we had to wait for it over two flights and we were stuck in Kona waiting for it to arrive. We ran into Joel Filliol's parents at the airport and shared a flight over to Kona with them. We managed to get a swim and a ride in still on Monday for recovery but today it was on. Our Home stays are awesome, and Justin and i are sharing a basement apartment up on a hill with a beautiful view.

Today was supposed to be another relaxed day with a 5500m open water swim workout which had some hard 1km repeats. In the afternoon we did a 2.25hour ride with steady state riding and 5x4mins max power intervals, with "Coach Paul" on the scooter. We ended the day with a little run and a great team dinner at the Coach's house. Tomorrow we are doing a huge climb up to the volcano with a track session off the bike and a swim at night. I don't think i have the right gearing for this climb with the above photos of Lance climbing it. Hopefully i can get some snazzy photos of the climb and the surroundings.

Kona

Today is the last day in Maui:( Tomorrow is camp #2 in Kona. Justin and i will go for a little swim and then off to the airport. Thanks to Linsey and Brent for the fueling swag today to keep me going for the next two weeks!
Its been a great 3 weeks(+1day) logged for mileage with 92hours of training (75k of swimming, 1,410km of riding, 270k of running). I still have a couple of big weeks left and my energy levels and motivation are still high.
Justin and i have a home stay in Kona together so i am hoping they have a big garden, and possibly own a supermarket so there will be food left in the house for me after the big guy eats. I am not sure they know what is coming, but it probably won't take long before they put locks on the pantry to lockout the starving athletes.
Stay tuned for some more adventures in Kona. Maui i will be back at some point, i still have 2 weeks to convince Dr. A that he needs a perminant athlete living at the house to keep everything in order and of course to watch College football with. And a side note: Justin put my Ed Hardey Shirt in the dryer today, i am glad it didnt shrink to much, but what did shrink is Mags Race Speed Suit.

Sushi Paradise!

A few pictures from Last nights " eat all the sushi or you cant leave" night on the town. Thank you Aaron for dinner it was so amazing. Aaron has been a regular at this place for 14 years and i got the invite out with Cowgirl Corbin, Brent and Aaron. It was super awesome, and i ate way too much. To top off the night we stopped at DQ and Linsey bought an awesome round of kid size blizzards(*i had to fight threw finishing it). I was defiantly fueled for " Super Saturday" which consisted of a pretty steady 4.5hour ride that had lots of wind and a 3hour part in our aero bars at a good pace. I went through 100miles in under 4.5hours so i held a good clip for my attention span. Off the bike i ran 1hour and felt great, so all in all another good day in paradise!

Off to Lances now for a team dinner and meeting with lots of good food.

TGIF is over!

Thursday we had our weekly awesome ocean swim workout. This workout usually falls on Friday, but this week it was Thursday allowing us to have a big Friday-Sunday before heading to Kona on Monday. Nothing changed however TGIF lost its meaning, and Friday would now be hard.
We started the open water swim session with a warm up followed by 20 minutes hard tempo, followed by 5x4minute @"giver pace" so that is somewhere along the lines of has hard as you can go for the 4minutes. Thursday afternoon was off as "Mean Coach Lance" wanted us to rest our legs a bit for the next few. (*We are feeling tired we just don't show it)

Fantastic Friday started with a boom this morning as the squad headed to Baldwin Park for a hard run session. The workout was 15minutes tempo, followed by 20x400m on 30seconds rest. The group did awesome and everyone held the same times we did with 1minute rest 2 weeks ago.(Justin wins the Stud award today for being sick and killing all the sessions) My legs felt a bit heavy but i stayed focused and got it done. After the run as Lance would say " Stack em up!" we headed out on the bike. The workout was just over 2hours with some steady state work and some jump intervals. The 3rd and final workout of today was our weekly 10x400m swim. Dr.Aaron may get mad at this picture above from one of our team dinners but i don't have my eyes open so its fair game for posting and now that i have Aaron on Facebook i can start tagging him in some secret photos once i flyout.(Justjoking)

Now its Sushi time with the crew, we are going to some secret location that has the best sushi ever. Anyways Super Saturday is still ago, i hope to have some war stories as well as some new photos, i had to dig up some past workout pics for today!

Good Day with a Fat Lip

50minute run with hill strides, 2hour threshold swim workout, 4hour hilly west Maui loop ride with 2flats, good day! Thanks to Brent for helping out with some mechanical's on today's ride, he was awesome and i am sure everyone in the group owes him at least one beer after some of the stuff he had to fix today. My roommate Justin is sick so i am hammering the vitamin c back and hiding in my room so i don't catch anything. I tried to reheat a stir fry in the microwave to eat for lunch, just as i went to take a bite to see if it was warm enough it popped and almost wrecked my face. It was scary but not as scary as my lip looks, its fat and not with a Ph. I sometimes hear that sound re heating food in the microwave but it never blows up on my fork. Oh well lesson learned! I couldn't figure out why people where pointing today when we were climbing some hills, who would have thought my lip would grow over the course of a 4hour ride. Good thing i have a great Doctor around the corner in case i need one! Rest Well.

Ouch!

Tonight John Litherland took some of us out for a great Flat Bread Pizza night. Thanks again John that was amazing! John is the owner of Events Online, and has been racing since the beginning of triathlon with a tremendous amount of knowledge in the sport!
Flat Bread pizza is a local favorite serving only Organic ingredients and Grass fed Chicken and other great toppings, it was some much needed fuel after today.
Formerly known as Terrible Tuesday was actually one of my better days so far here starting with a bike/run session.
The bike workout was 2.5hours with 8x3minute Best Average hill repeats followed by a 30minute Time Trial to Baldwin Park for a transition Run.
The run workout was 8x1mile at goal 70.3 pace or faster, i was happy to hold all under 530/miles with a lot of 24's-25's. After a cool down it was near 4hours, and time for lunch.
In the afternoon was a swim session with some pull work, and 20x100, followed by another little run of 5miles. Great day and even better food!

Suffer Sunday!

McManic i found this photo of you on the Internet! It looks like a cold race?

Today was action packed! Today started with a 2hour run workout (18miles) in the rain, followed by a 2hour ride with some steady state work and max effort intervals, followed by a 5k swim session with our weekly 10x400, followed by another run of 30minutes. Tomorrow is a recovery day with a couple of little sessions to loosen up.

We are currently watching CSI Miami (*my fav), i think Horatio is absoultly halarious! He seems to get funnier with the more fatigue i have. Justin does a wicked impression of him or Does He?

(* IF YOU WATCH CSI YOU WILL GET THE JOKE!)

Super Saturday!

Super Saturday lived up to its name. Tomorrow i will post all of the pictures from the adventure. We did a 4.5hour ride (80+miles) hilly ride past Hana to the Haleakala National Park and then looped back to Hana and then back to the park for a 40minute base transition run. After a quick lunch break we then hiked a trail that follows the stream uphill and ultimately to Waimoku Falls ... the two-hour round trip hike takes you to a spectacular 600 foot waterfall and through a mysterious bamboo forest. It was awesome, everyone took lots of pictures on the hike so i hope to have those soon. Thanks to Aaron, Lance, Mark, Chris for being in support vehicles and driving us home! Well off to bed, tomorrow is a big day.

Fun Friday!

A few pics from Thursdays bike/run workout, and me trying to wake up arriving at the ocean for an open water swim workout. I had a great swim, things are coming along and i am excited for the race season. The workout this morning was 15minute warm up, 20minutes hard tempo followed by 10x2minutes max efforts around the buoys. It was choppy, and awesome!

Stay tuned for "Super Saturday and "Suffer Sunday"! Legs off Day today so i can bring it tomorrow~

Rainy Day

Today was tough! After a 2hour rain delay this morning and a late start we headed out on the bike. After a 40minute warm up cruise we hit some " Best Average" hill repeats. 5x8minutes in the rain before a little ride over to our 30min TT. The time trial went well and the rain had stopped ending us at Baldwin Park. Quick transition to our run shoes and it was 6x1mile@70.3 pace (2x800m grass loop). The goal was 5:30/mile pace for me, and i did okay on the first 3, 4-5 some gi problems, and a good 6th was a good interval. My stomach was bothering me and i really need to figure out what is causing the problem because it caused some discomfort and caused a few nick names!
A little beat we had a snack and headed to the pool as our day was running out after our 4hour bike/run session. The pool was cold but we got it done. Everyone was flying today!
Summer from Austin, Tx came over to work on our legs. It seems like a lot of people come to Maui and never leave! umm? Grocerys are too expensive or it would be tempting!

ola,ola hou, ola loa? Recovery?

Today was the 3rd active recovery day and tomorrow its on. My title says Recovery? Well i think it says that. I pulled out the Hawaiian dictionary but i was a bit confused with all of the words to represent Recovery.
This morning started with a wake up call from my little annoying friend Mr Rooster! I am not sure where they come from but every morning they seem to find our back yard to squawk!
Good swim this morning, another 5k or so with 24x50s (mixed sprints) followed by 24x50IM, and then 1000kick for time. Lots of quality the past two days in the pool and we have some new additions to the squad adding another Olympian(Lisa Mensink) and multiple Ironman winner(Heather Gollnick).
After the swim we had a nutrition break and some relaxation, before we did a 2.5hour ride towards Hana with over gear work on the climbs. Off the bike it was an easy base run with Justin for 1hour where we met up with Brent for part of it out on the trail. The legs felt good and we needed to hold back on our aerobic pace as we were cruising at 6min mile pace on grass. Lance gave us specific orders of keeping it as a jog, so we backed off slightly but still ran over 9miles for the hour. Even though we are starting to get pretty tanned, we still hear some heckling from locals when out running in shorts. Tonight has been all about great nutrition and putting the feet up. Today was my first 5hour recovery day, you gotta love the volume at camp! Criminal Minds and then bed, awesome.
Cheers for now!

Aaron thanks again for the kewl Ed Hardy Shirt last night! At the team meeting and very good burrito Mexican night at Coach Lances house Aaron brought me a wicked shirt. I have never met someone who goes out of his way so much to help athletes get settled and cares so much in helping others reach there goals. Thank you Aaron! I have now reached my goal of looking like a rock star, Brent McMahon and i rocked out matching shirts today at our threshold swim session, but unfortunatly Dr. A swam masters this morning and didnt get to see it in action.

After a wicked weekend of training, Lance has given us 3 days of semi light training before he is going to hit us hard. We still have 7 workouts in 3 days but, really only the swims are hard, and the bike and runs are fairly aerobic. Yesterday a few of us headed out for a light open water swim at the ocean, even if me and my saggy red speedo almost got taken out to sea it was still a nice recovery.

Today started with a base run and some hill strides, followed by our threshold swim session with (8x50 followed by a 200)x3 hard with short rest. Even after a hard week i took a second or two of my 200's so that is good. After that we had a 1500 pull set and some kick and it was 5k logged. Getting home from the swim i had a box waiting from Colonels and i was pretty excited! (Thanks Doug, the small fits perfect!)

This afternoon was a light recovery spin with some crazy Maui winds. The plan was supposed to be 90mins easy but Coach Mark lead us on a tour of the island. That's it for today, here is to recovery we sure are going to enjoy the beginning of the week!

Suffer Sunday!

"Suffer Sunday" turned into a day that Lance said " we would remember for ever!"

The day started off with a 1.25 hour warm up on flat ground, and then a team challenge up the Haleakala Volcano. This is one of the only climbs you can do starting at sea level and climb up to 10,000 feet in roughly 60miles. This is the climb that Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin Slipstream) broke the course record in January! The game plan was to ride for 3hours or to the summit; which ever came sooner and then descend a bit and then run up. The only problem was 2hours into the climb, Maui turned to Toronto weather and the temperature at the top of the climb put everyone in a cold state. The group did awesome and at the end of the climb there was a lot of emotions because of how cold and tired everyone was, not to mention the ice on my shoes and helmet. After i took a quick descend to the information station where i was greeted with a heater and Organic Pop Tart from Brent, we hitched a lift to a chalet type restaurant and stood by the fire, as the rest of the group came down in the truck. Since the truck was packed Brent and I did a little more descending near the base to home and called it a day. I got in just over 5hours of riding and 3hours of solid climbing.

Here are a few pictures above. Lance and Mark did an amazing job in helping us out with gear and nutrition as we climbed and they made sure everyone was safe. Today is a recovery day with a light swim and another team meeting and dinner tonight at the coach's house. The recovery day that i will admit that i need. With nearly 30hours of solid intensity last week, my body is excited to recover!:)

Super Saturday!

Check out Aaron's Ed Hardy Cruisey Shades he rocked out at our swim practice! Aaron is a experienced triathlete friend of LifeSport and he is an awesome doctor in Maui. He also set up all of the condos and even brought me over some Maui Coffee and a new coffee maker. Thanks for everything Aaron.

Today was "Super Saturday", and i am starting to feel great training and i have adapted to the workload and travel. Tomorrow for "Suffer Sunday" i may not feel as fresh but i might as well let it ride while i can.

Here is how today went:

Run Session- After a big warmup, we did 15mintues tempo building to hard pace 540-520pace. Followed by 20x400m on grass on 1minute recovery and holding great speeds with the wind and slopes. Lance and Mark built a great course and everyone rocked there paces, it was tough but it felt wicked when it was finished. Then a cool down jog and the famous Justin program to improve my flexibility.

After a short break to eat and regroup we headed out for our second session.

Cycling Workout- A warm up followed by 45mins of Steady State zone 3 and we were cruising along, then into 6x1minute max power and a long cool down to just over 2hours.

So more eating and resting and it was off to the pool for a 1.75 hour swim that had our famous 10x400m pull session.

Now it is fueling time and chilling watching School of Rock followed by a little Dumb and Dumber.

Tomorrow is "sufffer time"! Wicked

The hydration yeah want

Linsey showing how excited we were to hop in the pool for a recovery swim.

Yesterday was fun with a 90minute progression run in the cane fields. The rain made it a bit muddy and i felt like i was running with concrete blocks. The middle of the day was a recovery/pace swim, and another little base run in the afternoon. After 30k of running for the day i felt like i ate everything in site.

Fridays are a legs off day and we headed over to the open water swim course to put in a hard session.

After a warm up we did 20minutes hard tempo followed by 8x3minute intervals around the buoys. It was solid and everyone was bringing the best out in everyone but i did swallow my fair share of the ocean. During the cooldown Brent took me towards a big sea turtle to hear some Whales. Its amazing how after all the hard work is done you can easily forget the efforts you just put in.

Tomorrow is Super Saturday! Lucky i have some fantastic coconut water to replenish my electrolytes naturally. I read about the water on Linseys blog and i couldnt wait to test drive it when i got here. So many different brands i am sure i will test them all before i leave and report on my fav.

Hydrate Well!