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Gower Sprint Triathlon 2010

So this has been a challenging weekend so far. I'm not sure what the lesson is but it's in there.

I invited a mate and his family to come and stay with us and to enter today's Gower Triathlon. Garry and I used to bike race together when we were half our current ages and now we have somehow both drifted towards triathlon. I thought it might be a good battle as I guessed my swim would be better than his, his bike leg would be faster than mine and who knows what would happen then in the run?

I took him round the bike course yesterday and we had a swim in Port Eynon while the families played on the beach (we did too a little!) The weather ended up being a lot better than expected and I seemed to collect most of the sun on my head. Normally I have a cap with me, but I thought it was going to be rainy, not sunny. Later in the evening a stonking headache began, and when I looked in the mirror I realised that the cause was a red face, rather than a resurgence of the mild fever I had earlier in the week. I'd fried my brain.

Trying to get an early night and a good sleep before the 5am start paracetamol dulled the pain but I got little sleep and was up all night peeing. But not drinking anything. That can't be good. At 5am I felt no better but drove to the race with Garry and a wet flannel on my head drinking as much as I could keep in my stomach to try and rehydrate. I didn't think I'd start the race.

Registered, kit together, transition sorted, wetsuit half on and it was clear I was going to at least get in the water. Maybe the cold water would help. My wetsuit fits poorly and the cold water flowing down my neck probably alleviated my symptoms. What the hell, race on.

It was great to bump in to some of the club guys on the beach & I found one of my students (Alistair) - a good swimmer. I'd like to hold his feet in the swim. The race eventually started & I just hammered the swim, got some draft, was pretty straight to the buoys & came out right next to Alistair. Excellent. Good swim.

I've been poor at running to transition but ran faster today up the beach, feeling ok. Hammering the bike up the hill out of Port Eynon I picked up most of the places ahead of me, another before the climb, another on the climb and then belted the rest of the bike course on my own. Lots of rain to keep my poor head cool and a course I knew really well. Lovely. I took the descent back down to the beach a lot faster than I'd expected too so I must have been having fun. Another good effort.

Off the bike, out onto the beach for the run and I was clear behind and ahead. I had a big gap to pick up so I pushed hard for the first lap through soft sand, shallow dunes, huge muddy puddles and boardwalks. At the turn to lap 2 it was clear I wasn't catching and no-one was catching me so I kept up a decent effort but took safer lines after nearly turning my ankle on a couple of hidden holes. Finish safe. I knew I was in 3rd or 4th place.

There was a good crowd at the finish and a nice finishing chute so I enjoyed that. As I was recovering Garry finished, way too close to me for comfort. Fit boy! Shortly after him Cardiff Tri jerseys started appearing, plus more students and friends. Great!

Waiting around for the prize giving my headache and sore neck started to reform & I started to feel like crap again. I don't understand how I was able to race at that intensity feeling that bad before and after. Maybe it was the cold water. I still don't feel any better now, writing this.

Officially 4th, Richard Jones was kind enough to stand aside for me to be awarded 3rd (open category age group) on account of him being an awesome ex-international triathlete. Thanks, Rich. A nice bit of glory for me, my face in the paper and a nice prize.

And my name next to Richard Jones' on the results sheet. Just don't look at the time difference.

Summer's here?

Just as I was getting used to the long, mostly easy riding, running and swimming my training has switched at last to more race-like speed work. Of course, I've been racing since April or May, so I'm a bit out of sync with my original and current training plans. I just finishing my winter training, for example. In July. The broken foot of February has rather confused my racing year, but hasn't dampened it too much (6th at the Welsh Tri champs in Broad Haven at the end of my final block of winter training on tired, tired legs was a great indicator and great fun).

Funnily, after anaerobic intervals on the track and in the pool and some muscular endurance intervals on the bike last week my (shortened) long run on Saturday didn't go as well as usual. I felt bloody awful. I cut the already short 1 hour 45 mins run down to about an hour and a half and plodded my way out and back by the Loughor estuary at around 8min/mi pace. Horrible. I barely managed 12 miles. Happily I don't think it rained though.

I assumed it was a good sign of the new stresses of the speed work. After a good night's sleep and a bit of a lie in to try and avoid the rain (failed) I also cut short my planned Sunday training to just 2ish hours on the bike and a 45 minute run off. I mucked about a bit trying to recalibrate my iBike power meter before it failed in a light shower, and it continued to rain for most of the ride. With a nice hill and a good wind my legs felt strangely good and strong. Getting off the bike I ran an easy 10km in 43:34 at around 7min/mi pace. Weird.

What a difference a day makes, eh?

Talking of which, my "Remote Wind Sensor" (rubber bung, some tubing and a wind catching flangey-thing) arrived for my iBike this morning. I'm hoping I can get it dried out, fitted and calibrated for tomorrow's bike intervals. More rain is forecast and I'd love it if this kept the rain out of my iBike and gave me power data for the whole ride. Oh yeah, and my mudguards exploded on the bike too. The bit connected to the rear brake broke and the mudguard got pulled forward by the tyre. I found the bits, took it all apart and stuffed then into jersey pockets - I wasn't far from home. I've no idea how the back bit snapped off though. They're clever modular things, these Crud Catcher Roadracer mudguards, so I should be able to get the bit I need. I'll get some Duck tape on it tonight as a temporary fix.

I'm racing at the Gower Sprint Triathlon this weekend with a good, old (?) friend so I've shunted a few workouts around this week and cut out the track intervals to balance training intensity and give myself a little recovery and avoid the dastardly dead legs of last Saturday. I'd better get back on the TT bike & see if I can remember how to go fast for 25km. I was just getting the feel for standard distance races too. There are a couple of short climbs though, so those will be a blast. I'll be able to swim HARD too hopefully as its only 750m. As it's exam week for the students this week I'm looking forward to thinking about something else. If I get the marking done in time I might be able to make a long weekend of it.

Llanelli 10k (2010)

Finishing speed, originally uploaded by samwebster.

Check out the heart rate for this sucker!



It was hot yesterday so my HR was a tad high, but see it kick up again at half way! It hits 95% of max HR by the end. It's a positive split but I reckon the second half of that course is slower than the first half anyway. The legs were tired from racing at Windsor & a full week's training, so maybe I was just slower in the second half. Hammered it though.

Good to see the legs are back to 36mins already!

Windsor race report

I also raced the Gower Duathlon a few weeks ago in which I ran a steady 39 minute first run (my foot was still healing), biked a quick hilly 43km in which my legs died after the final climb up from the Gower Heritage Centre and then held on for 7th place overall in the 5km run. A beautiful race on a beautiful morning, but I clearly haven't sussed my pacing for a 40km bike leg.

I raced in the Gloucester Sprint Triathlon 2 weeks ago & paced that much better to get 3rd in my age-group and 5th overall (beaten by 2 vets!) with a quick swim, a nice fast bike and a well paced run. I wasn't moving as fast as I wanted but I moved fast enough.

So last weekend in Windsor my legs were feeling ok after an easyish week of training. I certainly wasn't peaking but those legs have been getting faster & faster. They like racing! Funnily enough I was pretty chilled on the start line. So chilled that I didn't position myself particularly well. I got on the right side ready to cut across the current of the Thames but a few places back from the front. With the horn my start was unlike any other start before, and I swam over other triathletes as others swam over me & I easily found myself clear out in front with 2 other swimmers. I went hard to get on the next guy's feet then cruised in his draft upstream overtaking groups of swimmers from 2 or 3 earlier waves, turned into the downstream current at about 900m & dropped him. My swim got a bit wiggly and I missed the turn to the exit a little but was out of the water 2nd in my wave.

It's a long run to transition but hey, I'm always happy to run. A steady transition, feet in the shoes nicely for only the second time this year, and comfy on the bike on the way out. My pace for the first third was probably spot on but after dying at Gower I eased up a little through the middle section, swapping places with a few other riders. I dumped them all on the hill up to the Great Park (that ain't no hill if you train in South Wales!) and bombed downhill back to Windsor.

Through T2 I spotted the guy that came out of the swim behind me & shouted at him, "hey, where did you come from?" We'd been swapping places on the bike. He followed me out of transition but some lovely, clever race organiser had stuck a hill on the first part of the course (seriously, no sarcasm there) & I blasted up it to drop him. Rar! With the dead turns throughout the 3 lap course I could see my tasty gains. 1st lap was pain & fast (quads hinting cramp time was coming), 2nd lap was less painful & fastish, 3rd lap was full on effort & bury-yourself-in-it-pain by the end. Gorgeous. My times were a little off what I wanted but my pacing was good again. There were a hell of a lot people to run around.

Great race, great marshals. I could probably have swum harder & I could have paced the flat bike more evenly. Good lessons & I've got a better feel for the distance.

2:10.21, 25th overall (2500 entered?) but only 7th in my age group. That's about the same time as James Cracknell did last year & he got 4th. My bike leg was indeed a little slow for the top 30. I'll hammer it next time, shave a couple of minutes & get on that podium.

Official results here .

Long run

It's 92 days since I broke my foot and today I ran my first long run since then. Only 75 minutes and 500m shy of 10 miles hardly seems a long run, but to my legs it felt long. This is crucial as the Long Steady Run (or LSD) has profound effects on my run fitness. Running long distances at an easy, steady pace develops my efficiency and stamina allowing me to run faster (funnily enough), and it's a workout I can do every week unlike track intervals.

The last 5km felt like the last 5km of any long run: tired and a little sore, particularly around my left ankle. The broken bone itself felt fine. I see from my watch's data that my even pacing has survived, running 38:16 out and 38:16 back. Slow but steady, the aim of the run. My average heart rate was only a couple of beats per minute higher coming back than going out, suggesting my aerobic run fitness is actually better than I thought.

It was also great to be back out on the Millennium Coastal Path around the Llanelli coastline. Beautiful views and whatever the weather it's always a great start to the weekend (other people think it's great too).

Each week I'll build up the length of my long run slowly, until eventually I might get back to where I was.

Fading

Day 269: Fading, originally uploaded by samwebster.

The results from Llandovery triathlon are in and they look nice for me. I had a fast swim, which I knew, but I also had the fastest bike split. That's very nice as I don't think I'm biking very well yet. My bike fitness has only just caught up with January levels.

I gave up all my advantage on the run with a very slow (>19mins!) 5km run split. That makes sense of course, as I'd only just started running again that week, 4 weeks after having the plaster cast cut off my left leg. It will take a while to regain that run fitness and speed. It'll be fun though! I wonder if getting off the bike and hammering a 17min run will be doable?

Results aside it was a fun afternoon. It was great to hammer the bike & it's the first time it has been used in anger. My swimming has really improved as I've not been allowed to run so have spent much more time in the pool. Getting my feet on my shoes out of T1 is going to need a bit of thinking about and a lot more practice, and I've now worked out how to get my Garmin to pick up my heart rate when I get out of the pool. I'm sure I've got a much better idea of pacing a sprint distance triathlon too.

This was my third triathlon and they've been rather spaced out. 1996, 2003 and 2010. I think I might do a few more this year though.

All of this points to one thing: I'm going to get faster.

I won a trophy today

Day 268: I won a trophy today, originally uploaded by samwebster.

Hmm, not much of a race report for this one, from the Llandovery sprint triathlon.

Swam fast (fastest ever), got on my bike (ooh, tricky), cycled fast (no idea how fast yet, but caught lots of slower fish), got off the bike (also tricky), put slippery, heavily vaselined shoes on and ran hard (ow, fully stitched, tough to breathe) then ran harder (probably got some proper speed up eventually) and crossed the finish line ready to puke.

Surprisingly I was 3rd overall but shhh, don't tell anyone - I'm not supposed to be running yet. Very nice. Lots of fun & I learnt a lot.

Running around the bay

76 days after breaking my foot I went for my first run by the sea, in the sun, around Swansea Bay. It felt good to be running again, but it ain't easy. I've been building up to this slowly with walking and walk - jog - walk intervals. The foot has been feeling fine and strong, and my sports therapist has been working on my ankle to get the range of movement back. I've been very careful.

The pace was OK, and actually looks similar to the pace and heart rate that I was running at an easy effort with before I broke my foot. And that was back when the bay was covered in ice and snow. Remember? That was back in January. I've jumped from running in the snow to running in a vest.

Week 6 in plaster

I'm finally into my 6th and hopefully final week in plaster. My foot is feeling really solid still, and the only discomfort I'm getting is from the plaster cast flexing and squashing my toes and banging against my heels. Walking is still a bit of a hobble because the cast prevents any ankle movement and almost reaches my knee, making it impossible to fully flex the knee. The cast itself is starting to break down under the ball of the foot in thin areas, allowing it to flex where previously it was stiff.

A bus driver stopped at a pedestrian crossing to let a couple cross but was still looking at something in his cab when he accelerated towards me yesterday. He hadn't looked up and was only paying attention to the people he had seen out of the corner of his eye, so I had to hobble and shuffle quickly out of the way of the bloody thing and it's not easy to accelerate in a cast. It was a reflex reaction and my brain had briefly forgotten I was wearing the cast so my movement wasn't great. There wasn't any pain from the fracture area but the cast banging into bits of me and causing my knee to lock straight was uncomfortable and made me wince. The idea of getting run over by a bus at 5mph probably made me wince more.

I'm getting a little used to this free time, and starting to wonder how I'll adapt to going back to training next week. It's probably a good job that I entered all those races this spring and summer or I might have become a little lazier and not so keen to get out there every day, weather be damned. Upcoming races are a kick up the arse, excuse in hand (foot) or not. It feels like those lovely chemical rewards my drug-dealing brain got me hooked on for running, cycling and swimming every day are starting to wear off and I'm wondering why the hell I trained as much and as hard as I did. Make a plan, stick to the plan, get out the door, feel the opioids. I did cane it in the gym today so my worries are probably unfounded.

I've also been wondering if my attitude will change. Up until now I've been pretty indestructible. I was never a nutter rock climbing but I used to be able to put my head in a good place early in the season and climb some interesting stuff. I used to revel in the interesting stuff, but would maybe cack it a bit if I was pushing both my grade and the risk. But then I guess that's the point. Controlling the cack it factor. For a period I was making an average of one stupid potentially fatal mistake per year but survived, never really hurt myself (even when belayers didn't catch me!) and learnt from those mistakes. Indestructible. When Kim became pregnant with Jack something in my brain changed and I was never willing to climb as risky as before. Make of that what you will.

As I get older I get a little more sensible. Like the potentially fatal climbing errors I've learnt from I've also learnt to avoid the really icy roads, to ride straight, tall & slow (but don't brake!) through icy patches on the bike, and to not hammer it down greasy descents in the drizzle. Now that I've broken a bone and experienced the repair, the loss of fitness and the inconveniences, and have yet to even start the rehabilitation, will I become even more careful? To the point of losing time to competitors? Maybe I'm still indestructible. I feel like I'm healing quickly.

5 weeks in plaster

I've done 5 weeks in plaster now. That's 35 days in a cast from my toes to my knee on my left leg. From the end of week 4 the foot started to feel really solid again with no pain. I can sometimes wiggle it and find an interesting sensation, like probing a painful tooth with your tongue, but that's about all. Looking back through my tweets I see that I was predicted to not be walking without pain until 8 weeks or so, so that's encouraging. An orthopaedic colleague suggests I will be in trainers for a while when the plaster comes off, and that's fine with me. With walking and some work in the gym the strength and fitness of the quadriceps and hamstring muscles in my left leg have started to match that of my right leg agan already. Some of the work I've been doing in the gym has strengthened pre-existing weaknesses in my hip and core muscles to also better balance between left and right sides.

After periods of going nuts I'm starting to enter a new phase. Thanks to international adventure racing 1st year student star "Jacket" John Laughlin and a pile of inspiring DVDs he lent me my brain is feeling a bit better. But with 5 weeks of, essentially, sitting on my arse I'm falling back into that phase of, "do I really want to train every day for hours & hours"? My new found laziness is suggesting I take it easy. Swim every day? Are you mad? You want to go out on the bike for how long? Why? Part of my brain is sounding like normal people. I try to avoid being normal (normal is another word for "average"). If it's wet and cold when my plaster comes off I may have to push hard to get myself outside. But I doubt it. I'll lay down a plan and follow it, measure progress, and find out where the pain is.

I'm back in fracture clinic a week on Tuesday. I'll look after myself for 11 more days and hopefully my consultant will tell me I'm good to go. When I leave the care of the wonderful NHS I'll surround myself with the continued care of the University Sports Village and get myself back to form. That's half the fun.

Week 4

My ability to walk and move is much easier three and a half weeks after breaking my foot, but the boredom isn't getting any easier to deal with. I really miss the feeling of movement, of running, swimming or cycling. Reading about it, or planning for the rest of the year doesn't help much (although watching it does, funnily enough).

I've ditched the crutches & I'm walking with a stick this week, which is causing much piss-taking. There's no pain when walking, but I wouldn't want to stand on tip-toes or run.

To make it worse, I missed my gym session today because of a screw up. Grumpy, bored, annoyed. I might have cut this plaster off with a dremel before I make it to six weeks.

Counting the days

I'm back into fracture clinic tomorrow morning. The foot feels pretty good and is well supported by the cast.

As you can see from the image above, I've got counters running that count the days of healing and count down towards my major races this year. I won't be that fit for Windsor but I might be going well by Bala.

Going nuts

It's almost two weeks since I fractured the bone in my foot and I'm starting to go nuts. Kim's surprised I've not gone mad already. I'm trying not to think about it.

Six weeks in plaster and six weeks out of training is the least of it. As I can't put any weight on my foot I've no idea if it's getting better, and there's no change in the pain on that side of my foot. Healing bones is a fairly slow process. If I saw repair in an x-ray I'd be happier. Six weeks in a cast will be followed by around six weeks of limited run/walking, and that's if all goes well. It could be worse. When the cast comes off at least I'll be able to get in the pool, so maybe my swimming will become awesome. That's something I'm looking forward to, and I think five days a week in the pool or sea is a real possibility.

If I can at least get a cycling shoe on and spin on the bike I'll be a very happy cyclist. Having cycling replacing much of the running this year helped my running. I wasn't sure if this would happen but in January I was running easy at 7:15 min/mi pace, and 7 min/mi pace was at the upper end of zone 2. I only reached that pace for effort as I was approaching the marathon last year, so that's an excellent sign for under 50km of running per week. If I can get on the bike I'll be ok. There will be a lot of rehab for my left leg though so I've no idea how I'll perform.

So all the races I'd planned this summer will be for fun and experience. I enjoy the complexity of multisport and I love to compete. If I can complete the early races I'll be doing well. A couple of weeks after the cast comes off I think I'll start my training all over again, starting the long endurance building period from scratch before I add real intensity. My long term goals require endurance, and that takes years to build so I don't want to short change this one. At least my high mileage weeks should be in the summer rather than March!

Trying to plan the months ahead is a little depressing, particularly when I think about the uncertainty of it all. I need to find something to focus on to take my mind off it all.

Spiral fracture of the distal shaft of the fifth metatarsal bone of my left foot

After a very brief assessment in fracture clinic this morning (and all that was needed) I had a load bearing cast wrapped around my leg, ankle and foot to replace the weekend's temporary backslap plaster cast.

The verdict: 6 weeks in a cast, no load bearing for 2 weeks, expect 8-12 weeks before walking with little pain. That rather dulls the 2010 racing season for me.

It is what it is and there's no point crying about it. I'll sit down and look at the year I had planned. I'll probably add a half-marathon to the end of the year (Cardiff maybe) to extend it and try to get under 80 minutes, and remember my long term goals. Races up to July will have new goals of "finish the race" and "learn". Training to that point and from July to October is unplannable at this stage. I'll get into the gym & work on the rest of my body, although walking on crutches is already helping that. I think I may be able to come up with some lightweight elastic band exercises but I can't exercise my left calf muscles at all, and I have to be careful of damaging the cast.

It is what it is.

Polar to Garmin

Like me, my Polar heart rate monitor, chronometer, speedometer and sole training partner (other than my shadow, but he hasn't been out much lately) has been struggling recently. His memory failed this week after getting a little water inside his case, and he's never really recovered. Sorry buddy, but it's time for a replacement.

Polar have gone weird since I bought this S625x many years ago. Their cheaper models are crippled so that you can't get all your data off (but instead are only given the amount of time you spent in certain heart rate zones - useless for reviewing intervals and tempo work) and their expensive models are super expensive (and no longer competitive). They seem to have dumped their software development and keep hinting at new technologies using new standards (i.e. their stuff will only work with their stuff). Sod that, I thought. The move to Garmin gives a device with Mac software so I don't have to keep rebooting into XP just to get my data every day, clever online software so I can upload from different machines and still get the original data out to use elsewhere, ANT+ connectivity so I can use devices from a bunch of other manufacturers, and built in GPS. Their accessories are sensibly priced too.

The Forerunner 305 has also been around for some years now, but people have been very, very happy with their 305's and the price is awesome for the features (around £135 on Amazon). OK, this thing is a massive chunk of plastic on my wrist, which I wasn't too impressed with. I would have gone with the smaller 405 but I'm a little lean in the wallet after Christmas, kids' birthdays, the exhaust falling off, tax returns, etc. Really, as a wannabe triathlete, I should have bought the Garmin 310XT - it's the only device like this in their range that is waterproof. You can't swim with the 305. The 310XT has a bunch of extra features that makes its price of twice that of the 305 worthwhile. I'm not going to be racing with this chunk on my arm though, so I decided I'd take the cheap option. I don't want all this data when I'm racing but I do want it for training (as much for studying after as for during). I'll try to pick up something cheaper and smaller for racing (time, laps, HR and waterproofing will do me).

So this thing is a chunk of tech. It's not ugly, but it ain't pretty. It's light enough so that you don't really notice it when running. Just like the iBike though, when you start using it and you see the huge range of data collected, stored and displayed you see the thing's worth. Using GPS and tracking your route instills a feeling of flexibility (maybe I'll nip down that path & I don't have to remember the route later, it's all going to be collected) and confidence in its accuracy. If it can see a bunch of satellites and show you which side of the road you ran on it has got to be pretty damned accurate for pace and distance. Running with a footpod (an accelerometer that calculates pace and distance from the movements of your foot) is fairly accurate once you've calibrated it, as long as you run in the same shoes and don't change surfaces too much. It puts you off exploring off-road trails if you want to collect your data somewhat obsessively like me. Running tempos or intervals downhill gave bizarre speed readings with the footpod, but I expect the GPS to be more useful here. We'll see.

This morning's complicated run gave it a good test, although on snow and ice I could only guess that the pacing was about right from experience. The next few months should give it a strong test though. It's already feeling good to be able to access my data on my computer and not be forced to reboot into Windows.