Internal Mono(b)log

almost have everything together for 10 days of training camp

Big thanks to FirstEndurance, Extreme Endurance, PureProtein, TrainingPeaks, GU Energy and Redbull Canada.

Gonna be epic!

Jumping to the end I improved my 2012 time by nearly 15 minutes and almost did a sub-12 hr event.  I’m happy that I improved my PR, I finished strong and feeling good.

Comparing the two years isn’t totally fair: it was hotter on the run this year and windier on the ride (and the wind was inconsistent seemingly blowing from all directions).   Caveats aside lets compare the two years:

Getting out of the water I was very happy with my swim improvement.  Sub 1hr is the next goal for this distance in the swim and next time I’ll use the suit strippers to work on getting that T1 down (10 minutes is excessive… 5 would be much better).

Unfortunately, for all the things that worked well in training, my nutrition on race-day was total crap and I started feeling its effects even during the swim.  I’m not sure if I swallowed water in the swim or if it was the Passion Fruit flavoured GU gels (#fail, I’d never tried this flavour before swimming before – dumb dumb dumb and yes I do know and should’ve known better) that I swallowed before the swim start, but something unsettled my belly.  From about 1/2 way through the swim and all the way through the bike I had the “lump in your throat, you’re gonna puke” feeling.  In T1 I managed to eat a bonk breaker bar, but unfortunately from then through the end of the bike I didn’t manage to choke down more than maybe 200-300 calories.  Note: I trained with and normally consume 400-600 calories on the bike at the intensity level I was pushing on Sunday.  So rather than 500×6 hrs (3000 calories), I had a bonk breaker and 200-300 calories of the nutrition I’d planned and trained with.

Given the lack of nutrients coming in, the lack of electrolytes coming in and the energy I was expending, it’s not much of a surprise that my back started to cramp and spasm at about 80km.  I had to stop twice (briefly) to stretch out spasms that nearly pulled me off my bike and had to stop once to shake a bee out of my helmet (yea that coulda really sucked).   Also nearly hit a deer on my bike coming down Lac Superior at Mach3.. at first when I saw it I thought a fan had put a hunting decoy beside the road, but then as I approached it decided that it was a good time to cross the road.  Fortunately, I didn’t have to try to stop and she cleared the road without causing any incident.   Given the wind, and my fuelling problems, I’m ok with my bike split, but would really love to know what it’d have been had my nutrition issue not been there.

Coming off the bike and into the run my stomach had settled enough that I could start taking in some nutrition without throwing it back up.  My run, obviously, started slowly as I tried to slowly add some fuel to my system without putting so much volume in my stomach that I’d get ill running.  The run was HOT but the fans were awesome: garden sprinklers, misters, hoses out to help us athletes cool down were very very welcome.  Ice water sponges at the aide stations were also very welcome.  My run actually started to feel pretty good, especially once the sun dropped a bit and we got some shade.  My last km was done at all out sprint, my garmin has me at about a 4min/km pace (which for me is blistering).  I hit the line and was all smiles.  I felt great and had met several of my goals in the face of my fuelling adversity.

Ironman is never easy.  This one, for me, was as much a mental toughness test as it was a physical endurance one: it took a lot of will and focus to continue to push on the bike and into the run on nearly no fuel.   There was no way I was gonna stop, or even let myself pull back on the intensity unless my body just was completely unable (which it wasn’t). Sometimes bull-headed-ness has its’ value I guess.

2014 I’m not planning on doing any full-Iron distance events: just 70.3’s and Oly’s and maybe some off-road tri’s.  I really want to work on speed: especially in my run.  If I look at my typical age-group placement, I usually move forward in the rankings on the bike, then lose a lot of ground on the run.  That needs to be fixed if I want to be competitive. 🙂

Thanks again to the staff and especially the volunteers who made Ironmon Tremblant a memorable event once again!

In a few short days it’ll all be over for ironman Mont Tremblant 2013. The hundreds, or perhaps thousands of hours of training will have coalesced into a day of excitement, challenge, doubt and victory.  It seems like just days ago I was commenting on how far away the race seemed, now its here and sooner than I would like it will be done.  In fact, this morning I’m feeling a little schedule tension for the few things that I must get done today and the time windows they must occur in (this will be better after I finish my coffee).

Am I ready? Sure I am.  Could I be more ready? At this point in my racing career? No probably not. As with many others, I hope for a perfect day but have backup plans and goals for the less than perfect.  In the end, I will cross the finish line with a smile on my face and a feeling in my soul that, perhaps, only ironmen can truly understand.

In many ways everything has come together so easily that my pre-race nerves are almost non-existant.  Its’ kinda cool; yes, there is anticipation but more like that of going to the annual fall fair than that of going for dental surgery (lol).  All that said, last night, for the 1st time ever, I had a race-related dream wherein I “finished” the race but somehow by accident didn’t do the second lap of the run course and thought I’d completed.  In the dream, it wasn’t until after I was back in my room that I realized my error and I was debating what I should do.  Definitely an odd dream. 🙂

Thanks to all who’ve, once again, helped me toe the line on Sunday:

• my coach: Ian McLean
• my sponsors: Blacksmith Cycle, FirstEndurance, Sugoi, Nineteen Wetsuits
• Kim, my loving wife who supports these crazed endeavours though I’m not sure she understands why :), and
• my family and friends together with Kim, cheering me on from afar

I’m bib number 2233.  You can follow my progress on www.ironmanlive.com, or with the smartphone app IronTrac.

Cya at the finish line!

Day 3 brought us a 50ish KM time trial on the bike and then some short tempo runs with video analysis in the afternoon.

Here’s my TT.  Was pretty happy with it, especially given the baked feeling my legs have at the moment.

Was definitely channeling Jens Voigt for portions of this ride.

Fuel today for the TT was EFS Liquid Shot and a big portion of my continual ability to push this hard day after day is definitely thanks to ExtremeEndurance.

Hill repeats today on the Lac Superior segment.  Here’s my TrainingPeaks data.

Good Times!  Easy recovery spin planned for this afternoon.  Fueled with a flask of FirstEndurance EFS liquid shot and a couple of PickyBars

Most people are here, still waiting for a few to arrive tonight, but those of us who are here start punishing ourselves training today.  We’re doing hill repeats ad nauseum today.  Currently it’s a bit cool 6C, but it’s looking like it’s going to be a nice day.

People are drinking coffee, eating breakfast and generally waiting for the temps to come up a few degrees.  We’re probably going to head out around 9am, so a few hours to kill.

Individual athlete goodie bags containing ExtremeEndurance, a Finis swim cap, PureProtein bars, socks from TrainingPeaks and 1st Endurance Water bottles were a hit and our nutrition buffet with 1st Endurance, GuEnergy, Pickybars is setup.

Good times!

I’m getting pretty excited about the next 6 days! Tomorrow morning I leave for our annual spring Ironman (and 70.3) Mont Tremblant Training Camp!  2 of the 6 days are pretty much travel days with light training to workout the car-time if scheduling allows, but the 4 interceding days are gonna be all about pushing the body hard and taking full advantage of the following super-compensation training effect 🙂

Last year the water was warm enough to swim, but we won’t be so lucky this year, so we’ll be taking 5 days off swimming and just focusing on bike and run.

Unlike last year, this year we “splurged” on a chalet: yes!  Showers… real beds.. a real kitchen… internet… LUXURY 🙂  There are also more of us this year, which makes the chalet much more affordable.  Along with the dozen of us crazy triathletes who are going to put our bodies through the ringer, we’ll have 3 or 4 mountain bikers who are in Tremblant for a weekend race.

Like last year, we’re very well supplied.  Socks from TrainingPeaks, swim caps from Finis, water bottles, fuel and recovery drink from FirstEndurance, gels, energy and recovery drink from GU, bars from PureProtein and from Pickybars and lactic buffer from ExtremeEndurance.   Our athletes will definitely have no excuse when it comes to fueling their workouts and recovery!

Big thanks to all our generous sponsors!  You all are amazing!

More blog-entries and photos coming from the camp (hopefully nightly).  BOOM!

Wow! It’s been quite the whirlwind 12 days in hot, dry and sunny Arizona!  I left Toronto on April 4th, just in time to miss the unseasonably cold spring (winter) weather that hit the area and few to Phoenix with a follow-on drive to Yuma, Arizona where I’d stay for a week to train and try to get used to the desert heat.

Pre-Race Training Week in Yuma
I have to tell you: from the weather-perspective, Arizona in April is about as different from Toronto as you could imagine.  Arizona was wonderfully hot (30+ Celsius on most days) and dry.  The breezes when they blew were welcome friends rather than bone-chilling foes.  I love the sun and the dry-heat. LOVE IT!  Arizona for the last 12 days did not disappoint.

My friends Elyse and Devin were awesome hosts in Yuma.  They opened their home to me, providing me a comfortable and hospitable base to live and train from for a week.  I cooked for us all and “forced” them to eat my healthy cooking.  I think I made Devin almost like vegetables 🙂  I was especially happy to hear him rave about using collard greens as burrito/taco shells.  Go Devin!

In Yuma, I found a nice outdoor pool to swim in and no shortage of places to ride and run.  Even though Yuma isn’t known for being particularly cyclist friendly, I found the drivers always gave me a lot of room and respect on the road and never felt endangered.  My training time in Yuma was truly wonderful.  One of the highlights for me was a 90km box-route that left Yuma and did a square to San Luis, AZ.  San Luis was roughly 2/3 of the way through the ride and a great place to stop quickly to resupply. I rode this route a few times during the week and each time it had a slightly different characteristic.

The 1st ride of the route was a zone3 ride, feeling out the route and shaking-out the flight with a long ride.  The sun was hot and I got a bit baked but it was a great ride and definitely one I knew I’d repeat.  Wide, freshly paved roads with large paved shoulders and almost no traffic made for a super-comfortable training route.

The repeat of this route brought new challenges: rather than a zone3 easy-ish ride it was to do more solid tempo work.  Mother nature had other plans.  15k into the ride, the winds started to wake up.  As I was riding south out of Yuma, the winds were greeting me head-on.  I thought to myself, “Well this leg of the trip is short.  I’ll have a side wind for a lot and a tail wind toward the end when I’m getting tired to push me home.  All good!”.  As Route 195 bent to the west, the wind also shifted and gained strength: first out of the west, then the north-west. I was now riding in a full-on “Haboob”. Sustained winds of 25mph with recorded gusts to 38mph and me riding directly into it.  The big sky of a few days ago disappeared into a brown cloud of dust in all directions.  Sand was snaking down the road and drifting across it in places!  More than once I had to stop to clear the sand from my eyes, nose, mouth and shoes. Toward the end of the ride I was actually riding with the wind.  I took a lane of the 2 lane Route95 and was pedalling faster than cars were driving. Crazy fun!  Surprisingly, all this snotty weather only added 10 minutes to my round-trip time.  Definitely a good tempo workout!

Running in Arizona was a different beast.  Think HOT.  No. I mean think hotter than that, plus some.  My 1st run was an hour brick off the 1st loop ride.  I took my fuel belt with 4 flasks and drained it before the 30 minute mark!  Finding resupply was paramount!  Refilling the fuel belt and taking a cold shower with the rest of the water got me through the run.  Subsequent runs I knew better: Craft Cool Shirt, Ultraspire Surge 3L water-pack and ice in the shirt were the winning formula for keeping the pace up and the body core temperature down.

And Off to Tempe
After a week in Yuma, it was time to transition to a pre-race locale and taper-time: drive to Tempe, race checkin and athlete briefing, grocery shopping, and finally meet with my couchsurfing.org host Cindy.  Cindy was an awesome host.  Her apartment is small but she’s a generous spirit and opened her home to me as though we’d been friends for years.  An added perk was that her apartment was about 3 blocks from the race location.  How cool is that!

Tempe was already a triathlon buzz when I arrived on Friday:  not only were the 3 distances of the Leadman race happening on Sunday, but on Friday and Saturday the USAT Collegiate Nationals were running.  Thousands of triathletes, literally, all over the place.  The vibe was electric!  The vendors were already setup and TrainingPeaks.com was there.  I got to meet Bryan and Justin and had a bit of a home-base in the race-village.  Thanks guys!  One unfortunate side-effect of the nationals was that it was impossible to pre-ride the bike course because a lot of it was in use by those athletes.

The Race
Race morning arrived quickly enough. Transition set, suit on and into the lineup.  Pre-race meditation and deep breathing time and we were away!  2.5k swim, 109.5k bike, 13k run! GO!  The water was pretty nasty: I don’t think it was pollution so much as just a lot of suspended silt.  It was thick.  We were swimming by braille.  You literally couldn’t see your hand in front of your face!  I had a start spot for the swim at the front of my wave, and generally this was a good spot for me: rather than swimming over a lot of people, I’d only have to deal with being battered by a few who started behind me, but were stronger swimmers.  In the 1st 15 minutes of the swim that meant about 3 people.  Unfortunately at 20 minutes I was swimming beside someone and they kicked my Garmin 910XT which was on my wrist with the quick-release mount.  As soon as they did I knew it’d happened, the 910 was gone.  The water deep and mirky like chocolate milk, there was no way I’d find it and no point in trying to. *sigh*!  Unfortunately, my swim pacing was being driven by a repeating 15 minute alert on the 910 so, I swam on, holding the best pace and line that I could.

My swim felt good, my line was nearly buoy to buoy without a lot of wasted swim distance/time. Exiting the water there was a chute of wetsuit strippers.  I never use strippers as I can usually strip the top of my suit before I’m close to my bike and the bottom in a few seconds once I’m there.  These strippers were, um.. aggressive?  Trying to run the chute I was mauled by several helpful volunteers who didn’t understand that I really didn’t want their services.  No matter, suit off, and then to get ready for the bike.

Knowing how the Arizona sun would bake me and drive up my core temperature, I gave myself only 1 choice for a top for the race.  Frequently I got with a tri-top, but I knew from my Yuma experiences that I wouldn’t have enough shelter from the sun or enough cooling from a tri-top.  I’d only brought my Craft cool shirt to wear, so that I couldn’t at the last minute change my plan.  Unfortunately, putting on the craft shirt when wet is.. challenging.  In hindsight, I wonder if I could wear it under my wetsuit.  I’ll have to experiment with that.  Fortunately, I’d planned to use my Sportiiiis for bike and run output monitoring.  Even though my Garmin was with the fish, I didn’t have to ride or run by feel alone.

The bike course was supposed to be a long out-and-back route into the desert, but in the last few days before the race it was changed to 4 loops of a roughly 26km route that had no fewer than 4 tight 180degree turns and countless sharp 90 degree corners.  At one point this course would have Leadman, Olympic and Sprint distance cyclists on it.  I was very concerned about congestion before the race, but other than 1 close-call I had no issues.  One plus of the revised course was that we got 2 aide stations per loop (8 in total), which was super-good as I needed all the water I could grab to drink and wear.  I was happy with my ride.  With the Sportiiiis I was keeping my power in the 200w average and keeping my heart-rate in upper z3, low z4. Post ride I found that my average speed had been about 32km/h which given all the sharp corners, hairpin turns and congestion I’m very happy with.  As I was finishing the ride I dumped 2L of water over my arms, legs and core.  I could feel this drop my body temp and refresh me for the run.

Off the bike onto the run I felt good.  In fact, other than having to stop to pee, and stopping for water and ice at every aide station on the run, I ran most of the 13k non-stop at a 5:00-5:10/km pace. A good chunk of the 13k was technical trail with some pretty solid hills.  Yea I briskly walked those to save my legs, it was a good approach as I finished the run solid and feeling good.  I still need to work my run speed as it’s my weakest discipline, but Ian and I are definitely making progress here.

I’d estimated that I’d finish between 5 and 6 hours, my finish time: 5:33:17!  Pretty much right in the middle.  Comparing myself to the podium finishers in my age-group: my swim close, my ride 15-20 minutes off and my run 20-30 minutes off.  I’m very happy with my performance and feel that Ian and I are on the right track for pushing the run, especially the run off the bike, faster.  Thanks Coach!

In terms of nutrition/hydration strategy for the race, I went with what I know works for me:

•  pre-race EFS sport drink and some EFS liquid shot to top off fuel before the swim,
•  a BiestBooster 1 loop into the bike course to boost energy levels for the 2nd half of the race,
•  EFS liquid shot on the bike (had 1200 calories of this with me but only got through about 400)
•  PickyBars (had 2, but dropped 1/2 of one hitting a bump 🙁 ) and some dried fruit on the bike
•  a HoneyStinger waffle when I was in and leaving T2
•  some fruit on the run

At every aide station I brought on water.  I’d drink some, and wear a lot.  On the run, I’d refill my fuel belt (2 bottles) and dump ice down the ice pocket of the craft shirt.  The water in the fuel belt was primarily used for cooling.  It was like magic, if my tempo was falling, I’d hit myself with cold water and it’d come right back up.  Good to know!

All in all, I’m very happy with the day.  I proved some approaches I’d planned. Felt well fuelled but not over-fed and managed my hydration and temperature well.

Big Thanks To
My hosts: Elyse, Devin and Cindy.
My coach: Ian McLean @ Imfit.ca
My sponsors: FirstEndurance, Blacksmith Cycle, 4iiii, and Nineteen Wetsuits
And an especially big thank you to my wonderful wife, Kim, who cheered me on from home and held the fort while I played in the sun for the last 12 days.  Staying on top of our place is a big job when there are 2 of us working at it, solo is a daunting task.  Thanks baby! You Rock!!

Ok…. yes it’s exciting that there’s a potentially new carbon fiber material out there that’s stronger and lighter and sustainable, but their 1st product:

The first product, called FXR (Front Xtended Range), is designed to be mounted in between aero bars and carry a Speedfil A2 bottle.

Weighs in at:

just 20 grams compared to competing systems weighing 25 grams

Karbon Speed launches all-new Flax Carbon Hydration Product Line for 2013 » Endurance Sportswire.

Now come on… 5 grams?  I really did laugh out loud.

Extending this small piece into the full size of a bike frame and I start getting a little excited.  Say there’s 100x the quantity of carbon fiber in a frame than this little prototype.  That’d be a savings of 500g – that’s pretty serious.

Sitting in a cafe at Tremblant drinking green tea and passing time til dinner, I figure now is as good a time to write about my race day nutrition plan as any. So here it is:

My nutrition plan has changed a bit over this summer: I’ve started including more solid and natural nutrition into the mix. I still heavily rely on FirstEndurance liquid shot and drink but now have added my home-made energy bites into the mix with great results.

Today, the day before the race, I’m eating a lower fibre diet, still whole foods and largely unprocessed but no big salads, mostly cooked veg and light, easily digested fish and/or eggwhites for protein. I’ll aim to eat to a zero calorie deficit today and each time I wake at night to pee, I’ll top up with a banana.

For breakfast I’ll have a coffee and a banana, granola and cottage cheese (normal brekkie).

Pre-swim I’ll eat 2 GU Rocktane with some water.

Out of the swim, for the first 5-10k I’ll drink just water and let my system settle before putting any kind of fuel in. On the bike I have 2 flasks of EFS liquid shot diluted with water in a speedfil a2 (800 calories) and 2 bottles of EFS drink (200 calories), a bottle of water and 10 energy bites (500 calories) and refills for each of these at the Special Needs tent. This works out to about 500 calories per hour and since I hope to finish the ride in a little less than 6 hrs, my goal is to consume most of this.

The run is similarly planned. 10 bites, 1 flask and 1 EFS drink per 2 hrs with refills in special needs.

I expect that this will be my last blog post until Monday. Though I may try to do a quick finish time post Sunday night. I’m #1176. You can track me on ironmanlive.com or with the irontac app on a smartphone.

Cya on the other side of hearing: Rick Yazwinski… You… Are… An… Ironman! 🙂