Internal Mono(b)log

I just ordered Macca’s book I’m Here to Win.

Looking forward to giving the book a read. I’m not expecting much, but will be happy to be surprised. 🙂

Get your copy yet?

Hey folks! My blog is featured today on Fitblogger.ca. I’m honored to have the headline over there and happy to have your eyeballs on my blog 🙂

Please take your time and poke around. Make sure that you enter the draw for the RoadID giveaway that I have running. The announcement post is HERE: Busy Weekend and RoadID Giveaway!.

Happy Reading! Train Hard!

Wow! So crazy busy these days – in a good way, but still 🙂

This weekend, along with my normal long ride/long run, on Saturday morning I did a VO2Max retest with my coach, Ian McLean at ImFit.ca and did a swim stroke analysis session at AbsoluteEndurance.com.

The retest was good, a hard effort, but rewarding. All the hard work over the last 3 months, since my last test, have paid off. I don’t have the actual numbers yet, but initial feedback was that my threshold power is up about 40w, my VO2 max is up, my fat metabolism is working better. Generally I’m more fit and utilizing my body more efficiently. All good! I’ll post the actual data once I get it from Ian.

The swim session, this morning with Brittany at AbsoluteEndurance.com was pretty cool. The session was an hour long, in their endless pool. The pool has mirrors on the bottom and at 45° at the front of the pool, so you can see your stroke while you’re in the water. Brittany and I spent the hour working on small tweaks to my form. She said that my form is actually really good, but that when I try to pickup the pace, rather than keeping long and powerful, I tend to short myself on the power part of the pull and pickup the stroke tempo. Useful feedback and stuff to work on for me. Awesome! 🙂

Of course, having set new threshold power and VO2max levels, means my workouts are now going to get more intense. Bring it!

Yesterday’s long ride, which was planned to be multiple runs of the Milton Tri course, turned into 2 hrs at 200w on my trainer in the pain-cave. It was too foggy and wet to ride solo safely (I could sometimes not see cars infront of me, never mind bikes), and while I really really want to be outside, I also want to be alive. *sigh*

Today’s run was cool and wet, but the weather kept me from overheating and, you know, once you’re out there and in it, it’s not so bad. Hard to psyche yourself up for it, but really, honestly, once you’re going, it’s all good. I did get to wear my new Sugoi Firewall Tights and new Sugoi Versa Jacket. I didn’t really get to take advantage of the removeable sleeves on the jacket, but the tights were just PERFECT for today’s weather. The firewall fabric on these tights worked exactly as you’d want, keeping the worst of the rain and wind off your legs. I’m really impressed with these and was afraid that, given that it’s mid May, I wasn’t going to get a chance to wear them until fall. Guess this shitty weather is good for something after all.

Contemplating yesterday’s ride and today during my run, there were times when the fact that I wear a RoadID was really forefront in my mind. 3-times during my run today, I was nearly hit, clipped or was cut-off by a drivers who just didn’t see me, or having seen me, didn’t register with them that what they were doing was potentially dangerous or life-threatening to me. Knowing that I have a RoadID on and it can speak for me, if I can’t, lends some peace of mind at these times. I own 3 RoadIDs and, because I train (usually solo) 7-days a week, I’m almost always wearing one. I really believe in this product. It won’t make you faster. It won’t make you more efficient. It won’t get you to your training goals any easier. But… it may keep you alive in a situation where otherwise the outcome may not be as happy.

I believe in this product so much, that I’m sponsoring a give-away for a RoadID Wrist ID Sport customized with your info and shipped to you anywhere in the world! There are up to 5 ways that you can enter this draw. Each action qualifies you for 1 entry. Perform all 5, get 5 entries into the draw. I’ll announce the winner on the blog on the evening of May 29th. Leave me a comment on this post telling me how many of the qualifying actions you’ve completed (1 comment with the number of entries is all that’s required) and you’re entered. Note my comments are moderated, so it may not show up immediately, don’t worry.

Here are the ways to enter:

• Subscribe to rss feed: http://www.internalmonoblog.com/feed/
• Friend me on daily mile: http://bit.ly/leG0MV
• Like the RoadID page on facebook and tell them Internalmonoblog.com sent you: http://on.fb.me/jrO3Lm If you already like the page, just leave a note on the wall saying I sent you back to the page.
• Follow me on twitter: @ryazwinski
• And finally, if you have a blog: post a contest announcement there and send me the link for an extra entry

In order to see the comment box, you need to open this post by clicking on the post title or clicking on the “comments link” under the title. I’m looking at how to make this easier, but for now bear with me.

Good luck and train hard!

2011 Ironman St. George Champion Heather Wurtele Nutrition Video. | First Endurance.

It’s a heavy-duty sponsorship plug for 1st Endurance, who’s products I like, but if you can read between the product placement, there’s a fair bit of other useful info in this vid.

Check it out, and congrats to Heather! 🙂

My blog has been getting a bit ignored lately as my training schedule has been getting more demanding. Sorry about that! Life happens, you know 🙂

Anyhow, I’ve been meaning to write up a review of SportQuest’s Carbo Pro nutrition suppliment.

This stuff is pretty amazing. It’s like putting high octane fuel in your engine. It’s tasteless and colorless, but really packs an energy wallop!
1 scoop = 100 calories of mixed-duration easily accessible energy.

My typical long-workout/race blend is: 1 packet of Hornet Juice, (maybe) a scoop of Amino Vital and 1 or 2 scoops of Carbo Pro. With this high-test mixture I can run 20k and feel like doing it again! It’s pretty amazing actually. 🙂

This morning, for the 1st time, I used it in the pool for my Friday long-swim. I’m not sure if it’s purely psychosomatic, but when I start to feel energy dwindling, a swig of this blend seems to pick me right back up again. My 2 hr swim this morning just flew by, and had it not for having to get to work, I’d have kept going.

Definitely a fan! Definitely a long-term addition to my training and racing arsenal.

I just received the email that I’ve been selected as a Sugoi Brand Champion. I’m so happy and excited to be selected to represent such an awesome product line.

I’ve long since been a fan of the Sugoi products. Feel, fit and finish they’ve all done well by me and proven to have durable and long-lasting construction that has stood up to hundreds of hours of training and racing.

Thanks Sugoi!

I haven’t yet had time to summarize the survey data, but in the short-term thought I’d publish a link to the raw data for those who are interested.

This link will give you a .xls file with the raw data if you want to slice and dice it yourself.

My survey has attracted about 40 responses so far which is awesome (if you haven’t done it yet, please do!). Of the 275 triathletes I follow on Twitter 40 is a reasonable percentage. I’ll take a 1st cut at summarizing the data over the weekend and after randomizing the order of the entries, I’ll make the raw data available via a link to anyone who wants it.

In the process of badgering people to do the survey, I had a twitter conversation with Russel Cox (@russmcox) who pointed me at a report done by the USAT that answered a lot of my questions (and many that I hadn’t thought to ask). Their research is online here, make sure to look at the PDFs as well as they have a lot of very rich data. I wish the raw data were available so you could do analysis on it and drill down to ask specific, unanswered questions, but their data is great none-the-less.

While doing my morning run this morning and pondering the “nature of the universe and many other things” 🙂 I started wondering about other triathletes out there, their demographics, their spending habits, etc. (I told you I was pondering “many other things”).

Anyhow…

As a result of my pondering, I’ve put together a survey form to anonymously collect training, spending and demographic info. The survey is here.

Please share, link, retweet, and help the survey to be seen by as many triathletes as you can. I’ll summarize the response data when I have over 50 responses (and again at each 50 should responses keep coming).

Thanks in advance.

You’re probably going to swallow… You may occasionally spit…

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