Houston Tri, Mental Toughness and New Beginning

This sounds like its going to be a long post but its not.

The Houston Tri was supposed to be a redemption race for me. This redemption was derailed in the swim when I developed hamstring cramps that really bore their head as I was stepping on the beach to get out of the water. This needless to say drained my legs of power for the rest of the race and my performance shows. My effort was higher than it was at Austin Tri shown by higher heart rates but I finished a good 10mins slower and was slower in both disciplines on an easier course.

Mental Toughness
I wanted to quite during every stage of this race but I know one of my weaknesses as an athlete is mental toughness so I decided to keep going and persevere no matter what. I was able to do that and I am proud of my self for it.

New Beginning
Due to 4 out of my 5 races this year being affected by hamstring issues I have already contacted The Core Diet, which is Apex Endurance's new Nutrition Partner, to help me develop race fueling plans to try and tackle this issue. It is almost dumb for someone to spend hours and hours training and then have a race come apart because of ignorance when it comes to nutrition and their body's needs.

So from now on I would like to think that nutrition will no longer be a limiter and my true fitness will be able to show through and better performances are to follow.

Rotor Q Rings - Test

I will be using the above 53-39 TT Aero rings pictured above at my race this weekend. I took them out for a test drive this past weekend and I did not notice any significant difference in my pedal stroke or that it put any strain on my knees.

What I did notice was that climbing seemed easier in bigger gears and that my pedal stroke seemed a slight bit smoother.

The real test will be my oly this weekend though and I will be able to see what the difference is with average cadence, average HR and average power if they really helped or not.

Recommendation on this will be held till after the Houston Tri.

Houston Tri Race Week - Redemption

I am calling this the week of redemption as I am going to try to go out and redeem myself from my performance a few weeks ago at the Austin Tri and last years Houston Tri.

This is going to be a competitive race with the top 12 people in my age group all gunning for a podium spot this weekend. The course is fairly fast but has several u-turns on the bike and two climbs on the run where you enter a football stadium.

This will be my first race using a Quarq power meter but it should not be too much different than the power tap. I will however be using different power number and run pace goals going into this race to push myself a bit more.

Labor Day Weekend and The Austin Triathlon

First off I just want to say that Austin is awesome if you did not already know and my family cannot get enough.

Disclaimer: 1st half is about our trip to Austin and 2nd half is the Race Report.

Trip:
We arrived late Friday night as we do not make any long road trips now out of town until Pierce has decided its bedtime.  This makes travelling easier except we do not get places till way after my bedtime.

Saturday was a very relaxing day.  We got up and ate at Austin Java which we would do again on Sunday morning..  I highly recommend. Then we were waiting on some friends and Pierce wanted to take a nap so we drove over to Lake Austin and just enjoyed the scenery and looked at homes we cannot afford. How does a $3.3M 6,500sq ft house on Lake Austin sound?  Sounded great to us but again no way to pay that mortgage.

Then it was off to dinner where we tried to go to Moonshine with some friends. It was over an hour wait so we went to to Taverna off 2nd street.  This is our second time to go to this Italian restaurant and it did not disappoint   This is one of my all time favorite Italian places.

Sunday was an early morning as I went out with three friends Greg, David and Jason to ride the course and get in a short run.  Then Off to breakfast with the family plus David and like I mentioned earlier another trip to Austin Java. Lunch was another attempt to go to Moonshine but Sunday after church the wait was 1.5hrs.  So, we ate at a hole in the wall BBQ place that could be forgotten.  Finally for dinner we arrived at Moonshine early enough and got seated right away.  3 trips to this place in less than 24hrs.  3rd time was definitely the charm. Just like Taverna this place was awesome.  I had chicken fried chicken with chipotle cream gravy and a side of their groumet mac n cheese.  Delicious but definitely not something I would suggest a pre-race meal, but worth every bite.

Race Report:
Getting ready in the morning for a race in a hotel room while trying not to wake up your 7month old should be a sport by itself. That being said I would not be very good at it cause I definitely woke him up at like 5am or something.  Good thing was I was basically ready so I could feed him and let Megan sleep a bit more before I had to head to transition.

Since, we had to check our bikes in the day prior transition set up was a breeze and I had plenty of time to go for a short jog and do all the normal morning triathlon duties.  If you race you know what I am talking about.

Swim:
At the Austin Tri their is never a warm up swim as there are too many people and they just do not allow it. It was also non-wetsuit legal as expected with how hot Texas has been.  I did however have my Xterra speedsuit, which was great for getting rid of any drag from my two piece race kit.
The actual swim performance though was really rough.  Now is the part where I make a ton of excuses. 1. It was windy and we had to swim against a current on the way out and on the way back the current wanted to take us at an angle so we were fighting that. 2. Life is not giving me enough pool time. I am swimming at most once every two weeks on average and those count any race day swims.  I also have not put in over 1500m during a swim in a couple of months. 3. I am trying to work in a new swim stroke and I think that wore me out as my body is not used to it.
Enough excuses I am not a great swimmer.

T 1:
T1 was not as good as usual as I was worn out from the swim so my run in transition was definitely a slow jog.  Plus I was frustrated which made things a bit worse. Then once I got my bike and after exiting transition there was a long run to the mount line. At the beginning of the jaunt I got a rock stuck to the bottom of my foot.  Rather than stop and remove it I kept running hoping it would fall off or when I went to mount I would get it off.  The latter happened.  I did not think anything of this at this point but all of that pounding on the sidewalk with a rock stuck to my foot caused a deep bruise that affected me from the first step I took off the bike.

Bike:
The wind was howling and riding 88mm rims on the front and the back meant I was fighting the wind big time. A few of those gust definitely came close to knocking me over.  I know several time I was riding at an angle into the wind to compensate for its force. This course is rather hilly with one big climb that you do 3 times and then a long slight climb you do three times.  I chose to spin up these hills watching my power to make sure I am not pushing way too hard going up and burning up my legs.  I did well on the hills but there were several other parts on the course where I should have pushed much harder and did not. My avg HR was at least 7 bpm lower than it should have been, my avg power was 20watts lower than desired. So, I wussed out a bit on the bike which shower in my avg speed being just south of 21mph.  Should have been 22 at least.

T2:
I did much better in T2 as I was not frustrated coming off the bike and was only like 3 seconds off the fast T2 time in my age group. It was also faster than the top pro males who raced. This is when I noticed though the pain in my foot.

Run:
As soon as I left transition my left foot was hurting soo bad I contemplated pulling out of the race the first half mile or so. I decided as long as I could keep my pace with the pain I would stay in. I was able to keep my pace but then I feel my right hamstring cramping up. At this point I am probably low on sodium as I missed a dose getting off the bike as I dropped my pill container at the beginning of the bike. This caused some irritation but not any pain.  I just could not stretch my legs out or push any harder as I would have really cramped up.  So, 4.5miles to go with a deep bruise on my foot and some hamstring cramping.  To try to keep the cramp at bay I made sure I took in electrolytes at every aid station and I think that saved my race. The other thing that helped is my wife has a knack for finding the best places to watch a race and on this two loop run course she found a place where she could cheer me on like 8 times.  This always helps and my pace always quickens a bit when I am near her cause if not she will let me hear it. On the home stretch last 2.5mins or so I picked up my pace and was running sub 7's.  I went through the finish line hard and as soon as I did that my hamstring went into a softball size cramp and I need assistance getting to medical tent. With proper nutrition and an un bruised foot I should have been able to push the run harder as well.  My avg hr was at least 10bpm too low but probably more like 15.

Avg Pace: 7:17/mi

Total Time: 2:32

Summary
Overall I am ok with my performance and glad that I did not quit during the run.  I am really upset with myself for the fact that I did not push as hard as I should have and did not properly display my fitness but this performance showed me where I am and was great for that. So, not perfect but a lot of stuff I can take with me to help me at the Houston Tri oly in a few weeks.

Plus how can you be upset when you get a greeting like this from your son after your race.

Good Training Weekend

Weekend Started on Friday where I spent some much needed time at the pool working on my swim stroke.
I think I am getting a better handle
on some technique issues that have been lacking and noticed some improvement in my swim sets.

Bonus was the sunrise I got to see while swimming.  Check out the photo.

Then on Saturday I was in Jacksonville, TX visiting with family. This is always a good time for training and I took advantage of it.

Saturday I spent three hours on the road bike and climbed what locals call "The Beast". It is a category 5 hill climb that lives up to its name. For any climb to be rated (receive a climb score/category) it must be at least 500 meters in length with an average grade of 3% or more.  

After the long bike I ran for about 25mins or so.  Then Sunday I woke up and did another 11miles of running to cap off the weekend.

I feel pretty good today and am excited about my training and progress. I hope it shows in a couple of weeks in ATX at the Austin Triathlon.

Sprint Race Nutrition

For a sprint race you want to eat as little as possible before and during the race.  Eating takes time and is hard to do when you are in upper zone 4 or zone 5. It also raises your perceived effort and your heart rate.

With that being said below is what I did with my nutrition for this past weekends sprint race:
Pre Race
Blueberry Muffin with a powerade zero for breakfast about 3hrs or so before race time.
1-2 Hours out I am drinking a mixture of 1st Endurance pre-race and GU Brew Electrolyte tablets containing 320mg of sodium.
At the same time I am taking my MST Cordygen5 and Citruvol Ultra.
10-30min out from hitting the water I took one MST Athlytes electolyte pill containing 350mg of sodium. I will never go back to Endurolytes containing 40mg of sodium.

Bike
1 Water bottle filled with a GU Brew Electrolyte tablet. I am supposed to get at least half way through this bottle and I did.
1 more MST Athlytes mid-way through the bike portion
1 Serving of Strawberry Chomps 90 calories, 23g of carbs and 50mg of sodium

Run
Passed first aid station and only dumped water on my head.
Second aid station threw a little water in my mouth.
Passed the last aid station and again dumped water on my head.

My hamstring cramped up in a dead sprint at the end trying to beat another competitor.
My issue was probably not on what or the amount of nutrients I took in but I do believe I did not drink enough water pre-race and during the bike to allow all the electrolytes I took on to take full effect.
I think the chomps was a huge waste of time for a sprint and will never do that again. I actually knew better but did it anyway.

Nutrition Goals going in:
Take on around 700mg of sodium per hour for the race and take on enough water to make sure it took effect.
I took on probably 800mg or so of sodium thanks to the chomps and GU. I was out there for 1.2hrs so I needed about 840mg.

Next race I will try to drink the entire water bottle and nix the chomps.

  

 

The Bridgeland Triathlon - Summary

This race turned out to be the biggest sprint race I think Houston has ever seen with other 1500 athletes competing.

This many athletes meant there was a lot of talent and as expected and expressed in my previous post I was not expecting a podium but man was there a lot of talent.

Overall, I improved on my time from last years race and had yet another bike PR but finished outside the top 10. Oh well progress is what matters in this sport and progress I am making.

Swim:
Today was the first race we had in out new Apex Endurance gear.  I have been wearing a full suit the last two season but went to a two piece this year for our jerseys. The jersey caused a lot of drag but with the help of an Xterra Speedsuit I will not have that issue any longer.

I have not been swimming much at all as that is the one thing that does not seem to fit into my life with the new baby and wife's new work schedule. So, going into this race I have put in one swim in 3 weeks. To my surprise I still swam the same exact time I swam last year. But was already way out of the running for the race. I was barely inside the top 30% of people outta the water in my group.

T1:
I was somewhat disappointed in my T1 time but passed several people in T1. I was 6th in my group in T1 out of 95. I think the extra exhaustion from the swim caused me to run a little to slow in transition and that led to my slower than expected performance.

Bike:
The bike is a fast flat course with two u-turns and two right hand turns. The wind was a crosswind it seemed as it was never really in your face. I did however find myself a few times inbetween gears which is why I am going to be changing my rear cog probably this week and go back to a 12-25 cassette. Best part about the bike is now two races in a row I have set PR's on the bike. I do think however doing this is hurting my run a bit but that is part of the experiment to know what I can do off the bike after putting it all out there. This whole season is a test case for me as my training is somewhat down so it makes since to make sure I am getting something outta every race.

T2:
This is the transition performance I am used to. 2nd in my group of 95 in T2. I am sure if you added total transition times up I was in the top 2 or 3 and I can live with that. Transition = Free Speed

Run:
Well as always I take off on the run and try hard not to look at my watch for a while and let my legs just roll and I did that this race but probably looked to early. When I look and see that I am running fast I let my brain slow me down.  Not a smart move when racing but it happens.  This race was definitely hot but for some reason I could not push myself to zone 5 on the run.  I averaged zone 4 and my final pace reflected such. So, my heart rate and pace told me I had some more in the tank but my brain would not let me get there. I need to really work on mental toughness over the next few weeks before the Austin Tri.

Take Aways:

• When you do not swim with good form more swim volume does not help speed just endurance.
• Change my rear cassette on my bike so I do not get stuck between gears.
• Do more bricks so my legs and brain will be used to it for race day.
• Run my intervals harder during my speed days.