Jordan Creek Duathlon Race Report

First and foremost, I thought this race was organized very well. It was easy to park, get your packet, get bodymarked and pick up your chip, and get in and out of transition. The morning started off at a cool 47 degrees, but with little wind. Nontheless, it was a good day for the 2 mile run, 18 mile bike, 2.5 mile run. Here's a pic pre-race in the transition area.

Intentionally, I started off the run at a pretty easy pace, as I didn't want to blow up on the bike or the final run. It was a two loop run around the Jordan Creek mall. This was relatively flat and a fast course. I finished the first run around 16:23 - which average out to a little over 8:10 miles. I came into transition feeling nice and warmed up and ready to ride. As I got to my bike I realized that I didn't unvelcro my shoes, so I had a hard time getting them on which added uneeded time in transition.

The bike course was a flat, fast ride, with one 3/4 mile hill - it was fun going out, but pretty long coming back. I felt really good on the bike, and stayed areo the entire time, trying to keep a good pace and keep in mind that I had a 2.5 mile run ahead of me. As I came back into transition I hopped off the bike I ran into transition. I was trying to unbuckle my helmet, but my hands were frozen. I ended up just pulling the helmet off my head and slipped into my running shoes. Bike: 49:12 - 22 mph/avg

The last 2.5 mile run was just about pushing through the pain and getting to the finish line. The first mile my legs felt like anchors after the bike, but loosened up by mile two. I felt good going into the last 1/2 mile and enjoyed the rest of the race. It was a good start to the season!
Run: 18:56 - 7:35/pace

Here's an after race pic w/ the family:

Overall: Total time: 1:27:02
Run Pace: 7:35
Bike 49:12 - 22 mph

Week of 5/11-5/17

This week started off well with training, but the past few days have been lackluster to say the least. I hope I can get out of this funk before the Jordan Creek Duathlon on Sunday. I am considering this a 'C' race and am not doing any tapering for the event. In fact, I have a 10 mile run scheduled a day before the race. This is certainly NOT recommended if you are considering this an 'A' or even 'B' race. The distances are: 2 mile run, 18 mile bike, 2.5 mile run. My goal is to start off easy - around an 8:00 minute mile pace, then ~20 mph bike, then 7:45 minute miles for the final leg of the race. I am using this race to a)practice transitions, and b) get a high level evaluation of my bike/run fitness. Below is this week's workouts

Monday - weightsTuesday - 1 hour bike, 45 minute swim
Wednesday - tempo run, 30 minute swim
Thursday - 45 minute bike
Friday - 30 minute swim
Saturday - 10 mile run
Sunday - duathlon, tentative - 2 hour bike

Due to working 2 jobs right now, plus family my training volume is down a little bit. On June 1st that will all change! Happy Training!

Props to Athletes

I'd like to congratulate two athletes in my 7 Flags triathlon class, Angie Veenstra and Stephnee Leathers on recent PRs. Stephnee PR'd her Wildflower (70.3) Half-Ironman swim by 5 minutes earlier this month and Angie PR'd and came in 1st in her age group, and 5th overall in the Klompen Classic 5K Run/Walk in Pella, IA.As a coach, I am extremely proud of their efforts in class that has transferred onto the race scene. Nice job ladies!!

New Career!

My apologies for not posting sooner, things have been a little hectic. After careful thought, and consulting with my family and close friends, I've made the decision to quit my 8-5 job and become a full-time personal trainer/endurance coach. On the surface, this was a pretty easy decision to make - do what I love to do, what I have a passion for, and the positive effect I can have on other's lives. Digging deeper in the decision, there are a lot of unknowns, fears, and unforeseeable challenges that I will face. I am willing to, and excited to take on this new challenge to help people, share my knowledge, and be a leader in showing people how to live healthy, and reach their personal goals. I am also thrilled to have the opportunity to dedicate myself to helping athletes reach their endurance goals, whether it be run a 10K or complete an Ironman. This will also give me an opportunity to dedicate more time to my other passion, efitnessperformance.com, a web site dedicated to knowledge sharing and fitness tracking/logging. I will be starting my new adventure at 7 Flags Fitness Center on June 1st. For information on what I can do to help you, contact me at mgetting@7flags.com

Training Measures

In the next few posts I'm going to be covering the basics of different types of measures to use to optimize your training, including HR, RPE, and TT paces.
Training using your heart rate is the most commonly used method for training, and is the most accurate because "what you see is what you get". I like using heart rate because I can consistently monitor it, but it does take some discipline to stay within your zones depending on what your workout calls for. You can use a HR monitor, which you can pick up at your local sporting good store, or use your radial pulse(pulse on your wrist using your index finger and middle finger - although this is a kind of pain when you're running or doing any other aerobic activity.)
Now, how do we find this information?
Step 1) Max Heart Rate(MHR) - the easiest way to do this is take 220-your age.

Step 2) Resting Heart Rate (RHR) - when you wake up in the morning, before you get out of bed, take your pulse for 1 minute and write it down. Do this for 3 mornings in a row and take the average. Avoid caffeine, nicotine, or any non-prescription, heart rate altering medicine prior to taking your pulse.

Step 3) calculate your Target Heart Rate Zones using the following formula:
(MHR - RHR) * percentage effort + RHR
I'll use myself as an example to find my 80% effort at age 31 with a RHR of 50
220-31 = 189
(189 - 50) *.85 + 50 = 168.5 = 169

With the 220 method, your HR can be off as much as much as 10 bpm, so to find your true max heart rate use a VO2 Max test.

From a running perspective, if you're doing a long run your HR should be around 70-75%, for a tempo run it should be closer to 85%, and speed work ~90-95%.

Let me know if you have questions or thoughts.

New Direction, New Career?

So, I've been toying, well, truly considering a career change. I've been in corporate America for the past 6 years. This last January I started teaching a triathlon class, so I was busy from 5:45 AM - 5:00 PM, plus my own training. I was busy, but enjoying it. I have recently started personal training a few clients which makes for some long days, 5:45AM-8:00PM and trying to find time to fit in my training, and, more importantly, spending quality time with my wife and daughter. I haven't had any time to work on the web site, which is my ultimate career goal. (More on that on another post.). Plan A was to quit Corporate America, find a part time job, do personal training/triathlon training and work on the web site. I have been searching for an IT part time job for a few months and due to the economy I just haven't found much. (I don't think stirring sloppy joes at a local elementary school is in the cards for me :). So, how about quitting Corporate America, going to personal training full-time and work on the web site at night? This is the path I'm seriously exploring. The big caveat here is, as all personal trainers know, the job is 75% sales, 25% training. I would need at least 5-6 months, realistically, to build up a clientele that I could come remotely close to my current income. I have a few ideas of how I could cover income for a few months. Anyone have any input, similar experiences? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Your questions

As we get closer to the season, I want to help answer your questions about endurance sports. If you want to email me or reply to this post I'll be happy to answer any questions you have. To help trigger some thoughts, here are some topics:
Periodization
Dam to Dam training
race nutrition
transitions
open water swimming
recovery
weight training and endurance sports
I look forward to your questions.