Week 25: Review

Another good week for training, the only real exception was the rain yesterday taking a chunk out of my cycling mileage. Thankfully Friday's weather was good, so I was able to switch around the long ride for one of the medium distance ones in order to limit the damage. With that said, the heat and humidity have been lingering for most of the week so while I did get pretty close to my mileage targets the paces were a bit slower than I'd like.

On the swimming front, the pools are starting to get busier as the summer begins to come around. Tuesday's session, for instance, was packed and I basically had to choose between fighting through extremely slow swimmers (~3:00+/100m) in the medium lane or pushing it to try and keep up with the guys in the fast lane. I decided to bite the bullet and stick with the stronger group, and while it wore me out pretty good (trying to do 1500m sets while keeping up with guys doing 100m sets added to the complexity) I was able to get my mileage in :D

As for running, I was debating whether I should do another 16 miler like I did last week or back off a bit and call it a recovery week. With Canada Day coming this week, however, I figured it would be better to tough it out this morning and allow myself to take a few liberties next week as the schedule will likely be a bit tighter. Fortunately it was overcast this morning so I didn't have to deal with the sun like last week, but the humidity was pretty brutal and it was hard to breath in that thick air. Either way, I managed to fight through it and log another 16 miles at a reasonable pace.

Week 25 Totals:
Running: 59.7km (37.1mi)
Walking: 2.1km (1.3mi)
Cycling: 166.5km (103.4mi)
Swimming: 7.3km (4.5mi)
Total: 235.6km (146.4mi)

Year to Date:
Running: 1066.2km (662.5mi)
Walking: 57.5km (35.7mi)
Cycling: 2195.8km (1364.4mi)
Swimming: 160.1km (99.5mi)
Total: 3479.6km (2162.1mi)

I still haven't gotten around to settling in on a race plan for the year, and as such my training is still operating on an ad-hoc basis. Normally I'd be worried about not being in a structured plan at this point, however fortunately I've managed to maintain pretty high base mileage in all three sports so it shouldn't be too hard to work spool myself into a program when I do lock things down.

While there are tonnes of pre-planned running programs to work with, most Triathlon books I've read so far just give you the principles and leave it to the reader to build up their own plan. It makes sense as it would likely be difficult to pin down a fixed plan given all the variables inherent in multi-sport events. How much time one should devote to each of the three sports is going to depend on their strengths and weaknesses so some personalization is required. I'd love to sign up for a proper coaching service (where a skilled professional could design a dedicated plan for me), but at this juncture that's just not realistic. As such, I've got to find some time to sit down, consolidate the theory that I've read up on so far and put together something.


In other news, I've looked through my options of the hydration front and have pretty much settled on picking up a Speedfil for the bike. I still need to hunt down a retailer that actually has these things so I can check it out in person, but it seems to be the most logical choice for my requirements. While I do generally get enough to drink on training rides, I only tend to drink when I come to a stop. This means that I gulp water down rather than slowly sip during a ride, and in a race scenario where there are no stops I'm worried about not getting enough in. Having that straw in my face seems like a good way to address both of those issues, and I think that's worth the cost of a bit more aerodynamic drag.