I'm and Ironman!!!....Now what?

It's been 2 months since I became an Ironman and it still feels incredible.  I still cannot get over how well that day went and the people I saw during the course of the day.  So many familiar faces from my past seemed to have popped up out of nowhere along that race course.  But, as I continue to come down from that high, I am faced with a new set of challenges.  Mainly, what do I do now?  Where do I find motivation?  What new challenges await me in the coming year?

I have had to spend these past 2 months reflecting on these very questions.  While I still need more time to fully answer each of these questions, I do have a fairly good idea of where I am heading.  For one, planning for the upcoming wedding will keep me going as I get ready to start the rest of my life with my beautiful bride to be.  For that reason, I will be taking next year off from Iron distance racing.  It will be good for my body to take a year off from the rigors of that since I have spent the last 3 years competing and training in them.  I know my clubbed foot will appreciate it.  I also know a special someone who will be pleased to not have to plan her entire summer free time around a single race that I'm doing.

So what do I do now?  Well, my plan is to get back into training in the coming week.  I will focus mainly on core and strength work for the rest of this month and begin to add Cardio work in December.  I will definitely continue to compete in triathlons but will max out with an olympic distance, nothing higher.  Still working out which ones I would like to do so stay tuned on that.  So that's all I have planned at least in the near future.  As for farther down the road, I'm thinking of getting more experienced in triathlon, becoming a certified tri coach, and POSSIBLY doing a few more Half Ironmans and another Full Ironman.  If there is another full in my future it will be only when I have become a father to children old enough to understand the magnitude of it.  They would be the ultimate motivation.

Where do I find my motivation?  I will focus on looking as fit as possible for the upcoming wedding.  That in itself will be my motivator over this winter.  Another big motivator for me is making sure I stave off any possible seasonal depression that might want to rear its ugly head.  These will be my biggest motivators going forward in the next year with more surely to come.

What new challenges await me?  It's hard to say.  The biggest one will understanding that I am not training for an iron distance event, which means I will spend less time on aerobic workouts with long slogs on the pavement to shorter more aggressive workouts.  That will be a new challenge that I hope will make me a more well rounded athlete and help me when I get back into the iron distance races.  The other challenge is changing my diet to ensure I keep my weight down (I really really REALLY like sweets!).

As for goals, those will be for a different post.  In the meantime, I plan on spending some more relaxing time and start getting back into the swing of things.....I really hate the getting back in shape sore body :*(

WOOHOO!  NEW SHOES!!!  Ok I know that isn't as exciting for most people but knowing that I will have more comfort again in my ankles is happiness to me.  I started breaking them yesterday after a two hour long ride in the heat.  Surprisingly, the heat wasn't as detrimental to me as it has been in past workouts.  The ride was solid over all but my butt has developed all kinds of sores from the saddle and bike shorts.  It feels like I'm sitting on needles and sucks!  I know probably too much info but meh, I have no shame.  After the ride, I through on my new shoes and went for a short 1 mile run.  It felt a lil rough at first, as my ankles had stiffened up, but once loose the run felt nice and smooth and enjoyed the extra cushion the shoes were giving me.  Today will be a bigger test for them with a fartlek workout coming for me this afternoon.

One thing that did happen to me on the bike yesterday did make me extremely upset.  While riding and making my turn on the loop I created for myself, I came across and injured rabbit.  He/she had no function of it's rear legs and was crawling and stopping in the middle of the side street where it was.  It made me so incredibly sick to my stomach I ended up heading back to my car and ended the workout.  I didn't know what I could have done for it, I really don't.  I'm an animal lover by nature and hate to see an animal suffering.  With that said, I do understand how nature works and that death and suffering is a common theme but hate it when it comes at the hands of humans who can control, to some degree, their influence on death and suffering.  As you can tell this has really torn me up since yesterday.  Unfortunately, with logging as many bike miles as I have, you see this so much out on the roads.

Switching to more positive things though, my plan in the next few weeks is to head up to the bike course to take part in a supported ride.  My goal is to do the loop twice (+/- 88miles) and really see where I am just under a month out from race day.  I'm excited to get a real taste of the loop and can't wait to beam with confidence after riding it.  I'm also upping my running this week and the next few weeks to gain just a little more strength and confidence in it to compliment my bike.  So there you have it, just gotta keep on training.  53 days......

As of today, we have T minus 2 months until IMWI.  This week's plan is to try and squeeze about 13 hours of training into the week.  Emphasizing the 3 disciplines now but also still working on core strength and leg strength.  The highlight of this week though will be heading up to the course to ride it for the first time, and possibly the only time, this season.  I'm looking forward to it to get a feel for what it will be like but am also concerned about going.  My fear is that, once I get up there, I will struggle with the course and have serious doubts creep into my head about my training up to this point and if there is any time left to prepare more for the race.  So many mind games are being played on me right now.  All of which are my own doing.  Keep you posted on how the workouts this week go and how the ride up in Madison goes....it's going to be a hot week! 

61 Days

Back to the grind this week.  After a fun, relaxing, and yes lazy, 4th of July weekend it's time for me to get refocussed on the task at hand.  The plan this week is to hit all the disciplines harder then I have so far.  120+ miles of cycling, 6000m of swimming, and 18+ miles of running.  My body feels rested and I'm excited to go after it.  I've also been upping my core workouts to help compliment my running and help with protecting my low back during the cycling.  One big issue that I'm running into though is fueling during the bike.  Right around the 2:15 mark on the bike I begin to lose a significant amount of energy and power.  My hope is that Infinit will help cure that issue for me.  We will see come this weekend when I put in my first 4 hour ride.  I'm curious to see where that puts me distance wise but I have to be careful with getting overly excited about the mileage I'll clock.

The one big issue with training around the Northwest suburbs is its all FLAT!  I've been doing some modifying during my training rides to compensate such as riding in tougher gears, riding into headwinds more, etc.  But I know that won't make up for what I will face in Madison.  On the other hand,  With my constant grinding of the pedals on the pavement,  I am not getting the recovery downhills that I will get in Madison.  At least that is what I keep telling myself.  In just over 2 in a half months I will be getting my answer!  66 Days IMWI

Well I am halfway through my recovery week and feel completely like a slug.  Even to do my lighter workouts I have lost motivation.  At the same time, I do realize I need to have these easier weeks but am itching to get back to longer workouts to feel more like I am making gains.  I did also meet with Viktor on Monday to help me with technique stuff regarding lunges, squats and step ups.  For the longest time I thought I was doing them all correctly, I was sadly mistaken.  Now, I am focusing on no weights with these exercises and focusing on proper technique and am getting the same type of soreness which is good.

We are now roughly 73 days out until Madison and I'm slowly becoming a greater mixed bag of emotions.  The worries about not training enough are beginning to creep in, the concerns about race weight are worrying, and the worries about the possibility of a "breakdown" are always present.  At the same time, my excitement and anticipation levels are going up every day and I find myself checking the website daily for any new updates to the Madison page on Ironman to start planning out that entire week and weekend.  Everyone continues to be super supportive even if they don't really understand what I am going through during this preparation.  Just 73 more days.......73 more days......

The days seem to be flying by right now.  The past two weeks have been a blur with logging above 12 hours a week of training.  I am becoming physically spent.  I'm finding myself waking up only to think of all the training I have in front of me for that day.  On the upside, every time I have worked out these past two weeks I have felt amazing during and after them.  Am I sore? yes.  Do I crash the moment I get home? yes.  Am I getting more excited with each passing day? OH HELL YES!  Even with the longer hours I've been spending training, seeing the distances I am massing at the end of the each week is incredibly motivating.

Last week, I managed to log over 105 miles on the bike and nearly 17 miles running and 6000 yards swimming.  This week, my plan is to start surpassing the iron distance mileage for my total bike miles of the week and maintain my running distance and swimming distance.  This week will be another long week but I have the recovery week next week to look forward to and motivate me to really push hard this week to get to that nice easy recovery week.  With so much extra time I won't know what to do with myself!  Couple other training tidbits to note, the past few weeks I've begun a new weight training program and have noticed a huge difference in my run.  The emphasis has been on leg, butt, and low back and I'm noticing a lot more power being generated from my strides.  Beginning this week though, I am forcing myself to finally place some emphasis on core training hoping that will improve my run and swim even more.  It's a busy week and hopefully sleep will be involved!

So much updating to get through so here it goes.....

We are now T-minus 4 months and counting to IMWI.  The excitement has finally started to build for me more now that the weather is getting nicer and I can move a few workouts outdoors.  The past few weeks have definitely been a struggle though.  For one, 3 weeks ago, I completely lost all motivation to work out at all.  I was cutting workouts short or skipping them outright or modifying them to ease up on them.  It was not a pretty sight and my attitude was definitely being affected.  In hindsight, it may have been that I was slowly starting to get sick and my illness didn't hit me hard until 2 weeks ago.  2 weeks ago I woke up Monday morning with an extremely terrible sore throat, felt groggy, sore, and my head felt like it was blowing up like a balloon.  I was miserable for about 3 days before things finally started to subside.  Things finally picked up the second half of the week but by then I was in full recovery mode.  So you can say that week was a total wash as well.

This all led to last week.  Last week I was able to finally get back into the swing of things but it was definitely a struggle.  I hadn't lost all my fitness but workouts I had been able to handle and go beyond were serious struggles for me.  By the end of last week I was too worn out to muster the energy to log my long ride and long run so I scratched those off the training plan.  Probably not something most triathletes would do but I was trying to be honest with myself and allowing my body to recover and get acclimated to heavy training loads that are coming.

So now this week so far has been outstanding with workouts.  My ankles are extremely sore from a pace variation work that I logged yesterday but I will say that my swim workout was better then I expected now that I am dedicated one of the swims to stroke work to mix it up.  My first bike of this week felt really good as well and am enjoying the greater structure of the rides more then just straight rides like some of them had been.  As for the rest of this week, my plan this afternoon is to do a full body TRX workout, coach, then head home and get about an hour bike ride in focusing on heavy hill work.  I figure 4 months out is about the right time to begin prepping specifically for the walls that IMWI course call hills.  So there you have it, time to get back to the grind.

So I have come to realize what annoys/frustrates me the most in prepping for the ironman.  Waking up every morning and physically limping and waddling around for the first few minutes when I wake up.  I know it has to do with my clubbed foot but both my ankles act as if they can't bear my body weight and move.  I get this whether it was a heavy training day the day before or if its a lighter day.  I don't mind the work loads just this one thing.  Ok, enough with the complaining because I did sign up to do this.

On a happier note, I've been experimenting with new nutrition meals and snacks.  The one I'm trying out now is a recipe I came across online; energy protein balls.  It's actually a really simple recipe and no baking involved, a win for this guy!  All the recipe asks for is peanut butter, rolled oats, a fruit (we used dehydrated strawberries), vanilla whey protein powder, dark chocolate morsels, and milk.  You just mix it all together and stick it in the fridge for a half hour then start forming the balls.  Today is my first day using them but haven't noticed a change in energy just yet.  Although it makes for a really good tasting and convenient snack.  We'll see how I feel today after a swim workout, and run workout.  Even debating doing a light bike workout tonight at home but we will see if time allows for it.

Now that swim season has officially come to an end and I am no longer coaching water polo at the high school, I am able to really knuckle down and make serious gains in my training, especially in the aerobic area.  Last week and this week have already been brutal.  I've managed to squeeze extra workouts in and my body is feeling it.  Today will be a little crazy as my schedule got mixed up a bit today but I'm working on trying to be adaptive with it today.

Feels like, now that swimming is over, that other work is piling up quickly.  There are just not enough hours in the day to workout and accomplish everything I need to accomplish.  This is a short one for me but need to get back to work.

A new week brings new opportunities to get closer to my goal, being an ironman.  Last week, I was pleased with my longer run, logging up to an hour and 10 minutes on the treadmill.  This week will definitely be a more challenging one, with me adding more hill style bike workouts and more hill oriented runs on the treadmill.  My hope is that I can get out and do a little running outside just to regain the feel of running outdoors again as well.  The best part though, is that swimming is back in the mix!  The pool is available on Mondays and Fridays during my lunch period so I can get in and log a couple thousand yards for each day I'm in.  Not the ideal volume but its better than nothing.

I've slacked off a ton with my lifting and strength work.  My hope is that on Tuesdays-Thursdays I will be getting up in the earlier hours to do some lifting then, opening up lunches and evenings to work on swimming, biking or running.  This is going to be a busy week but I'm going into it with a much more positive attitude then before.  Happy training!

Training is quickly becoming my social life, or lack-there-of.  I have even tapped into my lunch hour to squeeze out either a 25-30 minute lift session or a 15-30 minute row, run, or swim.  The name of the game for me is to find any and all time to train and utilize it to the best of my ability.  I'm dreading the inevitability of morning workouts.  I am not nor have ever claimed to be a morning person but, as I look at my schedule, I may be able to squeeze an extra hour of workout time every morning if I manage to wake up at 4:30am and get right to it.

Who would have thought I would be sitting here thinking about getting up earlier to create more time in my day haha!  Hell, who would have thought I'd be trying to finish a full ironman.  I came across a quote yesterday that I had never seen before and stopped me in my tracks.  "Don't count the days, make the days count"~Cassius Clay.  This is definitely going to be my motto for the next several months as I seek to add more training time to my days.

Base 1 training has begun!  I completed my first week this past week and am into my second day on the second week.  It has been a huge jump in intensity from my prep stages.  I'm noticing a significant tightness behind my knees and into my calves.  I've been skimping quite a bit on stretching and rolling and keep telling myself that I need to take time out to do it but avoid it when the opportunity arises.  Perhaps writing this down will do a more effective job of guilting me into doing it. We will see though.

My base 1 training will be focusing on building up my mileage for both the bike and the run where I can fit it in.  Along with increasing mileage, I have added a rep to my weight program for all exercises and notice a difference in the work load just by adding 1 rep.  I decided to maintain the :15 rest between each set of lifts and anticipate that :15 will be the norm for me going forward.  I have also begun to reintroduce core work as it will be an integral part of my fitness and health.  With that said though, I only reintroduced core work yesterday.  I have also begun using Trainingpeaks to track my progress and am entirely in love with the program.  I don't plan on paying for a subscription but see myself caving in eventually.

People around me continue to be supportive.  Elizabeth has been so willing to pick up the slack at home and push me during times where I didn't want to put in the work.  She has certainly been my rock the past few weeks and I will definitely need her in the coming weeks and months when things get really tough.  My family is supportive as well but more from a distance.  I think my Mom is still fearful of what will happen and that concern has slowly slipped into my sister and Elizabeth's psyche. I know I have what it takes and will listen when things go seriously wrong, if they do.  Well back to training, time for a fartlek run.

Recovery week has begun!  My first one of my training season.  The plan this week is to slightly back down on the weights that I'm using for strength training while maintaing the same amount of reps for each exercise.  I'm hesitant to back completely off of weights this week as it may cause me to regress in any of the strength I have built up over the last 3 weeks.  Doing my first workout like this a a couple hours ago felt really easy and really enjoyable.  Workouts will not be nearly as long this week as they were in the past 3 weeks.  Next week I'll begin my base training which will really start making things real for me.

I'm looking forward to begin my first round of base training but am also nervous about getting the amount of free time to devote to training.  I'm also incredibly excited to get to this next stage to feel like I'm really building toward Madison.  I understand the value of the Prep stage but it gets incredibly stagnant and boring.  So this week will be all about stretching and staying active, and also saying goodbye to the relaxed life for 9 months.

So I'm now three weeks into training and am feeling really motivated and determined.  It's a far cry from how I was when I restarted.  The new trainer has definitely been a boost in my training morale. Training loads have slowly begun to change as well.

This past week I had to make some changes.  My last swim was last Monday for the foreseeable future as gym classes have raided the pool during my lunch hour.  So, in place of swimming, I'm going to move my leg strength workouts to Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays with uppper body strength work on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  With this new plan, I can better address a lot of my leg strength concerns for Madison.  Along with this shift, I'm focusing core strength work on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.  Hopefully this will address my weight and stability concerns.  With these shifts, I'll be placing my rest day on Fridays to help care for the dogs, saving my long workouts for Saturdays and Sundays.  It will be a work in progress for sure and most likely need to be adding AM workouts, possibly during winter break.

Outside of training, things are definitely stressful.  Prepping for this race has become a bit of a financial strain and logistics nightmare.  I fear that I have promised too many financial commitments and may not deliver.  These thoughts have weighed heavily in my mind as training begins to increase.  With the holidays and all the repairs/upgrades my bike needs, I just don't know what I'm going to do.  I'm losing sleep which doesn't help training and is keeping my mind drawn away from work, training, and my love.  I don't see things improving anytime soon.  I just don't know...

So I'm "back in the saddle" again, both literally and figuratively.  This is the week that I restarted my training for Madison.  The past few weeks nursing my ribs gave me an opporutniy to tweak my training plan and get the first few weeks of my training planned out.  The biggest change I made to my original training plan was the weight training.  My hope is that the program I have set up will pay off hugely on the bike and swim course of Madison.

My ribs feel significantly better although lifting seems to irritate them ever so slightly.  The biggest discomfort that I feel occurs on days when I'm doing the Lat pulls.  I also may need to look into the possibility of reworking my leg strength work as Wednesdays are way too short to get an effective lift in.  An option I may have is to get up early on Wednesday mornings, head to the weight room at the apartment and lift there then head into work for the day.  I'll toy with it some more and see what may work best.

Riding, running, and cycling have been really great so far.  I'm very sore from the first real bike workout I had yesterday so it will be interesting to see how my run goes for me later this afternoon.  The soreness feels great but we will see if I'm still singing this same tune after a few weeks of these sensations.  So there you have it, just a small update on what I'm up to, more to come in the coming days!

Well I managed to get my bike workout in yesterday after all.  I did 3 x 20 min pace work holding my heart rate between 140-160bpm with a cadence of 80-85rpm with 4 x 1:00 iso leg drills in between each pace round.  It was a solid workout but it was definitely hampered by my rib injury.  I could only hold a certain position on the handlebars for so long before needing to switch due to the discomfort.  After the ride, I struggled with a lot of pain, to the point that during coaching I could hardly talk above a casual voice which made it a challenge to work with the swimmers.

This morning I feel a little bit better and I'm definitely favoring that side a lot more to keep from aggravating the injury any further.  I think I have learned my lesson that I can't be so reckless over the course of the next year.  With that said, I am now being forced to stall my training and just waiting for my ribs to heal enough to resume all my training.  On the bright side, it will give me the opportunity to re-evaluate my training plan and improve it with more knowledge and information that I am gaining from my research.  I'm still going to conquer and become and Ironman!

So training last week became a derailed mess.  The plan was to get some nice long workouts in on the weekend and also knuckle down with my run training and get my legs back.  Neither of these plans panned out.  The first issue I had to address was the pain I was dealing with in both legs.  My every day shoes were well beyond their lifespan and causing a lot of discomfort in my Plantar Fascia and ankles making running for me incredibly difficult and painful.  So, to combat this I went out and bought myself a new pair of shoes and what a difference!  The pain and discomfort has already subsided after only wearing the shoes a couple days!  I still plan to take a few more days of recovery before I start running back up again.

The weekend was an even bigger mess.  On Friday morning I went to play floor hockey with co-workers before classes started and was having a great time.  Near the end of the game there was a loose puck that me and another player went for and collided.  I got the brunt of the impact right up in my ribs.  The pain was instantaneous and sharp.  For an instant I thought a rib had been cracked but was quickly relieved of this fear when I could still breath comfortably.  All weekend though I couldn't do anything due to the soreness and discomfort I was getting whether I was lifting something heavy or took in a very deep breath.  It is now Monday and the discomfort is still there.  While in class I did take a stretch and heard a pop with a sudden rush of stabbing pain back through the right side of my rib cage where I got hit.  Now I'm sitting hear in more discomfort than I was before and its frustrating!

My goal today is to try and get about an hour in a half bike workout in on the trainer.  My hope is that my ribs won't bother me during the ride and since I'm working on keeping my heartrate lower, I won't have to worry about taking deep breaths.  We will see how it goes.

Yesterday marked the first full day of training on my training calendar.  It was exhilerating to be working out again!  But, I must admit, I am utterly shocked at how out of shape I have become since my race at Steelhead.  As I write, I realize, I don't think I was as ready as I could have been for Steelhead.  I got too soft and lost focus more often then not.  

This time around I feel as though I'm more dedicated.  Getting back to yesterday's training, I started off with getting up earlier than I'm used to (5:00am) and got in a morning ab workout with my new stability ball.  Saying that it was an adventure is an understatement!  I managed to get regular crunches down pat, but when I attempted stability crunch combos, I kept falling off the ball much to the dismay of my neighbors beneath.  To simplify the situation and to stave off getting frustrated so early in the morning I resorted to doing 3 sets of standing russian twists and 3 sets of bent knee v-ups and called it a morning.  

During lunch, I have figured out that on Mondays and Fridays I can squeeze in a quick swim at the high school at which I work at.  The swim, as much as I dread the first shocking moments of cold, felt strong.  I cranked out 1500yds with most of the yardage coming from warm up and drill work.  I definitely need to put more emphasis on my core as my stabilization in the water was not where it could be.  The only crummy part about swimming during this time is how rushed I am to get dressed and grab a quick bite to eat before finishing up the work day.

After school, I went ahead and set the bike and trainer up in the cardio room of the high school.  I got a bit of a boost with having the HS swim team in their working out and blasting the music.  With all the bodies in their though, the heat definitely spiked.  I haven't sweat that much in almost a year!  The bike workout was good overall, but I pushed it too much in the beginning.  The workout mainly consisted of a 10 minut warm up and rolling hills for 45 minutes.  I finished up with 5 isolated leg spins for each leg and a nice 5 min warm down.  With all the sweat I started freezing and fortunately had a spare shirt in the car (what a livesaver that shirt was!)  Time to go and finish work and get my next workout in tonight.....boo for running!

This blog was originally created to chronicle my journey to becoming and ironman.  A journey I began two years ago to honor my late father and to prove to myself that I could do something so physically and psychologically demanding that only 1% of the population would dare try it.  Although I have not posted in a while, the final chapter of my journey begins now.

On September 14th, 2015 I awoke at 5:30am in Madison, WI and joined a quietly growing line of individuals who, just the previous day, took part in the 2015 Ironman as volunteers.  We represented a large chunk of what will be the participants in the 2016 Ironman on September 11th.  At 7:30am, the doors for registration opened and before I knew it, I was standing at a table providing my regristration information and handing over my credit card.  After only a few minutes, it was done.  As of this post I am 350 days away from competing in my first full Ironman.

Since registering, I have been experiencing a flury of emotions.  Everything from excitement, to fear, I plan on being prepared for this race more so then I had been for my previous half-iron distances.  This coming Monday is when I begin to hit my training again with an emphasis on strength work and core work to help in prepping my body for the toll that a full Ironman will take on me.  It will be a long journey, full of twists and all the highs and lows that one would experience, but I am ready.  I am ready for this.  I WILL BE AN IRONMAN.

Training season is off and running! (literally)  This past week I have hopped back on the bike and breaking in the new shoes which I love so far!  I didn't realize how much I missed working out until I was doing it this past week.  I will confess that I am starting off then I did last year but I figured that since I am starting earlier I have the ability to start out a little slower and ease my body back into all the training.

My runs have been fairly short and incredibly slow!  That would be the one thing that is really bothering my right now.  Then again, I have to remind myself that I will start out being out of shape and that it will take a little time to get back into it.  My runs consisted of an easy rolling hills run on Monday, a Fartlek run on Wednesday, and today will be a long aerobic run with maybe some rolling hills.

A lot of changes have happend with regards to my bike.  I have dropped the handle bars/aerobars about 1.5", raised the seat post a few centimeters and I've noticed a huge difference in my positioning.  It's not the perfect aero position but it is certainly an upgrade from how I was positioned at Racine.  It will take some getting used to but I think it will help me with overall speed down the road.  I'm hoping to get a long bike ride in either Saturday or Sunday, depending on when I will have time and the weather.

That's the major update for right now, hopefully I'll have a few more interesting updates to give next week!