One Last Tri - Week 3
Hello again! This week was an incredible learning experience for me. In the process of journaling my workouts, and preparing them to share with you, I have really taken a step up in terms of analyzing what went down. It has become clear to me that in the past I have ramped up my training way too quickly, which results in overtraining and not seeing any increase to my overall fitness. Through reading books and articles, listening to podcasts, and hearing testimonials of other athletes, I am very aware that fitness does not show up overnight. This week was a fantastic reminder to slow things down and trust the process. Two weeks of easy training left me feeling great and ready to push the limits. As you will read, I did not have the most successful week, even though I was feeling great in the moment! So let’s take a dive into what went down this past week.
Sunday - Rest Day
Goals:
Originally I was trying to make Sundays to be a stationary bike fitness day, a consistent workout in zone 2 intended to continue building a base level of fitness. However, the previous day was a long run and I was dealing with some pain in my right knee. Being aware of this, I decided to change this Sunday to a rest day and focus on stretching, rolling, and resting my knee to allow for healing.
Results:
I was able to spend a majority of the day off my knee, sticking to around 5,000 steps. I spent some time rolling my quads with my torture stick, I also got my feet massaged which helped my entire body relax. A full night’s rest had me feeling back to normal the next morning.
Monday - Swim
Goals:
My fear of the water is still there, I really just want to be confident at the swim. But, like all things in life, it will take time to become comfortable, time to develop good form, and more time to become confident in the water. This is a nice metaphor for life because we do not jump into anything for the first time and automatically become amazing. I have some fitness and decent coordination, but learning a new sport will still take patience.
Specifically for this swim, I wanted to track my time in the water, make sure that my Garmin was working, and begin to see where I was at in terms of lap swimming. I had a goal of swimming the length of the pool with my face underwater.
Results:
The most difficult part of Monday’s swim was simply getting in the water. I was still facing a fear, but feeling considerably better than the first time I was in the pool. I swam 650 meters according to my Garmin Watch,and did so in about 30 minutes. There wasmultiple rest periods in-between laps, and I spent a lot of time standing in the shallow end, practicing breathing with my face in the water. Just trying to get more comfortable in general.
Consistency in the pool is still going to be most beneficial in terms of getting more comfortable in the water. I was listening to a podcast with TriSwimCoach’s Kevin Koskella, where he talked about befriending the water; laugh with it, play with it, and inevitably you will become more confident in it.
Tuesday - Long Bike
Goals:
My goal going into this bike ride was to stay zone 2, keep things easy, and just stay consistent on the bike ride. I knew that my knee was still experiencing issues and I wanted to take things easy and allow my knee enough room to heal to remain consistent with training.
Results:
That was my goal, that was definitely NOT my result. Going into this ride I felt phenomenal, the sun was out, it was warm, there was a slight breeze at my back, and I wanted to push myself! I knew I had the goal of going slow, but once I hit the road I lost sight of that goal and started speeding up around every corner, pushing too hard up hills, and passing a few other bikers on the road. Since I started with no real destination in mind I decided to head towards a one mile Strava sprint segment around an iconic landmark in my hometown (Enger Tower). I pushed myself around that fun loop in a very high zone 4, peaking into zone 5 at times. It was a TON of fun, but my body wore down from this much faster than I expected and on the ride back I was consistently in a high zone 3, which is exactly what I am trying to avoid in training.
Let’s take a minute to discuss the “grey zone”. Zone 3 is that middle area of training where no progress is made, it’s too hard to work our aerobic system properly, and not hard enough to effectively train our top end. Zone 3 is our bodies race gear, not our training gear. Many athletes train at this zone consistently and complain that they do not see results, and that is the reason why. Zone training was something that I first learned about while reading Rich Roll’s book, “Finding Ultra”. I was further educated about training zones while listening to Triathlon Taren’s podcast. I HIGHLY recommend both of these as tools for success.
Arriving back at home I felt as if I had a really good workout, however, my knee was back to hurting and my body felt weak and broken down. The ride was overall too hard of an effort too early into training.
Wednesday - Swim (plus bike and run)
Goals:
I really wanted to get in the water twice this week, and the way work was looking, and my time was being scheduled, Wednesday was the best day to make this happen. My main goals were simply getting in the water, having fun, practicing breathing, and just growing more comfortable being in the pool.
Results:
I felt fantastic during this swim. The fear of the water was still there, but the low impact workout on my body was wonderful, I experienced no knee pain, and was swimming laps with fewer breaks. Forcing myself to keep getting in the pool has helped me dramatically increase my comfort with the water and is increasing my confidence in believing that I will complete the swim.
After I got out of the swim I went upstairs to the gym to do a short stationary bike, where I felt fantastic, so good in fact that I believed it was a good idea to go for a run after. This was my first “simulated” triathlon experience; swimming, biking, and running all in one day. The bike and run were each an easy 10-minute effort. These type of brick workouts are fantastic, but they need to be structured in the week during times when the body will respond well to them. It was good in theory but wore mybody down without adequate recovery time. Wednesday should have been my sign to slow down and allow myself to recover, but as you will read about Thursday’s ride, I continued pushing myself harder and harder.
Thursday - Should have rested, went for a “short ride”
Goals:
I knew at this point of the week that I should have been resting my knee, my body was definitely overworked from pushing into higher heart rate zones than my ultimate goal of building endurance calls for.
Results:
It was a beautiful day, and when I got home I took one look at my bike and craved a ride. I convinced myself that I could take it slow and not hurt and it would be a great idea to spend some time on the pedals, not only for my fitness, but for my soul. Biking gives me that sense of freedom that I desire after working all day. I wanted to ride and adventure and feel the wind on my face.
I ended up chasing another Strava segment, tackling a pretty big hill in effort to race a car, and around 26 miles later I was having some serious knee pain and crawled into bed hoping it would go away by the morning. Friday was going to be a long day working, and seeing as I am developing a triathlon training addiction to fund, it’s important to get my hours in at work.
Friday - ACTUALLY REST
Goals:
My primary goal was to stretch and sleep and do the best I could to stay off my legs.
Results:
Friday was a very busy day at work and almost 19,000 steps later I was definitely ready to crash. Some pizza and time in front of the TV with my feet being rubbed was definitely what I needed. I slept like a rock that night and woke the next morning feeling much better.
Saturday - Easy Cardio
Goals:
I would really like to work some cardio into my day in as easy way as possible. Being on my feet as much as I was yesterday I have decided to do a light warm-up on the elliptical, followed by a long stretch of my legs.
Results:
I finished the week out with an hour in zone 1 on the elliptical. I kept my cadence and intensity as low as I could while still moving. Afterward, I was able to stretch and foam roll my legs thoroughly! My knee was feeling in good shape, and my spirits were high about the upcoming week!
Conclusion:
This week was a really important lesson for me… In the past, I have quickly ampedup my training and overworked my body week after week. Dealing with injuries, training fatigue, and eventually not wanting to continue on to achieve my goals. In comparison to the two previous weeksI felt extremely worn down and like my training is not working. I know that if I stick to my plan, things will continue to grow and develop and my body will adjust to higher levels of training in a healthy way.
Journaling my day to day activities and posting them in a format like this truly helps me be aware of how my body is responding, and allows me to tweak things along the way to create my own custom training schedule to best prepare me for this upcoming race, as well as for life! The goal is not to finish just this one race, but to build my body into a healthy machine that will last as long as possible!
