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Showing posts from February, 2014

Karen writes: Waiting waiting waiting

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Everyone else is resting.  I'm meant to be resting but my brain is going at a hundred miles an hour and pre-event paranoia is in full swing.  This morning we got up early for the Ironkids race, that was great as the girls had Sam Warriner to lead their warm-up and inspire them. Then it was time for a swim with Kate, and later we went down to the venue to drop off my bike which had to be inspected, and I had to hand over my transition bags.  Of course we then had to explore the expo.  It was the second trip for me to pick up things I had forgotten, like the neoprene thingy to attach the timing transponder onto my ankle, new goggles, more anti-chafe, and a few extra items I really didn't need at all. Then we filled in competitions to win entry to next years Ironman, and had to stop at the nutrigrain stand where they had been handing out vast quantities of cereal and nitrigrain bars.   Tomorrow it all happens, outside it is sunny and windy, not a thunderstorm or volcanic erupti

Karen writes: Odd things

Packing....seem to have a surplus of odd socks, odd gloves, odd other things.  I cant find my favourite hanky, I think I'm catching a cold and I stepped on a piece of lego left on the floor and my foot hurts! Sheesh.  3 days to survive.

Kate writes: East Coast

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I've not been on holiday for a long time so when I got an invite to go to the East Coast with one of my running mates, I jumped at the idea. I've never been to the East Coast so why not. I packed my tent, bike, swimming gear and running gear and off I went. The instruction I had was get to Tauranga and turn right and keep going for 3 hours and then you will be there. The Hills were big and I thought why am I riding my bike down here. Well the first day I went fishing. That was great but I had had enough of that so the next day I road off to hicks bay, about 45k from the house. No phone coverage. I had a puncture at 20k, no problems I can change a tube, but a bit of an anxious time. Then my derailleur had a big noise come out of it and I could not change down a gear.   I had to get off bike and manually change down a gear. The consolation was the views. we are so lucky here to have such beautiful places to visit and see. The logging trucks passed me on the other side of the ro

Karen writes: Taper

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Taper is a confusing sort of thing if you read the advice of the experts, some recommend anything from 5 weeks of taper down to none at all.  Some deliver dire warnings about overtraining and poor performances because of not enough rest, others suggest that you lose condition for every day off you have.  I struggle with knowing what to do, especially since according to some plans, my peak is equivalent to what others do in their final week of taper. I've never followed the official plan I got off the coach back in 2012 for taper, I lean towards the less is more style.  I instinctively felt that having the longest run and ride at 2 weeks out wasn't good for me, so I split them up and moved them to 3 and 4 weeks out.  Peak weekly hours of 16.5 was a month out, and things have been on a gradual decline since.  In the final two weeks I cut time by 30% then a further 50%. Yesterday, Friday I had my last proper bikeride, 80km.  Today I've had my last swim of 3km and tomorrow is

Karen writes: A week to go to IM 2014

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Started this blog entry a couple of days ago, at that point, I had 10 days to go before I line up with a couple of thousand others for the 30th NZ Ironman. 10 days where no further fitness gains could be made. 10 days where injury could occur or bugs could be caught. 10 days to marinate in anxiety about whether or not all that training was 'enough'.  The Ironman people have had a countdown going on since 30 days out, each day of the countdown representing 1 year in the 30 year history of the event in either Auckland or Taupo.  Some excellent stories, all, no doubt, to generate enthusiasm and excitement. I'm yet to start feeling excited, but I do have a need to keeping going over and over what I have done to try to figure out how ready I am, it's about reassurance to prevent panic (I'm NOT ready!!). I'm spending time (still) poring over my training records and adding up hours from this year, comparing them to last year, and the year before.  Do the averages

Karen writes: Bugs

Bugs are causing me problems. I was sailing along on my bike, mouth must have been open. Instant decision, do I swallow whatever flew in since it went to the back of my throat then wash it down quickly in the hopes that it drowns quickly, or stop and ....well, stop and what? Of course after the immediate panic and relief that the shock didn't result in a close-up encounter with the drain on the side of the road, and after swallowing, there is always the period of wondering if whatever it was, was a) was poisonous, b) had a stinger, and c) had just come out of the cow paddock. Oops. I had been swimming along in the tide, in my wetsuit and didn't realise until afterwards that I had somehow picked up some sealice.  Can I really blame the little things for being disturbed enough to turn my neck into an itchy red mess while they were firmly compressed against my skin by the wetsuit collar? Oops. The ubiquitous croc shoes live on the doorstep at home.  These are essential to th

Karen writes: On bears and gazelles

I try to go twice a week to spin cycling class at the gym at Formosa. I do have a spin bike at home, it is my emergency backstop for the times when I need to train and cant get out of the house.  I hate it.  I never work hard on it, even when I use one of those grueling Spinerval DVD's.  More often I do things to sabotage any training benefit from pedaling like read a book or daydream.  You cant read books or daydream in a spin class and while the class only lasts for 45 minutes I am sure it is more beneficial than 90 minutes of sitting on the deck with legs turning lackadaisically on my own bike.  My reading suggests that hard spin is also likely to be beneficial in a different way from meandering round the countryside on the roadbike as I am wont to do. Some days I run to spin and back home, an 11-15km round trip, other days I cycle, usually adding on some extra miles. I pretend these are some sort of 'brick' sessions, and use them as an excuse for not running after the

Karen writes: Peak Ironman week - Stocktake time

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Here's the thing, you think when you sign up, nearly a year out, that you have plenty of time to get the super-fit, super-lean, super-ready body.  But you don't.  Well, I don't anyway, and I can now claim to have had a bit of practice, being as it's the third time I have reached this point of peak training for Ironman.  Last week was my heaviest training week, I had the longest bike-ride of 165km, the longest run so far of 28km, plus the other stuff which meant that over 17 hours were spent in pursuit of Ironman fitness.  Now three weeks out it is time for a stocktake of how things are going. So how do I compare fitness wise to previous years?  First of all, I'm 6kg heavier.  That is a real anxiety trigger, 8% extra mass must mean it will be harder to drag myself around the course. Next, my training hours per week over the last 2 months were on average about half an hour down when compared to last year, except for last week which was the highest I had ever done.  

Kate writes: long time

Its been a few weeks since I last wrote. It took me ages to firstly find the blog and then remember the password! I do have a new computer or at least I had wiped all its memory recently. Well I'm training for a half Ironman. Haha. Its actually really good as it gets me up in the morning and out. Yesterday I was going for a run. Well it actually ended up more of a walk but I had a lovely time. At the end I ended on a beach and started house hunting. Then coffee with one neighbour and then another. It was a hard morning.