Week 3 - Day 4 - Already? Swim, Jog, Chalean

Chalean in the morning.  Cardio day.  I drank my muscle milk (1 scoop) before but my legs were still tired.  I think from the bike, it does sort of build up over a few days.  Chalean just has so much squatting, my legs are feeling it.  Then it was time to work.  A fine stressful day, so I was ready to work out again after work.  We went to the gym to swim and run.  The swim was like 400 yards.  Again pretty easy, even trying to push the 4x50's.  We go to LA Fitness and if your goal is a gym with a pool, you should skip this one.  That lack just about everything a swimmer would want except water.  They don't have a single clock with a second hand.  How much would it cost for an actual pool timer?  They don't have backstoke lane lines so you know when you are close to the wall.  My last complaint is not swim suit dryer.  Why bother with the pool.  The YMCA near is us is much better, but yes, it cost more, but at this point maybe I would consider going back.
Then we went to jog for 20 mins.  It had more jog and less walk this time.  4min jog and 1 min walk.  We jog at 6mph on our toes and walk at 4mph.  Not blazing a trail, but it keeps the heart rate low.  Its so hard to think that is actually a good thing.  Training has always been more of it and push harder, feel sore, half dead and try to recover.  This is not that.

Week 3 - Day 3 - A Day of Measuring

We did Chalean and no tri training.  One workout still seems light and easy now.    We did it in the evening, so no morning workout.  I like the morning better.  We are getting ready to do Burn it off now, its the longer one with the Ab workout.

We did some measurement checks yesterday.  Since the starting point I was about 179 lbs and I'm about 174 now.  I lost 1in in my arms and 1.5 inches in my waist.  Everything else is about the same.  What kind of flabby arms was I sporting to loose an inch in them?  I'm not thinking I need big arms to run a tri. 

Week 3 - Day 2 - I love my bike

I think I have said it before.. but I love my bike.  I have posted it before, but yesterday was a 10 mile ride, and I really enjoyed it.  I think I was accelerating uphill.  I think I am going to have to train again on my old bike soon, so I have the extra weight working against me.  It was just so fun.  That said I may have not gotten the route right according to Girlfriends GPS, but we got where we wanted to be.  We biked over to the Fort again, but didn't go into the park.  This is one of the most challenge hill rides in this part of Indiana.  I brought my GPS, if I can figure out how to load the elevations I'll do that.  Its very hard to find any hills in Indiana and this was by no means some great feat of conquering mountains, but it was more difficult than our race course will be.  So at the point we get to the top of the largest hill on our route, excited to get some speed and maybe relax a little we encounter a construction sign.  The bridge is out at the bottom of the hill.  We ended up getting off the bikes and carrying them across the construction zone.  Girlfriend did look pretty hot in pink with her blue bike on her shoulder walking thru a construction zone.  I'm just saying.  Of course after a down hill there must be an uphill, and so it was a dead stop up climb, that put my legs in some pain.
Odd thing is that we only had to bike today, no Chalean so it felt like a day off.  In the morning we were sort of like, now what.  You mean no work out, what do we do?  Even Girlfriend came over to my desk, sort of bewildered about how nice it was out and what a shame it was that it wasn't a running morning.  More exercise seems to lead to a need for more exercise..

Week 3 - Day 1

Took Saturday off, which was a good break.  We are basically not going to be doing the extra cardio workout from Chalean, on top of the tri training.  That is not so unreasonable.  Sunday we did Chalean again, increasing the weights on many exercises again.  At this point, I'm using the biggest ones I have and I'm not sure I want to bigger ones.  I don't want to be bigger, but I don't want to waste me time.  Girlfriend tried to surprise me with new weights, however only a weight showed up.  Which wasn't going to work out.  No big deal.  I can go light or go home one more week, I don't mind. 
After Chalean we stepped out in the heat and ran 25 mins.  It was supposed to be 30, but the girl with the watch was going to vomit so stopped.  I'm not going to complain, it was hot.  I'm really liking the walk run training.  I feel like I work pretty hard, but not too hard.  I'm not sore the next day and my legs don't need ice or anything crazy.  I'm not sure I'm getting any faster.  I have been running on my toes for the jog part.  I still haven't decided if this is good or bad, since it is unlikely I would run the race on my toes.  I am jogging on my toes longer each time we do it and that seems good.

Week 2 - Day 6 - Unplanned exercise

Today called for a swim with a Chalean.  There was no getting out of bed this morning, we were tired.  I went kayaking with the kids on the lake, it was pretty hot and when we got out of the no wake zone we jumped over relaxed.  Then I decided that my son could paddle some on the way back and I would swim.  He thought I meant the entire way back, which turned out to be around 1300-1500 yards.  Glad I was able to actually swim it, because he was off and I only saw back as he continued to get smaller in the distance.  Then we got a snack and went to the pool.  We decided to start a pattern I guess and delayed Chalean until tomorrow.  By the time we got done at the pool we were starving.  Sushi it was, how bad can raw fish be?  Now we just need to get up tomorrow and do the workout.

Week 2 - Day 5 - Bouncing back in the morning

I was up until midnight reading stuff for work.  Doesn't exactly set you up for a great sleep.  The alarm at 6 am was my iphone, if it was anything else I would have tossed it out the window.  It was Burn Circuit 3, basically my nightmare of squat hell and shoulder work.  Seriously, on the squat machine, I squat 300+ 10-12 times and I hate her squats in this workout.  They are just never ending reps.  The shoulder work went well.  I haven't up the weight for those yet, but at least I'm back to full weight.  On all the other ones I have increased the weight.

Stupid scale
I was trying not to step on the scale until the weekend, so I wouldn't drive myself nuts about things that don't matter.  It didn't work, I did it this morning and I regret it.  2lbs heavier than the weekend of beer!  At least I was 2% lower in body fat.  I need to stay off that stupid thing.

Biking after work was 6 miles.  We biked at the Fort again.  It was so hot.  The temperature on the bank sign read 101 on the way to the Fort.  At least there are trees covering much of the path there.  There is a pretty good hill for Indiana, my speed was up to 32 mph, which is my fastest on this bike yet.  It was great to be out on that bike.  I almost love it more than my Mac, but lets not get crazy.

Like a crazy person, I stepped on the scale before I got in the shower.  Lets just go with stupid.

Its time for a good night sleep and some swimming in the morning.

Week 2 - Day 4 - Loosing patience

I'm already at the point where keeping to the program is getting more difficult. Today, I am tired. I have been working out 1 or 2 times per day and the results well, could not be seen this early, but no result combined with tired and I just have to keep looking at the calendar and doing whatever it says. Today I thought I read go back to sleep, but Girlfriend convinced me it said Burn Intervals. After that its Ab Burner. Its one of the longer workouts and I was tired. Its not heavy weight, but I was tired when we started, and tired when it was over.
Oh then there is thing called work. Yes, we still have to go there and give, the proverbial 110% and since I'm at a startup, 110% is just getting by for slackers. I wanted to fall asleep at my desk and today work was well, it tested my patience and I continued until about 7pm. At which time I took a 5 min nap to get fired up to swim and run.
We should redefine fired up in this case, as I don't really feel like leaving the house but I guess have to because the calendar says I do. I'm not ready to wuss out yet, I'm just not motivated. We went to the gym.
The swim was better today:

• 50 warm up
• 4x50 head up
• 2x50 just under race pace
• 50 cool down

It was at least worth getting wet, but hardly felt like a workout.  Then it was time to jog.  I'm always cautious about saying the word run, that set some expectation of speed, and that might be lying.  About 20mins total, all on a treadmill so I used an incline of 1%. 

• 5 mins - walk warm up at 4mph
• 1 min -5.5mph
• 1min - 4 mph
• 1min - 6mph
• 1min - 4mph
• 3min - 6 mph
• 1min - 4mph
• 3min - 6.2 mph
• 1min - 4 mph
• 3min - 6.5 mph
• Cool Down

 I really did like the running today.  It was the best I felt all day.  My heart rate hit 166 at the end, which I am sure is bad and means I ran too hard, but that's what I do.  My heart rate is higher than I like and it won't go down.  I also did all the jogging on my toes.  I have been steadily increase the amount of time I can run on my toes vs a heel strike.  That has been a great benefit of this training so far.  But I'm not sure how I will run on race day just yet.  I want to try to be on my toes more, but I really just want to be faster in less pain.  I felt like I was at a conversational pace the entire time except the very last part of the 6.5 mph jog.

So here is the thing, I'm walking out of the gym and I see myself in the mirror and I still look out of shape, only now I'm tired and have more pains.  This is just brutal honesty.   You aren't going to look different in 2 weeks and you probably feel worse.  I certainly don't feel fast.  So I have to keep doing what the calendar the says and trust the plan, because if you just thought feeling energized and looking great would keep you going, that's absurd.  I'm glad I have a workout buddy to kick my butt out of bed.  And really this blog, where I would have to admit failure if I gave up.  In reality these work outs aren't even that hard, I just have to keep pushing play.

Week 3 - Day 3 - Heat galore

Tuesday was a light day of Chalean Burn 2 in the morning and no tri specific work. We went to the Styx/Yes concert and had a drink there, and then had 150 calories of ice cream. Not the best, but our food was good.
Injury report:
Right foot - Jammed toe does not hinder my training at all at this point. Mildly annoying at times.
Left Shoulder - Shoulder still has some range of motion issues. I'm lifting almost like normal and I can light swim with it. Anything dealing with an overhead press is limited and has some slight pain. Even doing the arms p typical biceps flex motion hurts, actually that hurts the most. I'm training thru this and it appears to be getting better. I try to stretch it more and do some more warmup. Not sure where this one is going.
Left foot - So every morning my left hurt to get up and walk, but it would go away in about 5 mins and didn't impact my training, so as the typical male that I am, I ignored it. That went on for a few months and since has gotten progressively worse. I decided, I might need to check it out. I did some research and my symptoms appear to be an exact match for plantar fasciitis according to WebMD. All I hear is old person problem. Anyway, looks like there are some common remedies. Recovery time is anywhere from a few weeks to a year. Who has time for that. Either way, I'm still running.
What I notice about training as I get older is injury is more frequent and lasts longer. Even if its stupid stuff that 10 years ago, I wouldn't even notice. For now that's just part of it and I doubt it gets any better.

Week 2 - Day 2... training and beer

Last I blogged I think I was going to harry potter, which I did.. show was alright.. But the next day we were too tired to train, so we put it off a day and went to a bar with some friends. That turned out to be a good time. Beautiful night, music and people were good. German beers were 8$ for 16oz. I had 2. It seemed so cheap and who can only have two beers. Turns out Girlfriend should not have 2 of those beers. She was too tired to train again the next morning on Saturday. So we missed Friday and Saturday. Then went to our friends for a cook out and more beer. This time, I had 4 beers and mudslide for desert. I can't say no to ice cream. I say all this because at weight in on Sunday I was still down to 173. So beer and ice cream it is. Well not every day..
Sunday we did Chalean like we were supposed to. Girlfriend tried to wuss out of running but we went anyway. It was like 20 mins of jogging. Really there is no running here. Today was Softball Monday and 8 miles on the bike. We took the fall creek trail, which is really pretty right up until it turned into a wooden mess that we had to walk. Still it was very nice. I cranked the last 4 miles at about 20 miles/hr at a slight uphill grade. That is all that bike, I can't believe how great it feels to ride. Oddly all the seat and posture issues seem to go away on the road, that I was having on the trainer. I'm pretty happy about that, but I'm just so excited to ride that bike. I feel great afterwards too. Having my muscle milk, might be over doing it a little but I'm hungry.

Day 6 - Day of rest!

We made today the rest day. After staying up until 3 am for Happy Potter... I'm ready for some rest. Its easy to fit in workouts and rest on Saturday, then workout and rest again on Sunday. So our last day of the workout week will actually be tomorrow. The only thing so far is that it just doesn't seem hard enough in the tri training. Its a beginner schedule and so far it doesn't really seem like it will help me get faster, but I'm following the plan.
Enjoy the weekend.

Day 5 After Biking on the new Seduza

It was a little like I hope heaven will be, riding my new Quintana Roo Seduza.

The plan only called for a 10 min easy warmup and a 6 mile ride. I can't say enough good things about this bike. First I wasn't sure about moving from a road bike to a tri bike with the intent to train on it. After to talking to people about the pros and cons and evaluating my budget, I decided to go for the tri bike all the time. It won't be for everyone. I need the practice riding as this bike as much as possible. For me having breaks in one place and shifters in another was an adjustment. I also need to get used to the raised seat position. I had been on the bike on the trainer but on the road it felt so much better. Another new feature for me was the clipless pedals. On the trainer it was hard to tell how much different this would be on the road, but once I was pedaling on the road, they felt great - smooth and powerful.
It was joy to ride and when I finished the light 6 miles, I felt great, like I run 5K, no problem. Only time will tell.
I road at Fort Harrison.

Its a pretty nice state park here in Indiana. One great thing it has are some hills. A rare find in Indiana. Our tri will be on a flat course, but riding on the hills trains me a little harder, but its just more interesting. They have loop for bikes and the rest of the park is bike friendly. I think the annual pass is about $50, and that is good for all of the Indiana parks, we just haven't been any other yet, but maybe we will make an effort to do that. We are sort of busy.
Tonight we have to stay up late, we got midnight showing ticket to Harry Potter. I hope I can stay awake that long. Time to go search for dinner.

Day 5 Morning

I believe today I hate Chalean. Burn 3 this morning was all squats. My body does hurt today, my legs are just tired. I'm having my morning shakes for recovery and its off to work.
The one thing that Chalean doesn't do, is warm up and stretch enough for me. It might be enough for some people, but the stretching is really light with this much activity. Its about 2 mins of stretching, so plan to do your own if you want to legs and arms to keep working.
I put 8oz of water and 2 oz of milk in my Monster Milk this morning. This is the best tasting shake of any I have tried. Not to put those down, but this is actually tasty. We have a standing order for it at Amazon so it get delivered every month with Prime Shipping. Then you get a discount off the already lower than store prices. I can't remember exactly, but I'm guessing its about 40% less and no shipping. I can't remember if there is tax or not.

My hunger has gone up tremendously. Everything is starting to look like food. I'm trying to avoid eating bad things, and I've lasted so far... I might just need more protein from food to help that go away, all this green stuff and fruit isn't cutting it yet. My body went through those 12 shrimp I had last night before I went to bed. I need to find some food.

Day 4

Today, I'm just getting more tired. I have soreness, but its the good kind if that makes any sense. At least we are sticking with our plan. That is the most important thing we can do. Just keep the plan. 4 days seems too early to question the plan.

Today was a cardio and ab day for Chalean. My legs are tired. Mostly today I was starving all day. I had the two shakes, 2 fruits, lean pizza, almonds and dinner of shrimp, rice, corn and watermelon - of course 8oz of my favorite chocolate milk. I feel like I could eat an entire second dinner. I want to go eat now, like anything I can find. So am I eating enough, too little or too much. I can't ever tell. I somehow need to eat less to loose weight I want gone, but eat more to make muscle that I need to compete. And since muscle weights more than fat, I'm sorta working against myself on this one. I'd really like to see my body fat % go down, and my stomach go away. I could weight 200 and I wouldn't care if I my stomach wasn't in my knees on the bike. At some point, some people may think training for these events is just not worth it. Why bother? It would be easier to flog myself, buy the chocolate milk they give you at the end of the race and just sit on my butt at home.

Triathlon training today happened after work. 200 yard swim and a 15 min run. That's what the plan says. 200 yards of swimming is not really worth getting wet. Add then on to a 15 min walk, jog workout, and I'm not sure why we even do this. If the goal of the plan was to not discourage me than they were successful. The afternoon exercise did actually relieve some of the soreness I felt from Chalean.

Now I am just tired. Probably spent one hour exercising today. Looks like I won't have any trouble getting 8 hours of sleep tonight. The words of a sleepless man.

Day 3 - I'm not sore yet

Today was burn 2. I'm ready for bed at 9:30. Today's workout was harder and focused on legs, triceps and the back. I didn't eat before the workout which was at about 7pm so that might be an issue. I went for the Muscle milk after. Can't miss out on that. I lifted heavier weight today than I did on burn 1. Tomorrow is workouts. Better get some rest.

I laughed when I read this article today. Its about a guy doing his first tri at 45. The comical part for me was he got a flat. I got a flat my first time out. Is that just some sort of dues you have to pay. I actually had my bike tuned and checked before the race to be in perfect running condition for my race. Flat, going down hill, probably around 25-30miles per hour on arrow bars. My bike started to shake and I could see the air just draining out, I'm not going to lie, it woke up my nervous system a little. But I stopped got a new tube and off I went. Hopefully this time I avoid that disruption.

Day 3, its still too early to start feeling good about anything yet.

Day 2 - Softball day

On Monday, Girlfriend and I, play softball with friends. We made the plan so there would be no Chalean on that day, just tri training. Today calls for a 30 min bike workout. 10 mins spin, 5 miles and then some cool down.
Softball represents a training liability. Something happens when you starting competing and the next thing you know its for the world championship and your diving, sliding or running to hard. I really only wanted to drink a beer with friends. Girlfriend is pretty competitive, so she usually hurts herself too.. Today we came away with no injuries. Unfortunately, my shoulder is still bothering me, what a pain. It might be time to see the doctor. I was able to swim on Saturday, so hopefully I'm past the worst part. No pulled leg muscles or anything like that today. Probably because it was 95 out, feels like 110 they said, but I don't believe them. Either way, I would have gladly got out to go sit the bench today.
I got up at 7 and weighed in today at 173.2. That's much better since vacation, but mostly water weight I would think. Still better than going the other direction. Since I didn't get up early enough to work out in the morning, I had to bike after softball.
The bike was harder than I thought. The pedaling part went great, and my legs felt good, but I'm on a new bike. I got the Quintana Roo Seduza and the new riding position and the seat are going to take some getting used to you. My back side is not feeling good. I'm going to need some more riding for sure to get used to that. I used a trainer as well, which is pretty different. I personally would rather be out on the road, but the schedule just didn't allow for that today. I'm pretty sure I'm going to feel that workout in some place tomorrow.
After the ride I had an awesome salad for dinner, a recipe out of runners world that girlfriend made. Salad doesn't have to be boring. Also my favorite organic chocolate milk. Good for me or not, this stuff tastes awesome. It costs more, but it tastes great. I only have 8oz, which seems like I could use more milk, but right now, I'm still trying to avoid drinking too many calories and trying to drink water.
Day 2 down. Not faster yet.

Training Day 1

Yesterday was the first day of training. Thankfully it was an easy day. We (girlfriend) spent Saturday coming up with a plan. The short term goal is to complete the Fisher Sprint Triathlon. The long term goal is a half-ironman, and you have to start somewhere.

Early in the training I expect to do more general fitness work and specific triathlon training and then convert that to more specific and less general training as I get closer to the half-ironman. For the general fitness work, I'm going to be doing Chalean Extreme. I already completed P90x and really didn't think the time required for that would fit into triathlon training, but Chalean has shorter workouts and you can always vary the intensity. Chalean goes longer than I have to prepare for the triathlon so that will just get cut from the plan during the taper week before the race.
For the triathlon training itself, I'll be following a beginner 11 week plan. The first day had only 15mins of running and some of that was really walking. The hardest thing about this plan is probably doing less than it seems like you should be doing. After reading (very little so far) of the triathlon training bible, this seems to be a common problem, so I'm going to my best to stick with it. The first day of Chalean was about 35mins and then run was 15mins. For a Sunday there was plenty of time to get this done. I have no soreness today.
For food, I'm staying away from the meat and have plenty of supplements. Probably more than are needed at this point. I'm drinking muscle milk (1 scoop) before workouts and Monster Milk (1 scoop) after workouts. I'm talking CLA and the GNC vitamin pack for joints (read old guy). That's a lot of vitamin content when you add it all up. On the days I don't do Chalean I'll skipping some of the shakes. I haven't decided yet, and it will depend on how I feel really.
For food, I made some post workout organic eggs(2) with salsa and some cheese for about 165 calories. Chicken tortilla soup, for lunch and dinner. I added some almond snacks too.
I failed to get to bed on time. I'm not sure what bed time should be, but I wasn't tired. I watched TV until a little past midnight, but I was up until 1am.
Good thing day 1 always feels good.

Vaction is over

For the last two weeks I was on vacation at the beach. I love the ocean and it was a good time. That said, my training went no where. I did get out for 7.2 miles one day. I did a lot of walking overall, but also a lot of eating. At the water park we went to I stubbed my toe, not like a little brush with something solid, but like a black toe, I thought it was broken kicking of the foot into a hard object. Stupid. Anyway, that prevented anymore running and changed my view of walking for a while. By the end of vacation it appears to be better enough and not broken. My shoulder is better but still bothers me enough that I can't sleep on that side. Last, I came back a rather portly 179lbs. I guess I really did eat a lot, and drank some beers. Must keep in mind that vacation is a good time to relax and recover both mentally and physically. I've read that two weeks off will take 4 weeks to gain back in physical conditioning. These injuries and setbacks are just part of it and I think they are for everyone. I can't wait to get started training again.