Went for a short run this afternoon. It was supposed to be 20mins, but I stopped after 17 as my left knee is still acting up. Not sure what is wrong with it, but it’s the same knee I twisted at the start of the snowboard season, so I’m assuming it’s related to that. I’ll take it easy on the running for another week and see what happens. If it’s still the same I’ll head back to the physio who looked at it after snowboarding.

Anyway, that finished the first week of the training plan.

B: 130.9km – S: 3000m – R: 29min

If you ever find yourself buying bike shorts, make sure that the chamois pad does not have any stitching, or seams as part of the pad itself. If it does, like my ones, you’ll end up with a nice raw arse after a long ride.

Got up at 5:50 this morning to give myself time for some breakfast before meeting at Centennial Park for the ride to La Perouse at 7.00. It was a pretty easy ride, with about 9 of us in the group. We had a couple of sprint efforts on the way back before joining up with the regular beginner’s group ride at 8:00 bacin in the park. The focus was back to hard efforts with easy laps in between, and a couple of bits of hill work thrown in for good measure. I’m pleased to report that the new bike made a huge difference; so much faster! I can’t wait to get a speedo onto it and get some numbers. Total for the morning was 70km, so the bacon & egg roll was well deserved.

B: 130.9km – S: 3000m – R: 12min

Nathan came back from London yesterday, so we met up for a few beers down in Rose Bay. Struggled a bit getting out of bed this morning as a result, but made the early bus and got into the pool around 7.40. Did the usual easy 1km session, then strolled across Hyde Park into work. It’s starting to warm up nicely in the morning too – summer’s on the way!

5 * 200 FS, 30sec rest (Avg: 2:54)

Felt a little sluggish, though it’s probably just a combination of being a bit dehydrated and the fact that it’s early in the morning instead of lunch-time when I did my other sessions. That’s my target of 3km of swimming for this week achieved too, which is a bonus.

B: 60.9km – S: 3000m – R: 12mins

Met up with Niall on the way home last night for a few laps of the park. Headed over to Cheeky Monkey to get a new rear light, as I didn’t have one which would fit on the aero seatpost! Got that sorted out and cruised around the park a couple of times. I was taking it nice and easy when Niall announced that we were going 34kmh! I didn’t even notice and thought we were taking it easy. Doing 30kmh on the MTB would have required a bit of effort – the bloody bike’s a rocket ;-) We slowed it down a bit after that.

B: 60.9km – S: 2000m – R: 12mins

Today was the day for a cycle, so I decided to do a few laps of Centennial Park on the way into work. The mornings are starting to warm up now, though my eyes were still watering a bit on the speedy downhill from Vaucluse! My winter top won’t be needed for much longer. Cruised around the park for 2.5 laps (9.5km) practising my spinning, then headed on into work. I’m starting to get a bit more comfortable on the bike as I get used to the fact that it’s a lot twitchier than the MTB. It’s at most half the weight, and the tyres are a lot skinnier, so it’s only to be expected. It’s also a lot quieter and so much stiffer, so there’s no creaks from a flexing frame like I used to have on the MTB. Despite the fact that I’m missing some of the lower gears I had on the MTB, climbing is a lot easier that I thought it would be. I presume it’s because the frame is stiffer so there’s no waste in the power transfer from pedal to wheel. Anyway, it’s all good ;-)

B: 39.5km – S: 2000m – R: 12mins

Just back from what was supposed to be my first run of the week. My legs felt OK walking around today so I figured I’d be OK to go running this evening. Rather than focussing on speed, or distance, from now on I’m just going to go out and run for a certain time at a pace I find reasonably comfortable, which is usually 10-11kmh. I had a 20min run down on the training plan for today, so I set the timer on the watch for 10mins and set off on an out-and-back run. I managed about 12mins of it before I stopped, as it became increasingly apparent that my legs weren’t ready for it. I’ve a bike ride scheduled for tomorrow evening, so that should loosen them out a bit, then I can try again on Friday.

B: 10km – S: 2000m – R: 12mins

Got up nice and early to hit the pool this morning. Got to the changing rooms to find that I’d forgotten to pack my goggles, so that was the end of that. Postponed the session until lunch so I could buy some new goggles (which I’d been planning to do anyway). As I walked up to the sports store I noticed that the welcome home ticker-tape parade for the Olympic Team was on, though the athletes had yet to arrive. New googles in hand, it was off to the pool.

5 * 200 FS, 30s rest   (Avg: 2:48)
Total: 1000m

Everything felt a bit easier than it has done in the past, so I’m obviously getting some feel back for the water.

B: 10km – S: 2000m

I’ve just been creating a training plan in iCal, based on the training plan I mentioned earlier. It took about 30mins to set everything up, and an instant to publish it on the web.

Check it out here.

Looks pretty good too! As I edit stuff in iCal it automatically updates the online calendar as well. Nice.

I hit the pool at lunch to get my first swim of the week in. It was quite a bit busier than last time I went at lunch-time, and as usual there were people in the fast lane who shouldn’t have been there. If you’re swimming 1:50/100m you are not fast, even by normal standards, let alone ex-swimmer standards. I might try going at different times of the day when it may be a bit quieter.

5 * 200 FS, 30sec rest (Avg: 2:50)

B: 10km – S: 1000m

Now that the 10K is over and done with, I’m going to start a more structured and organised training plan. I found this plan last year, and intended doing it, but I never did. It looked a little daunting at the time, but one year of sporadic exercise later it looks a lot more manageble.

So, I plan to nerd it up using iCal and then I’ll publish the resulting calendar on the web.

In the meantime, the plan for this week requires:

3 * 1000m swims,

4 * 20min runs &

1 * 30min & 1 * 60min bike.

I might miss one of the runs as I have to wait for my calves to stop hurting, but the rest should be doable.

Here it is; my new bike. I picked it up from Cheeky Monkey on the way into work this morning. First impressions? It looks fast, and sure as hell feels fast, but I’ll have to wait until I get a speedo fitted to put a number on how much faster it is than my MTB. I plan to take it out for a blast around Centennial Park tomorrow evening to put it through its paces.

Well, we finished it! Got up at 5:40 this morning, jumped in the car, picked Niall up on the way and parked on Bondi Junction. Got the train to North Sydney, with more and more runners joining at every stop. By the time we arrived at Milson’s Point the marathon and half-marathon had already started, so there was just the people doing the 10K milling about. That was still about 10,000 people apparently.

It was bloody cold in the shadow of the bridge, especially once we’d dropped off our gear at the trucks which would carry it to the finish for us. We stood around shivering and stretching, then Niall headed off to the front as he was going for a time. Met Billy and Lisa briefly, then the gun went. It took us about 7-8mins before we crossed the start line, but once we did all doubts and apprehensions disappeared and we plodded off along the course.

I was obviously caught up in the moment a litte, as I’d forgotten to go to the toilet before the start, and I also forgot to start my stopwatch. I only realised this about 2km into the race, so I had no idea how fast we were going. The run over the Harbour Bridge was quite nice, though there was a biting wind blowing across the course, so I was pretty happy to get onto the Cahill Expressway. Myself and Jacqui had settled into a nice relaxing pace and the kilometres seemed to pass quite easily. Next thing I knew we were heading up Macquarie St. and approaching the 5km drinks station.

They had toilets there as well, but there was a bit of a queue, and I figured I could hang on until the end, so I skipped them. Sure enough, about 1km later I started getting signals from my bladder that I had better stop soon, so I left Jacqui with instructions to keep going, and I ran ahead to find the next toilet, which turned out to be at 7.5km. Thankfully there were no queues at this one, which was a relief in more ways than one!

Jacqui had just passed the toilets as I emerged, so I caught up with her and resumed our normal pace. My left knee was starting to hurt a little, but it was little more than an annoyance at this stage so we kept going to the turn-around beside St. Mary’s Cathedral. We were now on the home stretch with a little more than 1.5km to go, the majority of which was slightly downhill. We had the last of our 5 stretching stops at the 9km mark, and it was plain sailing from there until then finish on the Opera House forecourt. We crossed the line with 1:17 showing on the clock, so allowing for the time we were waiting around at the start, I reckon our official time will turn out to be somewhere in the region of 1:08. Neither of us were remotely tired or out of breath, though my knee was starting to become more than an annoyance so I was glad to finish. Niall managed a very respectable 43:19 by his watch.

All in all, it was a lot easier than I’d expected, but I need to figure out why my knee went all weird. I’d definitely like to try another one and actually make a race of it. It feels good to be an athlete again ;-)

B: 57km – R: 16km – S: 1200m

Just got back from my BRAT beginner’s ride which was a nice warm-up for the race tomorrow. We did a bit of hill work, followed shortly afterwards by a 1 lap individual time trial. I had no intention of busting my arse and draining my legs, so once Olivia came past I drafted off her for the rest of the lap. Racked up 42km in total for my final week on the MTB. Picking up the new bike on Monday, so I should be a good bit faster next week. Looking forward to it.

I’m off into town now with Jacqui to pick up my race pack for tomorrow. I haven’t done much training this week, since Tuesday anyway, so I’m going to call it a taper ;-) Looking forward to tomorrow, but with a bit of trepidation too, as I’m not as prepared as I’d like to be. Still, it’s a great course, so when it starts hurting I can allow the scenery to take my mind of it. Wish me luck!

B: 57km – R: 6km – S: 1200m

Cycled home and went out for a run. There was a little bit of rain, which was actually nice as the temperature was down as well. I did 6K in 34:33, which includes about 3 20sec stops to do a quick stretch of my calves. Ended up with nice even splits of 16:55:30 and 16:55:34 and finished with a pulse of 144, so the run was nice and relaxed. I’m pretty happy with it as it’s the longest run I’ve done which wasn’t on a treadmill, and I now know that I’ll have no worries with the 10K on Sunday. Jacqui has also entered the 10K, so we’ll just plod along together. Should be fun.

B: 15km – R: 6km – S: 1200m

Went down to the pool at lunch to get a swim in. It’s busier than the morning, but there’s less instances of slow people getting into the fast lane, so it went quite well. I even had one guy pass me out, which hasn’t happened in a long time ;-)

100, 200, 300, 300, 200, 100 FS w/ 60s rest (Pace: 1:25)
Total: 1200m

B: 5km – S: 1200m

88.5kg @ 18.6% fat. Lost 1.1kg and 0.5% fat in two weeks.

Adam from Cheeky Monkey called and they have the Soloist Team in my size, so I’m picking it up on Thursday morning.

I went up to Cheeky Monkey this morning and had a chat with Adam about my new bike. We agreed in the end that a full-on tri bike would not be the best option at the moment, and that a road bike was they way to go. That meant that it was down to the Soloist 105 or the Team Soloist. I preferred the Team Soloist, because it’s a much higher spec’d bike, the colour is nicer and, while it was more expensive, there was a much larger discount being offered on it. It turns out that I can still use my existing MTB-style bike shoes with it, saving me $250 I thought I’d have to spend on road shoes. So, that’s what I’ve decided to get. Adam is checking with the importer to see if they have any of my size left, and will ring me tomorrow, so fingers crossed!

B: 58km – R: 18km – S: 2200m – W: 2 sessions

Went up to Centennial Park for the third week of the BRAT beginner’s bike group. This week was sprint training, so we set off, two abreast, around the park. Two locations had been pointed out around the lap, approximately 400m apart, and we had to sprint that 400m, then drop to the back of the group. When my turn came around I took off, and got up a good head of speed. I’d underestimated how long the distance was and was fading a little in the last 50m. My legs were in bits afterwards, but we only had a few laps left after that. Once we’d finished it was time for coffee and a toasted sandwich before heading home via the Icebergs to meet Kev and watch him join BRAT. Niall is also joining. I don’t think they’ve any interest in triathlon per se, but there a couple of run training groups they would like to join, and there’s also the club racing series which provide a few cheap races for them to do. You never know though ;-)

B: 48km – R: 18km – S: 2200m – W: 2 sessions