Thursday, February 28, 2008

Lets just build into it guys...

The last couple days have been rough up here at altitude.  I have been getting some altitude headaches on and off and trying to drink as much as I can as it is very easy to get dehydrated up here.


Joel's idea when we got here was to go easy the first couple days, just to flush out the system from the race and get used to the altitude.  Then we will gradually increase the intensity from there so we do not overload the body.  Well the first day was flush, the second was rough, and the last two have been pretty damned hard.  I guess that is Coach Joel's idea of building into it.

Yesterday we started the day out with a set of 3x100 fast, then 3x300 sub threshold all on 1:30 per hundred pace.  We had to do that 3 times.  The first two rounds were pull paddle on the 300's and the last round was swim.  Thats where the altitude hits you like a ton of bricks.  I had to pull the 2nd 300 to rest my legs or my heart would have probably exploded.

From there we had a quick lunch and went for a 2.5 bike with the last 60min steady.  The group of us did that working pretty good together in a pace line, we were smoking!  Then we hopped off the bikes, did a quick change and ran 40min (10 steady, 10 easy X 2) on our Mooloolaba course.  Lets just say I hope I run quicker in the actual race.  Day done.

Today was a bit more manageable.  I started the day out with a 60min spin on the trainer (pic above) and then off to the pool for a recovery swim.  Later on in the afternoon we did a 70min run on a muddy, red dirt road.  Oh, and it was filled with potholes everywhere.  Perfect place for a 30min tempo run.  So we did 30min WU, 30min tempo, 10min cooldown.  Running tempo at altitude is tough but it went by quick and the day is finally done.

Now Joel is coming over to watch Lost.  It starts in 3 minutes so I am out of here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You guys are working soooo hard.
Maybe Coach Joel will give you a day off on Sunday for your birthday. Coldstone here we come!!
Enjoy :) You look like you need fattening up anyway...
Keep on pushing it and the improvements will come.

Anonymous said...

i don't think any other team in any other sport could be working harder than your tri group...i sweat reading the stats...unc good things ahead