Bits and Bobs

Well, I thought it must be time for a bit of an update as to how things are going over the winter. The winter time is traditionally supposed to be just spent doing the miles and building up the endurance so that, come early next year, you can start working on the speed side of things again and spend less time on endurance type stuff.

Thankfully, a small group of us triathletes have started to get together at the weekend and we are doing a long ride on the Saturday (~100k) followed by a 10k run when we get back - this can be quite painful as the legs are just so used to spinning around. Then, come Sunday, the plan is to do a longish run (10-20k) followed by a 4k swim set. Things are goinbg pretty well with this, although I have not been running too much, but the group seems to have been formed so we should be all setup for a nice winter long effort.

Other than this, I am in the process of changing a lot of things about where I train and who I race for. I am no longer going to be swimming with Swim for Tri on Thursdays as I have joined Wandsorth Swimming Club where I am trying to get to 3 times a week. They are a proper swim club though and they have a really good coach who seems to have a clear goal for how we should be training to work up to a good performace come race season starting in April. It may also mean that I actually compete in some galas...the last time I attended a gala, I think I must have been about 10 or 11.

I have also decided to join a triathlon specific club as well. The Thames Turbos are a pretty well renowned club in the triathlon world. They have had a whole host of champions who have been through the club, including the current world champ, Tim Don. I am still going to be racing for the Serpentines though, but I am only going to be running for them now...it is hard to beat the support you can get as a Serpentine runner when you do a running race..the biggest club in the UK pretty much always ensures that you have good level of support along the route.

The final thing is that I am currently in the process of trying to secure some form of sponsoship for the coming race season. I have written to a couple of companies already and am pleased to say that I am now sponsored by a company which makes recovery milkshakes. I first came into contact with For Goodness Shakes as they were given out after a race..they are pretty good though so I thought it would be worth writing to them.
I am also due to have a meeting with another company before Christmas - they are in the physio and massage business so it could be a winner if I can get them to do some kind of deal.

Winter Training - Cold and Muddy

Well, winter training is now in full swing, pretty much all of the injuries that plagued me after the World Champs have all cleared up so it is back to training now. A couple of weeks ago I had a chat with my coach and we went through some of the aspects of my training that needed to be addressed and also how to keep me fit over the winter months. The winter has already set in the UK...I am pretty much riding to work and home in the dark now so the lights are on and the bike is covered in dirt from what seems to have been the wettest couple of weeks in a while.

The main areas that I am going to be focusing on over the winter include my running and swimming, and to a much lesser extent, my cycling. In a bid to increase my running strength, I have taken on the x country season which runs all over the winter - the Metropolitan League has races every couple of weekends. So far I have done one Metropolitan league race and yesterday I competed in the North London X Country Championships. The first of these races was one massive shock to the system. I can't really remember the last time that I did a x country race, but I had no idea what to expect for the 5 miles of racing ahead. After lap 1, my legs felt like they were made of lead and my lungs felt like they had taken a right battering...I still had another 2 laps of this agony to get through as well. On the second lap I think I managed to find some sort of rhythm (slow) which seemed to be okay and I managed to get round. However, on the last lap, a club mate started to breathe down my neck and I knew we were in for a race. I tried to drop him on the downhill section, knowing that he had shorter legs than me, but he managed to stay there and eventually outsprint me for the finish - I was gutted. To give you some idea of the level of competition, I finished 147th in this race and there would have been about 300 competitors - this x country lark does not bring out the fun runners in any shape or form. I was also a massive 10 minutes behind the winner! Anyway, the 37 minutes for one race is probably represents the fastest way that you can ruin a pair of new shoes. I started in my shiny new shoes and finished with some brown blobs attached to my feet...and to think, this was not even a really bad day for the mud!

Yesterday's race was a much more civilised affair at a park in North London. The ground was good all the way round and it was a bit easier to maintain a good pace. There was one rather long hill along the back of the park, but all in all it was a lot better. I did get overtaken by an grey haired gent on the last lap and I initially thought he had me, but I had a quick word with myself and subsequently managed to get on his tail. I followed him all the back to the finish and then finally managed to outsprint the chap to the finish..a heartless effort..thanks for the toe through the hard bit mate, but I'll still beat you...racing is racing though and places mean points here :-)

Today I have been back to Regent's Park for one of the 10k races that Mornington Chasers put on, Regent's Park was the first place that I went under 40 minutes way back in February so today I really wanted to do it again. Although I have since been a lot faster than 40 minutes, I had a 15 mile run from Thursday still lurking in my legs and then I had done x country the day before. The aim was to try and get into the 38 minute mark but low and behold it was not to happen. I came home in 39:25 which I don't think is too bad considering that yesterday's offroad effort was close to sub 4min km as well.

I am also gonna be off swimming tonight with a new club. Barnet Copthall are pretty well known in swimming circles so it will be interesting to see what sort of things they do during their sets. Having looked at the schedule for tonight, it looks like it is a 2 hour session in the pool so it could end up being a real long set, possibly into the 5k region depending on what sort of thing we do. If the sets are good though it could be really good for me as they are only just up the road and they swim pretty much every night of the week so I could pick and choose when to go.