My Journey to Ironman - Build Phase

The next 10 weeks are now complete. They were pretty rough, mainly because I was very sick twice. I missed out on a lot of long rides and due to missing so many workouts from being ill, I sadly was forced to re-evaluate my training plan for the final 10-week phase.

Overview
Just like the other phases, the Build Phase is 10 weeks in length and includes workouts for swimming, biking and running. As usual, strength and any other cross-training are not in the plan.

This phase focuses on starting to add intervals into the workouts. This really helps build up your speed, as well as still helping to boost your endurance. I have mostly done the intervals with running, but no as much with cycling. Swimming is still it's own animal, with almost every workout being some sort of interval session; however the addition of using my pull buoy is in more workouts now.

My Opinion of Phase II of the Plan

Overall I think it's a really solid plan, and if I had been able to do all of the workouts, it would have built me up really well; both endurance and cardiovascular strength. My typical gripe is that there are no strength sessions placed in here.

How I Did
As I already noted, I did not do well at all. I was sick twice, with my latest bout being the flu and killing over a week of training. One of the big issues of this training, as well as from my Disney training, was how often I have been getting sick. My nutrition is pretty good, but my sleep has always been all over the place, with my range being anywhere from 5 hours to 8 hours. However, most of my sleeping has a lot of restless sleep, so my quality of sleep is horrible.

Sadly, I have noticed that I have been having constant allergy attacks at work, and ONLY at work. I am not sure if it's all just a coincidence or if my sleep is contributing to my immune system being so out-of-whack that it would have happened anyway, but I definitely don't have as severe issues at home or even when I am outside. I think this has been possibly the largest contributor to me getting sick. I'll be getting blood work done this week, so hopefully I can find out what's really happening.

With that said, I still have a plan C, which I have already mapped out. Basically, I'll be following a much lighter load which is part of the "Just Complete" plan, but still trying to keep my swims the same, but at only twice per week instead of three times. Swimming has really just kept beating me up like crazy. On one side, this makes me think I need to keep the 3-per-week since I'll have an even longer swim for the actual event. However, this drain in energy is causing me to skip or dramatically shorter my other training sessions. This means I am missing out on important doubles to build my overall endurance.

Even though I feel confident right now I'll be able to complete the entire race, I am not sure I'll be doing any sort of decent time. However, given all of the issues I have encountered, I am alright with that. My focus is to be able to finish the race and not hurt myself.

Notes for Improvement
As I noted, I'll be doing following the "Just Complete" plan, with still using my current swim routines. In addition, some of the longer rides and runs I plan on keeping or only slightly decreasing. I will also be focusing on getting even more sleep to hopefully offset the health issues I am having.

I don't expect to have my blood results back and a plan from my doctor in time to really help my training, but once I complete this race, I'll be able to implement whatever plan from my doctor and I'll also be taking off time to completely rebuild my strength as well as get back to a proper weight.

My Journey to Ironman - Base Phase

The first 10-week phase of my Ironman training is complete! It had a lot of ups-and-downs, as well as some hurdles for me to get over, but overall I would say it was successful. I feel it has me mostly prepared for the build phase; "mostly" because I couldn't do the first three weeks and started off too aggressively.

Overview
As I previously noted, the phase is 10 weeks long and has workouts for swim, bike, and run. There is a weekly brick workout to prepare you for the ever-rough transition from biking to running.

In addition to a good volume of workouts, you get a fixed rest day, which is very nice. All workouts are also duration-based, aside from swimming.

Swimming has a variety of 2500 yard / meter routines that alternate throughout the weeks. It definitely feels like the author put some thought into the order of the swims, because they seemed to really progress in a way that I was able to handle.

My Opinion of Phase I of the Plan
Overall this is a solid base plan for Ironman training. Even though I missed the first three weeks, since I had a good base for running at least, I was able to jump in with only skipping some of the doubles, and was able to eventually build to get most of the doubles.

One of my pet peeves with this plan, as with most plans out there, is the lack of strength training. I have yet to find a book, coach, or triathlete who says doing zero strength during training and competitive season is a good idea. Sure, the type of strength training will be different, with more full-body focus and fewer sessions, but you still need it. And yes, many strength suggestions are for functional and core strength, but again, you see the theme here; you need strength training.

With my ranting over, I want to note that it's ideal to have an off-season of strength training, which I have mentioned before. Unfortunately for me, I was in the middle of Disney Dopey training during what should have been my off-season. So, I am at a disadvantage in that area. And there is no such thing as playing catch-up. Therefore, I have opted for the next best thing, or so I think, and doing NTC (Nike Training Club) workouts. I have always been a big fan of Nike's approach to this training. And therefore, I am using it with this plan to keep myself loose and gain a little strength along the way.

How I Did
I already noted how I skipped the first three weeks due to other activities. If you want, you can send me a friend request on Strava and follow along with all of my workouts. Or you can read the rest of this section for an overview.

Swim
Much to my excitement, although not my skin's, I made all of my swim workouts! Now, just to be clear, my first few swims were not 2500 yards. Before this training plan, I have swam 2500 yards twice before; once in training and then again at a race. Therefore, 2500 yards is the farthest I have ever swam. I wanted to make sure I eased into it.

Surprisingly, I ramped up the 2500 much quicker than expected. However, this was at a cost. Many of my swim days were so taxing on me that I was not able to do the additional run or bike, usually bike, workout. This was a choice I made because I needed to make sure I could handle 2500, as the next phase of training jumps to 3k yards / meters three times per week, which is a dramatic bump.

Bike
I have no good excuses here; I did very little riding. I have an awesome "pain cave" set up, and it's perfect for riding indoors. I just don't like riding that much, especially inside. And I much rather be running. Therefore, I had unlimited excuses on training days to skip my rides.

Phase 2 will cover the rest of March, all of April, and the beginning of May. Therefore I plan on getting much more riding in, especially later in April since I'll be biking to work.

Run
Aside from missing my runs for my brick workouts, I hit almost all of my runs. Like I always mention, I love running. I would probably run 7 days a week if I didn't do triathlon. All of the runs this phase were straight-duration. This means no intervals or speed-work were mixed in. I pretty much kept at a certain HR zone (level 1-2) for most of my runs. I did change things up a bit when I did hill runs, since my HR would usually get to Zones 3 and 4.

Bricks
I got in a few bricks, and skipped the rest. With how tired I was getting, I chose to use my brick days as additional rest days. From a recovery standpoint, this worked out really well. However, from a conditioning and "base" standpoint, this definitely hurt me and it will provide additional challenges in the Build Phase.

Strength
I wanted to start out with incorporating strength, but I did not. This hurt me big time, as my first week my muscles couldn't handle the load, and I ended up bonking the following week on almost everything. So, I took a large segment of the training to get back into my stretching routines to get myself to a point where I wasn't hurting before and after my workouts.

Once I achieved that, I switched to NTC workouts. My focus is on body weight routines, with an emphasis on flexibility and balance. For the most part I did pretty well sticking with the routines; but when push came to shove, my IM items took precedence over the strength, which is something I will make sure is not an issue in the next phase.

Notes for Improvement
In regards to consistency, I did pretty well on swimming and running. However, my biggest areas for improvement are in strength and biking. As I mentioned, with the weather getting warmer in another month or so, I'll be biking into work whenever I can, so that will help a lot with saddle time.

I have my strength routine mostly figured out now, so strength training in the Build Phase should be a bit easier to handle.

The major issue I had in the Base Phase, which I am hopefully going to start improving on in Build, is sleep. My horrible sleep routine causes me to crash by the weekends. Therefore, I missed many Saturday and Sunday long workouts, which I cannot afford to miss in Build. With things finally starting to normalize at the house, I think getting a better sleep routine shouldn't be too bad.

See you in 10 weeks!

My Journey To Ironman - The Plan

I am getting to this a bit late, as I am already starting my second phase of training this week, but I like to document my races so I can have a historical look at what I was thinking, doing and how I handled a specific race or training plan. Plus, if I help someone out along the way, it's an added bonus. With that long-winded intro out of the way, here we go!

I signed up last year for Ironman Lake Placid, which will be my Ironman race. My ultimate goal is to qualify for Kona, but this race will be a good gauge to see how realistic that is.

The Training Plan

The training plan I will be using is the Intermediate Plan from Be IronFit: Time-Efficient Training Secrets for Ultimate Fitness by Don Fink and Melanie Fink. Due to my Disney Dopey Challenge and timing of the Ironman and this plan, I had to skip the first three weeks of the plan. However, I figured with all of the running, I would at least have that base covered.

The plan has three parts; Base, Build and Peak. The program is 30 weeks long, with each phase being 10 weeks long. All of the programs in the book are 30 weeks.

The Base Phase focuses on building up your cardiovascular endurance. I do want to note, however, Intermediate assumes you have a certain amount of base in each of the three disciplines; swim, bike, run. There is a "Just Finish" program which is actually pretty good if you just want to complete an Ironman.

The Build Phase works on building you up to the duration and intensity for your training. Since the workouts, aside from the swims, are time-based, you might not hit the distances you would typically get in distance-based training programs. However, it's more important to condition yourself for duration then a distance, as only doing distance can be limiting for long endurance races.

Finally the Peak Phase is where you get into the fine-tuning of your training so that you have not only the endurance to complete the entire race, but can complete it with a decent time (for you).

Estimated Times

With this being my first Ironman, and only one official 70.3 race under my belt, I don't really have a lot to base my goal times on. To make it even more difficult, my Disney training was only about completion since I spent a lot of time getting pictures with characters and taking in the sites. Plus I wasn't doing any riding and virtually no swimming, so I didn't have a good base to work from either.

Regardless, I have used my times from Disney, my first few weeks of training in the Base Phase, and what I feel would be good times for me, and tried to come up with a base time. For the swim, which is 2.4 miles, I am looking at 1 hour 45 minutes, which is about 2:30 per 100 yards. Sadly, compared to most swimmers, I am extremely slow. And with the Ironman, I don't see myself having enough time to really make huge speed improvements. For the bike, which is 112 miles, I am looking at 7 hours, which is about 16 MPH. This is rather slow given historical performances, but with the lack of bike training I have for my base, plus the amount of rides I have missed in Base, I do not expect to be around my usual 18 MPH. For the run, which is 26.2 miles, I am looking at 4 hours 30 minutes, which is a 10:19 per mile pace. With a generous 10 minutes per transition, I am looking at a base time of 13 hours 35 minutes 36 seconds.

Preparation

In a perfect world, I would have been doing a strength training program with swim/bike/run cross training during "off-season" and then hop into Ironman training raring to go. However, I had some races last year and due to Disney, never had an off-season. Plus I just haven't really done enough strength training at all for this. With that being said, I decided to start doing some NTC workouts to increase my mobility and flexibility during my Disney training, as well as just keeping up with my stretching. During Ironman training I will be incorporating NTC strength routines to help me out.

Time Commitment

I won't lie, the amount of time required to Ironman training is not light. Even the "Just Finish" program requires 8-10 hours per week. If you include strength training with this, add another hour or two per week. In short, it's almost like having a part-time job while having a full-time job and a family / life. However, I have a very supportive wife and have figured out how to incorporate training into my daily life, so I should be set.

I'll be posting overviews and recaps of each training phase after I complete them, as well as doing a full review of the Ironman Lake Placid when the time comes. Good luck to everyone out there with their training and races!

Racing 2017

I haven't really done a race post in a long time, since I have been dealing with a multitude of injuries over the last 2 years. But with me healed and rebuilding, it's time to get back in the game!

I am definitely going super light on races this year though, as the main goal is to get a qualifying time for Disney so I am not in the last corral, and then a triathlon to get myself back in the mindset. With that said, this will total 2-3 races planned for this year, with my fourth race technically being next year, although it's right away in January.



Running Races

First off, Rock 'n Roll Half Marathon. As always, this is a fairly flat and uneventful race, which is perfect for me getting back. I am familiar with the course and hope to do well; goal is to run 8:00 min per mile, or a 1:44:00. This won't be my best time, but it will be in the right direction.

I might toss in a 5k somewhere along the line, but I am not as motivated for shorter races, as my ultimate goal is to lead up to an Ironman in 2018, which means marathon for the 3rd leg.

Triathlons

Triathlon is one of those sports that you can't do well if you don't practice AND race. Sure, you can pull off amazing times by just practicing everything; but nothing compares to the stress of race day and especially transition. I really don't want to do short course, but I do really want to get back into the feel of triathlon. Therefore, I am considering Escape Philly Sprint. I am not sure I will be doing another one this year, although I have considered one after my century ride.

Cycling Races

This isn't technically a race, although I will be using this to gauge how prepared I will be for my Ironman next year. The plan is Bike MS: City to Shore Century (100 miles). I completed the 80 last year, but did very little training and struggled a lot at the end. This won't be the case this year. I have already started my cycling training and will be doing lots of training all year.

Final Race

Alright, I know this is technically 2018, but all of my training is leading up to the Disney Dopey Challenge in January 2018. This will be followed by an Ironman mid to late summer.

Final Thoughts

Overall I am pretty excited about the races. I would be lying if I said I wasn't nervous and even a bit scared, given my injury history. But that's the kicker this time; I am working my butt off to get consistent with exercise, especially strength training. I am looking forward to a great and injury-free race season.

2013 Four Seasons Parkway Run & Walk for CHOP

My company is one of the major sponsors of this race. The race is to benefit the cancer center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. They do some pretty amazing work, so my wife and decided to run in the race. On a side note, my team at my company raised over $3k for CHOP. I was extremely excited about this; we rocked.

Anyway, my wife and I signed up for the 5k run. They also had a 2k fun walk as well. The weather was perfect; mid-50's pre-race and in the upper 50's at race start. However, I was dumb and was wearing a long sleeve tech shirt and was sweating horribly during the run, even though it was only 5k. The event allowed people to sign up on race day, which is always good for big charity races...the more the merrier. The goal was to have 10,000 participants, and they got 9262. It seemed like twice that number there because of how many spectators showed up as well. They raised $976,786.01 at the race, but the final amount raised of $1,031,951.01 beat their goal!

I have to say that the Four Seasons Hotel was awesome for foregoing the port-a-potties and letting everyone use the hotel facilities...which were extremely nice. There was free coffee and water for everyone pre-race. In addition, if your team or company had a tent, they all had Dunkin Donuts. My only complaint for the race was that it started almost 15 minutes late and there was no National Anthem. I would have expected such an overall well organized to event to have started on time; but who cares, it was a for a great cause and it was fun time. The lack of National Anthem was sad...even all of the small local races I do have that...it always gets me amped up for the run.

The run itself was great. You start at Logan Circle by the Four Seasons Hotel, and proceed towards the Museum of Art and onto West River Drive. You turn around a little ways into West River and head back to where you started. Aside from West River Drive, there was a ton of spectators everywhere cheering everyone on.

At the finish, all participants received a free breakfast; which basically was a combination of continental and hot breakfast! Definitely the first time I got eggs, tots and sausage for free after a race!

There supposedly was an APP for your phone to get race results, but I couldn't find it anywhere in the iTunes store; maybe it was Android only? The results are posted now on the website. You can sign up next year if you are in the area; it's September 28, 2014.

Rock 'n' Roll Philadelphia Half Marathon - Race Review

I am going to try and be unbiased here, as I just hit a new PR on this race and feel like a million bucks. That aside, this is the 2nd time I have done the race, which is also the 2nd time that the formerly named Philadelphia Distance Run has been under new ownership with Rock 'n' Roll. So, this was the 2nd time I have participated in the Rock 'n' Roll Philadelphia Half Marathon. The race was just as enjoyable as last year.

Parking & Pre-Race

Parking is always a pain, so I recommend getting to the race at least 1-1.5 hours ahead of time, unless you have someone dropping you off. Or, if you are hardcore, you can just jog or bike over. The port-a-potty lines are always an adventure, but moved along pretty well this year. From what I noticed, it seemed like they had a considerable amount more than last year. They also have a VIP port-a-potty area, which you can either purchase a pass or if you got $150 or more of merchandise from any of the sponsors, such as Brooks, then you got a free pass. My wife and I qualified for the free pass, and stupid me, I forgot them...so we used the regular port-a-potties. Not a problem, they were well stocked this year with toilet paper.

Pre-Race in the Corrals

Getting into the corrals was a lot easier this year. There wasn't any security to see which corral you were entering, so technically it was first-come-first-serve despite what corral you should have been in. This was only moderately annoying because there were a lot of walkers and slow runners who went in the early corrals, which made running around people more of a challenge. I was a lot slower last year and in corral 18, instead of corral 5 this year, so I didn't really have to worry about this issue then. Still, it wasn't a really big deal.

Everything felt very organized and it didn't feel chaotic at all; just a lot of excited energy from the runners as you would expect. The weather was perfect! A nice chill in the morning and cool at the end of the race. Although it did feel a lot warmer after the race with the sun out in full blast. Fortunately, this race usually falls on a gorgeous days every year, so I expected good weather.

And We're Off!

It took about 5 minutes for Corral 5 to get to the starting line after the horn was blown. However, corral 17 for example, took 30 minutes to get to the starting line. This was because the later corrals had multiple corrals together. The first part of the race through the city in regards to the roads was a lot better this year. There had been road work last year and tons of uneven road and potholes to avoid. However, there were a ton of ignorant spectators and locals who felt they could just cross the race coarse and runner's were the ones who had to go around them. This is the first race where I saw this situation as bad. The Pittsburgh Half in May had some people like this, but nowhere near as bad. I have to admit that when I saw a 250+lb clydesdale runner take out some kid walking across the street with this headphones on, I got a nice laugh and only hoped that the runner was not hurt...the kid cursed at the runner...while the other runners cursed at the kid to get off the race course.

The Course

You can see the course map on the Rock 'n' Roll Philly page if you want to see the full details and elevation map. Overall, this is a very flat course. However, it ends on an uphill, which sucks. Not only that, but the last couple miles are in almost full sun, which combined with the uphill makes this a very challenging end-course. But, the rest of the course is fine. The only hard turns are in the first few miles through the city. Once you are get out of the city and onto Kelly Drive, it opens up for the rest of the race. There is a slight turn at Falls Bridge, but the road is very open and you make more of a gradual wide turn than a sharp turn. And then it's West River drive to the finish at the Art Museum. Overall, a scenic and very enjoyable race.

One thing I love about Rock 'n' Roll events is that you get music all throughout the course. This year was awesome. No country music (I don't like country, sorry)...but lots of jazz, a drummer, and other groups. Plus, there were they occasional speakers setup playing some decent tunes. Annoyingly the race starts with Eye of the Tiger...which is a song I would prefer to hear towards then end of the race when I need that last bit of motivation to speed up and complete the race. Oh well, they'll figure it out one of these years.

Finish Line Goodies

I think a lot of people complained about the finish line food and drink last year, because there was a LOT more this year. I am angry that Philly races don't seem to give out Philly Soft Pretzels anymore. I know it's not cheap...but seriously, this is a Philly race...I want a Philly Pretzel...and I don't want to pay for it. Sorry, I guess I am spoiled by the past. But, it's expected, as races have grown so large. The race this year was sold at 22,500 people. The race-day overall count was 25,209. Not sure how that works out. Anyway, they had lots of versions of chocolate milk (wish they had chocolate almond milk since I don't like dairy before or after a race), lots of Gatorade, water, Herr's products, bananas, bagels, and more. It was a good spread...I just wish I had a bag to put it all in. My arms were full of stuff.

Right after the finish line you got your race completion medal (in my picture below) and got a finish line photo.

The After Party

The beer garden is impossible to find just like last year. Very annoying and not clearly marked to be spotted over the crowds. Gotta love a free beer after a race though. They also had a "Merch" area. Why Merchandise is being called Merch now is beyond me, since Merch sounds like something you need to see a doctor about;

Me: Hey, did you know I got merch from the race
Friend: Oh man, that sounds painful, you should get that looked at...I hope there is medicine for that

So, the main band to perform was Walk Off the Earth. Sorry, this type of music is not my taste. I either want old school AC/DC style rock, STP, Green Day, or some old or new school hip hop or dance music. Thankfully, for me anyway, there was no country music playing on the race course or anywhere else. I am not a fan of country music, sorry everyone. Anyway, I didn't stick around for the concert, but I read that people who do like that music thought the performance was good.

Overall, a fun and enjoyable race and I highly recommend it. Congratulations to all of the other runners who completed the race!