So the lack of updating this blog pretty much shows how difficult I have found it fitting in work and training, there has not been a heap of time for anything else.
Since my last post, I seemed to recover well from the marathon, although I lost a bit more biking time than I would have liked over the marathon taper/recovery period.
Since then the focus has been on the bike, running has purely been about trying to maintain fitness, but I have not done any really long runs instead opting for 2 x 20km ish type runs per week, I’ve definitely found this approach to leave my legs a little fresher for my other sessions.
Racing wise, I had my first ever podium at the first XOSIZE race, set up by a decent swim and a really strong bike. Given a lack of much speed work on the run, a 5km run really hurt, I was pleased to pick up one place in my age group on the run, and didn’t get overtaken by anyone with the end result that I came third so was really pleased with that.
I’ve also ticked off Half-Ironman number 4, after worrying about the weather conditions, race day turned out to be a cracker, not too hot, hardly any wind and the course is flat and fast so I was confident in getting a pb and finally ducking under that 5 hour mark.
The swim went well, that is actually one of my stronger legs now relative to others, I got in a rhythm early and although it was a little annoying having to weave through slower swimmers from earlier wave starts, it was pretty uneventful and I was happy to be at the swim exit in about 31.5 minutes. I took my time through transition, I was running through my routine that I will use in Busselton which involved a change into bike kit, was out within a few minutes and on my way.
The bike was fast, I settled into my planned race effort and was moving along at around 37-38km/h. I stuck to the planned pacing and concentrated on getting the nutrition in and felt pretty good. I managed to maintain an average speed for the whole bike leg of 37.5km/h so heading back into T2 I knew I had the sub 5 and a pb nailed as the race clock was just on 3 hours.
The first lap of the 3 lap run course seemed to pass by pretty quickly, I settled into a relatively comfortable heart rate and just kept ticking the km’s off. I slowed gradually throughout the run which probably showed a bit of my lack of running but nothing that I was too worried about. I was conscious of not destroying my legs only 3 weeks out from the Ironman but was certainly pretty happy to stop when I got to the finish line, crossing the line in 4.39.09.
Since then I have had another week and a bit of big bike km’s and have now settled nicely into the taper. The Melbourne weather is forcing me to taper well, wet and windy today so not taking the risk of heading out on the bike.
Not too much more I can do now, I’m looking forward to heading over to Busselton on Wednesday and getting on with the race!
