Another few days roll by

After an easy Monday (about 2 hours of recovery training) I laid out 19 hours of training in three days. The format was fairly straight forward each day and it stacked up as:

Tuesday:

Morning run on Magnolia Road (8000+ ft); 10 miles in the rolling hills; 74 minutes.

Swim at 10:30; 4800 meters; 90 minutes. Good swim.

Ride at 1:15; easy to steady out to carter lake and return via backside. about 3:40 ride time; probably 75 miles or so.

Wednesday:

Morning run from the condo. About 11+ miles in the front range hills. 81 minutes

Swim at 10:30; 3900 meters; faster set; 75 minutes

Ride @ 1:00. Climb 15 miles up lefthand canyon, descend back down, climb 8 miles to Jamestown, descend 3 miles to lefthand turnoff; climb 5 miles to mile 10 marker; descend to bottom of canyon and back to Boulder on 36. About 72 miles and 3:55 ride time.

Thursday:

Morning run at Switzerland Trail (around 8800 feet at start), little under 12 miles. About 84 minutes.

Swim @ 10:30; 3400 meter swim with main set of 10 x 250 as 100IM/150 free. More effort than I really care for today.

Ride @ 12:30; climb 8 miles to Jamestown, descend to lefthand turnoff and climb to mile 15 marker (about ten more miles), descend out of canyon and logged some easier riding in the flats. About 56 miles and 3:05 ride time.

Plenty of climbing in there; both in cycling and running. I have a lot of thoughts running through my mind and I want to share them, but I need a lighter day to get them down. Tomorrow is planned to be much more mellow so I'll knock out some of those thoughts; including my ideas about training volume and fueling oneself for higher volume.

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Before I go;

There is a lot of racing going on this weekend.

Be sure to check The Tour of the Gila (www.tourofthegila.com) to follow my roomies racing for Team Velonews. (Josh is Cat 3; KB and Dave are in the 4/5 race).

We have about half the city of Boulder racing Wildflower as well as Gordo racing some obscure race in the NoCal Wine Country (Napa Tri or something along those lines). G better be setting a course record there!

AND big dawg Chris is headed to the Tri 101 in Florida.

Good luck gents and lady,

JD

I managed to be recovered well enough from last weekend's race by this past Friday. I kicked off my ten day volume block with a ride out to Fort Collins and Back with Marilyn. It was right at 100 miles in 5 hours with some steady, and even hard, sections along the way (followed by a 4 mile run off the bike). I guess the highlight (read:lowlight) of the ride would be a gift shop store owner (on your right as you hit the T in the road in Masonville coming from the south) refusing to let Marilyn_BUY_some water from the faucet. Please, if you ride out in this area; take your refueling business elsewhere.

Saturday brought warm temperatures and another good day of training. It started at Elks' pool with Billy and Dennis swimming 4K+ with a main set of 2 x 1000. I was pretty tired from poor sleep, but I warmed into the set nicely. A couple hours after the swim Billy and I headed up to Magnolia Road for a long run. It was getting pretty warm with strong sunshine that feels much different at 8000+ feet that it does for our flatland friends. I wasn't carrying any water (forgot my fuelbelt) so I tried a different strategy by pounding 50+ ounces of water shortly before starting the run. I felt a bit ill on the way up, but it did seem to do the trick as I avoided any hardcore dehydration. The run felt a bit rough at times, but I still managed to better my time from two weeks ago. Magnolia Road is the only place that I have a lot of data from so its pretty cool to see the progression over the past few years. I've come a long way from when I started.

I finished Saturday with a short one hour spin in the flats. Two days down.

Four days

Four days of recovery. That is my self-proclaimed standard for post Half Ironman racing. As I sit here on Friday morning (4 days + 1) I certainly hope to see the signs of the recovery today because they have been hiding all week. After racing on Sunday I drove 2 hours to Wichita Falls and then another 11 hours on Monday to get back into Boulder. It was nice to get back so quickly, but I was pretty damn exhausted when it was all said and done.

I actually felt worse on Wednesday than Tuesday with sky-high heart rates on all of my easy sessions and mandatory 3+ hour naps. Thursday saw a bit of improvement, but I was nowhere near where I needed to be. Nevertheless, I have faith in my four day plan and I scheduled my training to reflect this.

In the past years I have had nearly 6-7 months of training (base and otherwise) before I begin my Ironman focus. This year I have about 3-4; with only 1.5 of solid aerobic base. It will be interesting to see how it all comes together in the next couple months as my Ironman push begins today. I will be stringing together around 50+ hours of training over the next 10 days.; two of those days will only have one hour of training so its more along the lines of 48-50 in 8 days. I will have a few days of recovery following this block before I begin a 16 day build period that focuses on dialing into my Ironman pacing while maximizing the progression of all aspects of my fitness.

I'm starting with a 5-6 hour ride today with a short T run to follow. Lets hope the body is nearly back to normal by now.

until later,

jd

Playtri

I copied and pasted this report from an email I sent out yesterday about the Playtri Triathlon in Dallas. It doesn't work very well when I do that so I apologize if there are some formatting errors below.

jd
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A little over a week ago I was flipping throughvarious issues of Inside Tri and Velonews (two of my roommates work for them) and I came across an AD forthe PLAYTRI Half Ironman: a Dallas area race directedby one of my friends, Ahmed Zaher. I decided to make a quick change to the schedule and 13.5 hours (in a car) later I was in North Texas.

Race morning did not bring any epic Texas heat, but it did bring some impressive wind. The swim was fairly protected, but the rest of the course would certainly force us to grind a bit. At the swim start I lined up behind Todd Gerlach of Austin, but that's about all the contact I had with him once the gun went off. Two or three other swimmers tried to make a run for his feet with me, but all of sudden it was as if we conceded and found our own groove. We had an exceptionally large pack that stayed mostly in tact throughout the swim and we all exited just shy of three minutes behind Todd. Ouch. Good swim Todd.

I hit the three loop bike course with hopes of minimizing any lead that Todd would continue to build on the bike. My plan was to keep things somewhat moderate in the first half and then start to lift the pace with the final lap being the hardest effort. After about 8-10 miles of the race I got a split of almost six minutes to Todd. Well, crap. I still decided to stick to my plan since I felt the wind might really favor an attack on the final loop. Attacking on the final loop did catapult me from fourth to second, but coming into T2 I heard my announcing over the intercom that I was six and a half minutes down on the leader. That is a lot to try and make up over a half marathon, but you never know until you try.

After 3 miles of running I got a split of 6:20. No good. After 6+ miles I got a split of 6:10. No good. I might have mellowed out a little bit at this point, but third place was only 90+ seconds back and he was not fading so I lifted the effort on the second loop. After 9+ miles I had taken two minutes out of Todd and that gave me a second wind. I had images of running him down in the final 100 meters so I kept running hard. I pushed all the way to the finish, but I came up two and a half minutes short of the victory.

Nevertheless I was happy to come in second with one of the faster runs on the day; not to mention taking home a paycheck. The inaugural Playtri Festival(www.playtri.com ) was definitely a well-run and successful event. You can be sure I will be heading back there in the years to come.

Thanks go out to my aunt and uncle for all their hospitaity over the weekend and to my sponsors: EAS, Trainingbible.com, Descente, Javelin, and Fuel Belt.

See you in Idaho in June,JD

www.justindaerr.com

Virginia Tech

Its hard to comprehend the tragedy that took place in Blacksburg this week. No matter how much information they find on the shooter it will never justify or rationalize such actions. My heart goes out to the families of the victims, to the witnesses, and to the students, faculty and community of Blacksburg. Its extraordinarily difficult to empathize with their pain and sadness. Few of us understand the immense injustices in the world. Most of us only understand the petty.

Hang in there Virginia Tech Nation. Here's to hoping you can all rise above this.

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Training since Monday has included:

Monday:
easy 10 x 200 meter swim; mix of everything. weights followed (and I saw the news on tv at this moment).

Nothing else on the day; Mondays and Fridays are almost always easy in Boulderworld.

Tuesday:
Morning run at the Res with 8 x 90 sec @ vV02 (building to 184 to 185 HR) on 2:30 recovery. Total run around 8+ miles.

Swim shortly after at Elks. 3K aerobic main set on moderate intervals. Little over 4K total. Felt ok. I could not lift the pace at the end, but I did not fade either.

Ride about an hour after swim with Dennis, Gordo, Michael and me. Rode 36, backside of Carter, and home via 75th. My climbing is starting to come around as I climbed the backsde competently this go round. About 70 miles in 3:30

Wednesday:
Morning run, very easy 45 minutes finishing just before the swim began

Swim with some faster work. About 3200 total with 1200-1300 of hard/fast swimming. Felt Ok, but tired at the end.

Afternoon ride with a 15 mile climb up lefthand canyon. Probably the highlight of the day as I kept a high zone 2/zone 3 tempo the whole way. I am not feeling beat up at the higher altitudes so accilmization is coming along nicely. About 2:25 ride time

Finished up and headed over to Sports Garage to pick up the serviced PT. My ergomo is whacked out so I might need to send that back in. Hopefully the issues with my backup PT will be alright.

-jd

Sunday, April 15

Ironman Arizona race day.

I got a late start on the day because I was following the IMAZ swim finish. Once I saw BB's result (nice improvement) I headed out to do a long ride.

I rolled out via 75th st in the flats and started riding steadily right away. The goal of today's ride was to log a lot of steady state intensity in the flats. I made one small modification because I wanted to get some climbing during the second half of the ride.

I rolled out to Carter Lake and climbed the frontside, then rode back to Boulder via 83rd, 75th, Lyons, 36. I got back to the house after 3:15 of ride time and quickly checked the race status. Afterwards I headed out and climbed the frontside of Lee Hill, Mile 10 of Lefthand, a little beyond Jamestown, and home via the backside of Olde Stage. That added about two hours of climbing (and descending)

Total ride time was around 5:15 or so with quality throughout the entire session. My acclimation is coming along and it could be readily noticed by my ability to competently climb the steeper grades (as opposed to merely surviving them). I still have a ways to go, but that relates more to my fitness, not my acclimization.

I was supposed to get a short run off the bike in, but I needed to get down to Denver to meet my dad for an early dinner. I got to check out a lot of downtown Denver that I had yet to see before. Pretty cool spot. Lots of bars, restaurants, lofts, etc. That's the way to do it if you have to be in a big city.

The total volume for the week was around 28 hours; the main highlights including the overall run volume (and quality), Sunday's ride, and every swim workout of the week.

-jd

Saturday, April 14

Saturday proved to be one of those days that makes you happy to be in Boulder. The weather was absolutely gorgeous when we woke up. It was even more perfect when you consider the weather of the previous few days.

I headed over to Elks for the 8:00 a.m. swim. Gordo put together a fairly moderate, but long set of 5 x 900 meters as swim, band/buoy/band/buoy/paddles, paddles only, swim. All on about 30-45 sec rest.

A couple hours later Gordo, Dennis, Monica, Josh and I headed up to Magnolia Road for a long run.

Magnolia Road.

Mags is pretty famous. I'm not sure who started running there first, but I have no doubt that Lear upped its popularlity substantially and gave it a lot of glamour when he profiled the CU runners running there in his book "Running with Buffaloes." Whetmore does some of the Sunday long runs for the XC team up there on that long rolling road and everyone wants to do what national champions do.

Magnolia Road begins as a paved road from Boulder Canyon and continues for about 4.5 miles. Then a dirt road begins and continues another 7.5 miles to the Peak-to-Peak Highway. It actually continues another three kilometers on the other side of the highway where it dead ends into some single track. The beginning of the dirt is somewhere in the 8000+ elevation range and you climb all the way to the turnaround which, I would speculate, is around 8800 feet. I need to get the exact number on that because I have been speculating for far too long.

There are two roads in Colorado that serve as my favorite long run locations. One is Magnolia Road in Boulder. The other is Slate River Road in Crested Butte. Slate RR is wonderful because of its solitude and the river that runs along it that you can hear the entire time. Magnolia is wonderful because every single mile has its own character. The road has mile markers so you can really break the entire run into mini sections as they all provide their own challenges.

I normally cook myself a bit when I run Magnolia for the first time each year, but this time I opted to 'cruise' it and keep my HR under 160. I ran 60 minutes out (about 156 HR avg and 55 back (about 150 Hr avg) and I did_not_cook myself so I was very pleased with the session. I tacked on another 5 minutes of easy running to bring it to two hours. That also brings a seven day total of about 126 km (about 77 miles) .

After returning from Mags I headed out on an easy two-plus hour spin in the flats around Boulder. Then came home and chowed down on some burritos.

Good day.

Back in Boulder

Now is probably as good a time as any to sit down and write down some updates. Its about 30 degrees and overcast. Its hard to complain considering they were predicting twenty feet of snow or something ridiculous like that.

The past couple weeks have really flown by with travel, time in Crested Butte, travel, settling into Boulder, and, of course, training.

I finished Lonestar on April 1 and I was on the road by noon on April 2nd. I spent the night in Lubbock and then drove another ten hours on the 3rd to Crested Butte to spend some time with my folks and to drop off some stuff that I won't be needing in Boulder (read:work clothes).

I stayed in CB through the weekend and got in a moderate amount of training. There is something about 9500 feet that makes simple tasks like running a_touch_ difficult when arriving from sea level (while still recovering from the race). I was crashing pretty hard each night, but my body was starting to come around by week's end.

On Monday, April 9th, I headed over to Boulder to get settled into my new home. The condo is home to three ex-pats from Austin and about four times as many bikes. They are all great people (bikes are great too) and I think its going to be a perfect fit for the next five to six months. This will be my longest continuous stay-to-date in Boulder and its looks like I found the right people to spend it with.

However, Boulder has not been the kindest upon my arrival. The weather has been quite cold and I did not particularly come prepared as it relates to winter gear. Fortunately my sponsor, Descente, is based in Boulder and they provided me with plenty of gear once I got here to keep me warm in the windy canyons. Frankly, they saved my ass because I haven't missed a step of training despite to less-than-optimal conditions. Its nice to have sponsors that step it up to make sure their athletes can keep it rolling no matter what.

And their gear is great. Check them out at the link to the right ----->>>>>>

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My buddy Blake Becker, www.blakebecker.com has been keeping an upated training blog on his site and its all been about his preparations for Ironman Arizona this Sunday.

Good Luck B. We'll be pulling for you out here.

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Blake has been thorough about updating his blog with daily training for IMAZ and I will do the same as I prepare for Ironman CdA this June. Numerous updates per week should be the norm as opposed to one here and there.

Hope you're warm wherever you are. I need to get the day rolling,

jd

Lonestar Tri Report

Here is a copy of the report I sent out today:

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Family, Friends, Sponsors:

I want to start off by thanking the folks at Tri On the Run, in Houston, for being so patient and helpful this week as we worked on my bike. If anyone out there wants an accomodating shop with a friendly staff; that's your place.

I competed in the Lonestar Triathlon yesterday in Galveston, Texas. All of the participants had to have been fairly concerned about the possibility of a cancelled race given the wicked thunderstorms/flooding on Saturday before the race. The Sprint race managed to go through on Saturday morning and its amazing that they managed to find a window of oppurtunity in there.
The gun went off at 7:30 a.m. Saturday and my 2007 triathlon season had begun. The start was not overly aggressive, but I lost contact with the main pack by the first turnbuoy and cruised solo to the finish, coming out of the water in 7th position and about three minutes down on Todd Gerlach (no surprise there).

I headed out onto the bike course and I quickly found a rhythm pacing with Adam Wilk of Dallas. We made up some really good ground on the field on the first half of the out-and-back, but he put about 30 seconds into me with the tailwind back into town. I wanted to get contact with him as soon as we started the second loop again, but just as the second loop began I had a blowout on my rear tire.

I had been dealing with bike problems all week (because of the installation of my new ergomo) and when I heard my tire go flat I literally said something along the lines of "of course." I hopped off and went to work on it. My change took a little longer than I might have hoped, but I got it done as quickly as I could.

I was back out onto the course and the headwind had grown from the first loop. It was probably hovering right under 20 mph so it was a real grind to the turnaround. Nevertheless, I felt pretty good and I tried to get it together to prepare for the run.

I hit the two loop run course and my quads were on the verge of cramping which is not a typical issue for me. I think I was a bit behind on hydration, but it probably was a result of the body reacting to the first continuously hard effort of the season.

My goal was to try and float the first loop of the run and go from there. I moved into third halfway through the first loop, but Gerlach and Ronco (from Co Spring) were easily ten minutes ahead so my race was more about my own time and effort at this point. I had a little fade in the middle of the second loop, but I came back around and finished well in 4:16 behind Ronco and Gerlach who finished in 4:07 and 4:08 respectively.

Aside from the mechanical setback I was pretty pleased with the day. It was a nice way to get back into things after five months without any triathlon races. I feel great about this upcoming season and I am really excited to get things rolling in Boulder in April.

Many thanks are in order for my friends and famliy who made the trip down to Galveston to watch the race. Additionally, I want to thank my coach, Joe Friel, and my sponsors: EAS, www.trainingbible.com, Descente, Javelin, and Fuelbelt.

-Justin

Aggies lose, training, colorado

Well the Aggies 'fell short' last week against Memphis. Aggie fans (or those who picked them to win in their bracket) should not be bummed out, nor should they be kicking themselves over that loss. I read some article from a link on texags.com about the game and the journalist really nailed it when he pointed out the athletic upperhand that Memphis had. Both teams fought hard, but that slight advantage of quickness kept costing us. In fact, I was surprised to see it come to down to the final few seconds because it seemed like Memphis could make a run at any point. The home crowd was our advantage.

So the season ended 'early' and trips to Atlanta have been cancelled. I often tell some of my triathlon peers to 'never been disappointed with improvement.' Falling short of your dreams should not cloud the goals that an athlete or a team has achieved. You have to set your sights high, but there is only so much you can actually achieve. Obviously a team wants to win every game, but only B Knight has done that. He pointed this out in an interview I saw with him and said (abouting winnine every game); "by those standards I've failed every year, but one." (For the record, I think that his undefeated IU team is one of the most impressive performances in sports history).

Aside from winning every single game the ultimate goal is to win the national championship, but when you come from 0-16 in Big 12 play its going to take time. Gillespie reminds me of what I often hear about Brett Sutton (triathlon coach): "Lots of coaches can make a good athlete great, but Sutto makes average athletes great."

That's Gillespie. Law is a good athlete turned great. But TAMU was a piss poor program one year and a favorite for many in the Sweet 16 3 years later. Please hang around Coach G. You don't owe TAMU anything so I hope the university commits itself to keeping you.

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I finished up a three week cycle of training yesterday and I will be resting up for this weekend's race; the Lonestar HIM in Galveston, Texas. This will be a good chance to get a glimpse of my early season fitness before I head off to Boulder for another summer. This year is much different from the past as I put training in 'moderate mode' throughout January and February (and all that after a light December and hardly anything in November). It feels great to have held back for that long. I feel as though I have another gear to go to as the training in Boulder begins in April. However, I still think I can get a decent result this weekend with what I have done.

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U of H hosted a Sectional Masters Swimming competition (hope I got that right) this weekend and some friends of mine from the Worth of Fort came into town to race.

Swimming became an obvious topic of discussion and I always love to hear the war stories of swimmer kids. This time I was fairly impressed when Nicole told me she swam 15 x 1500 Long course in a workout once. That's a good week's worth of volume for me. It just goes to show how marginal the gains are at the top and what athletes do to try to gain an edge.

So is it necessary to do a workout like this? Probably not as it relates to physiological gains, but the psychological gains can be tremendous. Coaches have to take their athletes' heads into account when designing a training program. Author/Coach Cecil Cowen talks about one coach is his book, Breakthrough Swimming, who prescribed weightlifitng for his sprint swimmers. He wanted his athletes to look in the mirror and see strong arms; strong arms that could outspint anyone. He cared little about what the weight training did for their actual times.

I knew another athlete, an All-State Offensive lineman in high school (Stephenville), that told me he worked his biceps and triceps every day when played. He knew that this sort of training had little functional use, but he said he did it for intimidation. "I wanted the defense to see the most powerful arms in the state. And those arms were guarding our Qback."

You have to love that.

jd

Port Aransas, Spring Break, and March Madness

For those who aren't in the know... ...my parents are professors at Western State College (www.western.edu) in Gunnison, Colorado. They decided to take their spring break on Mustang island in Port Aransas, Texas this past week. Port Aransas is a small fishing/beach/tourist town about halfway down the gulf coast between Houston and Harlingen/Brownsville/So Padre Island. My family has been coming here since the 1970s (before me obviously) and they still have their original condo from then (minus the uber awesome 1970s furnishings). I decided to come down and join my parents for the week since my training plan was lower in volume (but higher in structure). There isn't a lot of variety for training on the island, but it does have a nice outdoor 25-Meter pool, a beach to run on (packed, not loose sand), a decent track, and one main hwy with a massive shoulder that runs the length of the island for cycling.

However, I did have to be a bit cautious with the Spring Break crowd so I had all my cycling done by 10 or 11 in the morning. I thought I might be hard to see from those monster trucks running around the island. If you ever want to be thoroughly entertained I suggest you head down here for spring break some time and park on the beach. The beach is like one main drag with people cruising up and down all day long (for 5-6 miles). Its something worth seeing once, if not more.

A bunch of my non-tri buddies came down for the weekend from Houston so I spent all day and evening with them yesterday. We spent time on the beach, in the bar, and at the house watching the NCAA tourney. The Aggies actually made it to the Sweet 16. I cannot believe it.

TAMU is to basketball what Rutgers was to football this season. The past four seasons have progressed as such: ZERO wins in the big 12; to 8-8 in Big 12 and bubble team that did not make tourney; to making the tourney, upsetting Syracuse and losing to eventual Final Four finalist, LSU, by 2 points; to making the Sweet 16 and perhaps more. Amazing. They could not pay people to go the games when I went to school (all of three-plus years ago) and now tickets are a pain in the ass to get.

One of the biggest, and well-supported, universities in the nation should have nationally recognized athletic teams in every discipline most years. I'm glad to see that seems to be taking shape. We need work with our XC team (not sure as many folks care like I do), but I imagine that might come in time as well. We just need one kick ass runner and everything could change. I don't think Whetmore is too worried about it though.

Anyways, I'm heading back to Houston shortly so that I can catch the UNV/Memphis game (winner places us in SA next weekend).

Take it easy,

jd

Ladies and Gentleman; Conway Twitty

I finally got a solid week of training behind me in 2007.

As 2006 ended I sat around and debated what I wanted to do in 2007. I was pretty unsatisfied with IMFL, but I wanted to avoid going into a 'redemption cycle.' In other words, I didn't want to compromise my recovery in the offseason, or my preparation early in the next season, to offset my disappointment from the previous season (I think I said that right).

Nevertheless, I found myself getting fired up in December as I recharged my batteries in the mountains surrounding Crested Butte. I was all set to race IMAZ, but as January neared I knew my_mind_was not ready for intensive focus. I still needed more time.

As a result, I decided to work during the months of January and February and put my training in a more moderate role. This was fine and dandy, but as February came around I was having a really hard time dealing with the lower levels of training. Its always a good sign to see motivation rise.

While this was hard, I still had another goal of trying to postpone my harder/longer training weeks in hopes of finding the right form with my new A race of Ironman CdA in June. I came onto good form in April/May last year as a result of having two excellent training partners in Florida throughout the spring. However, it was probably all coming together a little quickly as my A race was in late June.

Soooooooooooo, now its March and the heavier training has begun. My training blocks have a frontend loaded component to them which is followed by more intensive training prior to a short recovery block. A four week cycle might look something like this:

7 days of high volume, lots of steady state intensity and some tempo work
3 days of skills, lower volume; high cadence work, strides, normal swimming
11 days of moderate volume with higher intensity; mostly HIM pacing and/or threshold work
4 days of recovery, test day, easy day, test day

Test days can be long; usually AeT steady state rides and runs at this time of year. I might have a main set of a long ride with 2-4 hours of 150-155 HR. Hard, but appropriate. I also might place a race at the end of one of these blocks.

Anyways, this past week was the first overload week and I was very pleased with the results. My volume bumped up to 30 hours (can be 40 at its highest) and I had not even put in a 20 training week since this season began. Not only did I get in some good volume, but I also managed to handle a great amount of quality. This week's key workouts included 2 rides with 2.5 hours (in each) of continuous steady state riding (150-155 HR) and a 105 mile ride on Sunday with a wide range of intensities. I also got on my bike every day this week. My run volume was moderate, but it included a Vo2 workout, a 21k steady state run, a 10K race, and two short T runs. Swimming had a couple decent main sets, but it was generally a frequency week. I always think that something has to give a bit during a big week of training and this time it was swim intensity, but not swim volume or frequency.

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Last weekend I participated in the Tom Rodger's Texas Tri Camp (www.texastricamp and www.endurathon.com) and it was a great success. We had a great group of triathletes attend the camp and they were all highly motivated to learn how to improve. I know I made some great contacts and I will be looking forward to seeing all of them crush their respective races this season.

John Cobb, Coach Joe (Friel), Tom and I also had some brief discussions about some potential winter camps involving the wind tunnel at TAMU. TAMU's wind tunnel is more affordable than most, but availablity is always an issue so let's keep our fingers crossed that we can make it happen. I will keep you posted as everything develops.

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I will have some updates added to the website in this coming week, inlcuded a FAQs section to address some of the questions that I frequently get asked about triathlon, training, and myself.

It will also include a race schedule, but here it is for those who are biting their nails in anticipation...

April 1 Lonestar Triathlon; Galveston, TEXAS

May 6 Tri One O One; Brandeton, Florida

June 25 Ironman CdA; CdA, Idaho

July 22 EAS Boulder Peak; Boulder, Colorado (maybe depending on recovery from the IM)

August 12 EAS 5430 Triathlon; Boulder, Colorado

August 18 EAS Pikes Peak Ascent; Colorado Springs, Colorado

October 13 Ironman World Championship; Kona, Hawaii

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Have a great Monday,

JD

what up

Man, being sick is pretty lame. I spent the last weekend horizontal after some sort of illness kept from doing little more than sleep. Oddly enough, I still got in a 10k race on Saturday morning. I woke up feeling like absolute s**t, but I was hoping it was just a fluke. The race didn't begin until 10:00 in the morning so I was hoping I would come around in the hours leading up to the start. I didn't, but I went down there anyways. I decided I would warm up and if I felt alright, I'd roll. Again, I didn't, but I started anyways. Within one mile my heart rate went into the 190s and I realized I was in for a loooooooooooong 6.2 miles. That was honestly the highest level of discomfort I'd ever had to deal with in a race. Seriously. HARDEST RACE EVER. It was also the slowest 10k I have ever run (standalone).

I'm one of the more conservative individuals when it comes to balancing health and fitness. IOW, I often back out of situations and/or workouts if things don't feel right. I guess I was overly anxious to know whether I could tolerate the discomfort of racing after four months of none of it. Well, I guess I can, but I still should have been sleeping in my bed on Saturday morning instead of running that race like a yahoo.

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You guys need to check out Blakes's blog on www.blakebecker.com if you aren't already. He's got a really detailed outline of his Ironman Arizona training in there. I know we all like to get a little geeked out from time to time with that sort of stuff so that can be a great fix us all. He's really laying it down in the Land of the Mont.

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Speaking of blogs; my coach, Joe Friel, has a blog up and runnng at http://www2.trainingbible.com/joesblog/blog.html

He talks about some plyometrics I did during the month of February. Essentially it involves box jumps and 20 sec hill sprints on a treadmill. I didn't have a good setup in any local gym so I did my workouts in Herman Park in Houston. I found a big cement block to jump on and a hill outside Miller Outodor theatre to run up.

Totally Rocky stuff. I often did the box jumps with bums drinking malt liquor around me. They usually tried to send words of encouragement, but outsiders might have been confused and thought they were yelling at me.

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I'll be participating in Tom Rodgers' Texas Tri Camp (www.texastricamp.com) this weekend in Keller, Texas. Joe Friel and John Cobb will be there and we really have things running smoothly after three successful camps behind us. This is a great time to get one-on-one time with those dudes and there is typically enough downtime to get a lo of your questions asked from guys who know their stuff.

There are currently 4-5 spots still open and, interestingly enough, we tend to have people sign up the week of the event. If that's you, then bring it on; we'd love to have you. Its probably best to contact me or Tom directly. If you tell him you got your info from my blog he'll hook you up with a little discount and you'll get lots of jokes from me for no extra cost.

Keep it realz,

jd

Happy Ash Wednesday.

The sun came out in Houston. In fact, I would venture to say that last Sunday was likely one of the best days I have seen in all my life in this corner of the world. 60, sunny, no wind. Love it. Today it reached 80 degrees so who knows what the remaining time will be like here in Htown.

I’ve squared away my next living arrangements in Boulder from April-September. I’m not sure as to whether or not I will stay longer, but this is the longest planned stay I have had in one location in quite some time. I might stay in Boulder permanently, but we’ll have to see how financially viable that is for me once things get rolling.

Training has gotten rolling as well. Over the last couple weeks I managed 20 hours/week and even threw a birthday in the mix (26). One of the better bdays I can remember; for sure. My hometown buddies stepped it up and I think we all achieved rock star status for a night. I did train quite a bit on my actual birthday, but I assure you that I did_very_little (read:nothing) the day after.

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This Season:

I had a deep break this year from the previous one. I hardly rode my bike for two months and then I spent about six weeks with only 12-15 hours/week of training. I just kept moving at a reasonable pace until I started to feel that fire to fight. It took some time, but as February nears it end I feel physically and mentally sharp; and all before the heaviest and hardest training has even gotten rolling. I don’t think my choice to lay down solid training in Jan and Feb of years’ past was a mistake, but doing so this year might have been.

Tentatively it looks as though my season will include:

Lonestar Tri HIM April in Galveston

Tri 101 in Brandenton, Florida on May 6

Ironman CdA on June26

Boulder Peak (maybe)

5430 HIM Aug 12

KONA

Not much of a race schedule, but it’s a start. Off to massage,

jd

Training styles

Yesterday I was out for a 90-mile ride ‘Bjorn-Style’: strong, steady, long rides with no HRM, PM, etc. He might not do so anymore, but I still credit these types of rides as such.

As I was riding yesterday I noted the fact that I was ‘Bjorning’ the ride and I started to think about the other names that have been incorporated into training/workouts.

I really don’t have that many. Whenever I do “Cam Brown training” it means I attack the day’s training so that its completed by 2-3 in the afternoon. However, you have to get in at least six hours of training so you have to get rolling early.

I figure I can probably think of some others.

“Lessing training” would involve sessions where everyone is absolutely pinned. Just staying with the group would be solid workout execution.

“Mike Larsen training” would involve me calling my not-as-fit friends out for a ride and then promptly drilling them (sorry buddy. I look forward to the day I can return the pulls).

“JD training” would only be training during traditional business hours; 8 or 9 to 5. You also have to drink coffee that is at least twice as strong as everyone else’s and get very, very quiet when tired.

“Chris McDonald training” would be somewhat similar to JD training (minus uber coffee) except his days start earlier. IOW, one must train no later than 5 in the evening, but 5:00 a.m. swim sessions are ok. If you do this you must also be the most chipper of the group and never complain.

“Marilyn training” is similar to CMac and JD training. Take the coffee from JD and the hours from CMac. Fatigue includes a need for cold rooms.

“Armando training” incorporates goals of looking good as well as getting fit. Absolutely no mismatching gear.

“Marc Bonnet-Eymard training” is hard.

“Molina training” incorporates six-hour recovery days.

“Partain training” involves mandatory late nights before early morning sessions and lots and lots of fuel belts.

“BB training” includes ridiculous indoor training hours. If someone else has put in_consecutive_40+ hour training weeks indoors they can claim lead name. Oh yeah; You also have to work 20+ hours_on_your_feet and sleep NO more than five hours a night during these weeks.

I’ll think of some more. Anyone would reads this and can think of more send them to me and I’ll post them.

jd