I mentioned in my last post that I needed some time off of work, so the Christmas break couldn't come fast enough, and with a couple of weekends in the break it meant a nice load of time away from work. I had the 'out-of-hours' phone, but received only the one call. Sweet!
As usual, I approached the holiday with many thoughts of grabbing a load of training time. I knew we had a typically hectic Christmas Day, Boxing day and a day or two after that with plans, all of which were fantastic and appreciated (completely forgot about work quickly and the stress just fell away), but training for the rest of the time was not er......... focussed! Never mind. I did get in a few nice long bike rides in the freezing cold (bottled one 28 miles in as the road ice was just not worth the risk).
I had the onset of that old running injury, so I stayed off the runs for a week or so, but did manage my first Park Run 5K a couple of weeks ago. Times were measured differently wherever I read - I timed 20:54, official time was 21:00. Guess which one I'll be sticking with? I'm pretty happy with that since I don't like speed work too much and never concentrate on speed when I do my lonely runs, and towards the end I was ultra conscious of my chest / heart rate. Also, my PB is 20:48 from exactly one year ago.
I'm undecided as to how many of these runs I'll do during the next few months. I guess that I'll just play it by ear. A lot will depend on the plans for any given weekend!
The cycling remains good. Trying not to look at times or speed. As I mentioned, on the open road it has been a little risky with last years tyres only just replaced, a lot of frost and ice around, some howling winds recently and my lack of desire to risk it. Having said that, one Sunday I reverted to the Rollers in the shed while watching the Isle of Man TT movie 'Closer to the Edge'. So, dynamic cycling on rollers while watching on-board footage of a race-bike hurtling through villages at +180 mph is ..... fun! Concentration was needed right there!
I've had a couple of great MTB rides. One long 40miler that completely blew my up! Had real period of disillusionment after that 'cos the old chest was really struggling. Must remember to 1) take it easy, 2) remember that I'm building from the rest period STILL, 3) lots of time still, 4) don't be embarrassed to be slower than those you are training with 5), MTFU!
Rode Bedgebury last week with MrH. Why-O-why do I ALWAYS drive back home from there thinking 'I must do that more often'? Despite all the recent rain it wasn't disastrously muddy. Sure, a little sloppy .... you should have seen the Missus's face when she saw the plastered clothes - I don't know why, I ALWAYS come back at least three times muddier than anyone else. I do admit, the clothes remained 'soaking' in a water bucket for a couple of days before I plucked up the courage to tackle them. Bike got cleaned straight away though :)
Note to self - DO MORE OF THAT!
The old (NEW) turbo trainer has been a bit hit and miss - mainly due to the lack of focus, but also 'cos I've had a couple of hardware (PC) issues with the web-site training software. I needed to change the PC that I used in early Dec, but the old(ish) desk-top that I wanted to use just wouldn't acknowledge the ANT+ dongle that worked perfectly well on the loptop. At least the company offering the software were both local (South of the UK and in to Time Trialling) and really willing to try and sort it. The result was that it was almost 100% certain that it was my PC that was the issue, so a change of PC for a spare Loptop that I fortunately have at home (not my work one!!) and I'm back up and running ..... just in time for a business trip abroad so I can't use it for about 10 days now. Bugger!
Swimming is going well considering the low volume I'm doing. Happy to be doing CORE, low level strength work and technique work in the pool with short interval repeats, so Job is a good'un as they say.
The hotel that I'm in for the next week has a pool, so I'll use this to kick-start I think (hope!)
I'm lov'in the feedback I get from this blog - especially from over-seas, seeing how others cope / focus / enjoy.
Will try to remember to take some more images of training to help anyone interested see what I'm up to and the type of environment I train in.
Happy Days.
W.
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