30 weeks to go until race day, welcome or welcome back to my Ironman Canada training recap. If you missed last weeks recap, you can find that here. Overall, this week felt pretty good with regards to training. When I woke up on Friday, I was actually hoping to see a ride in my calendar, but instead it was a rest day. I definitely took it, instead of trying to convince my coach that I could do a low impact ride. It didn’t work the last time I asked her, so I didn’t bother trying. And I know it’s important to have rest days, and it ended up being really important because Saturday and Sunday were bigger sessions.
Swim
2 swim sessions, both Walton sessions. Feeling pretty good so far. No shoulder pain from re-incorporating using swim paddles. If you’ve never swam with swim paddle before, it’s the best. It builds strength, and lets you swim so fast. It’s a joy to be able to blow past people in the fast lane. I’m not a fast swimmer… YET. So swimming past people brings me great joy.
BIKE
2 sessions, a heavy intervals and a 2-hour long ride. Feeling pretty good here. Starting to hit some new resistance ranges on the bike, which is really encouraging. I look forward to all my bike sessions, and I hope I can say this in a few months still. It’s the most important part of the Ironman, and I want to be strong and be able to enjoy my day out there.
There was a 5 minute section on my 2 hour ride that did test my mental strength. It was the second 5 minutes hard at 60-65rpm, 3 minute easy section. Right before the 15 minute cool down, and more than an hour and a half of riding. I wanted to give in and turn down the resistance, but I was riding along to a Peloton class and the instructor said something along the lines of needing to push ourselves out of our comfort zones, because that’s when new neural pathways are created, and where growth happens. It message came at the perfect time. It reminded me to hustle and get the work done, and I was pretty happy to put out a consistent 200+ watts through that last 5 minute segment.
RUN
2 sessions, Fartleks and 90 minute long run. Inner thighs felt a little sore after the Fartleks session, but can’t complain. I’ve been diligent with doing my glute activations with resistance bands. The 90 minute run was a bit tougher than I expected. It was a hilly run, and I had to walk a couple of times. Not long, like 20 seconds or so, mostly to stop a side stitch from happening.
We’re doing a bunch of specific run workouts through the week (even in my long runs) which I used to do haphazardly back in 2017. It turned out well for me then. And even though it was all over the place, I managed a 2:02 half marathon. I’m very excited for what’s to come this year, because now I will have greater consistency to my overall training plan, and I should be able to run a sub 2 hour half marathon.
Reflections
Still feeling great this week, and reflecting on the month, feeling great about the month too as reflected in my Ironman Canada training recap. I love streaking challenges, where you do something like every day of the month kind of thing. So I jumped on the New Years bandwagon and started off with a bunch of 30 minute bike sessions to ease my way back into training. Then I finally messaged my coach to get started with triathlon training again, and I think we’ve made great progress so far easing me back into the swing of things. This week did have a jump in volume, which I didn’t really realize until my coach told me so. Overall, still feeling good and strong.
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