EMERGENCY RACE REPORT (Race report 6) and race week!

As per last post, I had a last minute race race. A local 5k in Sault Michigan. I may have mentioned eariler that I was coming to the end of my last big training block. My legs were nice and tired but I had enough juice to race. I didn't think a PB necessarily, but I knew I would have a good workout.

The course was more or less flat, though officially "downhill" for the first 1.5 miles, slightly uphill and on dirt road then flat for the last 800 meters. Pretty much one of the faster courses you could expect to find for a 5k road race. Looking around at the field prior I decided I would take it out at about 16:20 pace to potentially get into the lead, then get into a comfortable (as comfortable as a 5k race will allow) pace, then just go for it for the last mile or whatever. I took it out fairly hard as I had hoped, and found I was being chased. There were a good number of bends around this forested, nice neighbourhood course so I tried to lose him around each bend, but every straight stretch I would see him behind me again. It started to feel like that Twilight Zone episode with the hitch-hiker, I would get comfortable and feel like I'm alone and then he would be there. Never the less, I held out to the end, crossed the line in 1st. The best part? PB. 16:16. Splits are as follows.

3:08 - 3:13 - 3:20 - 3:25 - 3:23

I blame the 3rd and 4th km on the dirt road, though I'm not upset. Not upset at all.

ADDITIONALLY:

The race proceeds went to charity! How dare I forget to mention that!
http://www.girlsontherun.org/
Sounds like a good one, I'm happy to have my race fee go towards that.

Also! I won a rock. It's about the size of my fist and has a bit of a gloss to it. They put a sticker on it. I won a rock.

In other news, it's big race week 1! Yahoo! This has been my easiest week since iunno, January, but by no means has it been easy. As anyone can attest to, cutting back... and the way you feel before you really recover... not so great. But I'm finally feeling like I'm getting all rested and recovered. Yesterday I went out for another frigid swim, open water. I managed 10 minutes this time, but exited with hurting hands and feet, and a wicked ear ache. Today I had my last solid race prep workout - 30 minutes riding at goal power (~270W) into 10 minutes of goal race pace running (3:36/km). This was done indoor due to the rain in the Sault. People seem to think that indoor riding is more difficult and I hear things like it takes away around 5% of your power. I don't believe this, it makes no physical sense. I think its all mental (possibly another post), so I just ride the watts I want to ride. It was tough, but it was enough to keep sharp I think. Tomorrow I'm going to do a bit of quality swimming, Saturday I head out to Huntsville with my dad, and Sunday I race! Sweet! I have to admit though, I'm getting nervous. This is my first olympic distance race and second TT-style 40k. I'm feeling very confident with my run, I know I'll do my best in the water... But I'm nervous I'll explode on the bike or something. Anyway, I'll do my best and see what happens!

Adam "A rock!" Fortais

Emergency race!

A friend brought to my attention a 5km race happening tonight in Sault Michigan. I'm at the tail end of my last build week and feeling pretty tired, but I needed to get one more quality run in. What a good opportunity! Don't expect any PBs... but let's do this!

http://www.summersolstice5k.org/index.html

Adam "Race!" Fortais

Multimedia explosion!

On Sunday I tried getting out into the water for a little open water swimming and wetsuit practice. I lasted about 10 minutes. I don't know much about water and stuff, but I've deemed 45 degrees (F) unpleasant and to be avoided if possible.

On Monday I decided it was high time to try my hand at the ole' 40km TT. It was windy with a fair number of short, steep hills littered throughout the course (182m of elevation gain), but managed to hold 278W (-7 from my calculated ftp) and come in at 63:00. I've looked at other people's race reports online for 40km TTs and they seem to go much faster than me at lower wattages. I have bad wheels, but a fairly decent bike, and I believe a pretty good aero position. What gives?! Don't get me wrong, I'm satisfied with my result and it's in the ballpark of what I expected, but is there some sort of free speed to be had somewhere? I want it. I am currently looking into a disc wheel cover. Perhaps that will help.

I've dumped a couple pictures from the TAG TT below, as well as some video evidence of my swimming misadventure. Enjoy!

Adam "instagram" Fortais

(Arguably) The hardest week

As this is essentially the final chance for a build week before I throw myself into A-race season, I'm trying to make the most of it. I abridged my recovery week from my last build period to three days, and threw myself into some hard training and a race prior to this week. Since, I've been up to:

Monday
BIKE - 100min - 2x20min ftp w/ 10 min recovery, long cool down
SWIM - 60min - 50-100-150-200-250-250-200-150-100-50 on 50sec/50 (in on 45sec/50)

The biking was miserable, I had to wear winter clothes and not to mention very tough after my 10k the day before, but I pushed through and hit my power numbers. I felt sluggish and crappy during my swim warm up, but found once I started the real workout I was hitting my paces. It was a good tough workout, but I got through it!

Tuesday
BRICK - 60min - 5km bike - 2.7km run - 5km bike - 1km run - 5km bike - 1km run, all as fast as was reasonable, practicing transitions

I saw a post on slowtwitch, someone was asking the relevance or usefulness of multiple short brick intervals. My opinion is that they are useful to some extent for fitness, but much more so for working on T2 skills. So that's what I did. I didn't look at my power on the bike, but it ended up being around 270W or so... but the runs were about 3:20/km then 3:05 and 3:05. It was pretty tough, especially on tired legs but I got some quality running in and transition practice which were the goals of the workout. I managed to treat myself to a massage afterwards!

Wednesday
SWIM - 50min - 300 tempo (in <4:30 -="" 1min="" 2x50="" 300="" 3x50="" 4x50="" 5:15="" in="" on="" p="" paddles="" pull="" tempo="">
Another swim workout I was happy with. I needed a rest from the run-bike stuff and this was good.

Thursday
BIKE - 3 hours, 10 min - Long, hard Sault Cycling Club ride

Pulls in the range of 300-400 Watts with a hill sprint half way through... then I finished out the night getting the distance up to 100km because that's a nice round number! My legs were completely toasted. I woke up in the middle of the night because my legs were so sore. I got some water and went back to sleep.

Friday
RUN - 45min - 4.5km @3:32/km - 1min rest - 2.7km @3:32/km - 30 seconds - 1km in 3:27

I was very tired today and not highly motivated... but I guess I must have been because I got out and I did it, and I did it well. Recovery tonight? The movie Identity Theft. Terrible. So bad. Possibly the worst movie ever made. I can't believe how bad.

The rest of the week? I am going to try and get into the open water. I need to try out this wetsuit! I've been hunting for good places. I'm going to do another easier ride on Sunday I think, and a bit of easier running tomorrow. I need a bit of a recovery.

Good talk.

Really though. Identity Theft is so bad it's making me feel physically ill.

Adam "Movie review blog" Fortais

Run the Great Lakes 10k Road Race, or, NEW RECORD! (Race Report 5)

Am I the only person who runs in their running glasses even if it's overcast? I don't know if it's just habit, or a comfort thing from working in labs that required all-day goggle wear, or if I'm really worried an errant sun ray will pierce the clouds and blind me... but I'm over being worried about looking like a dummy. I'm wearing them.

This morning was particularly overcast and I noticed some rain earlier on while I ate breakfast. Do you wanna know what I had for breakfast? No, didn't think so. It was kind of cold too, 10C, but moved up to probably around 13C by gun-time. I went for the business-time look today, settling on purple shorts, white-and-orange singlet, black arm warmers, red shoes, and obnoxious running glasses. I had to make sure everyone knew I was there to race... or possibly entertain children with balloon animals. Sorry, I don't think there are any pictures of this. Shame shame...

So there I was, on the start line. No wait, rewind. I warmed up with buddy Scott whom I believe I will be training with in the near future. We did about 5k of easy running with some longer race-pace efforts. Nice. I felt a little light and wiggly.. whatever that means... but knew this would later be replaced with heavy and stiff. All right, so we get to the start line, ready to roll. Wait, one more thing. During the warm up I strapped myself up with the ole' HR monitor and flicked my GPS watch on and surprise! It didn't charge overnight. Also, it was completely dead. I don't have a backup or any other kind of watch for that matter. For the significance of this detail, please refer to the previous post where I in detail explain my race plan and pacing strategy. Needless to say, all that was out the window. Bro, we're running by feel today.

More specifically, we're running the other people's race. I could do nothing else but let them set the pace and try to out speed them in the final kms (unless they were running too slow at the beginning (which they weren't (just wait, I'm getting to that.)))

So we're at the start line. I find a guy who looks pretty darn fast and follow him into line. He lines up near the front. I analysed the finish times from the last year or so and expected to be near the front of the 5k race going into my second 5k, so I didn't let nobody push me off the front of the line! That, or no one wanted to go near me. Anyway, gun goes off, a 5k-er literally sprints off the line. 5 of us take a more conservative approach and start running. I realize I'm in a group of 2 other 10k runners, a 5k runner and being led by a 5 and trailed by a 10. We all run fairly well together for the first 2km. I'm sitting on heels, feigning leads here and there. This is weird, how fast do I think that first 2k was? It feels pretty good. Just shy of the first 2.5k turn around the only other guy with arm warmers makes a surge of a hill... though not a convincing one. I don't really make any effort to increase the pace to match. He falls back into line. Still lead by a 5er and trailed by a OH CRAP. The guy who was behind blasts by my group of three to catch the leader. I've never seen someone make an acceleration like that, but all of a sudden he seems like he's a contender. Coming around 4k, other-arm-warmers guy has fallen back (highlander rules, there can only be one) but otherwise no change in positions. The 5er I was with made a small surge to finish off his race, but was too far back to catch the other guy. Coming around the corner past the finish line timer I predicted a slightly faster than anticipated 17:20 or something. Nope. 16:50. What the... Still about 15 seconds down from the leader, and running strong with an old ex-teammate... who I had a sneaking suspicion had gone out too fast and was on the verge of crashing. With 5k to go I decided I would just sit at this pace because if he does crash, great, but if he doesn't, we've got to work together to catch the leader. However, at about 6k the route got twisty and he crashed. By twisty I mean actual right-angle corners along a bike trail. Wide open field/parking lot between corners though so I could see the gap between me and the leader. Actually, I could see the gap falling. And falling. And falling... Until we slogged uphill about 400m to the final turn around at 7.5km. I caught him at the turn. The goal was to hold on to his heels until about 1k to... woah, where's he going? He must have seen me at the turn and decided he did not want this to come down to a sprint because the pace was lifted. He got a gap again... but not by much. Maybe 5 seconds. I knew I had to close it, but I didn't have much in the tank and I could feel myself slowing... By 1km to go he had put a comfortable lead on me and I knew I was in that no man's land of 2nd place. I barely made it through the last km, but to my surprise as I turned the corner into the finishing shoot, the clock was reading 34:40... 41...42... I had very little left but I tried my hardest to keep it under 45. No dice, but close. I think 46. I found out (after some speculation) that the winner was one of the great local runners, Nathan, who typically hangs out around the 20-40k distances. We both went well under the previous winning time. I found him afterwards and tried to thank him through giddy and tired gasps for dragging me along for a PB. I don't know how much of that he understood, but we shook hands anyway.

So, how would things have been different were I running my own race? Iunno. I probably wouldn't have run 16:50 for the first 5k. But I also may not have pushed myself as hard. Being forced to stay with the group, regardless of their idiotic pacing (sorry guys... but I had a 55+ second positive split. everyone but Nathan was worse) probably forced me to dig a bit deeper? I don't know. I probably have a better PB in me somewhere, but I'm extremely hesitant to say I could have had the win. I am extremely happy with my performance, glad I had a chance to run by feel, grateful for the competitors who helped drag me to a PB... and uhhh.... thanks for putting on the race, race people!

I got a nifty long sleeve shirt for winning my age group.

There was a bit of a wind but it wasn't a big deal. headwind for 2.5, tail for 5, head for 2.5. I guess it was fairly unpleasant in the last 2.5k but what final 2.5k isn't unpleasant?

Adam "Maybe if I write a race report before the results are up I'll get more hits..." Fortais

Summer Races, Explained

I guess there isn't a whole lot to explain, my A races are the Muskoka 5150 in three weeks, followed by the Toronto Triathlon Festival three(?) weeks after that. They're coming up!

Why these races? Well... I don't have the ability to travel around and race tonnes every summer, for better or for worse. I decided I didn't want to piddle around with low attendance races. I worked really hard this year and want to see what I'm really made of! So I picked two Ontario races that I thought would be the most competitive. Also, they're AG World Qualifiers. Don't get me wrong, this fact isn't the biggest thing... But I mean come on! That's really cool! And by virtue of World's being in Edmonton next year, this is as good a year to try and qualify as any - I may even be able to go. Never the less, they're both Olympic distance because I also figured, I might as well "do it right". Not to belittle the sprint distance, I just think the Olympic distance will be the most competitive.

I'm running a 10k tomorrow as a sort of final run-prep thing. After this point I'll pretty much be finished with single sport stuff. Bricks will abound. That's what really matters.

This really only brings me to August. I am debating a bike bike block, I'm debating a big run block. I want to run the Halloween 10k again this year, so it might make sense to move into a solid run season, reduce the other sports a little, you know. But depending on my race performances, it may become evident that cycling has become a limiter... It's well established by now that I will be doing a lot of pool work over the winter, but I will have some good weather to use up. Maybe I'll continue with some solid bike work, but move into a base-building run phase, reduce the speed work and just try and hit a new volume-high. Actually, yes. I like that. I think I'll do just that. Thanks guys.

Uhhm, so as far as race specific work goes, I will have two weeks starting Monday to get in some last minute quality, then I will take the week of the race easy to recover. I'll take a day or two (max) off after the race and use the 7 days directly after as a sort of crash week. Then I have two taper weeks and it's back to race week! A little break from training, perhaps a week, and I'm back to training. I might do a local race in August (St Joseph Island Triathlon) because it's the best. I might do a half marathon in September to say I did it. I dunno. Stay tuned I guess.

Adam "Race season!" Fortais