Seasonal Greetings

I’d just like to wish every one a Merry Christmas, Happy New year and Generaly a wonderful Festive Period

WW

Swimming Lesson

Although I am not a bad swimmer, I thought I’d take the opportunity (while I’m suffering a foot injury and can’t run much) to improve my swimming. So along to the local City pool I went and booked an improvers swimming lesson, I only booked one to see how it went with the view that I would book a few more after that.

I consider myself a reasonable swimmer for someone that has never been properly taught to swim (apart from a weekend TI workshop) and has never been a member of a club … but I am not very fast (400m – 7:03)

But on analysis from the instructor he informed me that I had good body position in the water and a good technique so there was nothing about my swim that needs rebuilding …. The only thing that I need to watch out for is when I increase my speed I have a tendency to shorten my otherwise long stroke by exiting the water to soon.

So I don’t need any swimming lessons … what the instructor is going to do though is have a word with a couple of the national squad caches to get a few structured sessions put together for me to help me work towards my goals



One thing though …. Its sometime as good to be told what you are doing right,as well as what you are doing wrong

:o)

Swim Golf for anyone?

To work out a SWIM GOLF score, after you warm up and as part of your interval set do a set of 50’s to get your golf score (5x50m : RI 30secs) aim to swim each interval consistently

To get your golf score take the time taken to swim the 50 (FC) and add it to the number of the strokes it took you to do the 50 – a stroke being each time your hand enters the water

Your score is your most consistent score for the session (not your fastest)

As you improve efficiency / speed your score will come down so it a good measurement to



In last nights swim session my score improved dramatically from the last time I carried out the test from 81 to 75 .. so very happy

Engaged

Well, just a short post to tell everyone that I got engaged while on holiday

:o)

We’re all going on a …

Summer Holiday

Well not quite cos its November but I am off for 2 weeks in the sun, Corralejo in Fuerteventura.

Hoping to get some warm weather training in but m PF injury is going to limit the amount I can do … I still aim to try and get an easy run in each morning, but aiming to stick to the sand and limit the time to 60mins each plus I’ll hopeful get 2 sessions per day of swim drills and maybe hire a MTB for a couple of days

Don’t want to do too much … cos it is after all a holiday

:o)

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 264 DAYS AND COUNTING

Training Week 11 (or not)

Nowt – zip – nada – nothing

… and I’m not happy about it


BUT I am off on holiday on Tuesday night so should get things started again then

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 265 DAYS AND COUNTING

Down, Down, way on down

Injury has me so depressed … I’m not a happy bunny at all

I thought the PF injury was improving as my heal was not as sore when I got up on a morning BUT as I sit massaging my foot with a tennis ball it is evident that the injury is still as bad as my arch is very sore.

I’m off on holiday in a weeks time for some warm weather training that is supposed to start each day with an hours run … I am still hoping that I may manage an hour run/walk in the sand and will still get pool time to work on my drills etc and may even hire a bike for a few days

But this injury has me down … down means no motivation … no motivation means no training … and even if I did have the motivation, working on the house leaves no time for training


At a time I should been enjoying decent mileage … a am on the bench


And very down :o(

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 270 DAYS AND COUNTING

Training Week 10 (or lack of)

A massive low point for me, probably the lowest since starting this Blog. I got no training done this week down to Injury, Flu and having to decorate … all I got done was 1 Hour in the gym on Saturday

As I’m still only scratching the surface of the decorating I need to do and still need to rest the PF injury, so it looks like I’ll get next to no training in this next week either .

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 272 DAYS AND COUNTING

Training Week 9

A poor weeks training for me this week (less than 7hrs), a combination of injury and DECORATING.. and I‘m going to be spending most of the week decorating so its going to be even less this coming week.

The thing is being on my feet decorating is not giving my PF injury much of a chance to recovery

:o(

SUN	PM	00:40	RUN	Easy run with GF
MON	AM	01:06	BIKE	Gym bike followed by 5mins of stretching … legs felt sluggish (may be from Sundays long & hilly ride
MON	PM	01:01	OTHER	Warm up on the rower then circuit training finished of with 5-10mins of stretching
TUE	PM	01:10	RUN	Club run in the fog (about 8miles)
WED	__	__	__	REST
THU	PM	01:50	SWIM	Swimming with the Masters, I struggled this week and managed: - 1 x 1000 warm u 8 x 25 Build 4 x 50 Hard 8 x 25 Mixed Drills 7 x 200 Hard (flat out) 5 x 150 Pull & Paddles 1 x 200 Swim down
FRI	PM	00:53	OTHER	Warm up on the rower then circuit training finished of with 5mins of stretching
SAT	__	__	__	REST

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 279 DAYS AND COUNTING

Plantar Fascia :o(

Well it’s not just a bruised heel; a trip to the physio has revealed that I am most probably suffering from a Plantar Fascia injury so ... 2 weeks without running and regular massage of my heal with a tennis ball and a bottle of frozen water.

:o(

The treatment given for my heal by the physio was massage, acupuncture in the pad of my heal (OUCH!!!) and some manipulation

While at the physio’s I also had acupuncture for my neck/back ... a long standing injury that is the result of a car crash some years ago and some work done on my right knee, which I suffer from stiffness due to over hyperextension.

At least its only impact type training I need to avoid

IRONMAN GERMANY ... 282 DAYS AND COUNTING