Doing More With Less Since 1972
Spotify launched a Play Button that let’s you embed a song right in a web page. I’ve tested, and it works like a champ.
Now the really cool part…
You can do this with playlists too, not just songs.
For example, here’s a 90’s-ish running/cycling playlist I’ve been building up. Previously I’d linked to it so people could subscribe on Spotify, but now I have it embedded right into the page, so people can listen right there on my web site.
Nice!
Right now I’m about 6 weeks out from Haines City 70.3, and almost everything is pointing to a much better performance than the last time I did this distance. I credit this to sticking to the training plan much more strictly and actually listening to people who get paid to spout information about endurance training. I’m not saying I haven’t missed workouts…I have. Two separate sinus infections hurt me pretty bad. But I haven’t missed a single long workout, and I’ve done a much better job prioritizing workouts. For instance, most of what I’ve missed have been swims. If I’m going to miss something, I want it to be a swim.
I’ve also been reviewing my logged workouts from my last 70.3 as I go, and I’ve noticed a few differences. First of all, I never trained on heart rate before…I just did the distances. Also, it looks like my training was much more sporadic than I remember. This hurt me pretty badly last time around. In fact, I distinctly remember treading water right before the gun went off hoping the race would be cancelled because of lightning and wondering if I could really pull off that distance. I ended up having a pretty good race and hitting my goals, but I had no confidence going in. This time around, I know covering the distance isn’t a problem, even if I had to do it tomorrow.
So I’m expecting a PR this time. I do have a couple of doubts, but I’ve done my best to rationalize them away.
1.2 Mile Swim
This is no problem. An afterthought. I did a 40 minute swim last time, and I expect to go no slower than that this time. There’s a good chance I’ll go faster, but if I do it will only be by a couple of minutes…no real difference. I’ve done enough 1500+ meter open water swims since 2006 that I won’t be intimidated looking at the course itself. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming.
T1
I’m not sure I’ll be any faster here, but I doubt I’ll be much slower. No wetsuit to remove like last time, so that should save me 3 or 4 seconds. I will have to apply some sunscreen, so it’s probably a wash.
56 Mile Bike
Here’s where I feel confident in gaining the most time. Last time around I trained at around 18 mph on hilly courses and raced at 19 mph on a hilly course. These days, I’m training at ~ 20 mph in windy conditions on flat courses and will be racing on a flat (hopefully less windy) course; being 50 miles inland should help with the winds a little, right? Also, looking at my logs from 2006, it’s safe to say I was reasonably rested every time I went out on my bike, which wasn’t often. This time I’m already tired before I even get on the bike. My weight will be about 18 pounds below what it was last time as well.
I’m hoping for 21.5 mph. I have some test data here to back up my projection. Two years ago I did an Olympic distance race where I trained at just below 20 mph and raced at 22 mph. And this was on the coast, so winds were a factor. My weight was about where it will be on race day in May, but conditions weren’t as hot as I expect they will be then. Heat will be the big X factor here. If all goes well, I hope to pick up ~20 minutes here.
T2
I can guarantee an improvement here. I don’t plan on actually sitting down and eating a sandwich this time. I’m going to go ahead and get back out on the course. I should pick up at least 2 minutes here.
13.1 Mile Run
I really have no idea what’s going to happen on the run, but I’m trying to convince myself it will go great. And this is where I have to trust the program. Last time around, my training paces were waaaaaaay faster–sub 9:00 miles. I expected to go under 2 hours, but I ended up running a 2:14. That tells me that, again, I was running rested during training and was not really prepared to run 13.1 tired. This time around I’m training on heart rate, much slower pace, but I’m hurting pretty bad at the end of my long runs. Last week I did 100 minutes (10.25 miles) and was really struggling at the end.
The difference is that, just like on the bike, I’m running tired all the time now. The paces I’m running at are much closer to my training paces for my first marathon. That’s encouraging, because I raced at a pace 45 seconds faster than I trained for that race. If I can even get 35 seconds faster per mile on race day, I’ll be at 9:10/mile, and that will bring me home at 2 hours.
I’m working on a strategy to handle all possible situations for this run. I’m breaking it down into two five milers and a 5k.
Starting off at 9:30 shouldn’t be a problem. If I don’t have 9:15 in me for the second 5 miles, it will take some pressure off because there’s no way I’d be able to accelerate to 8:30s for the final 5k. I can back it down to the 9;30 pace and still make it under 2:05. That’s still a 9 minute improvement. Not optimal, but not bad either.
If I can make it through the second 5 miles according to the plan, I’m pretty sure I will be able to mentally push myself for that last 5k.
Goals–Good, Better, Best
I don’t see any way I’ll be over 5:44:59 if I actually finish. Anything can happen on race day (flat tires, temps over 95), and a DNF isn’t ever out of the realm of possibility for anything over 10k. But I can’t plan on things like that. If I beat 5:45:00 I’ll consider that to be “Good”. It’s still a PR.
I’d really like to hit 5:29:59. If I can pull a 2hr run and 20 mph on the bike it will come down to those couple of minutes on the swim and fast transitions. I’ll even give myself some buffer here….I’d be really happy with anything under 5:35:00. This is my “Better” goal.
If everything goes perfectly equipment wise, I have no serious injuries between now and then, weather cooperates, and my run really pans out, I think I have 5:14:59 in me. This would be “Best”.
Pretty cool photo of a “plus-sized” swimmer George Blagden courtesy of UIC Digital Collections
File this under, “If I Did A Rewrite Of A Project I’m In The Middle Of, This Would Get Careful Consideration”
But it’s pretty to look at.
Testing The ICS Panoramic Mode
You always hear about how hard it is to find time to train when you have small kids. I think it’s true that it presents a challenge, but one that’s pretty easily overcome if you are disciplined with your schedule. Finding time to train isn’t the hardest part of training when you have small kids.
The hardest thing about training when you have small kids is that there seems to always be a cold, ear infection, or sore throat lurking around the house. I don’t notice it so much when the schedule is light, but when volume picks up and the body is more susceptible to the crud, I seem to get it at every turn.
Saw this posted yesterday. Made a card today.
I’ve been training for Ironman 70.3 Florida since mid-January, and so far training has gone great except for a couple of weeks of illness. Even then I didn’t miss any of my long workouts.
But…
I’ve been putting off actually registering for the race. Part of the reason is that I’ve had a string of injuries (real and phantom) for the past couple of years and didn’t know how I’d do when I started amping up the volume in training. I think staying away from rugby and all of its related antics has gone a long way in avoiding injuries. Then there’s the money part of the equation. If you know me at all, you know it’s hard for me to chunk down a few hundred dollars for something and not get immediate value for it.
Today, when I was pretty wiped out from yesterday’s workouts, I went ahead and registered for the event.
So I’m officially in.
That’s a commitment to the commitment. Now it has to be done for sure. And it’s easier to get up and train on the days you aren’t feeling well if you think of it as getting your money’s worth.
Luckily, the race is close to home. So I won’t need to also purchase a plane ticket as a secondary commitment.
Now, about that diet…
Deciding who to ask to share their lane.
Our gym has a four lane, 25 yard pool, and it’s very rare to show up there and find an empty lane. If you do, chances are you won’t finish your workout before someone else comes in and needs to share with you. No big deal…I don’t mind sharing a lane. But I’d rather be the one who does the asking instead of being asked. The reason is simple–if I’m doing the asking, I get to decide what kind of swimmer I’ll be sharing with, and who I’ll be accidentally punching in the face. If I get asked, I’m obligated by the social swimming contract to say “sure”, but whether or not I’m about to get accidentally punched in the face is a crap shoot.
Choosing lanes is a little like choosing urinals. There’s an art to it. Today’s swim put all of my lane choosing skills to use.
So the dilemma was Lane 2 or Lane 4. Again, I’d rather not swim on the wall, but Lane 4 is extra wide, so that usually isn’t a problem in this lane. So I watched. Even though they were going the same speed, the Lane 4 swimmer was working harder than the Lane 2 swimmer to maintain the pace. And her form (I may not be able to lay an egg, but I can tell a good one from a bad one) wasn’t nearly as clean as the Lane 2 swimmer’s. Finally, the clock is directly in front on Lane 2. I don’t like to wear a watch while I swim and depend on that clock, so I prefer having it right in front of me if possible.
I chose correctly. Not only did I avoid making contact with Lane 2 swimmer during my workout, there was only one time during the session that we were side-by-side. I must have walked in during one of her rest sets because she picked up the pace with some sprints while I was in the pool. In fact, even when a lane became open I opted to keep sharing Lane 2 instead of jumping over to the empty lane and taking the risk that I’d end up sharing again with an unknown entity.
I need to do a post soon about choosing where to line up for the start of an open-water swim. Note: the decision is heavily skewed if you’ve already caught someone moving your stuff in transition set up and would like to kick them in the face.
Accidentally.
I’ve been doing a lot of my cycling at night lately, and I’m fortunate to be able to do that. The only problem is that riding the bike really wakes me up. I’m typically very alert and awake for at least an hour after getting out of the saddle. It’s like the anti-swimming. And that’s great for morning rides, but when I finish a workout at 11:30 pm, I just want to go to sleep…but I can’t.
If I had unlimited time and access to a lap pool, I’d handle this solution like Elvis–jump into the pool and swim for a while to induce sleep. Then I’d also need to jump on the bike after swimming to get my energy levels back up. It’s a vicious cycle.
Since I can’t go for a quick swim to make me sleepy, could a list of great post-cycling wines be the solution?
I just have to be careful not to partake when I have a workout the following morning…running with a headache is no fun, and even a glass affects me these days.
How can you hate the free market on a Wednesday when it is the very existence of the free market that allows you to successfully pressure for-profit entities to remove their advertising dollars from someone who says something you don’t like on Thursday?
This isn’t commentary on what was said, who said it, or whether it was right or wrong.
But doesn’t this prove (yet again) that free markets are a good thing.
If I were designing a Help Desk application from the ground up, there’s one feature I’d put front and center: Requester Competency Rating.
Every time help desk personnel handle a call or request, they should be able to rate the technical competency of the person on the other end of the phone. Right now, the default position for every support call is that the person asking for assistance is a pre-schooler, and you build up from there.
Case in point: a month and a half ago I registered a request for help with a vendor. I’d already spent a couple of weeks identifying a problem and eliminating as many possible causes as I could think of, documenting every step with data and including this information in my request. I was finally granted my request for a remote session today, where the person helping me spent over an hour performing the exact steps I’d already performed and included in my request.
The problem is that I have logged several requests with this vendor in the past, and each request has been in regards to an actual problem with their system that I’d identified and isolated. Wouldn’t it make sense to have a system that can flag any new requests I make in the future? Shouldn’t the default position be “incoming request from a guy who it’s safe to assume has already read our manual, read the community support forums, and still has a problem”?
Help desk people who deal with internal users (behind the firewall) probably develop a pretty good idea of who has technical skills and who doesn’t already, but there should be an easy way for them to share this information among themselves and for any new people who join the support team. Every time the phone rings or a ticket is submitted, the person who will be handling the request would have a huge leg up if they already knew what kind of user they are going to be dealing with.
And that’s not meant as an insult to non-technical users either. They need (and deserve) to have their hands held a little more than a tech savvy user, and there’s nothing wrong with doing that. It just doesn’t make sense to waste the time of someone who has already done half of the help desks work by isolating the issue for them. Why not leverage them to help provide better service to everyone?
This is your pain….Don’t deal with this the way those dead people do. Deal with it the way a living person does.
~Tyler Durden
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