Weekly Wrap-up 09/14/15

And with that, I wrap up my build for Kona.   Phew.  It's been a long road, but it's been a blur all at the same time.  I'm not exactly where I wanted to be.  I'm a few lbs heavier than I'd like, but not point in dwelling on that. I've proven in my last 2 70.3's that I can put together solid races regardless.  Consistency, specificity and being smart about pacing goes a long way.  

This last 7 days was one of the harder stretches I've done all year.  Mainly because i pushed my long ride form last week into Monday, and that just made the whole week a little bit harder.  By the time Sunday rolled around, I didn't have much zip in the legs, but I gave it what I had and put in a solid long ride.  My last ride over 4 hours and 200 TSS.  This might have been my first 300+mi week biking since last summer.

So the last 4 weeks looks like this:

Recovery Week - about 55-60% the volume of this week.

Peak Week 1 - about 80% of the volume as this last Build week, so not an easy week.   Recover most of the fitness lost this week recovering. I start some heat acclimatization at the end of this week.   Some overdressing sweat fest ugliness.  

Peak Week 2 - about 80% of the previous week above.  This  week gets front loaded a little since I'm traveling that weekend.  Intensity increases just a little on average, but overall training load drops.

Race Week!   Progressive taper.  I'm not sure what my workouts will look like in Kona, so it will be a day by day affair.  Most noteable is that my TSB will be positive for a full 6-7 days prior to the race.   In a "B" race its' only 2-3 days.

I've had some better swims lately.  Good timing on that.  It gives me a little fresh motivation getting in the water and feeling descent.  My plan is to do a small swim focus the last couple weeks.  It's a compromise I'd been looking at as I needed to reduce overall training volume this year.  I've also reduced the bike volume just a little.

Where do I think I'm at compared to last year?  I've said it before, but my main improvement isn't fitness.  It's been pacing well and aerodynamics.  I figure that if I rode IMWI now at the same power output, I'd ride about 10-12 minute faster. I think I'm a stronger runner, with more consistent mileage under me.  But I'm not any faster.  Maybe a little slower, but I hope on long course I can hold my mechanics longer and pull off a solid time even in the heat.

The real wild card is the heat.  However, I've done 3 hotter races this year and overall I can say it wasn't a major factor.  I don't think I would have run much faster in cooler weather.  I feel it, but I don't let it consume me or fill my mind with negative thoughts.  I focus on what I can control.  That's all you really can do.

By the numbers:

Swim: 2h02m, 8804y

Bike: 15h22m, 312mi

Run: 5h30m, 44.5mi

TOTAL: 22h54m
TSS: 1210