Week 1 of Tri Training

It's funny, but I'm not really sure what I'm training for. I've decided I don't have time this season to train for a 70.3, so I've picked a Sprint in early August and two Olympic distances 4 weeks apart at the end of August and September. It already looks like the August Olympic will have to be a scratch due to a potential family vacation that week.

Anyway, this was the first week of training under the watchful eye of @zentriathlon. We started with some easy base stuff with a couple of fitness tests in there to see where I stand from a aerobic/anaerobic fitness perspective.

Well, the fitness tests look like they show I'm dead. Or at least that I can't get my HR up. A 30 minute all out sprint (which produced my first ever sub 8 minute miles) yielded an estimated LTHR of 155 and a Max HR of 166. I need to try harder to get the heart rate up. A stationary bike test yielded a 141/152 respectively. Same problem. I may have had an issue conducting the tests on myself, but my guess is my max HR should be somewhere in the 170's. 18 months of LSD first for a Marathon and then for an Olympic tri seem to have shaved off my Max HR rate significantly. Not to mention, I felt no stamina to maintain a brisk/test pace for more than 5 minutes.

Anyway, we'll see how I progress with more speed work being incorporated into the regime. The swim speed work was a blast. I can definitely feel I'll be able to go faster, and more importantly maintain it without having to bail on freestyle in the middle of race. Having said that, I need to practice it more.

This weeks totals (Time/Dist) Swim: 1:53/6200m, Bike, 3:05/47.4mi, Run 2:41/24.06. Fitness workouts, 2x 45mins. Total non-gym time, around 7:40. It's more run mileage than I have typically been doing and I think I felt it a bit more sore as a result, but still somewhat manageable.