Solid Workouts Recently and RACING This Weekend

Here's a quick glace at what June's training looked like:

There were 2 time trials in there, and 3 relay triathlons where I was the swimmer.

And here's July so far:

Here's a breakdown of some workouts worth noting:

SWIM:

On June 1st, I did 8x200 between 3:07 and 3:11. Then a week ago, I did 7x200 between 3:04 and 3:09. Progress!

I did my "go to" long hard swim of 1500 on June 10. I felt like I was going to die, and I did it in 24:57 (1:39.8/100). I did the same swim 10 days later 1 second faster per 100 (in 24:42) and I felt much less like death. Logic tells me that if I just keep doing this workout every 10 days, soon I'll be doing it at 1:20 pace... right?

On June 7th, I did my "go to" speed workout of 10x100. It ended as an average workout: 1:26/100.

Overall, I've been doing a fair amount of swimming: I'm up to nearly 80,000 yards on the year already (which is GREAT for me). That's more than I swam ALL YEAR in 2012, 2011, 2009, and 2008!


BIKE:

I did lot of shorter harder rides earlier in the summer, and then did two Time Trials in early June. I had an OK amount of speed, but not much distance training.

On the 9th, I did my longest ride of the year - nearly 30 miles. (That's long for me right now - shut up.) I did 3x5 mile intervals in the middle. I did them in 14:10 (21.2 mph), 13:13 (22.7 mph) and 14:06 (21.3 mph).

On the 13th, I did my normal quick loop. (For locals, it's basically along River Road to Hwy 5, then continuing on Shepard Rd to downtown St. Paul, up Ramsey Hill, down Summit, and back home.) I had my fastest average ever at downtown before climbing back up to residential streets: 22.2 mph! Not bad for city riding! Oh, did I forget to mention I had the wind at my back for part of that? Whatever. After bucking the wind the final few miles back (and after the big Ramsey Hill climb), I'd only dropped to 19.9 mph. I finished in 46:30 when the loop usually takes around 48 minutes.

Yesterday, I did a 25 mile ride with the middle 15 at tempo pace. It was a little breezy, and I finished the tempo 15 with a 21.3 mph ave. Again, not crazy fast, but OK for me in the breeze. I'm not the fastest I've ever been on the bike, but I'm doing OK this summer.

Overall, to have 153 miles (and 40 mins on the trainer) from the 1st of July through the middle is pretty good for me. (I've actually only had bigger monthly totals 5 times* in the last 5 years, and I'll jump ahead of 3 of those totals by simply doing the triathlon next weekend - I will easily have my 3rd biggest month in 5 years.) But my yearly total is still pretty crappy. I won't be breaking any yearly records in 2014.


RUN:

So you all know I'm still working my way back from that nasty ankle injury in April. I'm doing 2.5 to 4 mile easy runs right now.

BUT, I did my first hard running last Friday night! I did that fun/nasty duathlon workout of bike, run, bike, run, bike, run, bike, run with 3 friends. My four 1-mile runs were slower than usual (being I've done NO speedwork in 11 months because of 2 different injuries), but I got through it just fine. I'll post more about that in the next few days.


Finally, I want to mention that Pharmie and I are racing the Waseca Triathlon this weekend. I'm doing the sprint for the 4th time, and Pharmie and Angela will be trying their "1/3 Iron" distance for the first time: it's a 1 mile swim, 34 mile bike, and 8.8 mile run. Wish us luck! Stop back to see how we do! The sprint ends with a 4.4 mile run, and I'll be doing that as my longest run in over 3 months. YIKES!

* My top 5 months of biking since August 2009 (when I started logging miles on BeginnerTriathlete) were May 2010 (208 miles), June 2013 (188 miles), May 2011 (163 miles), August 2013 (162 miles), and July 2012 (159 miles). I don't really like to bike much.