Sunday, January 16, 2005
Day 6
Today was an easier day. We were in Cooma for the whole day and I chose not to ride after being traumatised yesterday! I swam 4km then waited until after 6pm to do a 22km run. In between I had a 90 minute nap. It is still very hot here but the forecast is for cooler temperatures.
I felt OK on the run but my legs started to feel a bit weary towards the end so time will tell whether it was a good decision to go for so long. My goal is to equal my biggest weekly volumes in swimming and running while smashing my biggest weekly bike volume (already done). To achieve this I have to swim 4km tomorrow and run 12.5km. Should be manageable as tomorrow's ride isn't too long.
A couple of observations so far...
Food - the food is what I would call functional food. It meets the nutritional requirements of people doing these kinds of volumes but isn't gourmet. For example, Gordo sat down to breakfast the other day and I watched him heap some pooridge (oatmeal) on toa plate, cover it with scrambled eggs and tomato, smother it with salt then pour soy sauce all over it. This met his requirmenst for carbs,protein and sodium but didn't prompt me to replicate it. We always have protein and carbs in plentiful supply. I love the PRO4 recovery drinks because they just taste like milkshakes but I can convince myself that it is serious Ironman food.
Support
We have amazing support on this camp. There are five support staff )Peter, Mark, Dave, Michaela and Darren) dedicated to making our lives easy. We even have a full-time bike mechanic, Darren, who knows his stuff and keeps us rolling. Today he gave my bike a thorough going over because I was concerned about the buffeting it was getting from the rough roads. He instills great confidence in me which is important when trying to keep up with some of these bastards.
Nothing is too much trouble for our support crew. We are all very grateful for their efforts.
Aero
I have been surprised by how much time we spend on our aero bars. On most rides we must be spending more than 50% of the time on them even in pace lines with wheels inches from each other. It's good for specific training and once I learnt how to position my arm so my graze wasn't rubbing on the elbow pads it was great. It hurts a bit when I hit bumps but it's tolerable.
Gearing
I spoke with Darren the mechanic about my gearing after my 'experience' on Brown Mountain. I had assumed that I had a 23 tooth cog and a 42 tooth ring as my easiest ratio (650 wheels) and spoke to Darren about my options for getting a 25 on the back to make it easier. After servicing my bike he told me I had a 21 on the back! Bugger me! In some way that explains why I was almost motionless at some points on 'that climb' and made me feel a little better. Gordo had some spare cogs which I bought from him and Darren managed to put together a 11-23 cluster (losing the 16) which helped me sleep easier with the climbing to continue.
Points
The attitude to chasing points differs among the campers. I will take them when I can but my main aim is to do stuff that will help me go faster on March 5 in New Zealand. Some of the other guys are amazing. They will continue on the bike another 20km or so after a long ride to get the next point. Hats off to them.
Mental Benefit
Gordo talks about the mental benefit of getting through some very tough periods on this camp and I am sure he is right. When experiencing a tough period in an Ironman you can have the confidence that you have been through tough periods before and come through.
I felt OK on the run but my legs started to feel a bit weary towards the end so time will tell whether it was a good decision to go for so long. My goal is to equal my biggest weekly volumes in swimming and running while smashing my biggest weekly bike volume (already done). To achieve this I have to swim 4km tomorrow and run 12.5km. Should be manageable as tomorrow's ride isn't too long.
A couple of observations so far...
Food - the food is what I would call functional food. It meets the nutritional requirements of people doing these kinds of volumes but isn't gourmet. For example, Gordo sat down to breakfast the other day and I watched him heap some pooridge (oatmeal) on toa plate, cover it with scrambled eggs and tomato, smother it with salt then pour soy sauce all over it. This met his requirmenst for carbs,protein and sodium but didn't prompt me to replicate it. We always have protein and carbs in plentiful supply. I love the PRO4 recovery drinks because they just taste like milkshakes but I can convince myself that it is serious Ironman food.
Support
We have amazing support on this camp. There are five support staff )Peter, Mark, Dave, Michaela and Darren) dedicated to making our lives easy. We even have a full-time bike mechanic, Darren, who knows his stuff and keeps us rolling. Today he gave my bike a thorough going over because I was concerned about the buffeting it was getting from the rough roads. He instills great confidence in me which is important when trying to keep up with some of these bastards.
Nothing is too much trouble for our support crew. We are all very grateful for their efforts.
Aero
I have been surprised by how much time we spend on our aero bars. On most rides we must be spending more than 50% of the time on them even in pace lines with wheels inches from each other. It's good for specific training and once I learnt how to position my arm so my graze wasn't rubbing on the elbow pads it was great. It hurts a bit when I hit bumps but it's tolerable.
Gearing
I spoke with Darren the mechanic about my gearing after my 'experience' on Brown Mountain. I had assumed that I had a 23 tooth cog and a 42 tooth ring as my easiest ratio (650 wheels) and spoke to Darren about my options for getting a 25 on the back to make it easier. After servicing my bike he told me I had a 21 on the back! Bugger me! In some way that explains why I was almost motionless at some points on 'that climb' and made me feel a little better. Gordo had some spare cogs which I bought from him and Darren managed to put together a 11-23 cluster (losing the 16) which helped me sleep easier with the climbing to continue.
Points
The attitude to chasing points differs among the campers. I will take them when I can but my main aim is to do stuff that will help me go faster on March 5 in New Zealand. Some of the other guys are amazing. They will continue on the bike another 20km or so after a long ride to get the next point. Hats off to them.
Mental Benefit
Gordo talks about the mental benefit of getting through some very tough periods on this camp and I am sure he is right. When experiencing a tough period in an Ironman you can have the confidence that you have been through tough periods before and come through.
# posted by Vernon @ 10:09 PM 
