Florida Challenge Triathlon Countdown Clock

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Intervals: Up Close & Personal!

So now I'm officially in "Training Mode." That means no more Peanut M&M's! I think I have an addiction! lol It'll take me a week or so to get over the craving for them, but until then I'll need help. I have stopped taking dollar bills & loose change to work, and last week I told my co-workers if they see me eating them to take them from me. Hey, whatever works! lol

So now I'm focused on this upcoming race. I'm not signed up yet, but I'm pretty sure I'll do it. But I want a couple weeks of good training under my belt before I commit.

This week was a good workout week. I swam on Monday & Wednesday for an hour each session. I'm still pretty slow, but my focus is to swim at a relaxed pace where I don't use too much energy & fell relatively fresh. So far so good.

Tonight I lifted weights. Hurting my back several months ago might have helped me (to an extent.) What I mean is, since I couldn't lift, it forced me to focus on my swim & bike. As a result, I had a pretty good swim. So this time around I will swim in place of one of my weight lifting sessions. That means I'll only lift once a week until after the race, and I'm fine with that.

Tuesday I rode the bike. In my previous blog I talked about the hills that I'll be riding on for the next race. Those hills are very tough, and I'm not the best climber. There are zero hills in Tampa, and I don't get a chance to ride the bridges until the weekend. But I also have to RUN on the weekends too. There are only so many days in the week...

So to compensate, I have to use my indoor trainer to the fullest. I can't ride hills as much as I'd like, but doing intervals on the trainer can be the next best thing.

Truthfully, I HATE intervals. They are HARD. VERY HARD. I'd rather ride outside in the rain for 3 hours than do a 45 minute interval workout. The reason why is because intervals force you to ride as hard as you can in several short bursts.

Here's my interval routine:

15 minute warm-up

start of interval
15 seconds all out
45 seconds recovery

30 seconds all out
30 seconds recovery

45 seconds all out
15 seconds recovery

15 seconds all out

5 minute recovery

repeat interval

20 minute spin at vigourous pace

10 minute cooldown


This workout is anywhere from 46 minutes to an hour long, depending on the warmup & cooldown times.

Here's a first! Here's a video of me doing the first interval of the session this past Tuesday:



Let me say that it was ROUGH! When I start the interval, I put the bike into a higher gear, stay seated and ride as hard as I can. When I recover I take it down to an easier gear, only to repeat the routine again. This is the closest I can get to riding the hills, so this is what I'll have to do.

There's a 70% chance for rain this Saturday, so looks like I'll be running on the treadmill. If that's the case, I'll run for 2 hours at a moderate intensity. (I might even video this one as well.) This race is much harder than Ironman Florida so I have to make sure I'm ready. I've always liked a challenge, so let's see what got!

Thanks for reading (and viewing!) Till next time, Peace!

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