Sunday, April 15, 2007

Xterra focused... finally!

Damn my legs are sore after yesterdays run but...

First of all big ups to Bryan. He did IMAZ yesterday and took it out. It was his first IM and he finishined in 9:43 which included having to fix a flat on the bike. His goal was to qualify for Kona and by finishing 4th in this AG he did. I am so stoked for him because he trained his ass off and was totally focused.

This past week was defintely a tranistion from a training standpoint. After recovering from the 70.3 it was time to turn my focus to the upcoming Xterra races. Next weekend will be the kick off at the Arizona Xtreme Desert Triathlon in Mesa, AZ and then the following weekend I will be heading up to Xterra Castaic in Castaic, Ca (just north of Los Angeles). I am really looking forward to going out and racing hard. I am curious to see what I'll have in the tank.
After putting a lot of emphasis on the 70.3 I and just now switching to more intense "Xterra-specific" workouts I will be training through these next couple of races with a plan to peak and really throwdown at the Xterra West Championships in Temecula on 5/20.
After taking Friday relatively easy it was time to really hit it Saturday morning with and offroad, race paced brick workout. There's a killer offroad 1 mile loop right by my house that I used for this workout. The workout was basically 4 laps of the loop hard on the mountain bike followed immediately by running the loop once all out. All of that 3 times. To say the least I was spent after this workout and it defintely let me know where I am at and that there is still work to be done to get into top form for the upcoming races.

The bike:

The Run:
After the workout I came home had my shake and soaked in the pool. Then it was off to fish my brother. I hadn't been fishing is a long time and eventhough we didn't catch anything we had a good time. We ended up hiking about 2-3 miles to get where we wanted to fish... and I was tired. The only thing that kept me pushing were the ice cold beers my brother had in his cooler.
Next!
After a mellow Saturday night I had a open water swim and run on tap for Sunday. The plan was to swim first thing in the AM and then head out for a run. I got a hold of Tom first thing in morning and we called off the swim. The weather and water conditions were miserable. So instead I headed out for breakfast and put my run on hold until the early afternoon. With Xterra coming up I was to run in the warmest conditions I can. Around 11:45am I headed out for my run and it was a tough. I took a new route through the trails around my house and did some exploring. I found a bunch of new climbs that I can't wait to hit on the MTB. Here's the profile for the run. 12.5 miles and 2700ft of climbing!
I finally got my new Ergon grips installed on my bike. I love these things. It's been too long since I have used them. My ride with them on Saturday was killer.
The R2's:
The GX2's. I am saving these for my new bike, which if everything goes as planned I should have by Temecula. C'mon review bonus!!

3 comments:

barndog said...

damn! those grips look great. I only say damn because I just got SPEC. carbon ends. I like yours better. Looks like they help keep your hands on top...not so much pressure on the wrists from wrapping the grips. Right?

Unknown said...

I'm gonna start planning my runs the same way - aim for the heat of the day (around here, oddly enough, that's at about 4 pm).

I have to get used to heat because 1.) I am the complete opposite of you and excel at cold and rainy races, and 2.) There seems to be a sick pattern of PacNW tri's taking place on the very first day of a summer heat wave. So you train in the standard cool drizzle and then wake up on race day to 90+. Whee.

TRI Vortex said...

Dude back to back races! Must be nice superman. How far from LA is Castaic? Maybe the little lady and I can check out what a real race is like. Fishing is a great way to relax especially if you use that "special" tin baiting technique.
1)Pull pole in
2)Open beer
3)Drink
4)Poke finger trying to rebait
5)Cast and hook your leg
6)Rinse and Repeat