Du Days

Well now that my 2008 racing season is a thing of the past….. it did end over a week ago. I have started to look ahead to 2009 and picking a few of the races that I would like to do.

I have been writing a journal of all my workouts and races for the past year. I find this is a good resource to help me understand how I train best. I realize that if I want to continue having some success in duathlons I will need to of course focus on my running/cycling.

In running, this past year I used my tempo runs as my speed workouts. For next season, I need to break up my workouts in to more speed specific workout meaning hills, track work, and tempo.  This will hopefully help with getting me a little more speed, and faster first run times.

My cycling has come a long way from my first ride over a year ago, but I know that to be competitive I need to get into that bike chain ring and really work on my power output. I have been doing some reading on workouts and specific drills and exercises to help this.

Diet is the one area where I need to really focus some time. I need to work on eating a more balanced diet.  For this part I will need some help from my wife and also the local health food store.

As a teacher I feel that I need to set a good example for the students. We talk about the importance of exercise so I try to talk about my training and racing so that they can see that I am taking care of myself. Last year as a fundraiser a group of students wanted to raise money to send anti malaria nets to Africa. I mentioned to the group that if they raised over two hundred dollars I would ride my bike trainer 100 km in the front hall of the school. Well of course they raised over two hundred and fifty dollars and I put in 121 km on my trainer during school hours.

This year the students are raising funds for a water well. The are asking the staff to decide on something that they would do be it athletic, funny, or whatever. The students will bring money in and place it in jars. The teachers jar with the most money will then perform thatever they picked. Well without very much thought I decided that I would run from my house to the school. I really didn’t think long about this. The students love it. I will let you know if I win or not.

Training has started already for the spring. I am just going back to basic and doing some spinning. I really want to work on getting myself in the best shape possible.

After making arrangements with my parents to look after my son and daughter for a few hours. I grabbed my bike out of the garage, checked that it still was working, loaded it on the carrier and headed with the kids off to Sir Sandford.

My parents were waiting for me so I said a quick hello and goodbye, got my bike to the transition area and then went for a little walk of the mountain bike course.

The weather was amazing and I had too many layers on even just for walking. I was remembering back to last years race. I entered again not really knowing what I was getting myself into, with no mountain bike riding and 3 months of running.

Even as I walked the course I just felt different. Although I still hadn’t got on a mountain bike, I just felt better about the race. The bike course looked great with only a couple of really muddy parts to it. As I walked through the downhills and uphill sections I made the decision to dismount and run these parts. I finished my walk with about a half hour before the race was to begin.

So I started my race warm up and did a gentle run of the course just to get the legs moving. I could not believe how much the weather changed within a half an hour. It dropped about 4 degrees and the wind was howling .

My race went pretty much as I thought it would. I settled into a pretty good pace for the first run and managed to hold the pace to the transition.

The montain bike was great, even without riding with all my racing this summer my balance was much better than last year.

Last run I had a small stitch in my side which I tried to concentrate on my breathing and working it out. It did go away on the second lap of the run.

Overall, a great day and a good way to end my season. Finally.

Now it is decision time.  I am going to continue to spin for another couple of weeks and will work in two runs. I need to look at next year and also think maybe about training for a marathon and pick my duathlons. 

I thought that I was finally over my phobia of cars from my accident on my bike in June. Not only did I spend most of the summer looking over my shoulder and trying to use my sixth sense to keep me alive. I did have one more close call over the summer early one morning when a car pulled out of a drive way without looking. Again this happened within 1 km of my house.

So with the bike back on the rollers and ready for another fall/winter of garage workouts, I really thought that cars would be the last of my worries. Boy was I wrong! In the past month I have had 2 close calls with automobiles. The first one I didn’t even know was close until a coworker came up to me and said that it was a good thing I am fast. They then explained how they didn’t see me running across the street which had a green walk hand for me to cross. I was a little shocked and laughed because I really didn’t know what else to say or do.

The second incident occured a little farther from home and involved a drive with a car full of kids who ignored a stop sign and narrowly missed me, and I mean narrowly. This incident had me screaming at the car and the driver drove off in the other direction.

 I realize now that in order for me to be safe this fall/winter. I need to be cautious coming up to intersections. I will wait for the drive to acknowledge me before I move off of the sidewalk, and I want to be as reflective as a Christmas tree when I run.

I decided at the last minute to enter the Runnerslife Dirty Du. I have polished off my mountain bike from my last ride which was last years race. I like the trails but cannot find teh time with work, kids and location to get to them easily. I do remember one comment from last years race which I hope will make me go a little faster this year.

Wish me luck.

Well my training for the last part of the summer going into my final race of the HSBC series the International Du in Cobourg was well to say the least not the most consistent. I did manage to do some serious rides of the course before the big day and the week of the race I spent alot of time going over my plan for the race to unfold. I thought that if I ran around a 41 minute 10 k that would put me in a fairly comfortable position for the ride. My goal on the ride was to work hard on the out part of the race and really work on maintaining speed for the return trip. I even had some special messages written on the road by my daughter for inspiration. Then I knew for the last 5 k I should be able to hang on to the finish.

Well ther ace started out as planned and I found myself in a good pace for the early part of the 10 k, the ride was going as expected but then at about the 30 k mark i began to feel a little pain in the back of my right leg. I knew what I had to do and started drinking all the fluid that I had left on my bike. Well I got off the bike and ran out of transition and about 1 k into the 5 k run my right thigh cramped and I immediately had to start to walk and get the cramping to stop. I downed as much fluid as I could and managed to make it to the next aid station and again drank as much as I could. I managed to finish the race a little slower than I hoped to but I did manage to run across the finish line with my daughter and holding my son. I am glad my family ws there cheering me on and the look on my daughters face was worth all the pain.  One goal was accomplished and I was the fastest person from Cobourg in the International distance races.

I think I had overheated during the race so I went to the water park adn played with kids while my body temperature cooled down and I got my mind back. We were off to a wedding in Ennismore and also checking into a cottage for the week at Stoney Lake so our day was far from over.

The next week was all about rest and having some cottage time with the family. I did go for a 10 k run midway throught the week but it was just a little jog with no pressure. With school starting I realized that it was time to start thinking about the couple of fall races that I wanted to run in and also about what to train for in the future.

 I had heard good things about the Newcastle Fall Festival 10k so I decided that I would see if the race was as good as everyone had said. A 8 am start meant being in Newcastle early and also arranging for a babysitter for the kids. A teacher friend of mine volunteered and I ran from the school where I teach to the start line. About 100 runners in total and a pretty interesting route mostly flat with only a couple of gradual uphills. I had not put alot of time in on the road since the cottage and the beginning of the school year. I really think that my season for racing was a little long and I was having a hard time staying motivated. So I had decided that my fall running would be one or two weekly runs and then the races on the weekend.

I managed to go under 40 minutes for the second time in a year and I felt happy with that.

I then went on to race the Warkworth 8 miler, Madd 10k, and the Halloween 5 k.

Warkworth was amazing and the route was a beautiful mix of trail and road. I met some runners for the Northumberland Runners group who invited me to join their Sunday run groups. Again I found myself talking about the kids and our time together and how that was special to me. I did say that I would like to perhaps in the future try to fit the odd run in with them. I am not usually a group runner but I think the benifits of group running are really what I need.

The Madd 10 k and that stupid hill at the 3k and 7 k mark is enough to kill you. I ran hard at the first and really didn’t have anything left in the tank at the end.

The Halloween 5 k was the morning after a very late night so maybe not my best performance but I was happy with the course and also with getting faster.

Overall my year of racing has given me a solid base from which to sit down reflect and write myself some new goals for next year. I really don’t like putting my goals out there for people to know. But maybe I will share a little.