Sunday, June 13th
Since I moved my long run to Saturday, I had my long ride scheduled for today. James, Kyle, and I rolled from our house at 5AM and wanted to get in 80 miles. From our house, we headed over to Rio Verde and down “9 Mile Hill”. Rio Verde is just finishing up construction to put in bike lanes, but have left out some temporary speed limit signs that can create some problems if you’re not paying attention. It’s not too difficult to see the huge sign and orange flags, but the legs that extend out into the bike lane are. Speeds can reach 40-45 miles per hour and, if you’re not paying attention, you can easily clip them and kick off a real bad chain of events. At any rate, we were able to safely dodge all obstacles and make it down in one piece. After a short flat part, it was time to climb back out of Rio Verde and into Fountain Hills….nothing too steep, or difficult, just a nice steady climb. The centerpiece of Fountain Hills is their huge fountain, which is one of the world’s tallest man-made fountains. It was built in 1970 and sprays every hour for about 15 minutes. The fountain is driven by 3 600 horsepower pumps and sprays water at a rate of 7,000 gallons per minute. Under ideal conditions, the water can reach 560 feet, but typically only gets to about 300. When built, it was the world’s tallest fountain and held that record for over a decade. At any rate, once we passed this landmark, Kyle quickly realized that he had to cut his ride short and head back home. While James decided to give him an escort, I decided to ride on. Just up the road is Highway 87 (AKA Beeline) which serves as a portion of the actual Ironman route. I hopped on and put the hammer down for about 11 miles before I came upon my turn around point (a convenience store wedged between Fountain Hills and Mesa, AZ.) I quickly found out that the 11 miles back was more of an “uphill” ride with the wind. After making my way back home, and using Map My Ride, I saw that I put in about 91.75 miles. Had I known I was only 8.25 miles away from a century, I probably would have kept on. Anyway, some quick math came up with an average of 18.98 miles per hour for this ride. Overall, I was very satisfied with this ride and the results.
Elevation for my ride:
Monday, June 14th
I scheduled my moderate swim for today, so I picked out another force workout that looked like this:
Warm Up – 300 swim, 100 kick, 4x50 swim, 300 pull
1x300 Pull (:20 RI)
6x50 Swim (Fast) (:15 RI)
1x300 Pull (:20 RI)
4x50 Swim (Fast) (:15 RI)
2x300 Pull N/S (:20 RI)
2x50 Swim (Fast)
Warm Down – 100 swim
Not too much to say here, except that the pull sets felt strong and the fast swims felt solid. I’d say that it was a satisfying workout. Total yards = 2800.
Tuesday, June 15th
Moderate ride is the flavor of the day today. Again, I have about 3 hours available to do what I please. Typically, I like to go for about 2 ½ hours (or 50 miles). Took my typical route and was able to get 47.76 miles in that 2 ½ hour window. That comes out to around a 19.1 mph average. There was nothing new, or unusual, to report about this ride. I felt strong and was satisfied with the workout.
Wednesday, June 16th
Speed run. Erik had me going two full laps “on” and one full lap “off.” Working on my turnover, breathing, intensity, and recovery while it’s 100+ degrees has me wondering if I’m crazy. After thinking about it for a bit, I came to the conclusion that I am and headed off to warm up. After 1 lap of walking and 2 more jogging, I was already soaked and headed for the water bottle. No side stitches, no walking, and pretty good intensity left me feeling satisfied with today’s workout. Total miles covered were about 5.
Thursday, June 17th
Double duty day. 5 mile run in the AM and speed swim in the afternoon. The 5 mile run was my typical loop and didn’t really offer anything new. I kept a steady, comfortable pace and came in the front door feeling good. It’s always nice getting in a workout before the sun is in full effect!
The swim workout looked as follows:
Warm up – 2x (200 swim, 200 pull, 200 kick)
12x25 Swim (:40 SI)
6x100 Desc 2-2-2 (:20RI)
4x75 Pull (B-3,4,5, x25)
4x100 Desc 2-2 (:15RI)
4x75 Pull (B-3) (:25 RI)
2x100 Swim (Fast) (:10 RI)
B-3,4,5 x25 = Breath every 3 strokes for the 1st 25, every 4 strokes for the 2nd 25, and breath every 5 strokes for the final 25.
This was a good swim that provided just enough intensity. I felt good and was satisfied with the workout.
Friday, June 18th
DAY OFF!
Saturday, June 19th
Our tri team was going to do the “7 Springs Ride” and was leaving the Village at 5:30AM. Since they were asking for canned goods donations (and I didn’t want to ride there with a bunch of canned goods) I drove there and started the ride from the club. As I was loading my bike onto our truck, I saw a car leaving our neighborhood. The car caught my eye because it had a nice bike sitting on its roof. I thought that it would be too funny if they were driving to the same place I was to ride. When I rolled into the parking lot at the Village, who comes in shortly after? Yup, that car. Turns out that the guy is my next door neighbor! What a small world. It’s awesome that there is yet another cyclist in our area. A last minute decision had us riding the Rio Verde Loop in reverse. When doing the ride in this fashion, you have to ride up “9 Mile Hill” before making a decision to head back to the start or continue up into Cave Creek. On our way to 9 Mile Hill, I was pushing at the front of the pack when I ran over a huge staple and got a flat. Some quick hocus pocus and the group was rolling again. After cresting 9 Mile, a couple of us decided that we needed some extra time in the saddle and headed out to the ranger station in Cave Creek. Ultimately, this ride provided the perfect blend of intensity, speed, and power. I was very satisfied with today’s workout. Total miles = 72.85.
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