IMUK 2013 Bonkers!

Morning all! I'm not local either.

Good points, Bones - glad you moaned at the poor girl as now she might act on it. Keeping your knees together does seem to be the remedy to all manner of problems...

I don't know about Fink being light on cycling, but it's way too heavy on swimming! The book is probably aimed at time-strapped Americans who can easily get to a pool and maybe have to do a lot of cycling indoors. Most of us probably come from a slightly more running-oriented base (I guess, this being RW?).

I found it hard not to keep plugging happily away at my strength (running) and skipping the bike and swim sessions, but am now better at understanding that's the wrong thing to do!. However I think most would agree that you can drastically reduce the length of the swim sessions - especially if one look at them puts you off going altogether....

Hi all, I'm South Wales.  Went to my local tri club this week for the first time (NEWT) and loved it, very encouraging, great coaches.  Will definitely join!  Week 1 of Fink really enjoying it, although out to lunch with th emissus today.  Must .. .avoid ... cake.

Joining a club is one of the best things you will do. I've been in mine now for over 3 years and you can always run or bike with someone and the coached swim sessions are tough, but rewarding. You will find that there will be a few seasoned IM finishers who can help with the many questions we all have.

Fink has arrived

With the few pages I've read so far I'm thinking the time management alone has the potential to change my life for the better. I'm rubbish at it and rarely plan anything,

Its 'Happy Fink Day' to you then Woody!   WEEK 1!!

DTT well done on joining club, i have considered tri club but now been with my run club for year and half and they all great people and i really enjoy it.  Clubs deffo push things to another level!

Had 5mile run (only slight knee throb), gym session and tiny swim today.  Also went to Colin Lewis bike shop and got bike fit...and WHAT a difference, moved cleats, handlebars (slightly) raised seat and even pumped tyres up .....£20 brilliant...its really opening my eyes to all the details to do with cycling lately, i know my running stuff inside out but its 'a whole new world' (yes i'm typing that whilst singing it!) this cycling stuff!

Knee still throbbing slightly this affo but still gonna jump on bike in morning, and still got swim lesson later today.

Thats week 1 almost over, where did it go..??!!

Swim this morning. The coach took a recording of me swimming on my mobile phone, least said the better, suffice to say I look absolutely dreadful. My legs are all over the place, the problem is I don't actually think that I am moving them. I have been told repeatedly that this is a problem now for months, but I just can't seem to get it. More work to do on my kick, it needs to be much quicker (4 beat) and I need to keep my legs together and stop throwing them out for balance. I have been told that unless I resolve this I will not progress.

On a more positive note just done 40 miles on the bike with 2500ft of climbing.   

Excellent bike Kav thats some climbing, and good thinking videoing swimming, sounds like it will help.  I'm no good for advice for swimming, i am having lessons every saturday, seems to be progressing nicely.  Just finished todays and i've gone from 6 lengths freestyle to 12 today (400m), although he said we were only doing 6 again he kept saying "just 2 more", felt ok to keep going but ran out of time.  Nice to get to the 400m mark though!

dimtritris..........newts are really friendly..i would join if they were just a few miles closer to me.....its just too fat for me to go to swim............

1hr bike to test knee today..verdict...PASSED!  (well little sore but ok)

What a difference the bike fit made, comfortable, v v noticable subtle changes, he even advised me about relaxing my elbows and that felt really comfortable. best money spent so far!

Well done everyone, it looks like the new year has brought fresh commitment to us all. Keep it nice and steady, some good swims and bikes out there.

Sunday for me was:

Steady bike, bit fresh but the roads were ice free and dry

Distance      63.24miles

Time             4hrs 12mins

Av speed      15mph

Max speed    36.3mph

heartbeat       avg  128  max 152

Cadence        avg 80

Climb             3655ft

from the bike went up the woods for a 30min mud slurping run, 

As I said bike was steady, nothing mad, cadence was rather low as spent more time in big cog. Tried out using High 5 2:1 and 4:1 and it agreed with my stomach which is the first hurdle

Great biking, guys, and good news about the knee TT - it must have been getting the right bike set-up.

Training's not going that well for me as, having fought off the family's germs over the Christmas break, I have now succumbed and have been coughing and snorting my way through the last week. It's great to have the luxury of a very long time till  IM UK, though,so I'm playing safe and not worrying about a few days off. Hopefully back at it tomorrow, though, with a swim and turbo.

See you in the pool about 1230 then  

Will probably have to be early morning, I'm afraid, tho' perhaps I'll pop over to stalk you at lunchtime. At least my expectorated phlegm should have cleared through the filtering system by then .

How lovely ... I shall be with Sue and her 'double' inpingement 

Great riding Stephen, Bones. I'm at about the same level as you TT, did a slightly undulating 43 miles at 14mph average on Sunday. unfortunately I didn't manage wk one, Still not done any swimming and last run was on new years eve.

Get well soon Joddly hope you don't catch it Meldy.

The great thing about this forum is that we are all at different levels but will all finish the same race. Yes I did say that as we WILL all start and finish on that wonderful day (remind me I said that nearer the time). By the time we get to August we would have done the hard work, just a matter of tweaking onthe big day. Yes nerves will play a bit part on the day but we have 7 months to get ourselves ready both physically and mentally. Injuries will come and go, illness, lack of interest, even maybe wanting just to stop. Ive been on these forums before and by August we shall all know ourselves inside out and back to front. 

Good cycling Woody, what do you drink when on the bike?, you need to get yourself to the pool soon though mate.

Joddy very wise about taking some time off, keep on here though and keep focused on what you have to do when your back trainng again so as not to loose track.

TT great biking there i hour is good going at that pace, still got plenty of time

Last night I started following my new Peter Read Turbo programme

10 min warm up then 40 min avg cadence of 95-100 at 80% of max heart beat.

I managed an average cadence of 98 and an average of 75.5% of my max heart beat, although I may do the max heart beat test again soon. If you dont hear back from me you know it didnt go to plan!!.

This morning was a 5 mile run av 7.49 pace, Heart av 136, max 159, 553ft climb

Lunchtime (im off this week decorating) local pool 100 lengths trying to keep to 20-21 strokes per length using different breathing techniques.

Great pep talk, Bones. Sharing the highs and the lows is what these forums are all about. How does the turbo programme work? You sound like your base is in running, and I think it can be quite hard, if you are fairly new to biking, to get a high enough HR - or at least that's what I found!

I did manage to get back into some training today, without huge enthusiasm The advantage of being a bit poorly is that you can start a session promising yourself a bail-out if it gets tricky, and of course once you get going it's not so bad. So I got in a 2k swim this morning, then turbo this evening with 3 x 18min / 2min recovery. I'm now drinking a large whiskey so I can sleep without coughing . Run tomorrow.

Happy training, all!

Yeh, all good stuff Bones and Joddly, and like the sound of 'we will all finish' Bones!  How come 7 months doesn't seem that far away??

Had a 3k race last night and knee held up ok, got 12.10 which was 6 secs off best, we have one race left and i am determined to crack 12mins (i'm blaming the knee this time!).  Had a good swim after as well, got 12 lengths again so hopefully thats a bit of a swim barrier cracked for me.

10k race this sunday in exeter, so no doubt gonna be blooooooomin freezing, normally the river is frozen (always been quite tempted to ice skate some of it!).

Turbo/run brick tonight.  (any turbo advice would be much appreciated, i just jump on and ride?)

Hope you getting better Joddly.

Great training everyone, glad it's going well.  Had my third swim with NEWT last night (local tri club), and it went really well.  Coaches there are excellent.