week in training | 10.19 – 10.25

Florida fall involves July-like conditions, including some seriously soupy mornings. Despite 73-75 dew points, I somehow linked together two amazing quality sessions for my 10k training. The sub-8 miles are feeling more and more manageable, certainly not easy but maintainable when needed. I still haven’t quite decided what my 10k time trial will involve, or when, but I’m holding out for slightly more agreeable weather to reduce the chances temperature will derail my under 50′ attempt!

Monday, 10.19: 45.05 miles, 17.3 mph cycling

Whew, this one took a lot out of me. As with all of my long rides I inserted some tougher segments to avoid boredom. Today? 2 x 10 miles at tempo/threshold effort with 5 miles steady riding in between. Splits clocked at 16:56, 16:43, 16:55, and 16:45. Fuel for the day was my usual pumpkin spice Nature’s Bakery Fig Bar, my new favorite for sure.

Tuesday, 10.20: 9.78 miles, 9:12 pace + 1,700 yard swim (31:43) + 3.31 miles, 10:34 pace

Second attempt at my 10k pace mile repeat workout and I nailed it! Most plans call for 6 x 1 mile but I modified to 5 simply because of the temperature. When I finished I felt like I could’ve gone another interval if I needed to. I managed 7:59, 7:54, 7:54, 7:57, and 7:55 for the sets and in between walk/jogged for 2 minutes as recovery to manage overheating.

Swim involved 13 x 100 yard intervals, all ranging 1:49-1:51, hedged by two 200 yard sets at 3:49 and 3:59. After work I set up a walk/jog set for recovery and averaged 148bpm.

Wednesday, 10/21: 25 miles, 17mph cycling (1:28:18) + 4.43 miles, 10:09 pace brick run + 1,600 yard swim (31:36)

Nice training day through and through. 60 minute climb characterized my ride on Pittor, focusing on steady effort rather than gut-busting intervals. I averaged 17.1-17.3mph for the trio of 5 mile splits I rang up. After the whole brick ordeal, I baked us pumpkin buckwheat pancakes, which delighted J and gave me some further blog content to play with! They’ll be coming soon.

I swam 4 x 400 yards in the pool, very positive splitty: 7:42, 7:55, 7:55, and 8:01. Not bad as far as times go in general, and I certainly felt my form collapse by the last one. I chatted for a bit with one of the lifeguards about the prior night’s Rays game. I have hope for our hometown team, but they’ll need to get their cogs less rusted in order to beat the Dodgers. If you didn’t know, I’m actually a pretty avid baseball fan and worked in the minor league industry for a few years as a beat writer.

Thursday, 10/22: 7.45 miles, 10:04 pace + 1,700 yard swim (31:28) + 45 min strength

Easy miles and 4 sets of 50 yard intervals before a work shift. For two sets I performed sprints (:49-:52 were the splits) and two sets I pulled with the buoy (:53-:57) and swam 100 yards steady between each set. I averaged 1:51/100 yards for the total workout.

Lifted heavy after work and oof, did my body feel it on Friday! The initial circuit did not feel good at all and I had to really modify/allowed myself to dilly dally to catch my breath. I think I was fatigued from work and the sudden bout of intense movement threw my systems off.

Strength:

Set 1: 10 minute AMRAP (got through 3 complete rounds and 4 of the pushups)

• 12 burpees
• 12 pushup shoulder taps (dropped to my knees for the last two rounds)
• 10 jump squats
• 10 dumbbell pass throughs per side

Set 2: Heavy lifts

• 4 x 12 back squat/10 bodyweight curtsy lunges between sets
• 3 x 10 chest press/20 marching triceps dips between sets
• 4 x 10 SL deadlifts/16 alternating single leg jumps between sets

Set 3: Core, 3 x 20

• x toe tap
• deadbugs
• plank hip swivel

Friday, 10/23: 20 miles, 17.5 mph cycling (1:08:25) + 20.09 miles, 17.6 mph cycling (1:08:30)

Double bike day to crank up my mileage starting with a set of strong power intervals. After a warmup, I rode 4 x 1 minute 9/10 (average 20.6, 20.3, 20.1, and 20.8 mph) with :90 recovery, 4 x 5 minutes 7/10 (17.9, 17.8, 17.9, 18) with 2 minute recovery, and 4 x :45 full gas (21.8, 22.3, 22.3, 22.8 mph) with :75 recovery. I hit 29.8 mph during one of the final intervals. So close to 30!

Second workout I rode 40 minutes at tempo. 5 mile splits rounded out at 16:46 (17.9 mph) and 16:39 (18 mph) with a final 2.09 miles averaging 18 mph.

Saturday, 10/24: 14 miles, 9:40 pace + ~1,800 yard OWS (39:47)

Without meaning to, I clocked a sub-8 mile during a tempo effort! I took 6 miles easy at the beginning to gauge my body’s reaction to running, and since I felt okay I decided to jump into a 5k tempo run that turned much faster than I expected but still very comfortable. My splits were 8:26, 8:07, and 7:56! Gives me a lot of encouragement for a potential 10k time trial, for sure. I finished off with 5 miles easy.

The water was crystal clear at the beach, which doesn’t usually happen at that location. I saw lots of little fishes scooting about above the sand. It’s reassuring to see my own hands stroke through the water and knowing where the ocean floor was relative to my position on the water. Pretty cool in the waves – about 80 degrees – and overall a pleasant morning.

Sunday, 10/25: 45 minute strength + 3.33 miles, 10:31 pace

Felt a bit lackluster during my HIIT workout but the run surprised me with some peppy, not fatigued steps! I performed a run/walk breakdown of 2 minutes run and :30 walk, what I’ve been incorporating for a couple weeks now. Very humid morning that carried over into the rest of the day – the dew point read a horrible 76 in the afternoon.

Strength: EMOM x 4

• 16 alternating weighted side lunges
• 12 squat to triceps kickback
• 12 L raise
• 16 alternating TRX pistol squats
• 8 jump squat to curl-to-press
• 18 shrugs
• 20 single arm shoulder press
• 10 row to upright row
• REST

1 round of core EMOM:

• 30 x toe taps
• 50 mountain climbers/10 knee to elbow
• 20 dumbbell plank raises
• 30 reverse table toe taps
• 15 banded leg drops
• 20 lateral jumps
• 20 shoulder tap plank jacks
• 16 jump lunges

Total running mileage: 42.3

Total cycling mileage: 110.1

Total swimming yardage: 6,800