Many people ask me that, so I decided to dedicate one post to exactly that. What am I doing? Am I losing weight? How far am I going and how often do I train?
If you follow my blog from the beginning you heard me say that for me the most important thing is to lose weight. If I do not lose weight there is no training in the world that will make me go fast and be competitive. Although I really have not been racing for the past 10 years I did very heavily for the previous 15 and college, high school. Well basically since I was 12. So when I say competitive it means to be in the hunt for a podium spot are a big national race in the old man category 45-49 :-). Anything short of that I will be disappointed. I am down to 190 lbs which is still heavy. I can start to see some upper abs but I still have a spare tire. I am hoping to be around 175 by June. I think I have a decent engine but my trunk is full of bricks. So as soon as I unload those bricks I will be in good shape.
As far as training I am following the online 11 workouts per week program for a ½ Ironman. That is 3 bikes, 3 runs, 3 swims and 2 weight lifting sessions. We call that the traditional program. I can not take more than that. I often see many of our online athletes signing up for 14 workouts per week and later find out that they can not get all the training in and are always sore and tired. The reason we train is so that once we recover the muscles and body are stronger for the next round of training. So recovery is part of that cycle. If you beat the muscles and body before you recover there will not be progress. Just last night I helped design our next ad for triathlete magazine on this subject. Keep an eye out for it. If you read Triathlete you will not miss it. I guarantee you. So I will keep doing 11 workouts and if I feel good one week and have time I will squeeze another workout.
My swimming is definitely my strongest sport right now. I am not totally happy with it since it is still slower than 15 years ago. But I am close. I know what you are thinking. But Luis you are much older how can you expect to be as fast. Well that is the goal in any case. I find that once my running is strong it helps my swimming. I swim masters about 80% of the time. It is by far the sport I am most consistent about. I do get swims on my own where I go long with sets of 500’s or more. I need those as masters swimming plays to the sprinters and folks that think that a 200 is a long swim.
My bike is coming along. Over the years my bike was my worst sport by far. But once I chilled and decided to embrace cycling I made it a weapon at Ironman races. As I have mentioned it is a matter of a good fit on the bike and a lot of miles. I almost have my fit dialed in. I love the new aero position. My back feels great but I am having a little trouble with my right knee on my long rides. Just yesterday I changed a couple of things and it feels better. Tomorrow I am having the fitter here do a quick check. I will see how it does this weekend on my three and a half hour bike and 30 minute run. I am feeling confident. Cold weather in Boulder is still a problem as I have to ride the trainer. But I am doing it. I am looking forward to doing my “knarly ride” this summer. It is a 7 hour ride with 7000 feet of climbing. I have not done since 1996. It grows hair on the chest.
I have to tell you this fun little story from my three hour ride last Saturday. Boulder has to have the most bike riders per capita. So almost anytime you go for a ride you have to deal with someone passing you or you passing someone. Back when I was a decent rider I was usually passing people. But as I got out of shape it went the other way. There were people passing me wearing jean shorts! But now as I get fitter and fitter I am turning the tide. Granted I often have to eat my pride since I can not go higher than a 141 heart rate. So every time I see some knucklehead sprinting by me up a hill and I have to look down and remember the goal. Kona is the goal not to beat this knucklehead to the top of the hill. Well last weekend I headed out of town on my three hour ride and sure enough. I was not more that 2 miles into it when one guy goes by, then another one goes by and a minute later a third young knucklehead goes by. They are working it, I said. I am just warming up and my heart rate is 120. So once I got a little warm I got on my aero bars and decided to see if I can catch these guys without going over 141. Sure enough! I was catching them. Alright! It was a windy day so my aero position helped a great deal. I caught two of them and once we hit a hill I had to slow way down and one passed me back. These guys really worked the hills and I couldn’t to stay below 141. This type of passing went on and on for a while but I eventually caught the first guy. He was not happy. He hammered by me a little later. Finally 90 minutes into the ride all these guys were gone. They could not catch me. Very cool! Slow and steady wins the race and I stayed aerobic the whole time.
My running is also coming along but not as fast as I would like. The running leg used to be a great leg for me. Right now I feel that it is the one in the worst condition. A couple of weeks ago I tweaked the same right knee that hurt on the bike during a long run. Since then I have combined deep water running, treadmill running and regular running to get in all my miles. So far so good I think, although my knee does not feel 100%. Just Tuesday I did a 75 minute run at the running track? The reason I went to the track was so that if my knee did not feel great all I had to was walk 200 yards to the car. I did the entire run keeping it under 141 heart rate the entire time. My fastest pace was an 8:20 mile. That is not that great but I think it sounds very promising. Running is by far the sport where extra weight hurts you the most. I also know that if you lose a pound you will go 2 to 3 seconds faster per mile. So that would mean that if I get my weight down to 175 I may be able to run 7:45 pace aerobically. I will take that to the bank and deposit it right now!
My final leg is strength training. I am into it for sure. At age 44 and 355 days, I no longer have the strength I used to. Not that I was ever strong but if I am going to try to be competitive I have to get that edge. Right now I am so used to the lifting that I hardly ever get sore from it. That is the idea. It is not detracting from my swim bike run training in any noticeable way.
Well that is it. Let’s call this my quarterly report. Not great but good progress. Spring is almost here and that will help me shed the pounds. I do not recall ever losing weight in the winter.