T69 - Rainy Day Recess - Bike/Run Brick (Stationary Bike, Treadmill)

Gainesville

Fucking rain. I left Seattle to get away from the fucking perpetual gloom, but I forget occasionally summers in Florida provide a similar effect. Such was Thursday. The rain never let up all day, so my 90 minute light spinning ride became relegated to the exercise bike at GHFC. I wasn't about to do a 90-minute trainer session with a road ride the next day and a race on Sunday. And it's recovery week, so that's what exercise bike sessions are for. I opted to do a little bit of what I used to call "Fake Limited Triathlon" and do an Exercis Bike/Treadmill brick. Or, bascially, an incelement weather workout.

Bike - 90 Minutes (Stationary Bike)

2 Lipodrene
Because the Marlins had a noon game, there really wasn't much to watch on TV during a 90-minute exercise bike session other than reruns of "King of The Hill." Which was fine by me. I had exchanged the F-ed up headphones earlier in the day, and brought the iPod along. I decided on an all-Silversun Pickups set, including some older stuff that was on there from before I even liked the band. But it was suprisingly motivating, and aside from feeling a little worn out at about the 1-hour mark, the ride went pretty well. It's hard to gauge how good an exercise bike workout is, becasue you don't really go anywhere and the resistance is set. But I averaged about 17.5, which is not great, but not bad. I wasn't really pushing it, but I did get in some good sprints. I was also encouraged by the fact that I biked a lot harder that last 15 minutes than I had the rest of the session.

I took a gel at the one hour mark (didn't see the need for 2 during an indoor workout) and finished a full bottle of water. The exercise bike has a totally different seat than a regular bike, so my ass was surprisingly sore after about 50 minutes. When I finished up at the 90-minute mark, I seriosuly had trouble walking. I've developed saddle sore immunity from my bike, since I've ridden it so much, but this one left me seriosuly uncomfortable. And the walk to the treadmill was very awkward.

Run - 30 Minutes (Treadmill)
Went back to abuse the Summer Run 2009 mix, once again, but the first 5 minutes all I could think was "God damn, my ass is sore." But as with all extremety pain during a run, once I got going it pretty much went away. I mean, I still feel sore from the exercise bike seat now - 20 hours later - but at the time it wasn't an issue. This was a short, indoor run with an iPod, so obviously I crushed it. It felt so good that when I got to "Big Sky" at about the 28-minute mark, I opted to just run to the end of the song. I NEVER extend workouts past their assigned times unless I'm going slower than I should be. Ever. But I was motivated and felt like I wanted to keep going and so I did. Nice to crush a run, I hadn't had a real good workout in a while.

Recovery week is going well, and this is the kind of workout you do during recovery week. I just hope the rain lets up, as I can't really be subbing in the stationary bike during the next month. That was something I did a little too much last cycle, and we all know how that turned out. But I've been avoiding most of those habits this time around, and I feel like the results will reflect that.

T43 - Recovery Week Attitude - Bike/Swim Brick

Gainesville

I do see the point in recovery week. I really do. But it's hard to get motivated for workouts that aren't even one sixth of the distance you'll be doing at race time. But given that I need to find a point in recovery week, I decided that it is to still get the muscles moving without it being a strain. And to lay off my knee. So I opted to do an hour on the stationary bike today with the iPod after yesterday's intense bike effort, and them swim right after. I saw no point in a gel, this wasn't going to take long.

Bike - 60 minutes, easy spinning on stationary

1 Lipodrene (last one, not cool)
I did manage to figure out how to enter my age and weight into the computer on the stationary bike today, which was cool because I realized I burn a lot more calories biking than I thought. Like I burned about 750 today doing relatively easy spinning on level 11 and going about 17.6 miles. It was just kind of tedious as the trance music got a little old and the Seinfeld reruns aren't nearly as funny without sound. My crotch started to hurt a lot too after the long bike Sunday and the two rides this week. So good think I'm giving it a break. But it was nice to workout in the AC with music on and just kinda chill while I trained. Definitely in the spirit of recovery.

Swim - 4x200, 1x150

I was actually supposed to do 5 200s, but for some reason forgot this in the water. Not that I couldn't have. But the swim was lackluster as the sinlge Lipodrene just wasn't cutting it and I was starting to get hungry. I hadn't wanted to waste a gel on a workout like this, but I bet taking it would have made a difference. Not that the swim was hard, and by the third set I was stroking ok. But it was just very lackluster. So I think I will include gels even in these workouts. Just because its recovery week doesn't mean it has to be half-assed.

My knee is still bothering me. What the fuck? I'm skipping tomorrow's run in the hopes that it feels better by Sunday. I can't have this happen any more during training, as I seem to be limping or at least walking real gingerly all the time now, so I'm staying off my feet as much as possible. Seriously fucking pissing me off.

T22 - The Ugly Club - Swim/Bike Brick (Stationary)

Gainesville

My schedule has been very weird lately. I tend to do work all day, maybe do some training, then stay up and do work until 2 a.m. Miami time aside. Waking up at 11, going to bed at 3. I'm not sure if this is a bad thing or not, as I've been very productive, but it leads to workouts like this one, with me heading out to GHFC at 10 p.m. And let me tell you, there are no good looking people at the gym on Saturday night late. I had the opportunity to walk around a little, and it was like being at Curves or something. I think all the people who are too fat to get dates, and too self conscious to workout with other people around go late night on Saturday. And me, of course, I'm just a weirdo.


Swim: warmup: 400 continuous. last 50 in each 100 is kick
main: 8 x 100 EBEH

2 Lipodrene
48 hours off and I hit the pool with a vengeance. I think I timed my ephedra just right, but I went pretty strong during the warmup. Each EBEH was also solid, as I was not dogging it at all on the "easy' laps. I also put out full effort on all 8 final laps. Nothing bad to say about the swim. I think time off just does me well.

Bike: 45 minutes (Stationary bike)
Yeah, this was another thing I did a little too much last cycle, doing the stationary bike instead of the trainer or going on the road. Again, the whole no motivation thing really hits the bike the hardest, especially when you can use the iPod and watch TV on the stationary. At any rate, it's recovery week and I hadn't used the stationary once yet, and I really didn't feel like setting up the trainer after I got home.

I changed over and walked by a couple of solid 4s engaged in deep conversation on my way upstairs at GHFC. This must have been the social highlight of their night. I put on the iPod and did 45 minutes on the stationary bike, which was not terribly challenging. It still makes you sweat a lot, though. I walked back downstairs to shower and the 4s were still talking, still not working out. Definitely their social highlight.

I'm going to try to keep the stationary bike workouts to a bare minimum this cycle, but if there was even an appropriate spot, this was it. That, and I was supposed to meet up with this girl after my workout, so unlike the rest of the people in there I had social plans that extended past a conversation on the staircase.