Boulder Musings, Part 3

This blog post was 75% written 8 days ago (please ignore timeline)…training induced laziness has meant it has sat on a word document untouched for days now. Regardless here are my latest ramblings from Boulder. Unfortunately I am in the homestretch of my stay here and my room (yes I’ve checked) is being taken the day after I leave. Already planning next years (longer) sojourn.

Training

Trying to add ‘colour’ to the inherent monotony of training is quite difficult. With swimming there is only so far you can go in describing 10-12hrs a week in a pool, routinely battling ‘larry lactate.’ Swimming in an outdoor pool at more civilized times (7.15am has been my earliest session, but generally I go to the 9 or 11am sessions) has been really nice, it will be a rude shock going back to the 4.20am wakeups in Melbourne.

There are three coaches whose sessions I go to:

1.Wolfgang Dittrich: If Jens Voigt was a swimming coach I’d suspect he’d be like Wolfgang. In his own right he was a super-swimmer, consistently having the fastest swim times at Kona, finishing 3^rd overall one year. His sessions though are not only a test of physical but also mental (especially mathematical) prowess. Sessions are never written on the board and they are never simple. Here is the instructions I received at the start of one session:

 “Okay, you have 9 75s, 3 on 5, 3 on 10, 3 on 1. Then you do, 9 1’s 3 on 25, 3 on 30, 3 on 20, then 9 50’s 1 kick on 1, 1 choice on 50, 1 swim on 40. Okay Go. Don’t waste time, especially at your age.”

Try and remember all of that whilst swimming! Generally as the end of the session nears, he likes to throw in a mileage booster, e.g. 2x500 paddles on 10s rest max. By the time you’re finished he has most likely gone.

In spite of all of that, he’s probably one of my favorite swim coaches I’ve had.

2.Jane Scott: Sister of Dave (I think), frequently refers to us as ‘hooligans,’ e.g. “okay hooligans, hold up, hold up!” Meaning, stop warming up. Like all other coaches at Flatirons, there is no gap between sets, if your sitting at the back of the lane, desperately trying to hold the cycle (and dig yourself out of oxygen debt), its quite crushing to make the last rep, to already see those infront of you already starting another main set! Her sessions are generally the smallest but best attended by the resident freak swimmers.

3. Dave Scott: 6 time Ironman World Champ, Dave Scott’s sessions are a must for any triathlete spending time in Boulder, always new people there. They are generally the biggest with nearly 50 swimmers spread across the 7 lanes. One perk of being an ‘improving’ swimmer is that the two fast lanes have the fewest swimmers, generally only 4 or 5 people per lane. Las Thursday it was me, Tim Don and Craig Alexander! 

Boulder cycling tip, if you want to head into the mountains, its best to do it mid-week rather than on the weekends, as many of the Colorado locals will hoon up the canyons to camp on weekends. With that in mind, I moved my long-ride a day early to Friday, or has it has become known, ‘f-ed up Friday.’ The plan was for a long-ride trying to get in a heap of climbing.

To those who know Boulder my route was: Flagstaff x2, Old Stage Road x2, Jamestown and Ward. 139k’s in 5.31hrs (yes my average speed was very low.) What was a hard ride in and of itself, was made even worse by some of the most brutal conditions I’ve ever encountered. At the top of Jamestown it was still well into the 30s. 30mins into the final climb to Ward the weather turned. The heavens opened with a ferocious thunder-storm and torrential rain. It was quite an eery climb, I barely saw anyone (cars or bikes) for the entire 70mins, moreover there were people shooting on the side of the road (cue some slimily to a horror film). I reached the top freezing. Fortunately there was a small store at the top. Armed with $10 I had a hot chocolate, a coke, bought a garbage bag, a plastic bag and some hospital gloves. Unfortunately I didn’t have the money to ‘upgrade’ to the full yellow suit. With the garbage bag down my front, the plastic bag on my head and with gloves on the descent became almost manageable, I was freezing, probably the coldest I’ve ever been on a bike. The descent in torrential rain, whilst shaking (due to cold) was very sketchy! I was lucky I had Bronti back home to fill me full of warm liquid (once she got over the shock of seeing me in such an uncharacteristic cycling attire). 

On another note, I crashed my bike last week. As usual it was one of those silly crashes when I wasn’t concentrating. I hit a pothole and went over the bars, fortunately I landed on my back (which was cushioned by my backpack). On that note I was VERY lucky that I had a good helmet, it took an enormous impact, getting torn to shreds, my head was fine. If I wasn’t wearing a helmet I’d definitely be in hospital.  

No crash is complete without a complementing pic :)

Boulder Aquathon

In the absence of results posted there is not much detail to give. It was a very weird (and painful) feeling running fast for the first time since March 22^nd, let alone trying to squeeze back into the tri-suit (its feeling a little tighter than I remember!).

About 100 people took to the swim, I’d say nearly half were ‘bandits’ just doing the swim (and not paying!) and (luckily for them) avoiding the run, did I mention my Garmin was reading 41.1c 1hr before the race (added to the fact we were racing at 1600m, this was a brutal experience).

 

With the heat I decided not to wear a wetsuit, the water temperature was about as warm as the Flatirons Pool, I was hot in my trisuit! I excited in a decent position, but a little off the leaders.

 

Out onto the run I thought I was in a decent position, although it was hard to tell as the short-course race were already onto the run. As I’ve mentioned on number of occasions running at altitude is pretty horrible. To put it into perspective at the Boulder Peak Tri, the winner (Tim O’Donnell) ran a 34.50ish, and 2^nd and 3^rdran 36mins.

 

Running sub 4min/ks for the first time in months, in heat and altitude was a perfect storm of suffering. I was moving pretty well (thinking I was sitting around 2^nd from 1k in), one guy caught up to me around the 2k mark, I tried to keep up with him, the pace dropped from a very pedestrian 3.40, to a very uncomfortable and slightly less pedestrian 3.20. This brief foray into mediocre running was short-lived.

At the ONLY aid station I was sitting in 2^nd, my arms started tingling (a tell-tale sign of ‘larry-lactate’ hitting). With a little under 2k’s to go I gave up any hope of holding onto said runner and drifted back into a more sustainable pace. I crossed the line in 3^rd, roughly 20-30s behind the winner. I was spent and very relieved to get through the race. The post race (free) food and the stop at Lucky’s Bakehouse was at least one perk of the 41mins of suffering.

 

Other Notes

-Our homestay has left her house (to go to New Orleans), unfortunately she has left the cat (Barney or Barry, can’t remember). Now, as previously mentioned, I am not a cat person (and also allergic to them). Barney has decided to sleep in my room every-night, despite my best efforts. I went to the toilet today, and suddenly he appears out of nowhere right in front of me.

-The state of coffee has turned me into an espresso-drinker (don’t think I ever had one in Australia). On a better note LOVE bagels!

-There’s an annoying trend of people wearing wetsuits to squad so they can swim in the fast lane…please cease and desist!

-Dave Scott didn’t turn up to coach our squad session yesterday, Tim Don turned coach for our lane…that guy is one funny man!!

-On one hand it is very convenient having the Tour De France on at 6-9am each morning, in spite of the incessant ads. Yet there is something kinda cool about staying up late and watching it back home on SBS (in spite of Anthony Tan’s woeful ‘expert’ analysis).

-Boulder has an obsession with categorized waste disposal, I can deal with ‘Trash’ and ‘Recycling,’ but when they throw ‘compost’ into the mix it really complicates matters. I definitely feel like I’m being judged when I’m disposing of my food at Wholefoods (my favorite haunt).       

-I don’t get why I’m expected to tip at Café’s when there is no table service and you are expected to clean up after yourself.

-We have a new person staying in our house. She wanted to get the Wifi code from me, so I said I’d email it to her….fail!

-My awesome housemate/college friend Bronti is leaving in two days, unsure how I will survive without her cooking for the remainder of the trip. 

-Feeding Guide ‘Snooze’ for Breakfast, ‘Wholefoods’ for Lunch, ‘Boom’ Frozen Yogurt anytime, ‘Amante’ for pre-ride sustenance, ‘Spruce’ for post-ride Sustenance, ‘Pasta-Jays’ for Dinner (and eye-candy)

Till next time 

Boulder Blog Week 2 and 3

Apologies for the lack of blogging last week, on each occasion that I told myself to sit down and write the urge to eat or sleep or some form of inane distraction took over. In reality after the first week here, once I’m back in a routine, the days meld into one. Before you know it another week has passed. Secondly, I have been accused/criticized for namedropping in my posts, all efforts have been made to minimize said fault; however, in spite of my best intentions there will be a lot of namedropping :)

Swimming

Swimming is done at Flatirons, the 25m pool which is both awkwardly shallow and with narrow lanes is far from ideal, but the squads and (more importantly) the people who use them make it easily my favorite place I have ever swum. Its quite hard to put into context (for non tri-tragics) what an incredible standard of people swim at Flatirons. Imagine (using a tennis context) you are being coached by Andre Aggassi and training alongside Rafeal Nadal, Andy Murray and Roger Federrer. Last week one lane included…Craig Alexander (3-time IM World Champ), Tim Don (3-Time Olympian and 2006 ITU World Champ), Lisa Norden (2012 Silver Medalist). Keeping up (aided by some blatant drafting) and not have my bodily functions shut due to exertion (and altitude) are my two most pressing concerns in most sessions.

During one lunch time session, to my chagrin I was leading a lane. My inability to remember sets/send-offs are bad at the best of times. But when we are given annoyingly complicated sets, which are not written down, the whole thing tuned into a farce. To say I was universally despised in my lane would be putting it mildly.

Last Friday Lachie Kerin and I decided (in hindsight rather stupidly) to have an “F-ed up Friday” swim day. In short the goal was to do two squad sessions, totaling at least 10k’s before lunch. The first one was just plain stupid hard. I felt pretty terrible and moved down a lane, only to annoy them (forgot the time-cycle). At the end of the session plus cool down, I had 5k’s on the clock. We donned the cycling kit, rode (at best) 200m down to the bagel store, downed a bagel and a dangerous amount of caffeine. In a very short space of time we were back in the pool. Cue another annoyingly complicated set. I was feeling quite good for the opening 3.5k’s (a welcome change from 1hr earlier) and managed to get through the set. Fatigue-induced delirium always helps in speeding up the process. The last 1k I had to swim solo to get to that magical 10k’s. It was a battle, nearly 3.5hrs in the water, all before 1pm (we first got in the water at 9) I hopped out trashed by quite proud of my efforts.

Biking

Boulder has some of the most incredible riding, the hills are always a good test for my (swim-block induced) deplorable level of bike fitness, not helped by the fact that the general standard of fitness in Boulder means that you have to be prepared to put the ego away. Boulder is probably one of the few places that when you see someone in full team-kit you don’t automatically think they are committing a serious violation of “The Rules” rather they are probably a legit professional. On Saturday Lachie and I rode with Peter Robertson (warning name-dropping…..an Aussie who has won the ITU World Champs three times). His idea of a long-ride and mine were slightly different. A Strava PB of 6mins up the 25k (1100m vertical) climb to Ward and an average speed over the last 1.45 of nearly 41km/h highlighted that. It’s these sort of rides that make you strong, I was happy to get off the bike in one piece, satisfied with my effort.

Ride File Here

 

The other ride that stuck out was today’s. With all the pools shut and the weekly aquathon not on I had a long-ride planned instead. Lachie and I did our usual climb to Ward. Instead of either turning around or climbing another few hundred meters to the Peak to Peak highway and descending, we continued our ascent into ever-thinning air. 2.20mins since we left (of which 2hrs was of solid climbing) we reached 10300 feet (roughly 3100m). It was a surreal experience, especially considering there was still (in some places) clumps of snow on the ground.

Ride File is Here….the speed on the way back was affected by the fact that I snapped my rear-derailler cable so couldn’t get out of the big-ring.

Yeah I found some snow and got overly excited

Run

The trails here are pretty insane, apart from the swooping bird (which for its size has an incredible amount of confidence) things on this front (in comparison) have been pretty mundane. The heat has meant that I’m either running at or before 6am or after 6pm. The altitude initially made running a VERY slow process.  Unlike some people who do long runs at low (or even sub) 4min/k pace, I am a plodder when I run aerobically, preferring to keep it around the 4.45-50/k mark. The altitude relegated that to around 5.20 pace for the opening few days. It probably took me around 10 days to get to a level similar to sea-level performance.

 

General Thoughts

Only make eye-contact with someone in Boulder if you are willing and able to engage in a full in-depth conversation. People are VERY friendly here.

Swimming on the right hand side of the lane is not ideal, but tumble-turning is fricken impossible, I am unable to teach myself to do it the other way.

My new friend Barney, the “checkout chick” at Luck’s Supermarket asked me how my day was, I did the usual response of ‘good,’ I asked him how his day was…. “SPECTACULAR!!!!!”

Our homestay enjoys eating and passing judgment on the incredible cooking my housemate and college friend Bronti does for ME.

I just got a fan in my room!! This is a big deal! The lack of airconditiong has meant that some nights my room has been near 30c’s

Bronti has been spoiling me rotten in the food department. Was greeted on my return today by an incredible lunch.

Wholefoods self-serve meals….nuff said!! Although don’t get over-excited in your first outing and get 3.1lbs of food on your first outing.

My homestay keeps acting surprised if she ever sees me during the day. Generally if she sees me more than once before dinner (she is a late riser) she asks me if I’m on a recovery day.

On my weekend of babysitting the cat I discovered I’m allergic to them. (long story short the whole house was away for the weekend except me, I was left in charge of the cat).

-Things that make me unhappy: Being mistaken for a New Zealander.

On a completely unrelated note, I stumbled across this article and found it absolutely fascinating. Here is an exert from the article, link here:

There’s a well-known survey in sports, known as the Goldman Dilemma. For it, a researcher, Bob Goldman, began asking elite athletes in the 1980s whether they would take a drug that guaranteed them a gold medal but would also kill them within five years. More than half of the athletes said yes. When he repeated the survey biannually for the next decade, the results were always the same. About half of the athletes were quite ready to take the bargain.

Only recently did researchers get around to asking nonathletes the same question. In results published online in February, 2009 in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, exactly 2 of the 250 people surveyed in Sydney, Australia, said that they would take a drug that would ensure both success and an early death. “We were surprised,” James Connor, Ph.D., a lecturer at the University of New South Wales and one of the study’s authors, said in an e-mail message. “I expected 10-20 percent yes.” His conclusion, unassailable if inexplicable, is that “elite athletes are different from the general population, especially on desire to win.”

With the Tour de France on at a very sleep-appropriate time of 8-11am here, not only have I been able to watch almost every stage (generally they are recorded and watched when I get home). Every year the question of doping rears its ugly head. I find the physcology of doping and especially its justification fascinating. Studies such as this provide a fascinating insight into the murky world of doping in cycling as portrayed in books such as the ‘Secret Race.’ The Sport Scientists blog is another great resource if you’ve got some time to kill (and are slightly nerdy). There latest post (an annual TDF occurrence) looks at the power outputs of the top riders in the mountains, it is well worth a read.

Hopefully I will get my act together and post next week, I also have an aquathon, that in itself will be fun. Running sub 4min K’s (well if all goes to plan) will be an interesting experience, considering the last ‘hard’ run I’ve done was on March 22nd. 

Till next time