am

Weights

Swim

pm

Turbo - main set (tempo) 50min x 230W x 85rpm

Busy day today, don't usually train twice but the opportunity came up. 

Beetroot is meant to be the latest thing for enhancing exercise. I don't like it. I've had some sitting in the fridge to try for the last month and today I gave it a go. Not as bad as I remember from childhood. Did it make any difference?

The red graph is today (appropriate colour!) the blue is same session a month ago. No difference, although I hadn't done two sessions that day. Unfortunately I may need to experiment further.

Dropped the saddle another 2mm today (at the end of the session) - this is one of the reasons behind the blog - it helps to keep track. 

Run
60mins easy pace with a lot of drill.

Busy night shift, tried to sleep in the day but found it difficult. Ran slowly but probably started out too fast as Achilles sore but OK.

Core
Yoga
Swim 1.4km - drill

A quick trip to the gym. The gym pool is only 20m long so only really able to do drill work.
Appointment made with GP for the Achilles - hope the surgeons don't get involved but I think it would be good to get an ultrasound to see what's going on.
Night shift tonight, will take the Christmas chocolate cake into work instead of eating it myself.

Turbo
270W x 5min at 65rpm on 5min recovery x 6sets

Here's where i'm at on the turbo. I have some major mile stones which I often can't manage on the first attempt. The latest is 3x10min at 270W with 5min recoveries - so i've broken it down into the above.

Looking in the diary this time last year I was doing 5x5min at 300W but that was all I was focusing on - there's some work to do.  

The saddle came down again tonight which felt much better. It looks like i've had the saddle way too high for a long time. Apparently achilles and hamstring problems coming on together are a classic sign. I think i've been measuring it from the wrong place on the saddle all this time - The widest point rather than some arbitrary point further along. 

I've also been tinkering around with TSS or training severity score - this is meant to give you an idea of how hard the session was to allow appropriate recovery. This session was 89. Over 150 means rest a day. It was in Sir Bradley Wiggin's biography so it deserves some attention.

NEW YEAR - return of the blog

With the start of the new year it's back to the blog. Just over 30 weeks to the ironman. There's been lots of change since my last entry back in August, with a new son Rory being the major headline.

The main purposes of writing remain; accountability so I do the sessions I set out to and to let my Mum know what i'm doing. 

This year will be different as both my achilles are very dodgy. I don't think it'll be a fast year but I hope to do the work and see what happens.
The mantra is going to be "injuries are a chance to come back stronger"

Since August i've kept the training ticking along. What i've done;

- 7th in the ludlow sprint triathlon.

- A gym and core session once a week.

- Yoga once a fortnight (weekly was the goal)

- Swim drill - twice a week

- Turbo - twice a week - once interval session and one tempo session. I haven't managed to stop changing the bike position all the time but keep learning more.
- Lost 5kg, from 72kg to 67kg (but back up to 68Kg over Christmas)

Run 60mins

Slow jog round park in Mansfield. I've moved back to big clunky "anti-pronation" running shoes to see if the achilles improve. The logic being I wore them before there was a problem.