The Festive Season

Well just for a change it has been a long time since I last posted.  But hey it's the Xmas season and of course I'm slack.

After the Taupo Half Ironman I wrote about in my last post I was pretty washed out for quite a few days, all that fatigue just to get a finisher medal.

Even the following Saturday an easy 70k ride was a real battle just to meander around the countryside at a very slow pace.  But work is always a bit frantic in the lead in to Xmas so having a bit of a break from training fit in nicely with getting 'stuff' done.

The Xmas break itself was great.  Obviously pressie time is always good.

But no these aren't all mine but hidden in there were some very cool things coming my way.  It was a lovely Queensland day on Christmas Day and the family had a great time. My personal pressie highlight was a new Garmin Edge 800 unit, courtsey of my lovely wife.  This is a GPS based cycling computer, heart rate monitor, course follower and so on.  It is a lovely unit as shown in the middle of the "cockpit" here. (Also the cool Profile water bottle was a gift from my daughter Courtney)

The Edge has some really cool features.  You can create a course using something like MapMyRide and send it to the unit and it will guide you around the course just like a car GPS. It will also let you ride against a "virtual partner"; now this can be you from the last time you completed the course or just an average speed that you want to maintain.  Either way the system calculates the time and distance that you are either ahead or behind your virtual partner.  The first time I used this was an easy 40k loop I do out around the bayside suburbs of Wynnum & Manly.

This map was actually recorded from that ride. Anyway I set the virtual partner to 30kph and set off.  This course has the hills at the start and also the ride out to the coast is usually into the wind.  So the potential is there to be somewhat behind by the time the coast is reached, but having the system tell you that you are 30 secs or 300 metres behind is great for keeping focus and while there were points when I was behind I ended up the ride something like 3:45 ahead.  It was great fun.  I have also used it to compare one morning ride against another.

So far this year has involved no travel for work and that has been just great for getting better consistency in to my training.  Now that it is down to the last 50 days this is going to be important.  Certainly I can feel it in all 3 sports so far, so the next few weeks will be telling.

Tomorrow morning I am setting out on my first attempt at a BIG days training.  This idea comes from two world renowned coaches Joe Friel & Gordo Byrn.  Tomorrow will involve a 50 minute swim, 90 minute rest, 4:30 cycle, 90 minute rest and a 2:00 run.  All up just over 7 hours of training for the day.  I will report back promptly.  Promise.