A View of Manhattan (and New Jersey)

Just a quick photo post. Last weekend was part of my recovery week so I took it easy and led some new team members on their first ride over the George Washington and up to Piermont. I think everyone enjoyed and they were all pumped to get over the bridge and onto 9W again soon.

(Pictured: Gabe and me on the bridge on the way back to Manhattan. New York City on the left and New Jersey on the right.)

Race Report #3: Spring Series 1

In preparing for my first Ironman last year, I really fell in love with cycling... which is a good thing since I spent 10-15 hours on the bike each week. With some encouragement from my cycling mentor Brad, I decided to dedicate a good amount of my spring to road cycling. It's a completely different riding style than you experience in long-course triathlon and adds a lot of fun to my training.

Anyway, I competed in the first race of the Central Park Spring Series a few weeks back. The morning--5am morning--was brutally cold with sleet. Considering that it was my first road race and tight pack effort is definitely not my bread-and-butter riding, I really considering calling it off. I showed up to registration, asked Brad whether he thought it was safe enough to race and he basically roped me into committing.

We did a warm-up lap, talked strategy and then lined up at the start line.

The field was small--15 to 20 riders--which I was happy to see given the conditions.

The race covered about 12.5 miles (two loops of Central Park).

Some notes
Lap 1:
- Worked way too hard on first pass at Harlem Hill. After pushing up the hill, I realized that I had dropped the peloton... a little early for that!
- Stayed in front all of the way through "shit alley" (named for all of the horse excrement from the Central Park carriages). Being up front was definitely more work but kept me feeling safe.
- Pushed up Cat's Paw Hill way too early and got smoked through it. Was in last place going over the hill and had to work to catch the peloton after getting through the hill.

Lap 2:
- Took it easy on the east side to recover from my effort to catch the peloton.
- Did some work towards top of Park.
- Led the group down the hill and into Harlem Hill. This time I worked less hard on Harlem Hill.
- Led through fast portion on west side. Drifted to back of pack through "shit alley."
- The race got a little sketchy as the pace picked up and I nearly bit it on a pylon.
- Worked back to near the front (on the side) for final hit at Cat's Paw. Stayed in saddle for a while and used that to pop out and sprint to the end.
- Finished with pack.

All in all, the race was very cool and pretty safe. I worked way too hard but I didn't mind pulling for people since it was my first race.

And, after finishing, I took a look at my bike. Front and rear derailleurs were frozen (i.e. I couldn't shift gears) and there was a sheet of frozen sleet coating my bike frame... Rough!

Tomorrow, I'll be doing the third Spring Series race. Lots of learning ahead and I'm definitely excited.

Testing!

So I've just wrapped up Base 1, my first month of real training for 2009. Each four-week base period consists of 3 long weeks of increasing volume followed by a rest week. During the rest week, I significantly cut my volume and do three tests, one in each sport. The idea of the tests is to gauge my fitness after each period and track my progress month-over-month. The swim test is simply a time trial. But, for the bike and run, I do Joe Friel's threshold tests. These tests allow me to not only measure my speed/pace improvements but also track changes in my anaerobic threshold and determine my heart rate zones.

The run test:
- easy 15-minute warm-up
- 3 1-minute efforts comprised of 20-second sprint followed by 40-second recovery
- 30-minute time trial, all out, even pace but to the point of complete exhaustion at the end

The bike test:
- easy 15-minute warm-up
- 3 2-minute efforts of 1-minute high cadence, 1-minute recovery
- 3-minute effort, all out!
- 5-minute recovery
- 30-minute time trial, all out, even pace but to the point of complete exhaustion at the end

For both tests, I use my average heart rate from the final 20 minutes of the time trial to estimate my anaerobic threshold and profile my heart-rate exertion zones.

Anyway, enough of the nitty gritty. The tests were hard--very hard. Haven't done much speed work since last summer and I definitely felt it. By the final 5 minutes of the run time trial, I just focused on keeping my gait, all the time feeling like I was about to blow up. The bike was equally awful, this time the misery being caused by crazy headwinds.

The results:

Cycling
Zone 1 <177
Zone 2 117-131
Zone 3 132-137
Zone 4 138-146
Zone 5a 147-150
Zone 5b 151-155
Zone 5c >156

Running
Zone 1 <151
Zone 2 151-160
Zone 3 161-169
Zone 4 170-176
Zone 5a 177-180
Zone 5b 181-187
Zone 5c >188

All in all, the two tests went reasonably well. I think I had the run spot on; had trouble finding my pace on the bike due to the wind. I find it interesting that my run zones were so much higher. I don't know if that points to muscular endurance being my limiter on the bike or is just something to be expected. Have to consult my two bike gurus, Nick and Brad, for insight.

Will be exciting to see where I'm at in a month's time. Now on with Base 2!

Race Report #2: Bronx Half Marathon

Wrapped up my second race of 2009 this past Sunday. The Bronx Half--second of five NYRR half marathons--was a set of loops up and down the rolling hills of the Bronx. Unlike the Manhattan Half two weeks before, the weather on Sunday was beautiful and warm--so warm, in fact, that I ditched my long-sleeved jersey at mile 2 and had to wander back along the course to pick it up later.

All in all, a decent race. Finished in 1:37. I had been hoping for a 1:34 but was happy with the time considering my 5-hour bike ride and hill repeats the day before. In fact, my legs didn't begin to feel the previous day's workout until I hit some reasonably bad hills at Mile 10 and slowed up significantly... Guess this bodes well for my run off the bike this season.

Posie was awesome and came up to hang out and watch the early AM race. Looking forward to running the third half (Brooklyn) with her in May.

A few pictures of the finish from her camera:

Coming in to finish up.

Looking over my shoulder to see if I'm going to be caught in the last 10m.

Sponsorship!

So some pretty exciting news... I recently was selected by my team, SBR Multisports, to be a sponsored athlete for the 2009 race season. As an SBR Ambassador, I will lead a few team workouts a week and receive sponsorship benefits from SBR, Zoot, Blue Seventy, Rudy Project and Squadra! Now all I need to do is get some podiums and qualify for Kona and Clearwater....... More to come on this front.

Manhattan Half Pics

Just a few pics from the Manhattan Half.

Coming in for the finish with Nic from Trilife. He and I ran the last 5 miles together.

Ditto the first comment.

Crossing the line.

Chugging away around mile 8.

Starting to speed up for the last 3 miles.

Nic and me starting our kick for the last 200m.