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May 5, 2007
Good Stuff
I am so delighted to report that the weather finally cooperated for one of my long rides! It's been nice for a couple weeks now but it seemed like every Saturday morning it was either raining or really windy or pretty chilly. I don't even want to think about last Saturday when the weather necessitated a mid-workout shower to warm up! But when I woke up this morning - 50 degrees and overcast with no chance of rain. I'll take it!
The first hour of my ride was a bit cold. I didn't want to wear too much because I knew by the end of the ride it would be more like 65-70 degrees and I'd be too hot. Cycling is tough. It's not like running where you can just take your long sleeve and tie it around your waist when you get hot.
Anyway, I finally got warmed up and rolling about an hour in and had a good 3.5 hour ride total. Because I do all my riding by myself now these long rides can be intimidating. Three and a half hours by youself can get lonely. But today the time seemed to fly by and before I knew it I was back home and ready for my 30 minute transition run! I rode just a bit over 65 miles.
Quick transition into my running shoes and I was off and boy did my legs feel great! Kind of strange - it usually takes them a good 5 minutes to come alive again off the bike but this morning/afternoon I was flying high. My heart rate was keeping low too so I chugged along and was excited to see that I was running ~7:25 pace. Since when can I run 7:25 pace with my HR under 153 let alone doing that after riding 65 miles?! Progress is fun!
Anyway, good workout overall. When I was finishing up the run I started to feel a little wobbly leading me to believe I didn't take adequate nutrition/fluid on the bike today. This got me to thinking about my nutrition for my first 1/2 IM coming up in early June. I would be lying if I said I wasn't more than just a little worried about the whole nutrition/fluid side of things for that longer distance. I don't want to mess it up and suffer greatly because of it. As they say - nutrition is the 4th discipline of triathlon!
For my long rides I've been taking ~800 kcals on the bike - a mix between fluid, gels and Shot Bloks. This usually leaves me feeling pretty good but with a swim before hand and then the half marathon after, I don't think it's going to be enough. I at first thought I might get away with not having to take gels on the run but I don't think that's going to happen either. My new plan is to take more like 1000 kcals on the bike and try to get at least one gel down early on in the run. That just sounds like SOOOOO much to me but the fact is I'm going to be out there for close to 5 hours so I need to be able to fuel myself well or that 5 hours will turn into 6. And we don't want that. No, we don't want that at all... :)
So yeah - that's my story for today! O is at yet another track meet (prime time track meet season right now!) so Roxy and I will be hanging out this afternoon - likely in front of the tv - likely with our eyes shut. That dog can be wild and crazy and full of energy but she's also pretty good at napping. Luckily napping happens to be one of my specialties too. :)
Hope everyone has a great weekend!
Posted by beth at May 5, 2007 2:31 PM
Comments
Heya Beth,
Really nice representation of your fitness with the low heart rate/fast pace after a long bike ride. Sweeeeeet, you are so-danged fit!
Regarding nutrition: That's great that you are practicing and modifying as you train! 1000 kcal + a gel doesn't sound like very much for 5 hours, though (Then again, I have no knowledge of triathloning; I'm speaking of my limited ultra-distance experience). I'm taking in about 300 kcal an hour during these (shorter distance) ultra-races, a mix between fluids, gels, and nutrition bars.
I know you're the nutrition expert, though, with your job and all! ;) I'm curious what you think of the following info I learned and have been trying to stick to. I was told the following for shorter-distance ultras: You have a glycogen store in your body that's roughly equivalent to the amount of calories your body requires for a single day of life, with no exercise added. (A nutritionist once did this analysis for me and told me it was like 1775 kcal, for example. This was a few years ago, though, and I know my base metabolism is a fair bit higher now.) So, the theory is that, in order to fend off the bonk all the way through an endurance event, you have to keep the caloric consumption high enough that your body doesn't go through all of that glycogen storage until the race is over.
I think this kind of stuff is really fun to organize, though. Call me a dork! :)
Posted by: Meghan at May 6, 2007 12:45 AM