Race Report: Racing the Valencia F1 Circuit

Thanks to Virgin Active, a bunch of Team Freespeed went down to Valencia to race the Valencia triathlon at the weekend.

A week after Ironman 70.3 Zell Am See, Mr TOTKat and I would have just about enough time to get over lead-legs and needing to sleep a lot, and get out and race an Olympic distance with a good degree of fitness and energy.  We swapped bikes in the bike boxes, TT bikes out, road bikes in - Valencia is a drafting race so TT bikes aren't allowed (or rather, long aero bars aren't allowed as they're pretty dangerous at close-quarters riding).  Plenty of clip-on, stubby aero bars in evidence at the race, but I'll get to that in a bit.

We flew out on Friday morning from Gatwick and into 28C an sunny skies in Valencia - gorgeous!  The forecast was for cloud and still warm across the whole weekend, so no need for a wetsuit (though we both packed one, just in case) and no need for socks apart from the fact I really want to be sure my feet are good for the next few weeks into the Rotherham 80km Ultra marathon.  Fun and games at the airport with 9 people and 5 bike boxes to get to the hotel and only normal-sized cars as taxis.  No mini-buses, no people carriers.  We managed somehow and got to the hotel, which was really lovely and welcomed us with cava and orange juice as well as little gift packs with maps and travel passes in them.

A little unpack, then off for a swim down at the beach and back to the hotel for an early night.

Next day we put bikes together and headed out down to the sea front to have a look at the race expo.  Not so many vendors there but a few stalls with general sports kit and the registration tents for when that opened later on in the afternoon.  Back to the hotel for a huge nap and then out with the other guys again to register and rack up bikes.

Sunday morning was an earlyish start at 6am to get to transition before it closed at 07:45 in time for the first race start at 8am.  I popped into transition to set up my shoes, helmet and take the plastic cover off my bike that'd been protecting it from the potential rain overnight.  I said I'd take the plastic cover off Matt's bike for him so he could have a nice lie in for his race start at 10:30 so I did that and checked his tyres were OK - they were.

Mr TOTKat was due to be off at 08:20, so those of us off later went to check out the swim course while he got ready to start and then watched the swim leg for the first few waves and then saw Matt burning off the front of his wave before Jenny and I headed to get ready for our start.  We were herded into the start pen for a pre-race talk; 5 minutes in Spanish, no English for the International athletes.  Oh well!  We then plopped into the water, which was gorgeous temperature for swimming in!  It was so very very salty too.

Bang went the start cannon and I tried really hard not to just mow over the row of women in front of me who were really slow, but got over the reticence and got on with it.  It really wasn't very fighty as deep water swim starts go, just a little jostling at the start then I had clear water.  Having recced the swim course earlier, we had a great idea of how to sight for almost all of it and I put some good effort in for the first few hundred meters before easing off a bit, slightly distracted by the salt water in my mouth.

With the beautiful water, the temperature and the freedom of just a tri-suit maybe, the swim felt really really easy.  I didn't put a whole lot of effort in, if I'm honest, but it turned out I led the second pack for quite a way until getting under the bridge for the final few meters and a couple of women overtook me, and I let them as I wasn't sure where the exit was so I'd rather follow them.  I scrambled out, up the ramp and jogged the long long carpet through to transition and around to where my bike was racked.  On with the helmet, race number, socks (paranoid about blisters at the moment), bike shoes, sunglasses, unracked bike and jogged with it to the bike exit.

Over the line, mount the bike and clip in.  I heard cheers from the spectators of "Go on Kat!" etc.  I guessed that was Nick and Mr TOTKat as he'd've finished by now.  Start to pedal as I just hit the left turn for the bridge and *THUB*THUB*THUB* er... not a good noise.  Stop, unclip, feel back tyre - fine, feel front tyre - flat as a pancake.

Bugger.

My repair kit was not with me, having lost a chunk of it last week at Ironman 70.3 Zell Am See I'd not replaced it yet and decided not to carry a reduced kit for an Olympic distance race.  I unclipped my other foot, dismounted and hugged the fence back to transition against the flow of other athletes.  I had to find a race official, to withdraw from the race so they wouldn't worry about a missing athlete.  I found one with a radio and made the international sign of the glum face and pointed at my dead wheel.  That worked.  Mr TOTKat had by that time made his way level with where I was and shouted that I should use his repair kit from his bike.  I politely declined at that point - it'd've taken me ages to find his bike, get the kit and wrestle the still fairly new tyre off and by that time I'd've lost over 10 minutes and I'd be the last person over the finish line.  I didn't much fancy that and I'd had a lovely swim, so why get cross and have a horrible run by myself in the blazing sun when I didn't really need to?

I racked up my bike and joined the boys to cheer the rest of the team home over the line.  Turns out I was 3rd in the Vet Females in the swim.  Which was nice.

Matt won the Veterans race, and Jenny was 4th woman overall and 3rd in the open women's race.  Pretty darned good for her seeing as she'd had the twins only 10 months ago and not been able to train for a long time!

All in all, I really enjoyed the race and the weekend.  The swim was really very nice and although it was a shame not to have been able to ride the bike course, there's always another year and we'd be more than happy to go back again.  The short of it, the Valencia Triathlon is a good 'un and at a good time towards the end of the season to keep spirits up in the sun.

[Thanks to Nick for the use of all of his photos in this article!]

Nick on the camera bike

Race Report - Virgin Active London Triathlon 2013, Sunday (Olympic distance)

Having had a bit of fun on Saturday and a lovely meal with team and some of our sponsors in the evening, the alarm went off at 04:30 on Sunday morning.  I wasn't due to race until 12:25, but Mr TOTKat was off at 06:30 for the Olympic Plus (1.5km swim, 80km bike, 10km run) so we had to be up, breakfasted and in the Excel centre at 05:30 to rack up and get him ready.

For the second time in 9 months I had porridge for breakfast, with a healthy handful of California Raisins (oh how I have missed raisins!) and some actual sugar in it.  I figured that as I'd taken a good chunk out of my carb stores on Saturday by having a bit of a burn above the threshold where I start to burn carbs at an appreciable rate, I wanted to make sure I'd topped them back up again before my midday effort.

Somewhere around 160BPM there's a knee point in my ratio of fat:carb burned

I cheered off Mr TOTKat and the rest of the Freespeeds who were doing the Olympic Plus and went to get a coffee in the 20 mins I then had before they'd start to come in off the swim.

After cheering them all back in from the swim; Dion, Matt, Hobbo, Cat, Ali, Dec and Mr TOTKat I then needed to go and find some food to bridge the gap I was going to have between a 5am breakfast and finishing my race some time around 3pm.  Food scored, I headed out onto the bike course to wave at the guys with Jenny, Mette, Richard and the twins.  Then a quick look at a bit of the run course to take photos and it was time to get myself into a wetsuit and head for the swim assembly point.

Having put in a 15 minute easyish, fully-drafted 750m in the sprint on Saturday, I wasn't sure how the swim would go.  But I tell you what, I did the one thing I really wanted to do in every race for the last 10 or so and I started out really hard.  I led the whole wave for the first 200m!  Then faded a bit and fell into a rhythm, sadly in clear water with no toes to draft off.  I dug in and just decided to try to stay as on-course as possible and make sure I got some water into my wetsuit at the top just before the end so it would slip off easily given I struggled a bit on Saturday with my shoulders (they're big shoulders and they didn't get all that wet, so that does make it difficult.)

Best Olympic distance swim ever!  PBd by 21s and without putting a huge amount of effort in; 9th in age group too.  Quite pleased with that.  The run up to transition was a long one, thankfully it was compulsory to take off wetsuits before running up the stairs to transition.  My choice of racking point, although easy to find, meant that I had a long ol' run to get to my bike, but a shorter run on cleats from there to the bike exit.

Helmet on, followed by race number belt, bike shoes and sunglasses.  Bike unracked and then a trot off to the mount line.  A two lap route, with some roundabouts, undulation and the Limehouse Link.  Fun!

Garmin had a little trouble in the Limehouse Link tunnel, as you can see from the plot straight-lining below on the map...

And I was *shifting* on that course.  Yes, it was a bit windy and I got a good few hard gusts that pushed me across the road a couple of times.  But I had some fun and I got up the confidence to let go through the Limehouse Link and let the speed really pick up - the shame is that Garmin loses coverage through there so doesn't show the speeds I managed through the tunnel - reckon I probably gained an extra 15kph on top of the speed I was doing entering the tunnel (you can see the blue line on the graph stops each time I go through the tunnel - 6 times in all).

I got back to transition to find my bit of the racking void of other bikes, the odd one hanging but really only the odd one.  I felt great - in an "on the edge" kind of way at times due to the windy gusts and the speed through the tunnel down on the aero-bars and with no way to get to the brakes in an emergency - but I did ease off a little at times, so I know I could have gone harder.  I did remember to get into a low gear before that nasty little trick hill up into transition at the end of the bike, but slipped gears quite a bit and worried myself that I might fall over like a couple of ladies did in front of me on Saturday.  1 hour and 8 minutes, only a minute quicker than 2011 where I had had no idea about anything, had done the odd bit of cycling and was on a road bike.  That said, it was quite a bit windier this year and I did come in 4th in my age group this time.  I'll take that.

Check that lean :oD

The run was a 3 lap course this year, only 3 times up the slope into transition, but a lot wigglier, and hot and windy too.  I felt horrible throughout the run, but while I was doing it I completely forgot that if I feel terrible, it means I'm not slacking on effort too much.  So despite failing to be able to get my heart rate to go over 170bpm (proper effort running at that distance puts me 180bpm+), I managed to PB the run by a couple of minutes over my all time Olympic and several over last time on a course & conditions that have been recognised as a bit tougher than 2011.

Over the line in 8th place in my age group, up from 32nd in 2011.  I think I'm happy with that, given I've not been training for this distance specifically, but for 70.3 really.  It's a shame I have no finish line photo, but I do like this one from the run course.

All in all, it was a great weekend and I really really enjoyed it.  Above and beyond my own racing and having fun with the team around the expo etc., Mr TOTKat got out and raced for the first time since IM Wales last year (knee injury for months since a half marathon in October); he had a great race, hit his goals and I'm really happy for him too!

Race Report - Virgin Active London Triathlon 2013, Saturday surprise sprint relay

What a weekend!

I'd always intended to race the Virgin Active London Triathlon this year and had entered previously, but since then I won the Virgin Active competition to become the 12th member of Team Freespeed Virgin Active and that meant it was more than just the Sunday Olympic race on the cards.

Saturday was now a day that I was now going to be taking part in team duties; helping out on the Virgin Active stand at the expo and perhaps filling in on a relay team for the VIPs if there were problems for any of the teams with people unable to race.

Saturday morning, Mr TOTKat headed off to parkrun at Wansted Flats while I went to the expo to register, find the stand, meet the team and some of the sponsors.  The guys at Skechers were brilliant; knowledgeable, enthusiastic about the new range of Performance shoes and really helpful with sizing.  I've been running in the GoRun Ride for a couple of weeks now and I think Mr TOTKat is going to kill me if I mention how incredibly light they are one more time!  Looking forward to trying more of the range soon.  I bumped into Stuart and Richard Hobson at the Skechers stand, closely followed by Dec, Cat, Dion, Ali, Matt, Charlie, Jamie, Jenny and Richard Melik.  Tim arrived later and Sam was racing in IM Switzerland (and a great result he had there too in hot conditions with a no-wetsuit swim too).

We all headed upstairs to split into groups to help with the VIPs and Virgin staff competing in the race - offering tips, advice and making people feel comfortable about their first race as there were quite a few. Jenny,  Jamie and Matt headed into the VIP area to help with a couple of the celebrity relay teams who had missing members for various reasons and I helped in the staff room.  Shortly after that, there was a problem with one of the Cosmopolitan magazine relay teams who had lost their swimmer and cyclist both.  Richard Hobson was going to step up and take on the job but had no idea where his bike was, so I volunteered and then had to trot back to the hotel (about 10 minutes jog) to get bike, helmet, wetsuit and bike shoes.  So exciting!

Poor Holly having been dumped by the rest of her team had me come to the rescue :o)  Not quite the same standard as the rest of the Freespeed team, but not too shabby in the end nonetheless.  I wasn't expecting to race, so putting in a bit of an effort and coming out 57th (overall - mixed age & gender) in the swim and 57th (overall - mixed age & gender) on the bike of all the sprint teams (253 teams in total) I felt pretty good about thatand it put Holly in a good place to have a nice run and finish well before a lot of the other teams.

The swim was a nice surprise and I got on someone's feet and drafted pretty much the whole way around for the first time ever - I was trying to take it easy but put in a decentish time for sprint relay team.  I had a bit of fun on the bike, though the sprint course was very short at the first turn end so there wasn't much chance to get any speed up but the other end was quite fun and the promised rain didn't come.  Richard Melik took a cracking shot of me on the bike in the sunshine in my borrowed race top (thanks Matt!).  I also ended up borrowing swimming goggles (thanks Jamie!) and snaffling a race number belt as I really wasn't prepared for racing that day.

Holly (from Cosmo) was ready and waiting in transition for me when I came in off the bike and she had a lovely run out in the sun and seemed to really enjoy the whole experience.  Shame I didn't get a photo taken with her really.

I can happily say that the sprint was great fun and I was very pleased to have been able to help out someone who might have missed out on the experience of being part of a relay team otherwise.

But Sunday... I had an Olympic distance race to do!  (To Be Continued...)

Chewing at the bars of my cage [@thelondontri @virginactiveuk]

The day before the weekend of The Virgin Active London Triathlon and I am right where I should be before a race - chewing through the bars of my cage to get out and race!

Last couple of months training; pink = intense/long training, blue = fitness, yellow = "race freshness"

Having tapered training down, keeping the number of sessions this week the same but dialling back the duration or intensity, I've been getting more and more itchy to just go out and run hard, or swim fast or *grrrrr* anything!  And that's where you're supposed to be at this point before an important race.  I can't wait to get out there on Sunday and mash around the swim, bike and run!  I'll be fit, well-adapted and rested with not having put as much fatigue as usual into my body this week and the little fun race the weekend before last really whetted my appetite.

My checklist is sorted and, even better, I have race kit to collect on Saturday morning and I'll be in full Freespeed colours for this flagship race.  I'm going to be so happy and proud to be wearing them (plus they are amazingly comfy - I have a pair of the tri-shorts already and they're lovely to wear) and the lift you get from supporters yelling for you and ringing cow-bells is something special.  I had a taste of that last weekend and a long time back at Blenheim (very fond memories of my first race there!) and it is an amazing feeling that even the hardest cynic can't fail to be moved by.

Tomorrow, I'll be on the Virgin Active stand at the triathlon expo in the afternoon, so if you're racing, supporting or just at the expo for a look/shop come and say hi!  Sunday... I'll be out on the course, having fun!

Virgin Active London Triathlon: 1 week to go! @thelondontri @virginactiveuk

One week to go!

And ohboy are we ready for a taper week :o)  I'm gonna go crazy!

This weekend Mr TOTKat and I went parkrun touring again for the first time since he did his knee in.  He's been slowly working back up to the 5km distance after many weeks of not being allowed to run (or cycle) at all and this week was the first time he's been able to run 5km entirely in one go.  And it was lovely!  We went to Clair parkrun at Haywards Heath which meant a nice little trip on the train.  A hilly 4.5 lap course in this heat was going to be challenging enough, but I had an intervals session of 5x1200m off 6 minutes scheduled and I was going to try to do that over parkrun and an extra lap.

Not today, sweetie and not on that course!  Too hot and too hilly, but I had a bit of a go; warmed up with some drills for a lap before starting and then hared off for my first interval.  Over the course, I decided that 1200m intervals just weren't practical and with the hills, the 6mins/1.2km plus some recovery wasn't going to be happening.  Still the quickest parkrun this year for me, but of course way off my 5km PB (22:36! srsly, I have no idea how that happened but reckon it was a lot to do with not being allowed to do any swimming & outdoor cycling for months earlier so ending up working on running a lot, and then a really good warm up).

So I have a medium length bike in for tomorrow, followed by a little brick run afterwards.  My worry at the moment on cycling is the RideLondon 100 the week after VALT where it's not only 100 miles, but there are a couple of evil hills in there so I'm feeling a bit apprehensive having done pretty much no hill work on the bike this year.  So, I sorta want to be a bit naughty and do some hills instead of a gentle 2.5 hour ride.  We'll see if I'm good or not :o)  This time next week I'll've finished the race and be hopefully not nursing very chafed underarms due to the salt water like last time I did this course - this time I'll use bodyglide and try to get rinsed off a bit better under the water sprays at the swim exit.

Not a lot planned in for the rest of the week; rest day on Monday, little short runs on Tue and Wed, then a short, sharp swim Thu and a short, sharp bike Fri and that's it!  Hoping to pick up some team kit on Thursday morning too - it'll be good to ride and run in the right stuff and wear it with pride.

Sneaky extra race :o)

I'll be entering the Shock Absorber Women Only Triathlon at Eton Dorney on Sunday.  (Thanks to Jenny for suggesting it might be fun!)  It's going to be a real fun bash at 3/4 Olympic distance on a flat, sweeping bike course and a totally flat run course on tarmac with a bit of grass right at the end.

I had a miserable time at the HSBC Olympic distance race two years ago (back before I had any idea about what training was, how to do it etc.) at this venue, but a whole lot has changed since then and I expect a stonking good time on Sunday.

Not sure I'll get to race in my new Sailfish G-Range wetsuit (courtesy of my new membership of Team Freespeed Virgin Active - thank you for the incredible support so far guys!) as the water may be warmer than the threshold for a wetsuit ban under BTF rules (22C).  Bit of a shame really as the little try-out I had in it suggests that it's a really quick suit!  Also not sure I'll manage to sustain the three tweaks to my swim stroke that team-mate Matt Molloy suggested this morning; one of them really puts a lot more power in my stroke, but as always with more power it means it's gotta come from somewhere and it's quite tiring when it's not ingrained into technique with a good few hours practice.  That said, 800m swim isn't all that long to really dump out some energy :o)

I'm going to be brave and use the TT bike (though I'm being advised to take advantage of the fact that the team is headline sponsored and run by Freespeed (bike fit studio - Retul certified) and have my bars checked out for suitability for me, so I'll do that soonish but there's not enough time before Sunday) as there's pretty much no need to get up out of the aero-position for the whole bike leg apart from at the end.  Fingers crossed I can do that as it's great experience to rack up for me, given I'm not the most confident in my own ability cyclist.  I so want to get a good go on that bike with the new HED Jet wheels on it (6 on the front, 9 on the rear)!

And I'll be giving these here Skechers Go Run (Ride) a good try out on the run too - they feel spectacularly light but are a lot more cushioned than I'm used to.  Reckon they'll be perfect for the training and run I'll be doing in October - Rowbotham's Round Rotherham (80km Ultra Marathon).

AND there's a barbecue after the race too!  Perfect!

Countdown to @thelondontri

The little countdown timer has gone under 24 days to The London Triathlon now and I'm feeling a mixture of emotions.  It's been quite a while since I've raced at Olympic distance (and, to be fair, I've only done 3 anyway) and I've really not managed to race much this year at all, so it's feeling unfamiliar.  That said, London was amazingly good fun when I did it in 2011 and despite lots of rookie errors I felt great and it was such a rush crossing the line that I cried with happiness!

I've come on a bit since then, so I really want to put in a good time this year.  And given that I will have a good base and some consistent training in place, along with good nutrition and relaxation choices there is absolutely no reason why I shouldn't put in a good time this year.

The other good thing is that I'm enjoying the training; as one World Champion said to me once at a workshop "Enjoy the journey, don't focus solely on the race. It's a long journey!".  So I am.  And it's great! Sometimes I have to keep reminding myself that I've only been doing this triathlon lark (well, any sport at all really) for 3 and a bit years, it's such a big and joyful part of my life I can't remember how it was before.

*tiny thermonuclear explosion of joy* @virginactiveuk @teamfreespeed

Somebody pinch me; I can't believe it's real!  I, er, won.

Thanks Heather, I don't look 40 in this one :oD

I am now the 12th member of  Team Freespeed Virgin Active.  11 high performance athletes and me.  I am so unbelievably happy, scared, excited, nervous, honoured, fired-up... it really is a dream come true.  11 of the best amateur athletes in triathlon at the moment and I'm going to be able to spend a bit of time with them, talk with them, race with them, be part of their team and it is all because of the generous gift from their sponsors Freespeed and Virgin Active.  There is lots of support and kit coming my way, with a membership to the gorgeous Chiswick Riverside site of Virgin Active health clubs and I'll be racing in team kit at the Virgin Active London Triathlon and Prudential RideLondon-Surrey 100, as well as Valencia Triathlon a bit later in the year.

I need a little bit of a lie-down and some time to make sense of it, but right now I'm on cloud 9 and want to start to channel some of this phenomenal, new enthusiasm into mojo for training well.

Another mixed bag

I had a time trial scheduled in for last night's training session with coachJez.  The plan was for a partly indoor sprint tri but by the time I got to the session, I didn't really see the point of doing it.  I have 4x identical sprint races this year, the first of which is really very soon, so why do a time trial now?

After a bit of a chat, we decided to go ahead with -something- anyway.  So I plopped into the pool in my 2XU tri separates and hit a 400m swim.  Which was rubbish.  07:18 and every time I turned, my shorts felt like they were filling up and causing drag.  This was very confusing at the time as last year all I remember of those shorts is how fabulously comfy they are.  I'd never felt that drag in the water before. Current suspicion is that I've not worn them for a swim without a wetsuit over the top... I'll verify that from my race spreadsheet later, but it makes sense.  Anyhoo, not the fastest swim I've done by a long shot and a demoralising start.

A quick dry off (people get snippy if you drip all over the gym floor)and on to the spin bike for 30 minutes hard work.

I started off at a heart rate of (caveatted) 85% HRmax for 10 minutes, then 88% for 10 minutes, then 90-91% for the last 10 minutes.  This was absolutely great.  Never mind that 30 minutes is way faster than I can probably do 20km, learning that I can push my cardio system that hard for that long is a really good thing.  OK, so the real % will get moderated once I've done a proper max heart rate test (hopefully this weekend), but understanding how it feels to push that hard for that long and not keel over, or even vomit, is a very useful experience.

And straight on to a run around the track of 10 laps (and extrapolate a 5km time from that).

Lap 1 and coachJez yelled at me to wind it back a bit.  The next 8 laps came in at 51s per lap (90% HRmax) like clockwork so I put in a bit of a spurt for the final lap, coming in at 41s (94% HRmax) for that one and the calculation came in at 24 minutes for 5km.  That would have been a PB for 5km for me even without a swim and bloody hard bike beforehand.  Very very pleased with that.  Very pleased indeed.  I know I can hold a higher heart rate over 5km as I've more than once held over 180 bpm (84% HRmax) for an entire 5km, so there we go.

The swim I'll put down to bits of biology and the fact that I just hate that particular pool; it's dark and busy and I nearly smacked straight into someone's face at the end of one length.  I can do better, by around 10s per 100m or so, so it was just a bad day.  The heart rate trace shows there's loads of effort for little forward motion compared with previous swims.  The bike and run were really good.  Overall, despite not really getting the point, I got a massive psychological boost and a couple of learning points.

Brick this!

I think I might get 'round next weekend.  If I can work out how to get the k-tape to stay on through the swim, it's going to work.

T2 brick test today; 31km bike followed immediately by a 7.8km run.  The secondary tests were, some race fuel (High5 EnergySource) to see if my stomach is OK with it, and drinking on the bike.

Apart from being yelled at by a twat in a Chelsea Tractor at Wimbledon Common (dude, if you had a less stupid car and a bit less of a vein sticking out on your forehead, you'll probably live longer), the bike was good.  I'm still completely useless at using a bottle on the bike - seriously, if you've never tried it, it's a lot harder than it looks.  I can get the bottle out of the rack relatively OK as long as I'm free-wheeling, but drinking is really difficult and getting it back in the rack again is pretty stressful.  I ended up with sticky drink on my hands, handlebars and down my leg a bit and some of it in my mouth.  My heart rate monitor hadn't worked for the cycle, so fuelling was really going to be a bit off as I'd got no idea of the amount I'd burned through.

31.16km in 01:11:04 including slowing down for traffic lights, being a total useless goit with the drinks bottle several times etc., so I'm hoping that will translate to 01:32 - 01:35 next weekend over the 40km race route.

I chugged the remainder of the fuel drink and the run started off pretty nicely.  As usual between bike and run, my legs felt a bit heavy at the start but I went off at a reasonable pace and the route was a loop of around 2.5km which allowed for stuff going wrong and being not too far from home if it did. 

Pace-wise, that's around my usual fastest 10km pace -without- having cycled 31km first.  So I'm quite encouraged by that.  That sort of pace should give me a 10km run time of around 55:00 - 56:00, hopefully.   My knee stayed quiet throughout and the only indication of anything not being perfectly fine was a tight hamstring into the back of the knee and that was it.

So, I'm pretty sure I'll get 'round next weekend.  No idea what transition times will look like, but with a 30:00 swim, a 01:35 bike and a 56:00 run I'm looking at an overall race time of 03:01:00 plus transition, so a target of 03:10:00 seems reasonable.

K-tape

Physio visit involved a recap of the MRI results (mild ITB irritation, fat pad inflammation and mild fraying of the cartilege - perhaps related to the syringing many years ago) and a bit of a trot with physio in tow, assessing my gait.  Apparently my back is very rigid, my hips do something weird and one foot does a floppy thing every 5-6 steps at slow speed but at fast speed my gait becomes much better.  He prodded my hips and glutes and did some deep-tissue work on those (OW!) to loosen things up a bit.

Current thinking is to tape my patella to encourage it to move a bit differently, to see what effect that has on the pain:-

Will go for a decent run at the weekend to see how that works out.  And in the mean time physio is drawing some pictures and having a think about what's going on with my hip movement to see what's going on there.  With 1 week left to London thereafter there may be some other interim management required to get me through that before the more long-term management strategy.

Two race weekend

Work has been crazy.  I've over-indulged and not done much (any) training.

We had an open water swim session on Sunday, set up by the Virgin Active London Triathlon organisation, but run by NOWCA (a really great organisation who have noticed that open water swimming is really taking off but there are problems around it in terms of finding safe places to swim and safe ways to organise swims and are looking to regulate things - founded by Martin Allen and the infamous Rick Kiddle (truly lovely guy, great coach, great athlete)).  The idea with the Virgin sponsorship of the triathlon is to expand the sport even more, bring it to more first timers and these open water swim training sessions are designed to help people get to grips with the differences and techniques associated and gain confidence in open water.

I don't pretend to be an expert at open water swimming, but I do (so far) seem to be not totally shite at it and I've had no problems with confidence or the rather physical nature of the mass starts you often hear about.  So I was there mostly to pick up any tips and keep Mr TOTKat company.  I enjoyed myself, got a little bit competitive and the group we were in weren't shrinking violets (though all rather British about physical contact in the water - heh, they'll learn soon enough :o)) which added to my enjoyment.  The end of the session was a bit of fun as we all raced to the bank to get out and strip off our wetsuits first, as was the challenge, to find when we decided to stand in the water to wade the last few feet, we were all more than waist deep in a soup of thick silt and mud and needed to get a lot closer to the bank before really trying to stand up and wade out.  Mmmm, sludgey!

Then on Sunday I had a hard session with Geoff the Awesome, who gave me a nicely confidence boosting workout of more old-school weight training where I still failed to really get the snatch technique even remotely right, but came away feeling worked really hard which I've really missed.  After that, we had roast chicken and drank waaaaay more than is a good idea for a Sunday night.

Monday, no exercise - planned no gym as I'd gymmed the day before, but I was supposed to cycle to work and decided it was a bad idea in the morning given the amount I'd had the night before.  Tuesday, no exercise - we were out for dinner, so I wasn't going to cycle in and leave my bike at work - I hate doing that.  And we went for dinner.  And drank waaaay too much again.  Today, no exercise.  I had no gym kit with me but thought I might get a swim in today; work denied me that due to being insanely busy.

So.  I have a race on Saturday - Shock Absorber Women's Triathlon - and one on Sunday - Clapham Common 10K.  And I really can't go to the gym on Friday as that would be foolish the day before a race.   The plan is to cycle and gym tomorrow and rest on Friday before the races.  Sub-optimal, but I don't want a whole 7 days with no resistance training at all.

Experimentation with swimming effort

The slightly further away Virgin Active isn't where Google Maps says it is. So I missed it, went past it and wandered around aimlessly for about 10 minutes until I stumbled across it by accident. Anyway. 25m pool, normal swimming cossie and no real attempt to go particularly quicklyt resulted in 07:33 for 400m. Not bad, I think. And definitely improveable. Though I did end up only doing 1200m instead of the usual 1600m in total as I'd be way late getting back to the office after getting so nicely lost.

Oh and my HRM watch total exercise time has finally ticked over the 100 hours mark. So now it says "100 h" with no minutes or seconds and it looks like there's no rounding up, it'll only get to 101 when I've actually done at least 101 hours.

Mmmm lamb biryani for dinner:-


Exercise - 25 minutes swimming

B - Greek yogurt with frozen blueberries, 1 scoop vanilla whey and flaked almonds
S - Nakd bar, Berry Cheeky
*swim*
S - 1 scoop chocolate whey in skimmed milk
L - salad - lettuce, sweet peppers, capers, walnuts and honeyed goats cheese
S - tangerines
S - carrots and houmous
S - mini babybel light
D - lamb biryani, peas and sweetcorn

Calories (kcal) [kcals to maintain weight (inc. exercise)	1710 2024]
Protein (g)	115.6 (27.%)
Carbohydrate (g)	155.7 (34.7%)
Fat (g)	70.8 (37.9%)
Fruit & Veg	7.5