Monday, September 7, 2020

Training Overview #63 – First Week of Anaerobic Work- Week of August 31 thru Sept 6, 2020

Training Thoughts:
As I moved into the Anaerobic Phase of my Lydiard plan it was the first time in some time I would do intentional intervals.  While I had done some Fartlek in the Hill Phase in this phase I was going to use Fartlek more intentionally as a form of intervals but a little less structure.  To add to this I need to figure out how to meld intervals and such into my riding so as to get benefit for both disciplines but also to keep the miles on my foot lower than I might otherwise do.

The main goal of the Anaerobic Phase is more about getting the body to deal with being uncomfortable when breathing gets tough due to less oxygen.  I have to work at this as I also deal with a what I was once told was exercised induced asthma, or at least something similar, but bottom line if I redline a little too much and I let my breathing get out of control I have to slow down to not gasp for air too much.  Does not usually take too long to get back on track and sometimes I can run/ride though it but other times I just have to slow down and recover.  That said I have found that if I can feel it coming on and work to control my breathing I can often control it.  These intervals will help with this I think and at the least help me to better know when it is coming on.

It has been years since I did regular intervals running on the track or even on a known loop.  I like to do them on the track the best, but on a marked loop will work, as not only do I get in the speed but also helps with pacing.  Interesting part is I have never done intervals or specific speed work riding.  It is not that it is not a good thing to do and something many riders do but when I started racing in Arizona many years ago we had some great group rides and on about any ride you could do long breakaways to work on strength, short bursts to get away to deal with mid-ride speed and most every ride had a sprint at the end.  So while I never intentionally did intervals riding I did them on a regular basis unintentionally, actually the bigger issue was over doing it.

I am confident that by working in some anaerobic riding and running efforts I will garner the same results for my upcoming 5K in November – to be able to run through the discomfort.  The hardest part about most races, but especially shorter ones, is coming to the ever-present point of discomfort and pushing through it.  Not backing off, not maintaining but pushing through to go faster.  In a 5K for me that is often the 2 mile point where my mind wants to just maintain till the last mile to half mile to push it in.  But by then it is too late for a great time as the 5K is too short to give up the middle of the race to just maintaining.  In riding often that point is at the start of a race where the speed is high but only for a relatively short time till it all settles down.  The other place in bike racing that needs to be pushed through is when you come to a hill and the group picks it up and the majority of the time if you do not make it over the top with the group you are done for and thus the need to push through the discomfort so as not to lose the draft of the group.

Again, this anaerobic phase is not simply to gain speed but confidence to push through what you might feel is your limit.  Thus the intervals and fartlek are not at full speed to exhaustion but to discomfort where you can work through it.  Now to work on the next 3 weeks of this.

Overview of Weeks Runs and Rides:
Being the first week back in So Cal for work always takes some getting used to as I have figure out schedules with regards to work, daylight and what I can get in.  As I do not have a trainer here in So Cal the basic plan is to run early and ride later on 3 of the weekdays and then on the others I am not riding I can run later.  That was the basic plan this week with maybe the hardest part being doing a Fartlek at 4AM.  Most of my runs this week were easy but felt good except for the earliness of the runs.  Thursdays fartlek went well with running segments of from ¼ mile to ½ mile at about 7:00/mile or less but running relaxed and not going to far over the limit.  The rest between segments was also between ¼ and ½ miles as well – I did a 1+ mile warmup and cooldown.  I then ran an easy 7 miler on Sunday AM after a long ride on Saturday which while running easy and having the temperature at 8AM being 91F and by the end being 99F was faster than planned but that was OK since it felt easy.

As far as riding I decided to do my interval session on the bike this week instead of during a run so did a 40 mile hilly ride with 2 X 6mile section and then 1 slightly up hill 1.3 mile section to finish off the intervals then cooled down about 4 miles.  I rode hard but not all out and got PRs both times I did the 6 miles and then even got a PR on the last 1.3 mile segment.  Was a good ride and while not running do feel the effort will translate well later on since the goal was anaerobic work without going too far into the red.  The other two rides mid-week were fairly easy and felt good.

On Saturday the goal was to ride 100 miles which would include the GMR climb and ride over to
Medici 53/39 X 12/24 (7 Speed)
Baldy Village and then add some extra at the end to get the 100 miles.  That said the weather forecast was calling for 113F temperatures so was going to play things by feel.  I started out at 6:45AM, sunrise at 6:30AM, but temp was already at about 75F so got to GMR and the start of the 7.81 Mile climb segment at about 7:15, so already about 80F or so.  One of the unknown on this ride was that I was riding my 30+ year old Medici that has a 53/39 X 12/24 (7 speed) so not the usual gearing I had on the previous bike I had borrowed.  I planned on riding in my 39 X 19 for as long as possible so I had my 21 and 24 for a bailout gear but never needed it and rode seated for the entire segment and most of the following climbs.  The good part about using only 39X19 is that you just have to keep it going to get a good time and I got my PR by over 2 minutes and could have gone faster but that was not the goal.  Did the rest of the ride and then back and down East Fork but by now the temp was probably already getting close to 100 and in sections of the canyon with wind and where it had been in sunlight for a while it was like a blast furnace.  Bottom line is I decided I was just going to ride back to the hotel and not add any extra as it was just getting too hot and by the time I got to the hotel it was 106F.

Even though I did not get in the longer ride I wanted with the time in the saddle and the climbing for the week and running a few more miles it was a good week.  I was able to get in a two good interval/fartlek workouts in as well as a good day of climbing on Saturday.  I just need to be careful I do not overdo it in the heat in that while I can take the heat it does wear me out.

Saturday’s Long Ride


- Monday PM: Run – 7.02 Miles 
- Tuesday AM: Run -  5.41 Miles 
- Tuesday PM: Ride – 40.02 Miles
- Wednesday AM: Run - 5.03 Miles 
- Wednesday PM: Ride – 30.35 Miles
- Thursday AM: Run – 5.61 Miles 
- Thursday PM: Ride – 40.01 Miles 
- Friday: Rest Day
- Saturday: Ride – 72.73 Miles
- Sunday:  Run – 7.02  Miles

Weekly Totals:
- Running Miles – 30.1 Miles
- Running Time – 4:09 Hours
- Riding Miles – 183.1 Miles
- Riding Time – 11:04 Hours
- Total Miles – 213.2  Miles
- Total Time – 15:13 Hours

August Totals:
- Running Miles – 108.7 Miles
- Running Time – 15:46:05 Hours
- Riding Miles – 747.2 Miles
- Riding Time – 35:20:48 Hours
- Total Miles – 855.9 Miles
- Total Time – 51:06:53 Hours

Diet Notes:
See below for Weekly ride fueling

Weekly Fueling:
All the morning runs were done fasted with nothing before the run and the rides were done in the afternoon about 4 hours after lunch

Saturday’s Ride Fueling
Pre-Ride Fueling:

- Coffee with Coconut Oil and Butter, Collagen, Heavy Cream, Chocolate Primal Fuel (1 Scoop) & 1 Scoop SFuels-Life
- Oatmeal W/TBLSP of Butter, tsp of Honey and TBLSP Heavy Cream
-1ea Vespa
-1ea Altred
- Also use  AMPHuman PR Lotion
- Total:  999.8 Cals &  gr 56.2 Carbs

Long Ride Fueling;

- 128oz Water
- 4 Scoops of SFuels Train
- 1ea packet of SFuels Race+
- 2ea Rapid Rehydr8 – 2 ea @ 2.5 Hours
- 1 Vespa at 2.5 hours
- 1 Altred at 2.5 hours
- 1 Banana at 3.5 Hours
- Totals:  463 Calories  – 55 gr Carbs
- Totals for Pre and During Ride: 1462.8 Calories – 111.2  gr Carbs

- After the ride I had a serving of SFuels Revival

The Week Ahead:
See below for the general week ahead as it is supposed to be hot, not as hot as the end of this past week, so will see how the rides go in the afternoon.  As far as running I did make one adjustment to my original schedule by moving a few things around but most stayed the same.  Still planning for a long ride on Labor Day as the temp is to not get over 100 and I will work to start at 6AM when it will be a little dark but as the streets are lit up should make it to the bike trail when it is light so should work out.  Just may have to stop more on the way back if it gets too hot.

For running this week I have planned two fartlek runs but will run them so they will be more like intervals for this week.  One of the fartlek workouts will be during a longer run so will see how that goes.  I would like to do one or two workouts on the track but need to figure it into my schedule with work – we shall see.  This is all a work in progress as I have said when at home it is easier to schedule but when on the road working it is a little harder so need to be more flexible.

The goal for this segment is to get my body ready to work at a faster more uncomfortable pace.  I have always been pretty good about riding and running hard but once I go over the limit some I do tend to throttle back more than I should and that is what this Anaerobic phase is to work on.  I could feel it this week on the hard bike segments as I tended to ride hard, and did get my PR, but know there is more there.  I also hope this works on what I once was told a is a form of exercised induced asthma where if I go over my limit I start gasping for air and then it takes a little bit to get back to not gasping.  I do know if I feel it coming on and can control my breathing I can control it more so these intervals give me practice for controlling it.

Last Week's Overview #62

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