Just back from USAT level 1 conference

Man, what a long weekend, but how amazing it was. Not only did I get to listen to Bobby McGee, but also Bob Seebahor and Ian Murray, all tops in the field in Triathlon, running, sports nutrition and fitness. My mind is spinning in so many directions and full of so much new information it is somewhat overwhelming. Some of the important things I did get out of this conference were:

1. How much I don't know and need to learn

2. How important it is for me if I become a coach is to beable to fully explain the physiological reasons why our bodies perform the way they do in each and every exercise we do. If I can't explain why I am prescribing an exercise to an athlete and beable to explain why it is beneficial to them at this point in their plan then I shouldn't be coaching. I approached this with nursing, I made sure my nursing students could completely understand how the liver functioned, how the heart worked, etc.. because if they didn't know the basics how would they know how a medication would work in the patients body or even how a disease process was affecting a patients body. I think being coach is similar to be a teacher in that way.

3. Most importantly is that I think I can be a good coach, actually I think I could be a really good coach. I have a way to go with regards to knowing my shit ( I know some) but I think with my personality and my ability to relate to people and still push them in the right direction, based on who I saw this weekend and networked this weekend I can do this.

I am a sponge right now and want to talk to my coach, my other friends who are coaches, I want to talk to them about their philosophies and i want to learn more, lots more. Something I didn't think I could do, I know think I can, how great is that.

On a side note I got to spend some time with my friend Ali who moved from the North Shore to Boston and it was so great to catch up with her. I am so psyched about her becoming a coach herself and also signing up for her first olympic triathlon this spring. She has a lot of motivation and a lot of talent that hasn't been touched yet, maybe she'll let me coach her as my first guinea pig ( just kidding) however, I do believe she has a great future in triathlon.

I also got to spend sometime with Mary ( IronMatron). Unfortunately the conference didn't allow a ton of time for socialization perse, being in class from 8a-9p for me on friday and 8-4 on saturday and 8-12 on sunday, throw in workouts and trying to get some food in ,not tons of time to chat, however we ended up in the gym together this morning and at least got to talk for an hour. Very motivating and very inspirational to listen to her and I'm very excited about her new coaching business. Even though I don't know her very well I get a good sense of what type of coach she will be and anyone would be lucky to have her guiding them through there specific training programs. Good luck Mary, I hope I get to see you more often and chat more.

Anyway, its now time to just relax tonight and then its back to the books this week to finish my exam and hopefully everything will go well and in a few weeks I'll hear I'm a level 1 coach. I'm excited about getting back to a good block of training this week, I feel very motivated and refreshed, WOOT, WOOT. Bring it I say, Bring it.

Bike Class and other tidbits.......

My new favorite quote from Richard Quick who was the Stanford and Auburn swim coach is:

To me, a goal is what you are going to accomplish, It's not what you hope to accomplish, or wish you could do, or what you dream about.

So since I'm traveling to North Carolina this thursday I did my trainer bike class with coachie this morning at 6am. So hard to motivate and get the blood flowing for such a tough class that early but it had to be done. Thank goodness my sitter said she would come early so I could get my workout in and Phil could go to work, the things we do in the name of a good workout. So the class went like this:

good warmup of about 10-15 minutes at intensive zone pace- 145-150 watts

single leg drills 4 x 30 seconds each leg f/b 30 seconds both leg- at intensive wattage keeping cadence at 85 or above

4 min ramp up- starting at steady state wattage- 175 watts and building up to vo2 max by the last 15 seconds- 275 watts-280watts

The Main Set: 2 x through

1 min 30 seconds: at mid range vo2 max with last 30 seconds at high end vo2 max 250-255 watts finishing at 275 watts

45 second recovery

1 min 30 seconds: mid range vo2 max, last 30 seconds at high end vo2 max

45 second recovery

4 minutes at mid range tempo ( 220 watts) with 1-2 minutes of mid range v02 max thrown in ( 255 watts)

45 second recovery

4 x 30 seconds of 100% v02 max with 15 seconds of recovery in between intervals

3 minute recovery and repeat set

I felt tired today but I hit all my intervals and my watts, my second interval was much better, not as much lactic acid to move around in the legs and I was able to push 280-303 watts for the last four 30 second intervals. I still have lots of work to do but all in all it went well.

After that it was a 4 mile run f/b some resistance training and physical therapy.

I am off to NC this thursday and can't wait to learn more about my sport and the intricacies around how we all train. I get to finally meet Mary the IronMatron who I hope to learn a ton from and talk about her new adventures with her new coaching business. My friend Ali will be joining me in NC and we get to share a room together which will be soo much fun, I miss her since she moved to Boston.

Anyway, hopefully the weather will work out and we will get to go see the Lion King tonight, its getting pretty bad out right now.

No Jinx yet, bike class, so awesome!!!!!!

Okay, so I was hoping that my earlier post wasn't going to kill me tonight on the bike, the class was hard but doable. Actually, I felt great. It went like this:

warm up 10-12 minutes-regenerative/intensive zone 110-145 watts

single leg drills-4 x 1 minute ( 20 seconds one leg/40 seconds both)

3 minute ramp up starting from steady state zone 175 watts-v02 max 275 at the end of 3 minutes

3 minute recovery

Main set: 3 x 8 minutes with 2 minutes of recovery in between sets. Staying at low end tempo most of the time and adding in 3 minutes of work at low end to mid range V02 max during the 8 minutes-

So I needed to maintain 210-215 watts for my low end tempo and then when he asked us to bump up to v02max ( low end) I needed to hold 238-245watts for however long he wanted us to do it.

Well lets just say I shut that set down baby, hit them all and then some. The last set my low end tempo range went up to 230 and I hit 290 watts at the end. So psyched, the bike is really coming along. However, most of my work on the trainer has been upright so over the next month or two I'll be slowly working my way down to aero position and trying to hold these wattages in that position. So, still lots of work to do on that front but I'm pretty happy at this point and I'm having soooooooooooooooooooooo much fun. I love to sweat, I love to work and I love to see improvements. Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Tomorrow is just a swim approximately 3500 I think and a 40 minute run. I'm hoping to get that all in after volunteering in 4 different class rooms, getting my massage done to keep my body together and then water polo, swim lessons and whatever else my kids have in store for me.

Life is good people.

I don't want to jinx it, but I am.....

I have been feeling really good lately. Ever since that week that my legs felt like crap and I completely faultered in my run and underpowered on my bike I have been feeling great. I don't really know why but my workouts have been going much better than expected. I probably shouldn't be saying this since I have my hard as hell bike class with coachie tonight and most likely he'll have me puking my guts out by the end but so far everything has been doable, very doable, all my intervals hit, run times hit ( if not better) watts right on the money or better, swim times fine ( still boring swimming by myself) but everything is great. Except for the blisters I experienced the other day in a new pair of sneakers ( which pissed me off) my body is holding together. 5 1\2 months till Lake Placid, 2 months until my first duathlon and 3 months till my first tri of the season, I'm getting pretty pumped. I will say, this sunday is my first look at a possible 3 hr ride and I have to say I am stoked to do it, now I don't have to, its a possible option but I can't remember when I was actually psyched to sit on my bike for 3hrs. So happy right now.

Interval Bike Workout #4 with Coachie, it Rocked!!!!!!

Okay, after only doing some resistance training this morning, I got to have some fun with my 6yr old all day so my legs were pretty fresh for my class tonight. The class was going to be a bit less intense then last week but had a good 22 minutes in the middle of some above tempo work with some Vo2max thrown in for shits and giggles, here is the class structure and my wattages:

Warm up for me in intensive zone - 146 watts for about 15 minutes

single leg drills 4 minutes total, 30 seconds one leg, 30 seconds both

ramp up for 3 minutes starting at steady state and building to vo2max by last 20-30 seconds 186 watts-275 watts

Recover 3 minutes

Main Set

1 minute at 100 % vo2 max- 275 watts - hit it on the nose

1 minute recover

2 minutes at 96% of my vo2 max- 261watts- on again

2 minute recover

3 minutes at 96% vo2 max-258 watts right on again

3 minutes recover

10 minutes of being no less then low end of tempo 210 watts for me and adding in 3 minutes total of 96% of my Vo2 max 258-265 watts. It worked out at holding 2 minutes at 211 watts, then 30 seconds at 260watts, 1 minute at 215watts, 30 seconds at 265, etc.......

I felt great during this set, the 215 felt so doable, not hard, keeping my cadence at around 94, I hit every Vo2 max with no problem. Coachie said if by 7 minutes we were feeling frisky we could bump up our tempo watts to mid range so I upped it to 225-230 watts, the last minute I averaged 275-300 watts. So psyched to have my legs back. It was great. Total average watts for my ten minute segment was 228 watts, HR average of 166.

3 minute recovery

3 minutes at 96% Vo2 max-265 watts

3 minute recovery

2minutes at 96% Vo2 max-265 watts

2 minute recovery

1 minute at 100% of Vo2 max, averaged 310 watts, cadence of 94, HR max of 171

I felt awesome, so great, worked hard but could of worked harder. I loved it, I wanted to do more. I love when workouts are successful and you feel good, the men in the group were working hard and not talking, its fun to be the only girl and kicking ass. Yeah..... Another one in the bank. Thanks coach.

Swimming/Hill repeats and Kellens 8th Birthday..

Today was a long day and it started out with only 2800 yards of swimming with a 1000yd time trial thrown in for giggles. Why can't coachie just round up to 3000 I have such a hard time not doing at least 3000, I do what he says, but I think about it all day and it drives me nuts, something about numbers. Anyway, after the swim it was a small drive to find the only 2+ minute steep hill I could find and do it 8 times, running a nice 2 mile warm up before hand with strides after and then a ten minute cool down after. I do have to say the first hill repeat had me thinking, " no way am I going to finish this thing, I'm tired", but with each repeat I felt better and got a bit farther up the hill by the 2 minute mark, by #7 and #8 I kept the same pace and didn't make it further but I felt successful enough.

After all said and done, stinky and no shower, it was pick up time and going to the "Roller Palace" for an afternoon party for one of my kids schools. After one of my children devoured 6 slices of pizza ( a parent told me) multiple bottles of water, an airhead and popcorn-good lord, it was time to pick up the other two from school and go to swim practice. AFter practice it was off to pick up my sons cupcakes for school tomorrow ( its his 8th birthday tomorrow), grocery shopping and then come home and help with homework, baths and reading. Whewwwwwwww.

I'm looking forward to just a bit of resistance training in the morning and hanging out with my 6 year old who has the day off because of parent teacher conferences. I do have my trainer bike session with coachie tomorrow night so I don't get off that easy tomorrow but at least I can do some stuff during the day that I normally rush to do all afternoon.

Tomorrow my oldest turns 8, I can't believe 8 years ago on February 4th, 2002, ( yes to all you New Englanders my son was born right after Adam Vinatieri scored the winning field goal in the first Patriots superbowl. And yes, they shut the curtain on me and upped my epidural medication so they could watch the end of the game- even my hubby) but I digress, it was a mere few minutes after the winning field goal my son was born, happy mom, happy baby, happy hubby. So after Kellen Winslow my son was named ( I didn't know at the time) but the name stuck and now the name seems to be popping up all over the place. My son is amazing in so many ways and my life changed for the better after having him, its why we wanted more kids because we were so blessed with him. My little man is growing up and I'm allright with that because he's amazing........

My first Ironman dream/nightmare

So I had my first dream about my ironman last night ( probably not my last) and I was visualizing the course and then the gun went off. The swim went fine but for some reason both my tires were flat when I got to transition and I didn't have my extra tubes ( don't know why), then when I borrowed some tubes when I was changing them they started blowing up like balloons, don't ask me why it was just my dream. For some reason my dream kind of ended there and I woke up, I think having a bicycle issue for me scares me no matter how hard I work on those skills, it just stinks.

AFter crashing in LP last year and being so nervous to ride my bike after that, it has made me concentrate more on caring for my bike and making sure I learn everything I can on how to maintain my bike and fix it when I can, I have a long way to go but I'm getting there.

I also have had little dreams on and off since getting into IMLP, of course its the dream race where ( I won't mention my goal time or dream time) but of course I qualify for Kona and I'm actually running the entire marathon and PR'ing the marathon at the same time. Anyway, lets hope for that race, man how awesome would that be. If not, I always can close my eyes and dream some more.