It has been a few days since my last post,  mainly because nothing monumental has occurred-with my training.  

The big news around here is the investment in my home office.  I am fortunate to be able to work from home when I am not traveling so having a place to work is important.  For the past 7 years, I have been working on a desk that is a piece of crap purchased for $80.00 in 1998 from IKEA,  a left over kitchen table,  two old book cases $45.00 from IKEA topped off with junk laying all over the floor.  Well, Shani suggested I stop being so cheap and we went back to IKEA on Monday night.  Wow has that place changed.  We found an awesome workstation,  some new book shelves that are huge and an awesome new filing cabinet.  

The hard part was fitting all of it in the mini-van,  but we managed.  Like every other obsessive compulsive triathlete,  I was determined to put the stuff together when we got home.  We managed to get the desk and the bookshelves thrown together and got the old junk moved out of the room.  The only problem was it was close to midnight when we finally went to bed.  Now back to training.

I was supposed to do 7 x 1 mile at 20 seconds faster than marathon pace on Tuesday.  Because I was too excited about fixing up the office,  I only did a 40 minute run.  I will be heading out the door this morning and doing the intervals.  My legs felt good yesterday so hopefully today will be the same.

My diet however has lacked.  The holidays are a killer.  I read all the articles about snacking before parties,  alcohol moderation,  blah,  blah, blah.  Well,  I have enjoyed every moment with my family this holiday season including some nice meals at Rico's for lunch and some good wine with Shani.  Kona is still a long way away.  Looks like I have a good New Year Resolution for myself to get back to healthy eating.

I got up early for a 1.5 hour run as this week was an off week, so I did not have to shuffle around for 3 hours this morning. The run felt fine, but I still feel that my fitness is lacking for this marathon. The weather turned cooler yesterday right during my recovery ride so the run this morning was in the low 40's with some rain. Much more seasonal than the balmy 74 degrees on Friday. I did a mile at my aerobic max pace and was at 7:40 per mile. I am normally around 7:20 so my aerobic fitness is nowhere near it was prior to Wisconsin. I guess this is fine since I am not trying to peak until October.

After the run, Parker and I received some complimentary tickets from the Kiniffic's and headed to our first Texan's game. Parker loved it and we had a great time. Parker had an entire bag of cotton candy and a few cokes. Nothing like a sugar diet during a football game. Of course we were playing the Chicago Bears. What a surprise that bunch of drunk Bear fans would start a fight a few seats over from us. The good thing was Houston's finest had them hauled out of there pretty quick. The Texan's had nothing to play for and still managed to whip the Bears. Maybe next year the Texans can make the playoffs and give Houston some postseason excitement for the first time in quite a while.

Today is an off day for my marathon training. It is hard to set here though with the weather so warm here in Houston.

Yesterday's run was crazy with the temperature at 72 degrees at 6:30 in the morning with 100% humidity. It felt like a summertime run while trying to do the intervals.

I have found a large retention pond that is exactly 1 mile around and it has dirt which makes it a bit easier on the legs. I ran down to to the pond and did 3 x 1 mile intervals on the way down and did 5 around the pond when I got there. I met up with my friend Mike Young he did a few loops with me. One of those loops, Mike held 7:00 pace which he was very pleased with. Mike recently completed IM AZ back in April and had a great race season in 2008. He plans on doing the Houston 1/2 marathon.

The intervals went ok despite the heat with all of them at goal pace or faster of 6:50 per mile. On the last two, our local pro Michelle Leblanc showed up and ran them with me. She can fly. Michelle is one of the fastest female cyclist alive and can also light up the run. I do a lot of training with her because she really pushes me since I am like every other male athlete not wanting to lose to girls! However, she often leaves me in the dust as to remind me who the boss is while we train.

I finished the day up with a bike ride with my daughter on her new mountain bike from Santa. She loves cruising the trails and shifting the gears. She hit the mud pretty hard yesterday and had her first real tasted of getting dirty on the bike. Now my problem is that I don't have a mountain bike myself. I knew it would not take long before I found some other piece of equipment I just have to have. Time to hit E-Bay!

Tim

Cruise Intervals are a term my coach uses. I truly dread these, but always feel like they are the best workout to sustain a pace during the run. For the Ironman over the summer, I did a lot of these. They typically fall during the week and take about 1 to 1.5 hours. You go out and run a warm up then do 1 to 2 mile repeats with about 1 to 2 minutes recovery.

For today, I have 8 x 1 mile repeats. I normally run these on the road on a marked course. With it being the day after Christmas, I hope they burn off some of the excess I have consumed the past week.

For me the pace is suppose to be about 6:50 per mile or 20 seconds faster than goal marathon pace. To make this even more challenging, it is already 70 degrees outside with 100% humidity so it will fell like a summer time run requiring a lot of fluids. I will know by the end of this workout if qualifying for Boston is doable.

We had a wonderful Christmas here, with the kids getting everything from bikes to microscopes. My daughter got an awesome Gary Fisher mountain bike from Santa and can't wait to go for a ride later today!

Good Training,

As I set here on our plane about to leave Pittsburgh,  I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas. Shani and I are on our way back to Houston today after a wonderful Christmas party at our corporate office.

No running for me the past 2 days because the temperature here in Pittsburgh was 8 degrees yesterday morning.

This post is short,  but more to come as I pick up the final bit of my training during the holidays.  I am scheduled for some pretty long and quick tempo runs later this week.

Good Training,
 

For those that train for the marathon,  there is no other ritual quite like the weekend long run. This Sunday will be my longest run for the marathon and we hit right at 2:50.  We ran most of it on trail and finished up the last hour on pavement.  I think I feel decent enough to try and qualify for Boston.

In October,  my family and I attended the Livestrong Challenge event in Austin.  We did this with several of our friends from Girls Run (www.girlsrun.net).  Girls Run is a local charity running group that my daughter participates in and I assist on the executive board (more on Girls Run in a later post).

My wife and daughter did the 5K on Saturday and I did the 90 Mile Ride with two friends, Jody Gaddy and Mike Bradley.

Lance and his group left 10 minutes before the start of the 90 mile ride.  He had several people in his group including Taylor Phinney and other supporters of Livestrong.

Me and a group of about 15 other cyclist hammered it from the start.  No one in our group needed to say anything.  We all knew what was going on.  We were going to catch Lance.  After about 10 miles,  we did!

Next thing you know,  I am riding up next to the king of cycling.  I expected him to be surrounded by protection,  but it was him and at this time about 30 other riders and a pace car. 

After about 5 minutes I found myself riding next to him and we started talking.  We talked mostly about Livestrong and Girls Run and how much money we raised for his cause.  There was no doubt in my mind that he is very passionate about that organization.  Lance was decked out with a custom made Trek and in Livestrong gear from head to toe.  

At about mile 20,  the pace really picked up.  Lance said to the rest of the group  "We are not stopping boys,  if you can hang you can ride with us."  At that point Taylor went to the front and we were doing 25 mph in the pack.  Our group quickly began to thin out and we were down to about 20 people.    During this time I was drafting off of Lance a few times,  and thinking to myself,  please do not run him over.  I also found myself with him on my wheel for a bit which was even more nerve racking.

The funny thing about the whole experience was it feeling like any other Sunday ride with friends.  The only exception being Lance!

Later in the ride,  I asked Lance about my friend Brad Kearns, (www.bradventures.com).  Lance and Brad go way back to Lance's triathlon days and Lance had great things to say about him.

Several friends asked me what it was like speaking with him and I have to say, it was like talking to anyone else in a group ride.  There were a lot of laughs,  jokes flying,  ribbing and all the regular group ride antics.  Bottom line,  he was just like the rest of us endurance athletes (except he has one the tour seven times).

Well,  we hit mile 65,  and Lance was not kidding,  we were not stopping.  I was out of fluids and we hit an aid station.   The group went on and 7 others and I stopped to try and re-fuel. The only problem,  we could never get back on the group.  My dream ride was over.

Lance went on to finish the ride with Taylor and as I was coming in,  I found myself catching up to the remnants of the pack.  All of them were bonking quite hard.

I finished the 90 miles in 4:10,  thanks to some fast pack riding.

As I set here on Saturday morning at the start of my off day in December,  I still wonder about that day.  It was a once in a lifetime experience.

The Livestrong Challenge events are awesome and I encourage anyone to attend.

This past weekend at the A4M show in Las Vegas, NV,  I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Joe Maroon.  He is one of the premier Neurosurgeons in the world.  Why is this important? Because at 68 he just finished his 3rd Ironman World Championship in Kona.  Here is an article written about him in the Pittsburgh paper shortly before the race.

What does someone that has access to over 700 supplement products take? Since I started at Douglas Labs, Inc. I have tried just about everything. Here are a few of my favorites during the off season:

Elite Athlete Multi-Vitamin
This is a Dr. Specialty item in the Douglas Catalog designed by Dr. Cooper. Great formula designed for the active endurance athlete.

Opti-EPA
This is an enteric-coated fish oil supplying a high dose of EPA. This product is so pure and made so well, you have no chance of burping it up. If you are going to rely on your heart so much for this sport, you need to take good care of it.

Wobenzym
Provides immune system support and is featured in countless clinical studies. Made by Mucos in Germany. I don't train or recover without it.

I have tried many other products, but with this still the off season, I keep it simple. More to come as the season kicks off and I will talk about recovery beverages, bars, gels etc.

Good Training

Shortly after Wisconsin, I had a brilliant idea to sign up for the Houston Marathon to stay in shape. Well, it is now one month away and I am not in shape! Running a marathon sounded like an awesome plan back in September, but now, not so good. I have done a few long runs and few tempo runs, but I definitely don't feel like I should be toeing a start line anytime soon.

My idea was to run Houston and qualify for Boston. I would then go to Boston in April, and add this to doing the IM in October and have a Year of Championships. Well reality has sat in and that is not happening this year. So what should I run it for now? If I qualify for Boston, I can go in 2010. However, after my quest for Kona, 2010 is going to be The Year of Shani. That is me doing the home improvements we have put off to pay for the Kona trip.

As far as training today, I will head out the door tonight for a tempo run. It was way too cold to run this morning and I am still quite tired from the A4M show in Las Vegas over the weekend. I love Vegas, but it can really take it out of you when you are there for work.

Have good day training, and more to come as I figure out this whole Blog thing!