Trifecta Sunday

Did a hard 2,000 meters in the pool this morning with some fast 100's and anerobic starts continuing into 200 meter sets, this simulates fast anerobic starts until you settle into race pace, these workouts are hard but very good. When we got home from the pool I rode over to the track on my bike and did a dreaded track workout, (Tony did his yesterday) man these hurt, maybe it's just that I'm getting old and soft, I don't know, but doing quarter repeats just plain hurt, especially when going all out and trying your best not to fade on the last 100 meters! Rode home, did a recovery drink and then ground up some fresh Starbucks Breakfast blend and vegged, nice.

Nice weekend all around and the weather wasn't too bad either. We're tapering this week for the upcoming NEO triathlon kickoff race on Sunday. Hope everyone had a great weekend.

C-ya

Cutting grass,

installing a new cable line into the garage so we can hook up the t.v. and getting a ride and run in today.
Good ride yesterday on the new Super Six High Mod, sweet bike, the nicest I have ever had. Thank you Rudy for pressing in the bottom bracket inserts. The Super Six has the BB 30 and I converted my Dura Ace stuff over and it has the outer crank bearings, so Rudy pressed in new bearings into the bottom bracket so I can use the Dura Ace crank.
Ended up getting 50 miles in yesterday afternoon with some climbing and only 1 water bottle. I was tanked afterwards too, couldn't get enough to drink when I got home and into the evening, also had to get up 3 times during the night to pee.......

Rode the trainer

yesterday afternoon for an hour then took off on a fast 5k run in the rain, awesome! The run that is, I dread the trainer but sometimes it's necessary, specially on a day like yesterday. Ran a FAST 5k and felt good, love running in the rain.

I'm heading down to the bike shop this morning to build my new Cannondale up. The Super Six High Mod frame came in yesterday so last night I stripped all the stuff off of my present frame to get ready for this morning, Tony, Scott and I are going to ride this afternoon when I get back, hopefully the roads will be dry, I'd sure hate to get my new bike all dirty and wet on her maiden voyage.........pics to follow.

Cav's were awesome last night for those that didn't see the game, good luck again to them on Saturday.

Another day

@ the pool, good thing too. We were contemplating riding this afternoon but I saw the radar when I left work and the little storms weren't that far away. The little bursts turned out to be a helluva storm here, almost lost power too. Anyway we did some long intervals in the pool. 700 meter warm up with swim, pull and kick's then started with 500 meters with :30 rest, 400 with :30 rest, 300, 200, 100, 50 all progressively faster with the last 100 and 50 being almost unsustainable. 50 cool down and I'm cooked, but a very good swim. Almost 5,000 meters in the past 2 days and hopefully an open water swim with a bike this weekend.

Good stuff!

Good swim

this afternoon, Scott, Tony and I swam pretty hard doing a total of 2,300 meters with drills, intervals and a finishing 600 meter endurance set. I wish the lake would warm up already though, I'm ready for some open water swimming and besides it's in fresh water, not chlorinated..

Came home and did a nice easy 5k run and the weather was still pretty nice, windy, but nice. It's 8:00 right now and it hasn't started raining yet, Westlake was probably okay.
Kinda tired tonight, I doubt that I'll make much of the Cav's game, so I'll read about it in the morning.

Later all.

Rest day

today. Finished trimming the large hedge and now I'm done with the yardwork for a little while, got a lot done that I wanted to get done this weekend so I'm very happy with the way everything looks yardwise, we could use just a little rain though, but not alot, I probably shouldn't say that for fear that I might put the jinx on things..............

Off to the pool and a run tomorrow after work so we won't be making Westlake, there's a 50% chance of thunderstorms tomorrow too, so we'll play it safe and not make the 50 mile trip out west. The N.E.O. triathlon kickoff race is June 7th. in Canal Fulton and we're registered already, and we can definately use the swim time tomorrow.

Congratulations to all that raced this past weekend in Ohio, Michigan and P.A., sound's like our local teams represented well, nice job everyone!

Track workout

Tony and I had a guest join us today at our track workout. Nick decided he wanted to run today too, so we drove over to Riverside High School to do our quarter repeats, 1600's and bleacher running, Nick did a great job and he even rode his bike with Lynn before going to the track, nice job today Nico! Tony and I did 6 fast quarters and ended up with our last LT 1600 meters and ran it in 5:29 for a total track workout time of almost 1 hour. When we got home we headed out on the bikes for an easy ride of 21 miles with a few hills, it was a great workout today and some good training over the past 2 days.

Here's some pics from today.

TT and GCT training day

Went 9 seconds slower this past Thursday at Leroy than last, thats quite alot, just didn't have it and I knew it after the first few miles on the warm up. Fatigue from Westlake and the ride on Wednesday, that's okay I'll take it a little easier for the next few days leading up to Tuesday night worlds. But, we did the first of 3 Greater Cleveland Triathlon training days this morning at Headlands State Park in Mentor. These training days draw alot of triathlete's out that are going to do this race in August and today was picture perfect, there were even a few brave souls that donned the wetsuits and went out for a swim first. The water temp's are still in the mid 50's, and that's pretty cold for distance swimming. One guy came in and said that when he dove in it felt like he got brain freeze from eating something ice cold.....that's a little too cold.

Tony and I rode with the first group and did the Olympic course. It wasn't a blazing fast ride but good enough, average was about 21 mph and my legs felt fine. We got back to transition and took off on the 6.2 mile run course that has 5 hills in it and felt pretty good once again. We averaged a 7:45 training pace which was perfect and rounded out a perfect training set.

Easy day tomorrow and Go Cavs!

WCS #2 (Westlake)

Good hard night of racing last night at Westlake and the team was very aggressive once again getting Matt, Shawn and Jack in breaks and also Matt, Shawn and myself getting primes. Matt and Shawn ended up in top placings along with the RGF crew. Nice work TLE mates, everyone raced hard and threw down plenty of attacks, that was nice to see. Avg. speed for the 40 mile race was a couple clicks over 26 mph.

I didn't almost get killed

today for a change and it was really enjoyable too. Actually there wasn't that much traffic this morning when I was out so it was nice. I got in a tempo pace 25.5 mile TT bike followed by a LT 6.2 mile brick run. The run was hard and it kicked my butt, but they will pay off. Yesterday we got 2,400 meters in the pool with some race pace endurance sets. Warm ups followed by 800 meters at race pace, rest interval of 1:00, 400 meters at race pace, rest of :45, 200 meters race pace, :30, 100 meters at race pace, :15 rest, 100 meters race pace, cool down. It was a hard workout but I swam fast and felt good in the water, hopefully I'll race like that too. Good weekend of training and I'm looking forward to putting all this hard work into some positive racing this season.

Later all

New blog title

coming soon I think, I'm going to copy the movie title aptly named "Kill Bill" you know the Quentin Tarentino flick starring Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu and "Kung Fu" David Carradine.

The other day when I was running to Nick's ball game I almost got wiped out 3 times in 4.5 miles, tonight on my training ride I was almost hit by someone that blew the horn at me and then just 100' up the road, got stuck at a red light. I pulled up next to him and asked if that was really necessary, he politely...........told me to go f myself.......I politely told him the same thing and then he told me to get the hell out of here, he was all hot air. About a half hour later I was buzzed again by a mini van with no-one in the other lane, didn't even bother to move an inch, almost like it was on purpose, or on the phone or texting, I don't know, but we all have to be really careful out there anymore, more so now that ever. I know I'm not the only one and everyone has their stories but I was thinking tonight that this Kill Bill thing could actually be my new motto..........

Stay safe.

1st. Leroy TT

Beautiful day today but SUPER WINDY AGAIN. Fast on the way out but brutal on the way back. That's okay it only makes you stronger...............that's what I keep telling myself anyway.
I still averaged 25.82 mph on fatigued legs. Did a 10 mile warm up, raced and then did a longer cool down ride for a total of 35 miles. Everyone rode fast tonight, nice job all and thanks once again James.

1st.World Championship race

of the season for me. I felt pretty good and after doing some chasing and sprinting for a prime, I got into a break of 6 with 4 or 5 to go into the 19 lap 38 mile race. We were away for all but the last lap when the group caught us and we all finished in a bunch sprint with Shawn taking 3rd. overall. Avg. speed was around 26 mph for the race with a large field and nice conditions.
Did a little running before the race to loosen up and warmed up with 4 laps on the bike and cooled down with another lap for a total 48 miles and about 2 miles of running. Nice day.

Got a 4.5 mile run in today to Nick's baseball game, the run hurt because my legs were pretty tired from last night, thats good cuz it simulates running on tired legs in a triathlon. Nick's team lost to Mentor 11-7, but he was 2 for 3 with an RBI and played a nice second base.

LeeRoy TT tomorrow if the weather holds out, I don't know though, their calling for rain and high windage again.

Busy day today

2,100 meters in the pool with some HARD intervals and endurance work, good swim workout, felt good. It was such a nice morning Tony and I brought the bikes out and put em in the work stand in the driveway and scrubbed the bugs and gunk off, tightened all the nuts and bolts and re-lubed everything, good to go on the bikes. We washed 5 cars, actually Tony and Nick washed 5 cars then Nick had to go to work at the grocery store. We ate Mothers Day dinner that Lynn made, I wanted to do it but Lynn said, nah, you better let me do it, I said OK. Now were done.

Later

65.5 & 16.5

is the mileage we rode and ran in the last couple of days. Tony and I did a fast 5k and then rode 25.5 yesterday with hills and this morning Doug came over before the hurricane force winds arrived and he, Tony and I did a 40 mile TT workout followed by another quick 5k run, it was a hard workout today because we did mostly race pace on the bike and did a LT run. We're getting alot of time on the TT bikes lately. Jim Behrens is starting the LeRoy time trials up again this coming Thursday @ 6:30 also, so between the Westlake series on Tuesday and LeRoy on Thursday we'll be getting some good fast work in. Mothers Day tomorrow so I'm not sure if we can squeeze a workout in or not, gonna try though, just easy though.

Happy Mothers Day to all Moms!

Paine Falls 10 miler

Scott and I made it out this morning for a nice 10 mile trail / gravel road run. We did 3 stream crossings and ran quite a few hills and some nice singletrack, it was a very good run today and Scott ran great. He did a little belly achin though about the stream crossings, he even went so far as to take his shoes off on the first crossing.......citing, and I quote "I'll get f'in trench foot if I have to run with wet shoes and socks for 10 miles" At the next crossing he was cussin a little bit more but the shoes stayed on and by the 3rd crossing he didn't even flinch, he looked like Flipper he was running so fast across the creek. See Scott, it aint so bad!

Yesterday Nick had a baseball game close to where I work, so I loaded the bike up, changed after work and set off for a 2 hour ride ending at Willoughby South where Nick was playing. I dropped down into the North Chagrin Valley from Wickliffe and did some climbing and rode into Kirtland Hills and back up into Willoughby. I got caught in the rain but not really that bad, but wet enough. I'm not a big fan of riding in the rain, too many A holes out there as it is and they seem to be worse when it's raining. Nick managed to play 4 innings before they cancelled the game, so it wasn't even official, they'll have to make up another one............Oh yea, Nick took his drivers test today also and passed, Congrats Nick!

Hopefully a TT workout tomorrow if the weather stays decent.

Happy Birthday Nick

The big 16 today and Thursday he takes his drivers test.....uh oh, look out everyone.

Thanks for being YOU!

We love you, Mom, Dad and Tony.

Great weekend

The rain stayed away and we got lots o miles in. Saturday we didn't do RATL, instead we went out on the TT bikes for 45 miles with some race efforts and felt good, transitioned and ran an easy 2 miles. We're putting lots of miles in on the TT bikes now due to the TT's starting up and tri season is right around the corner.

Sunday we headed down to the Cuyahoga Valley for the last Covered Bridge race of the series. Our goal, since Tony and I were doing the 1,2,3 race was to ride hard and see how the legs were going to respond after Saturdays efforts, we knew it was going to be hard because everyone is racing very strong already this year. After a very fast 1st lap the legs were feeling pretty decent and I started to move up in the group. There were alot of surges and jumps and after the initial break got away our group along with TLE brought the break back to within a few seconds, that's when Tony jumped from the front of the chase and latched on to the break. He was in the break for the last 3 laps and ended up sprinting for 5th. place and the last money spot. Matt and Tony were a few spots apart and our sole TLE riders in the break. Nice job guys! Todd, Josh, Chris, Pete and Mike all rode very strong in the field. With warm up and cool down we had a total of 45 miles. We got home and did our 25 mile TT loop for a total of 70 miles today and 115 miles for the weekend.

Nice racing with everyone today.

When it's time to relax,

one beer stands clear, beer after beer......remember the ole jingle? For all the beer connoisseurs out there, this one might not be their beer of choice due to it's lack of body, lack of flavor, lack of hundreds of calories per bottle like the Belgians and the micro brews, but every now and then I kinda like the domestic lite beers, and I'm also kinda watchin the caloric intake at the moment. I bought a 6er of Miller Lite and a 6er of Coors Lite. I definitely like the Coors better though. I bought them to drink on the deck in the sunshine after a nice training ride and run, but I haven't really had the opportunity to crack one open. Hopefully this weekend I'll get the chance. It's not supposed to be incredibly warm but on my deck it's not too bad if we don't have hurricane force winds. I think I'll get an early jump on things though and have one now!

See ya Sunday