faster with age

This morning I went for a 10 mile run an an 8:31 pace. I plan to cut the mileage back a bit for a recovery week then I plan to do the Cache Valley Biathlon on Sat. It is a 5 mile run followed by a 16.5 mile ride. I've been riding my bike 2 days a week but nothing fast. I did a tempo ride last week and the week before and was disappointingly slow. I did this race last year and there were a lot of serious cyclists and triathletes. The good cyclists do the best at these. Last year it seamed like I must have been passed by 30 people on the bike that I beat on the run [ I don't have a very good road bike and a lot of these guys are on 4 to 10 thousand dollar bikes]. Oh well , It's close to home and should be a good workout.

PM   went for an easy 3 miles 9+ pace.

I started out to do a ride on my road bike this morning that included a couple very large hills. I was in a lot of wind and some rain and some hail. I've been having some problems with my bike skipping in and out of gear and it just got a whole lot worse. I had to go home early and only got in 8.5 miles. I got a new gear cluster for the rear and a new shift cable. I ended up busy all day and didn't get another chance to ride until after nine pm. I went for about 1/2 hour and got in another 9 miles. I wanted to do more but it got to dark and I don't have a light. I came home, put the bike away, changed and went out for a 5.5 mile run. I didn't get back till nearly 11 o'clock. There was a bright moon and it was very calm. It was nice. I did underdress though as I wore just shorts and a long sleeve tech shirt. The temp. got down to 35 by the time I got home. 8:38 pace.

Boy this is crazy weather this spring. It's June 11th and we just had our 4th night of frost in a row.  The one Saturday night caught us by suprise and killed most of the tomato and pepper plants in our garden. It was chilly this morning with a bit of a breeze and a few scattered snow showers. I did 8 miles this morning at the track. After 4 miles at 8 something pace I did some fartlec running 10 x 200s fast. 200 easy. I averaged  41.5 seconds on the fast ones. I just wanted to get the legs moving a little faster before the race this weekend without wearing myself out to much. I felt a bit sluggish during the first 4 miles but felt pretty good once I sped up. I finished with a 1.5 cooldown. Overall pace for 8 miles was 7:51.

I went for 3 miles in the morning with the intention of going for 15 to 18 miles on the bike and another 3 mile run later. I needed another part for my bike and was going to get it in the afternoon. I got tied up all day shoveling mud out of a trench and putting together 10 inch pipe trying to get  our new irrigation pipeline finished before it gets to hot. We've actually lucked out this spring with the extra cool and rainy spring since we haven't been able to irrigate yet. It ended up being after dark by the time I got home and I still had a lot of work to do on my bike. I was totally trashed from the days work and a little worried about how my back felt. So that was it for the day. An easy 3 mile run. Not near what I had planned.

This morning I completly went through my bike got everything adjusted and lubed and finally got everything working right. I went about 14 miles and rode a little harder at times than I probably should have with a race tomorrow. I guess I felt rested after not much running yesterday. It would have been nice to have done todays workout yesterday and had the near goose egg day today.

PM   I did an easy 3 mile run. The last two days have been so busy this is the first chance Ive had to blog and it's 11:30 pm.

     I wasn't quite sure what to expect out of this race. I did it last year and I figured I would be faster in the run this year but I have felt slower on the bike. It's a little intimidating to pull up and see all the nice race bikes being unloaded. A lot look like the time trial bikes you see them using in the Tour De France with the rear disk wheels, aerobar handlebars, and carbon frames. A lot of these guys are into cycling the way people on the blog are into running. I'm just glad in running you don't need to spend thousands on equipment to stay up with your competitors.

     This race starts with a 5 mile run then you do a 16.5 mile ride. I have learned from past experience that I can't go all out on the run and still have good energy for the ride. There is a lot more time to be gained or lost on the bike. My plan was to try to keep my run at about 6:15 to 6:20 pace. I started out with a 1.6 mile warmup The run is on a loop course that you run around twice. It has a few small hills. I hit my first mile in 6:14. This was the only mile marker and my garmin was right on. My second mile was 6:19 and still felt pretty good. My third mile I thought I was keeping the same pace but it read 6:29. My fourth came up 6:38 which I didn't understand as I felt I was keeping a consistant pace. The last mile my Garmin read short and said I finished in 5:39. It said I ran that at 6:19 pace. The effort still seamed about the same and I didn't sprint the finish. The hills are pretty evenly distributed so mile 3 might have had the most uphill but mile 4 I didn't understand. I measured this course last year in the car and it came up a full 5 miles. I know cars are not that accurate but usually close. My garmin is off by .02 on some miles but this was a .1 difference. I read Logans blog and his 4th and fifth miles came out about even. My heart rate averages on miles 2-5 are within 2 bpm per mile. Not what I'd expect to see with such a big slow down then speed up so I'm not sure what to think. I finished the run in 31:21. Best case at a full 5 miles is 6:16 pace. Worst case 6:24 pace. I suspect it is somewhere between.

     From there I went into transition to change shoes, rehydrate, put on helmet, and get on bike. After a little fumbling this took 1:54 which is way to long. The bike course is an out and back course that is always either slight up or down whith a couple steeper hills big enough to slow you way down then hit 37 mph going back down. I think there must be a little more uphill on the way out and I averaged 20 mph. On the way back I averaged 22.1 for a 21.1 mph average. My bike computer read it at 16.62 miles and it is very accurate [ I wish I would have checked the run course with it afterward ]. It took 47:18. My overall time was 1:20:34.

      I'd like to have a do-over at the transition. I could have been 50 seconds faster there. I finished 15th overall and 4th in my age group which included all the way from 40 to 49 years. I know at least 2 of the first 3  in my division were just over 40. All in all I'm quite happy with the race. Other than the transition and miles 3 and 4 of the run [ and that may be partly a garmin error]. I finished over five minutes faster than last year. 1:38 faster in the run and 3:30 faster in the ride.