Warmer weather.

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Although winter this year wasn't all that cold, it sure is great to have Daylight Savings started & Summer knocking on the door.

A couple of weekends ago here in New Zealand it was a public holiday which in this household means only one thing, & that's to go swim in the ocean. It was great & the water wasn't to cold. A group of about 15 of us got in so it was fun.

So with summer just about here that also means the TRI Season.

Yep we have an Olympic & Sprint distance race here in the Mount in just 31 days. I'm doing the Sprint this year as the following week is the Taupo 1/2 IM which is far more important to me, so the sprint is more like a solid brick session at race pace.

Also with the season beckoning I have recently bought some race wheels to complement the bike. A nice new shiny pair of SRAM 60's, with a new pair of Vittoria CX Tech tyres to follow.



Now for the training side of things.

Have had a good solid October & the body is still feeling strong & injury free. I've had some great rides & probably nothing better than the 144km I knocked off in 5 hrs. This was done on a mainly flat road but so is the Ironman course.

So here are the boring stats for last month.

Bike 886km / 33hr

Run 145km / 12:45hr

Swim 22.8 / 8:15hr

I have a couple of big brick sessions coming up over the next few weekends so looking forward to those. Just can't wait to get out there & do a race.

8 weeks till Round Taupo.

Yep that's all.

This year I haven't done as much cycling leading up to the event, but I am only going round once this year & it's all just part of the bigger picture, not the 1 race I was aiming for. In saying that I am feeling quietly confident about the race.

My plan for the Contact Round Taupo Cycle Challenge is to start with the 7 hr group near the back & just TT all the way round ( apart from the hills ). Starting with the 7 hr group should hopefully give me a free road without all the bunches & I'll just get to ride my own race. Knock this off & that will be part 2 of the Cameron Brown award done.

Bike training has been going well with a 122km ride last weekend & a 135km ride just done this weekend. I must admit climbing hills on the TT bike is certainly harder but I'm getting better & think my seatpost height might be just about right now which is helping.

Last month I managed 388km total & hope to build on that now daylight savings has started & can get out after work.

All the other training pretty much went to plan for the last couple of weeks & I have managed 125km of running, 178km windtrainer & 21km of swimming for September.

Now I haven't forgotten about the City to Surf fun run. Last Sunday turned on the best day we've had all spring & the run was great. Awesome atmosphere at the finish line area & I posted a 57:34. The run was definitely not 12km but we all ran the same race & I was happy with where I finished.







All in all a great September & bring on October, with warmer weather & longer hours of daylight. Will also get into the sea for my 1st swim over the weekend of 23-24 October.

Just ticking off the boxes.

Yep that's about it.

The last week was all good & got everything done. Saturday mornings bike ride was extremely hard going as the entire country was covered in a large storm which bought about very strong winds in the Bay of Plenty. I did manage my 4hr 20 min & clocked up 105km, but it sure wasn't easy.

The rest of the week was fairly normal training & clocked up 28km of running & 1hr 45 min on the windtrainer & 5kms swimming.

On a positive daylight savings kicks off this weekend so hopefully will get some more training in after work.

Have the City to Surf 12km run to do on Sunday so I'll let you know how that went next time I check in.

Bring on Summer

Now the last few weeks have just been wet, windy & wild. I'm over it & just want warm summer & daylight savings.

In saying that I have been able to get out on the bike the last 2 weekends & clock up over 100km each ride without getting very wet.

The new bike feels fast & easy to ride. I do struggle a bit on the hills but just means I've got to work harder. ( Yes I'll get round to the photo one day ).

Once again my running has been a little slack over the last couple of weeks with only totals of 26kms. I really need to build on this but the old leg has been abit sore recently. I think this has to do with the aero riding straining the butt. Starting to feel better now though, so hope to see the distance increase again over the next few weeks.

So in total I've only been putting in 10 - 12 hour weeks. Bit slack.

Not long now till the Tri season kicks off & the Taupo Half Ironman so these times will be increasing. I also have the small task of the Taupo Cycle Challenge 160km bike ride. My way of thinking for this years race is that I will start near the back with the 7 hour starters & just TT the race. That way I hope to miss all the big bunches of idiots that can't ride sensibly.

Just had the weekend away with work at the Jamis Day Night Thriller & it was a long couple of days so this week i'm going to have to be onto it or I'll just be lazy. Also busy week at work with a number containers to unload , so it's going to tough.

Onwards & upwards though. Plenty of things to look forward to on the training front with a Half IM camp, a trip to Broadlands Rd for a training ride & I'm going to compete in the City to Surf 12km fun run.

Train safe & hard.

A good solid week

Firstly I went back to the physio this week & he's real happy with the way my right leg has strengthened up with the exercises & now is happy for me to steadily up the running. Great news.

So once again there hasn't been much running this week ( only 15km ) but time to ramp it up a little. The swimming has got alot easier this week & with good numbers turning up to the squads this week we real have started to push each other.

Now unfortunately the weather was cr@p this morning & I still haven't got out on my bike. I did instead do a 2hr 12 min hard out ( AVHR 143, MXHR 164 ), windtrainer session in the garage with another IM in training. That help bring the total hours on the windtrainer to 3hr 40min this week.

So this week I would have to give myself a big tick in the box of doing all the programme & each session was constructive.

We have the last of the Tri Cub's winter Duathlon's tomorrow & hopefully the weather is good afterwards, as I hope to take the bike for a ride up & down the Toll Rd.

Tonight the All Blacks will hopefully win the Tri Nations & the Warriors beat Manly.

Time for the business to start

Yes I went to Taupo ( pronounced Toe paw ) & set about achieving my 1st goal of the my season, the Half Marathon.

As I had planned I came in with my worst 1/2 Mary time of 1:54:22. My PB is 1:39:13 & back in 2008 I ran 1:41:43, so you can see I had a goal of pacing myself & did just that. Finished the race feeling fresh & wanting more. We also had a great fun filled weekend with our friends & training buddies.

I had the following week as a rest week, then on the Sunday I competed in the North Island Inter Club Duathlon race at the Pukekohe Raceway. This was a 5km run, 20km bike followed by a final 2.5km run. I didn't go there to break any records & certainly didn't , but had a good fun race. That's what it's all about isn't it ????

During this time I finally dragged myself along to the physio to see what might be causing the pain behind my knee. Physio's thought is the glute injury I have had for about 15 years is playing up ( & not firing ) & as a result the hammie has been doing more work & has now become inflamed & sore. So 2 weeks into treatment & the glute is already much stronger. I can only look at this as a positive thing & not something that has slowed my running down to only 30 minute runs for the next few weeks.

So now with just over 6 months left till that gun goes off for Ironman I have sat down & nutted out my training schedule with my wife / coach. I now feel that it's time to start doing some real serious training & not just going through the motions & just getting the job done. Each training session from here on in needs a purpose & a goal.

It's taken a couple of swim sessions to get back into that & I haven't been outside on the bike yet but did have an excellent windtrainer session in the garage in the weekend. Did the Spinervals 24.0 HILLacious DVD. Awesome workout !!! The running is obviously taking a little while to get back into but hopefully I'll be stronger.

I have now taken possession of my new Jamis TT bike but haven't been out on the road yet so that is going to take a bit of time getting used to. I also have a new pair of K-Swiss Konejo 11 running shoes to try out so all very exciting times.

So for now it's just head down & get training. Will post some photos of the bike as soon as I take some.

This weekend

Only 48 hrs now till the start of the Mizuno Half Marathon in Taupo.

I really enjoy doing this race & halfway through the year it comes at a good time, giving you the motivation to keep training through the winter months. Now as I've said before this run is not about a PB, it's just about finishing feeling strong & fit. My time I'm looking for is between 1:50 & 1:55.

The weekend should be abit of fun also as we have a group of 12 staying at the Huka Falls Resort & we have other friends who are in Taupo but not staying with us. Might even watch the All Blacks kick the Wallabies on Saturday night.

I'll let you know next week as to how it all went.

No I didn't do the fun ride last weekend. I chose to stay @ home, save some money & time & did my 6 monthly gardening instead. Was worth it.

And lastly , hopefully I will get my new TT bike on the road in a few days time. I've had it sitting at work for a number of months now but haven't had it built but very soon it will hit the road. Can't wait !!

Might see ya in Taupo.