Ironman Training...

The graphs below show training for the 10 weeks leading up to Ironman NZ. This was not ideal as it could have been. I am not upset about this or anything like that. Sam was born on the 22nd of Jan so in the weeks leading up to that date and afterwords the amount of training was somewhat reduced.

Still an average of 13h30m was reasonable and I am quite pleased with this volume...

Week 1 was a smallish taper for the Taranga Half Ironman as I consider this as an A race. Then week 2 was the week of the race.  The next two weeks were building up to Sam's birth and her birth. So they were lower average volumes that what would have been ideal. On the plus side I had two weeks off work, so I was able to slip in a few sessions when otherwise it might have been impossible.

The swimming is not really too bad. An average swim distance of just under 3Km and about 3 swims per week. I was happy with my swim time at IMNZ too. To me the only thing missing was perhaps some squad training for faster sets and maybe one swim per week to up the volume a bit.

If you go back further in my training log you will see lots of bigger rides all the way back to September 2008. So I did have some really good volume as a base. I was also doing a lot of club Thursday races so was happy with my speed and intesity.

I did a very good time at IMNZ (5h3m) so was happy with that... But (there's always a but) I think I did need a few more long rides. As you can see above there was a big gap in weeks 3-4 and weeks 8-9. There really needed to be 2-4 more rides over 5 hrs (150Km). Just was not really the time though. Being away from Iz and Sam would have not been the best option. I therefore settled for 3hr rides (about 100km).

The running was a different story. This is possibly the area where lots of running even if shorter distances would still make a difference. The problem thought was that I did not feel I could risk running lots. Sometimes I felt I needed two days break between runs to make sure I did not break down... Only 2 runs at about 30Km plus was not enough... Missed a long run the week before completely for the hope that the legs came right... The weeks before Xmas were not much better. The weeks 3-7 were quite good though if slightly light on the volume... I also Lacked any kind of speed work.

Still after the bike a 3h17m run was OK. I was hoping for about 10mins quicker than that.