Malibu Madness

Quick training update...More Mountain Madness this weekend...I have also updated my 2009 Race Schedule, including several more bike races.

I am in the middle of the final push for Ironman 70.3 California. The goal is a personal record and a time that will qualify me for a domestic Ironman, such as Ironman Couer d'Alene or Ironman Canada (they are all sold out, so you have to qualify at this race if you want to do a domestic Ironman, to hopefully qualify for the Kona Ironman...follow me?) Things are progressing nicely, with rolling 20+ hour training weeks in my legs over the last couple months.

On Saturday my Team nuun-FeedtheMachine.com teammate Cyril Jay-Rayon and I will ride 125 miles in the Santa Monica mountains, with about 12,000' of elevation gain. The ride will start and finish in Santa Monica, riding up PCH through Malibu. We plan on including most of the classic climbs...Yerba Buensa, Latigo, Piuma, Old Topanga, Mulholland etc. I will try to post BlackBerry photos during the ride at water stops.

After this weekend I am only 3 weeks removed from Ironman California 70.3, which means I have about one more week to actually "train" before tapering down for the race. Physiological adaptations take approximately 15 days, so any "monster" training sessions in the final two weeks are counterproductive. Hence, I am going to make this and next weekend count!

Lastly, running is coming along well. Aerobic pace has dropped from 7:40s in February when I came off my leg injury, down to the 7:20s. My goal is still to drop that down to 6:50s by my "A" races this summer. Looks like I am on schedule. I have done ZERO hard training or tempo runs. I have continued on the Mark Allen program of simply building volume at a Steady pace, or just at or under your first deepening of breath. For me, coincidentally that happens to be a heart rate of around 150bpm. Until I plateau for a couple weeks, I will continue this approach. Since my goal pace in a Half Ironman or full Ironman is not going to be faster than this "Aerobic" pace, this metric is particularly useful.