Another Day in the Office...

Back Towards the Center.

Well, I'm alive...

I'm no longer poisoning my body with pesticides/antibiotics and my digestive system seems to be functioning with reasonable efficiency once again. I am able to train at an early-summer level of intensity. I do not have a home that is being foreclosed on, nor do I have money vanishing in the black hole that our stock market appears to be. And my bank hasn't closed yet either.

Yep, life is good.

So I finished my prescription of Flagyl, which killed the Giardia along with a huge amount of good cells that would have been nice to hang on to. As the medicine left my bloodsteam, I started to resemble a human once again and a little later even started to resemble an athlete. A 10 pound lighter athlete, but still an athlete. I had to start back into training very slowly. I mean really slowly. I was basically going for walks, sometimes with rollerskis on my feet, sometimes connected to my bike, sometimes just plain walking. I started with an hour and over the course of two weeks built up to 2.5 hours and a couple of days with two workouts.

This past week has been like a normal training week in June. Modest hours and a couple of interval workouts, I also rode my bike for 4 hours on Wednesday. Things seem to be coming back together though I am still not recovering as quickly as I would like.

The bottom line is that I am just not in very good shape right now, relatively speaking. Thats how it is. Some of the people around me have been trying to convince me that I'm not out of shape, Im just a little off. Thats not the case right now. I'm just not in good shape. Period.

I've always been a proponent of being honest with oneself as an athlete. If you don't address weaknesses you can't fix them. The only way I'm going to get back to top form is the old fashion way, through hard work. There is no way around it.

In terms of a timeframe, I'm definitely aiming further down the road this season than in those past. I'm hoping to feel prepared by January and be in top form by February. Its going to be a fairly thin race schedule for me this year, focusing on few very but important races. One thing I am definitely looking forward to is training more on snow in December and January than I have in some time. I really do love to ski and it will nice to have the time to actually do it in the early winter.

For now its back to the basics. I'm still trying to gain back some of the weight that I lost. I am getting really hungry during workouts right now and that needs to stop. Once I can hit the high hours and long workouts again, I might look to move towards some more speed based training.

The more relaxed pace of my training lately has given me the opportunity to bring my camera along. Here is a bit of what I've been seeing in PC:

Photo Blog: One Day of 6th Grade Ultimate Frisbee.

Here are a few pictures from last Thursday's PE class. I'm shooting these from the hip here, literally. If the kids see me look through the viewfinder, they start posing. I don't want to disrupt class so composition is a matter of luck here.

Mayhem

The past couple of weeks have been a bit chaotic. I crashed on my rollerskis about two weeks ago and landed on my thumb. Luckily I didn't land on my thumb the way that most people on skis land on their thumb, which causes a scaphoid break - a small bone near the wrist. Not me. Instead I landed on the tip of my thumb and hyperextended the upper knuckle and tore a ligament.

I have a slow motion video of the crash that keeps replaying in my mind. My thumb does not look good. The first thing I did when I stopped sliding was grab my thumb, half expecting it to be flopping from my hand. It wasn't that bad. I've still been able to rollerski. Lifting weights has been and exercize to exercize type of thing and most of it is no problem. Shifting gears on my mountain bike is a bit of a challenge.

that was the first issue.

about a week ago i started to have some serious stomach problems. I thought I had food poisoning but it didn't go away. Thinking it might be something serious I went to the doctor this weekend and found out that I probably have Giardia. Which is pretty cool. So now I'm on some seriously strong medicine that, from what I have read is more of a pesticide than an antibiotic. Either way, its making me tired and giving me a headache. Not to mention the metallic taste in my desert of a mouth.

By next weekend I'm hoping to get back to something resembling training again. Hopefully with a few less protozoa in my intestine and bit stronger thumb.

Until then.

Post Olympic Post Modernism

Well the Olympics have come and gone and I enjoyed every minute of it. I love watching the Olympics. Its so fun to see so many athletes from every corner of the world compete in every sport under the sun.

I always find myself embracing one of the lesser known sports that I had never otherwise considered. In Torino it was curling, I don't know why. Its not that exciting and it doesn't even look like that much fun. But it sure was intriguing to imagine how much time those people spend practicing sweeping the ice. And I don't think I missed a match through the entire games. It must be the allure of a sport I know nothing about, I have to know more.

During this Olympics it was wrestling. I couldn't get enough of it, especially the Greco Roman competition. Alongside running, I don't think there is a more pure sport. Man on man, nothing else. Minimal variables. As a ski racer I must envy that a bit, the lack of a wild card element.

And as much as I enjoyed watching each event, this year I really found myself growing tired of the commentators and their attitudes towards the competitors. I didn't take long to realize that those commentators, like John McCain (nice speech last night, Barrack), simply don't get it.

It is a rare case when an athlete 'settles for silver'. Settling for silver is reserved for only the phenom who wins medal after medal, the Micheal Phelps of the world. But most silver medalists don't settle for silver, they win it, contrary to the notion that the commentators seem to extend.

My dismay was lightened, however, upon hearing Chris Collinsworth describe the scene as he sat amongst the parents and family of many of the US swimmers. He noted that while much attention was paid to the mother of Micheal Phelps and her reaction to seeing her son win gold medal after gold medal, in fact the scene played itself out over and over again within each family set. For Ms. Phelps it was seeing her son win gold, for some it was seeing their daughter make the semifinal, for others it was surely the joy of simply qualifying to compete in Beijing.

I suppose my point is that glory comes from competing, and the way in which one competes. Success, of course, is desirable but success is relative and to me it seems like a major loss to write off all of our athletes who don't bring home a gold medal.

End personal diatribe here.

So its that time of year where I stop training so much. And good thing for it because I was really starting to get bored. I've been putting in 4+ hour days for quite a while. 25 hours weeks really start to add up, especially when they are all solo. All of them. I'm on the verge of losing my mind and my ipod wearing out.

I'm trying a little different training plan this fall, trying to make use of the massive base I have built up this summer and the many summers that I have trained before this one. One of the issues I've had in the past years is that I just can't go fast enough in races under 30km. So I'm pretty much just going to lift weights and hammer for the rest of the season. Thats it, im not joking... and try to lose some weight... simple plan, power up and weight down. Last season I raced at 155 and this season I'm hoping to race somewhere closer to 150. If i can do that, it will mean serious speed going uphill on skating skis. And that's the point.

In the greater world of my life I've been rounding out a few design projects and making strides toward putting together a full fledged professional portfolio that may let me one day get a job or something like that... someday. I've also been doing quite a bit post-production for a handful of high-end action photographers, and I've also started to assist a local Photographer, which is really cool because I'm learning a ton. Assisting is like being an apprentice in the photo world. It has been a really great experience as I'm still trying to find my place in the commerical art world, whether it be as a designer or photographer or creative director... or who knows what... high school art teacher? i don't know.

Lastly, I have started with a new group of kids at Ecker Hill Middle School. We are diving straight into the school year with hiking and the high ropes course in the next two weeks. I've only been one day so far, so not a lot to share in that regard but it looks to be a promising year with a good group of kids to wrangle.

Adapting

Training has continued to be most excellent since my last post. I've been pushing the volume very heavily and things are really coming along well.

In the midst of my last 4 week training cycle I started to get a little sick of training on my own. I mean, a guy can only do so many 5 hour days solo... Living in Park City there are often people in and out between the US Ski Team, the Univ of Utah Ski Team and a few other independent racers like myself. July/August is a tough time to work through because a lot of people are at training camps, the university is away for the summer, there just aren't a lot of people to workout with... Unless you are a road biker...

So I've had to adapt a little. Lately I have been riding a lot so as to get some workouts with others. Its been a great mental break and also a good opportunity to really get pushed extrinsically. I've gotten myself hooked up with one of Utah's top pro team and have done some training rides with them and really enjoyed it.

Several weeks ago I hopped into a road hillclimb. I had yet to do any really tough workouts on a bike so I was unsure. Even more, I hadn't done a real race since late March. I felt awkward the morning of the race. I really didn't feel prepared mentally and I couldn't remember the steps I typically go through to get myself into that place. Though as the start time neared I settled down and managed to focus my energy on the effort. Once my class got called to the start line it all came back and I was really able to get into it.

The race itself was good. I rode away from the field less than a mile into the race and more or less time trialed my way up to the summit. I rode well, very steady. I didn't have much top end but I haven't trained the top end at all, so none was expected. On the final results I was 7th overall, which was satisfying given that all of Utah's top riders were in the race.

Afterwards I definitely had renewed motivation for competition. I have a month or so without before the Utah State Hillclimb Championship, which I am putting a lot of energy into preparing for. Its a time trial for everyone so I'll have a chance to compare solo efforts with the best guys.

My next training period is another big one with major focus on volume and my last little bit soiree-ing as a road biker before I crank up both the intensity and specificity. With any luck that will coincide with plenty of training partners around. I'm looking forward to dropping the hammer.

All for now and good luck to Mike in Beijing.

Benchmarks.

The first portion of the training season is officially over and I am now into the meat of the training year. The early months of the training year, May and June, were a bit hectic but so far July has been excellent.

There were so many things going on during May that I really was unable to put forth the effort that I expect from myself in training. June was better in that I did manage to accomplish all of the training that I had laid out for myself, though I was still trying to tie up loose ends from projects that started in May. The month was solid but it did not feel focused. That lack of focus left me wondering where I was in regards to my fitness. I knew I had been putting in the hours but was unsure if any real gains were made.

Once I realized that the only thing missing from my training was a bit more direction and focus, I did everything in my power to cut out the peripherals and put my head down. I tied up projects, planned out the next months of preparation so I knew exactly where I was headed and got after it.

I felt like I needed to test myself a bit to find out where I was, especially compared to last year. The tough thing about having one excellent training season is that the next season after it feels like a bust until you get back to a level that you have attained before. I needed to know how I stacked up.

The Spring is always focused heavily on strength for me. Having a good strength base is crucial to having good finishing speed and finishing speed is something I pride myself on. Last season I made some huge strength and power gains in my lower body and I was hoping to achieve similar results this year in my upper body without gaining any additional body mass.

Last season I was very happy about being able to do 4 sets of 15 pull-ups in the late fall. Having that bench mark in mind, we decided to find out if I could accomplish the same thing only two months into the training year...

Turned out, it wasn't even that hard. After 4 sets, we decided to set another benchmark to compare with in the future - total number of sets of 15. I kept cranking them out, only resting enough between sets to do a set of another exercise... I ended with seven sets. The only reason I stopped was because I ripped a callus clean off my left hand and the nickel sized hole was starting to bleed quite a bit... Nonetheless, we were pretty happy about 105 pull-ups in a single workout.

Two days later, we wanted to see what I could put out in a single max set. The most I've ever done is 26 and that was a looong time ago. I think I weighed about 125 lbs back then... 35 was the magic number. 35 pullups. After that I did another 3 sets of 20... And that was just one exercise. The others have been going similarly well.

With strength gains aplenty, I really needed to test my fitness a bit. Most nordic skiers rely on uphill running tests, as rollerski speeds vary a bit too much between pairs and over different temperatures. My history with running is not good. In college I was unable to run for two years after a growth spurt left my IT bands playing catchup with my femurs. The past two years i have been battling what i thought was a neuroma but now know is an arthritic joint... So I rely on uphill road biking.

I hit up a popular hill climb in town that I have done a few times in the past. I know what a good time for me is and with so many excellent bikers in Park City, I know what a good time is, period. I managed 20 seconds slower than my all time best. About 35 seconds off of the best time posted this year by one of the best climbers in Utah. I'll take it.

So with three weeks left in July, I am very happy to have not focused until now. I feel fresh and ready to tackle the next 5 months before the season starts...

Here are some numbers from my training year so far:
Most pullups in a workout: 105
Most pullups in a single set: 35

Toughest squat workout so far: 2x30, 165lbs
Workout on plan I'm not looking forward to: 1x50, 165lbs

Longest workout so far: 7.5 hours (road bike)
Miles covered: 125, altitude gain of ~8000 feet.

Longest runs: 4hrs 50min, 5 hours 20min (it should be noted that my mom ran with me for that 5:20 and continued on for 6 hours in training for a 50k).

Longest rollerski: 5 hours on several occasions

Number of times I've questioned why I didn't choose Alpine skiing: 47

Holes of golf played in July: 27
Holes of golf played in past 5 years: 36
Last time I played golf: 3 years ago
Best score 18 holes: 100
# of birdies: 1
# of quadruple bogeys: 1

Training hours in last period of 4 weeks: 82hrs
Training hours in next period of 4 weeks: more than that!
Largest 4 week period on this seasons' training plan: 90hrs

Largest training week so far: 26 hrs