Breaking down walls

When I started running again, it was because I'd seen a picture of my fire chief crossing the finish line at IM Canada.  I saw it and thought "I could do that."  So I started running again.  One race after another, and I rediscovered my love of running.  And competition.

I soon found that in local races, I'd do well.  Usually well enough to place, or at least close.  But distance running, my first love from middle school, was my favorite (although, somewhat slower now than I was then).  I'd do well enough to make a ten minute mile average pace over the run, and could hold that.  By the time I ran my first marathon in 2009, I only had one goal: to run faster than a ten minute pace.  I did it.

Last year I made the transition to triathlon, and made a few breakthroughs.  With the addition of swimming and running to my training, I found both my 5k and long distance pace getting faster, incrementally.  While experts and veterans may argue whether or not the addition of other sports or simply the extra miles made the difference, I still found myself doing better.

Then, a month ago, Jeff at Apex Endurance started coaching me.  I've been self trained for the majority of my experience - picking up bits here and there, and mostly looking up to a few people who are good at endurance sports, without ever really understanding how to get better.  Prior to any formal coaching, my training usually involved running/cycling/swimming at whatever pace I could handle, for however long my training plan called for.

Suddenly, over the past week, I've started to see improvement.  Higher power numbers during cycling, faster swimming for some of the same drills.  But the best moment came for me during a hour and forty five minute run two days ago when I broke the mental and physical barriers of the nine minute mile average pace during that hour and forty five minutes. And I hold no illusions that this is a fast pace in the running world. But there came a moment when I realized I could do it, and that I was breaking down any preconceived notions about how fast I can run.  What is important, though, is that in my love of running, I'm seeing improvement.

Kirsten, at Awesomeness of You, taught me last season to break down "realistic expectations" I hold for myself.  The result is that I enjoy my sport so much more.  Essentially, Kirsten has taught me not to have limits for myself. She taught me to not believe that I can't do something, that a certain athletic capability is out of my reach, or that something is unrealistic to expect.  She taught me how to teach myself and believe that I can.  Race jitters are pretty much a thing of the past, when they used to tear up my stomach before a race.  Kirsten taught me to look beyond what my mind and body were telling me to do and find out what I really can do.

Jeff is teaching me what I'm capable of.  Every day, I look at what he has scheduled for me to do and think  "He's crazy! I won't be able to finish that!  Okay, I'll do what I can, and finish as strong as I can, and go from there.  I'll have to email him and let him know that it was too much."  And yet, every day, I find that I can finish the workouts, and finish them strong.

So here's to the future.  I don't hold any expectations, and I haven't found my limits.

Why trainer and treadmill work are (in my opinion) important to any good training program...

There, I said it.  The boring, mind numbing, OH-MY-GOSH-THIS-WORKOUT-IS-NEVER-GOING-TO-END, work that involves a treadmill or a bicycle trainer (better known as dreadmill and drainer, muahahahahaha) is important to a triathlon training program in my opinion.  With winter setting in for the Northern Hemisphere, many of us relegate ourselves to hours of indoor riding/running.  Despite the mindsuck that is trainer riding/ or treadmill running, this is something that is an important piece of the triathlon puzzle for me.  Here's why:

No breaks, unless I take them.
When I'm out for a ride on the road, even on the flats, I can get to a point where I can stop pedaling and coast for a bit.  Not true on the trainer.  If I stop pedaling, the trainer stops.  Constantly pedaling, constant effort.  It's the same on a treadmill.
Of course, there are the breaks that I take... More on this in my next blog post...

Increased resistance... (trainer)
I've found that it takes more effort to push those pedals a similar distance when my bike is properly installed on the the trainer.  And, depending on the model of the trainer, I might even be able to increase the resistance even more.
Increased speed... (treadmill)
I've found out how fast I can really go under controlled circumstances, leading to greater gains in the wild.  Ideally.
Unsolicited advice:
The biggest thing here is if you are running this seriously that you care about times and gains and are keeping track of your miles, you should consider investing in a high quality gps heart rate monitor.  One that can keep track of your mileage inside and out.  The reason here is that I started to discover inconsistencies between treadmills and their speeds.  The key is that I calibrated my gps monitor about two weeks after I buy every  new pair of shoes. I'll post more about that later this month.

Cadence:
You can keep it where you want it for as long as you want it.  Well, if your legs hold out!!!  Thanks to tougholdbuzzard for pointing out this one, you can keep your cadence where you want it for a specified amount of time.  Combined with resistance, this makes for a MEAN workout!  This goes for both the bike and the treadmill. No dodging or running from dogs, cars, geese, or snakes (Texas, remember?)  I seem to remember my running and cycling mentors nagging me to keep my cadence high for both cycling and running, and, well, my training still reflects that teaching.  So, depending on what metric you use for training, cadence can be an important factor.  It's one of the few that I look at on a post run analysis (distance, speed, time, cadence:  that's it)

Inclement weather...
Pretty obvious here.  But what sends one person indoors may just be another day on the course for another...

The pros do it...
 Do I need any other reason?  Okay, so I'm kidding.  But, the pros do it. Companies that make money producing indoor workout videos for cycling make a big point of counting how many of the podium winners at each big race use their videos.  Lately I've been hearing more and more about treadmill videos!  But pros don't typically do useless workouts.  And as I get more and more educated about the elements of workouts the pros do and why, I'm adapting my workouts as well.

I want to point out that I'm not saying take ALL your workouts indoors.  I'm saying that I think I should do a few workouts a week indoors, and that I think treadmills and trainers are valuable to a triathlon training program the way that a race belt is to a marathoner.  Valuable, probably helpful, but not necessary.

There are many more reasons...  I'll update my blog post as readers give me some great reasons.

Why do YOU take your workout indoors, and why do you believe it's a necessary part of any good training program?