Sunday 13 December, 2015.
My race didn't quite turn out as I had hoped. I believe I
have developed into a much better athlete over the past 12 months and I
genuinely thought I could produce an overall time of around 4 hours 15 minutes.
Unfortunately, this was not to be on this day.
My finish time was 4 hours 27:43 minutes with the following
splits:-
Swim 1.9km – 31:11
T1 – 1:56
Bike 90km – 2:23.21
T2 – 0:50
Run 21.1km – 1:30.25
My swim time was a personal best for the 1.9km but bike and
run were a couple of minutes outside personal best splits, as was my overall
time. I finished 10th in my age-group but had high expectations of a podium
finish for the first time. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a qualifying slot to the
Ironman 70.3 World Championships either so I will be looking for that at
Ironman 70.3 Geelong on February 7.
NUTRITION
My nutrition before, during and after the race turned out to
be very successful. My breakfast, which I had two and a half hours before the
race, was three scrambled eggs cooked in a tablespoon of butter, along with two
of my 'Coconutta' frozen muffins. These are something I recently invented which
have turned into a favourite pre-workout snack (if I have one) or something I
can take on long rides. They consist of crushed almonds and macadamia nuts with
a heap of coconut oil, a generous amount of pink Himalayan salt, some 90% dark
chocolate and banana. I spoon it into a muffin tray and place in the freezer.
They are then about half the size of a muffin (because they don’t rise like a
cooked muffin) and have a solid, yet creamy texture when straight out of the
freezer. Along with this, I drank about a litre of water during the couple of
hours before the race and had a coffee but because I was already feeling pretty
wired with race morning anticipation I only had half of the coffee.
My nutrition during the race was the first time I have
fueled predominantly on fat as my main source of calories, as opposed to
sugar/carbohydrates. I was very fortunate to have Mandy Riordan from My Clean Eats specially prepare some high
fat/low carb ‘gels’, made from all natural ingredients, to use during the race.
I had tried these twice during training and was very pleased with how I felt
using them. They were a tasty chocolate flavour, I didn’t have any digestive
issues whatsoever and they went down easy. In fact, my guts have never felt
better during a race as they felt light and undisturbed. One thing I did expect
was that I wouldn’t need to consume a great deal of these to fuel my race
because:-
- The ingredients of the high fat gels allow a slower energy release in contrast to what a common energy gel full of sugar would do. Also;
- The high fat gels, gram-for-gram compared to sugary gels, provide a higher calorie content, probably double the calories, for the same quantity so, the amount consumed was much less than if I was using sugar based products. And;
- Because I am fat adapted, I knew my body was going to work just as well at producing energy from my own fat stores, provided that I maintained proper hydration and electrolyte intake. This is what I relied on during the run whereby I only drank water and my body took care of a steady stream of energy.
In terms of volume, I only consumed approximately the same
amount as two commercially produced energy gels. This equates to about 70 – 80 grams and I
estimate that provided me with approximately 400 calories. There was also a
small amount of naturally occurring sugar consumed through my coconut water
drink.
FLUIDS
For my fluid intake, I took two 700ml bottles, one with
water for washing down my gels.
The second bottle contained my
electrolyte mix of 500ml coconut water (for potassium replenishment), the juice of one lime for a
lovely fresh flavour, a generous amount of pink Himalayan salt (for sodium
replenishment and some bonus minerals) and topped
up with water.
This was a very sufficient amount of fluid, however if it was a really hot day I would have grabbed some
extra water from the aid stations too. In hindsight, I think I would have
benefited from getting a bottle of water at aid stations to pour over my head
and body to help in cooling my body temperature, so that is something I will
take away to implement in the future.
POST RACE
I initially had some water in the recovery area but didn't
hang around in there long because there wasn't anything else I was interested
in. Especially, not the coke, red bull or sports drink. There was fruit but I
was keen to start refueling with fats and protein and only minimal carbs.
Instead, I had packed myself some delicious post-race replenishment, starting
with 600mls of chilled full cream milk which I had about half an hour after
finishing. Then, I sipped on another bottle of my coconut water electrolyte mix
over the next half an hour or so. And, to complete the nutritious recovery food
about 2 hours after the race, I had a frittata made with 5 pastured, free range
eggs, asparagus, cauliflower, capsicum, mushrooms and cheese which was cooked
in plenty of butter. Yum!
GOING FORWARD
As always, each race brings a new experience to learn from. As
I have plenty of years ahead of me to continue improving in this sport, it is
of utmost importance that I look at all aspects
of the race, and my preparation
for the event, to understand what worked and what didn't so I can be better in
the future.
As I look back over my training log, it had been a sporadic
build up during the last couple of months prior to this race. I began my
focused preparation at the start of August after having about six weeks of
little or no training to enjoy, with my wife, the arrival of our first son.
This meant I had four and a half months to build to the event.
Throughout the course of those four and a half months I
planned my training well in advance as best I could, factoring in home life and
work, but on a regular basis I was adjusting that schedule because things
didn't always go to plan. This isn't a problem because I don't expect
everything to go exactly as I intend and I try to be as flexible as possible. However, as I look back
over my training records I see distinct inconsistencies, which I believe
led to my sub-par performance in Ballarat.
GETTING MY BODY RIGHT
In the final two months of the preparation I had two
occasions of overtraining and one dose of gastritis. The gastritis, five weeks
before the race, was unavoidable being caused by a stomach bug or maybe food
poisoning, but the
over-training was definitely avoidable and it happened the second time only
three weeks out from race day. I have learned a lot from this and this new
knowledge will be very helpful as I plan my training towards Ironman 70.3
Geelong and Ironman Port Macquarie.
On both occasions when I became over-trained, I didn't heed
the very clear signals that my body was giving me. In fact, both times were
almost identical. They came after I had completed a very solid block of
training over the course of about two weeks. These training blocks involved one
or two very large double workout days near the end, after which I only took one
day of rest as I
believed I was recovered enough to continue pushing myself.
So, I proceeded to perform more tough sessions thinking that
my body was able to handle it since I was feeling so strong. However, it was
during these sessions where I should've realised that my body was not OK. I
felt tired, lethargic and very irritable. During the first extra session, I
would think I was simply having an off day so I would finish the session as
desired instead of stopping and resting. Then, the next day I would try and
push myself again and have the same symptoms of fatigue but still not stop to
think how serious this was. I would then repeat this dose on a third day before
I finally succumbed to the understanding that my body was stuffed and needed
some serious time off - by which time I felt absolutely terrible.
These periods of overexertion were usually mixed in with not
enough sleep, generally because I was trying to fit in a certain amount of
training, and drinking extra or much stronger coffee which sometimes masked the
fatigue. From now on, when I feel the need to increase my caffeine intake, I
will know that there might be something wrong and I will now be including this
in the list of symptoms to look out for. Also, if I feel like I desperately
need an afternoon nap I will take it (if possible) or not do any training and
ensure I get some extra sleep the next day.
Another important alteration I will make to my training will
be to have more regular scheduled rest periods of two to four days. I will look
to take a proper break in every two week period and it will include a minimum
of two days of no training whatsoever.
I am planning
on doing 14 day cycles with a ten day building period followed by four days of
rest/recovery. I believe this will allow me to remain much fresher throughout my
entire race preparation and help me avoid overtraining. However, the main challenge will be to
make sure I follow this plan properly and not do extra just because I feel
really good. I am confident that these regular rest periods will help me improve
my fitness. When I
had those two occasions of over-training I took four or five days of absolutely
no training, stayed in bed as much as possible and when I returned to training
I felt amazing.
Taking that time out was just what my body needed to absorb
all of the hard work I had done and become fitter and stronger. However, it is
never, ever a good thing to push yourself that far, as I did, because it can
have some long term effects on health, energy and fatigue. I believe I was
still having some slight effects of the second bout of overtraining on race day
based on how my muscles felt while pushing hard on the bike within the first
few kilometers. That is why I took ten days off to recover from the race before
I begin training again and I now feel really good, fresh and ready to push
myself again.
TWEAKING MY RACE PREPARATION
There are some other aspects of my race preparation which I have
critically assessed. First of all, I will start spending a lot more time in the
pool. For the majority of the four and a half months, I was only doing between
2 – 3 km sessions in the pool and not seeing a lot of improvement in times. However,
after doing a swim session with my mate (chiropractor and gun swimmer, Dr.
David Riordan from HolistiQue Health
and Spa), I was inspired to push my water
mileage up to a minimum of four km per session and have greater variability in
my workouts. This proved effective over the final six weeks of race preparation
and I noticed a big improvement in my feel for the water. My overall strength
and strength of technique and my general comfort in the water also improved. I
will now be aiming for sessions of 5 – 6km most of the time which will be
essential as I push towards the Ironman on May 1. I don’t believe this will be
over doing it, as I know I get so much benefit in my aerobic capacity from
working harder in the pool which greatly assists the other two disciplines and
I will only be swimming four to five times per fortnight.
Due to the periods of forced rest, I didn’t complete many
long rides (over 100km) and I am sure this had an effect on my ability to push hard
in the second half of the 90km bike leg as I had done in the first. I know how vital that endurance
training is and I will be aiming to complete one ride of approximately 150km
per fortnight from now on. It’s not a ride I will perform at high intensity, but
it will be important for building endurance and to practice maintaining an
aerodynamic position for a long time. When I am closer to the Ironman, that
distance will increase to approximately 180km. This ride will always be the
last session I do before my fortnightly rest period as I feel I really need to
take the time to freshen up properly from such a long effort.
Another aspect of my cycling training that fell by the way
side in the final couple of months before the race was high intensity work on
hills. I gave much more focus to high intensity work done in a time-trial
position but neglected the hills because the course at Ballarat is relatively
flat. However, I sensed that I was missing a little bit of fire power and
strength on race day, particularly through my quads, which I am very confident
can be found again by getting back on some steep hills on a regular basis. This
will be absolutely necessary in preparation for Geelong and Port Macquarie as
both races contain some serious inclines. Call me crazy but I am actually looking
forward to hammering some hill repeats again soon.
My run training, in general, was just inconsistent in the
final six weeks or so. I don’t think there was much wrong with the type of
sessions I was doing but it was just a bit all over the place with what I was
able to fit in. One positive point from the race was that my stride rate was
very consistent throughout the whole 21.1km run leg. I have found it hugely
beneficial to maintain a consistent turnover regardless of fatigue and the
speed at which I am going. I am sure that if I wasn’t so focused on keeping my
stride rate up, I would have run quite a bit slower. Spending time on the
treadmill and counting my strides often has paid off in this regard.
My run training will change too as I move towards the next
two races as they are different types of courses to Ballarat and I will have
the long term goal of the Ironman, in May, to keep in mind. I plan to increase
my long run to two hours or more, incorporate some hill work and move away from
sessions (such as 1km repeats, which have been a staple of my training for a
while). I will also start
using more Fartlek type runs and some extended Tempo runs off the bike.
I need
to make the changes mentioned above in order to expose my body to
new stimuli to make improvements to my performance whilst being effective
and efficient with the time I have available. As always, it will be a case of
trying to do enough without doing too much, which I know from experience is
dangerous.
I am looking forward to working through this next phase of
training and development and I will bring updates along the way.
Cheers,
Lincoln.
