Training Log # 19 - The Present and The Future

As of the moment, I am a month and a half away from my first 70.3 Iron Man. My training has been good and quite frankly been really long. I take pride in saying that I have been working 18-20 hours per week in preparation for this event. Over the course of these last few months I have recognized and realized how much time, dedication and heart it takes to train for one of these events properly. You can enter the 70.3 with improper training and heck maybe even finish it, but your only hurting yourself in doing so.When I do this, I wanna do this the right way and give myself what I deserve.

Looking through this though, its quite funny that I don't see myself doing this type of long distance races again for a while after this event. I've come to the realization that I want to focus on short-middle distance races and from there build up again to long distance after a  few years or so. For one thing, I get bored easily when training for endurance. Its just way too long! Another thing is that when training for long distances, I feel that my speed is suffering a lot because I'm not able to train it as much anymore. At this early age I believe I should focus on building a solid speed base and then later in my life I can work on endurance. As science has it, it would be much harder for me to gain more speed when I hit my 30's.

This has still all still been a very rough idea for me as of late but we'll see what happens after this 70.3.

Triathlon, a rich man's sport with a poor man's mentality.

As a spectator, you've heard it or probably have seen it for yourself. Triathlon as an expensive type of sport. From spending on pool fees every week, buying an inexplicably light bike, and wearing and tearing running shoes every few hundred of kilometers, it can't be denied that it does take a bit of green to get into the sport. Heck its three sports rolled into one! But this I believe could be the wrong co-notion for this growing sport. You don't need a 150,000 peso super bike nor 10,000 peso shades which glisters in the sun while you run. Simplicity may have been lost in this once uncomplicated sport that I love.

What does it really mean to do a triathlon? For me it has always been a test on what my limits are and how much dedication I can be able to put into one certain thing in hopes that I achieve my goal. I'm not out there to win. Don't get me wrong, I would be the happiest person in winning the race, but what can I do if another guy is faster than me? It's not like this is basketball and I can play defense to stop him from passing me. Triathlon is always about you and nobody else. It's about surpassing your own limits and pushing yourself to reaching the best that you can be. If that leads you to winning the race then its great and all the better!

If there is one thing I've learned through all this. It must have been simplicity. Life could not be any simpler and happier in finishing a triathlon event. Material things which seem to be the basis of happiness these days don't come close to the feeling of finishing this event. It lasts even longer than most possessions. These are the real intangible experiences and joys that makes me feel alive.

Which brings me to do most important lesson I may have for the rest of my life. I don't need any of these so called "things" like expensive phones, designer wear, nice cars, and what not. All I need are things that work, things that can get me to where I wanna be and things that will help me do the things I need to do. At the end of the day they still get me what I need and that's what matters. Have the simplest life so you can live it to the fullest.

So is triathlon a rich man's sport? Well yes and no! It's up to you if you want to be spending on these unnecessary things which aren't anything more than fashion statements and sometimes not even really the basis if you will go any faster in the sport or not. Live your life and attack triathlon with the poor man's mentality. Simplicity is the key and use and only buy the things that you utmost need to reach your full potential.

Training Log # 18 - Base Building

23 Kilometers. If you asked me to run this a two months ago, it would have been a breeze and I would have gladly done the mileage with a smile on my face. Today though is a different story. During my run I simply felt like HELL. The first 13kms were a good strong pace, but after that I found myself struggling with heavy legs and foot pain. Thankfully though I was still able to finish my workout, but still I was left questioning what could be wrong.

Last months workouts were low volume to high intensity, meaning 13-14km runs were termed as "long runs" but then these would usually be done at 5:00min/km pac. Other than that, short distance intervals and tempo workouts were the main stay of the run workouts.

Two months ago, long runs and rides where there main focus of our workouts. Having 15kms be barely the warm up of our workouts.

Looking back I begin to see how the transition of condition has changed, moving from the base and speeding up things to peak performance. Now though as we begin to return to the base it feels kinda hard cause our body became somehow accustomed to the fast painful, but short spurts. I think by this week though we'll probably be able to fully transition back into these long distances.

Well I just hope it does workout like that cause the mileage from here on just keeps getting higher and higher.

Training Log # 17 - Returning back to the training grounds

Coming off training for the standard distance triathlon, I already felt the training to have been quite long and strenuous. We were averaging 230kms weeks mixed with high intensity for four weeks. Now that base building has returned, and now having it be for a half ironman, the distance has now increased to almost double. It's just plain out scary.

But after seeing how much the training has paid off during the last race. I think I'm more motivated to work harder during these next three months. I'm trying to get mentally prepared as I know this will be a tough three months for me. I know I'll be lazy, I'll sometimes want to cut my workouts short. But focus and discipline have to be the first things on my mind.

I know what I want and I know how to get it. It's now all a matter of putting in the work.

Pit Stop #1 Road To Camsur Half Iron Man - Subic International Triathlon

The Subic International Triathlon (SUBIT) was a major race scheduled for the year. This was basically an assessment race to see where we were in terms of training and preparation for the upcoming Cobra Half Iroman. Truthfully, I was quite nervous for this race. I had big expectations for myself, I've put in the workload doing about 220kms of training mileage per week. And not reaching the goals I had for myself may leave me discouraged and broken.

Race day was on Sunday and we've had a lot of rest since we were there since Friday.

During this time we took the chance to do the swim leg of the race since it was infamous for having a "deep abyss" which can scare swimmers if you weren't ready for it.

At first I was confident swimming out to the booey thinking,

"hey now where is that abyss their talking about? is this it? all i can see if the floor moving away. This is easy!"

Then out of now where like a swift wind, the floor went black. PITCH BLACK. You could not see anything and you were left to your imagination. At this point I first stopped and had hold on to the booey as if to ask my team mates  

"are we really doing this?"

But then of course we ended up doing it. It's time to MAN UP! Eventually we finished the swim and finished off our day with a sumptuous dinner.

Race Day

As it always is, I had the hardest time sleeping the night before the race and waking up even before the alarm goes off. Talk about the adrenaline right? That morning I was trying to keep calm as much as possible. Solemnity was the only thing in my mind. All I kept telling myself was,

"you've done all the work and the only one who seems to be doubting you is you"


As we started to make our way on to the starting line I positioned myself at the very left side. This way I wouldn't get eaten up by the faster swimmers since I knew whole heartedly that I'm a pretty terrible swimmer. Through the swim I was pacing quite alright, problem was I forgot to sight and I kept losing track on where I was. For two laps this kept happening so I eventually exited the water at 35 minutes. Taking into account, this wasn't too bad but I think I wasted way too much time sight seeing the under water wild life. haha

Coming up into transition one, I was shocked to see that there were no more bikes by my side. I was second to the last to finish the swim leg in our age group. DAMN was I heck a slow! I told myself though, hey this is a triathlon and not a swimming race, so lets focus on executing the bike and run stages properly now.

As I began my ascent through the hilly bike course I found myself passing biker after biker. I think this is where my weekly hill rides have started to pay off. Through out this part of the bike no one was able to overtake me and that helped boost my confidence a bit. Although, as we reached the flat part of the course three tri bikes were able to pass me. I was at awe at the majestic speed of these bikes in the flat (which really makes me want to start saving up for one).

Overall I think I had a really good ride. I finished off the 40km bike course at 1:16 minutes.

Once I started with the run. My legs felt a little heavy but I told myself to trust in them and they will turn themselves around. After about 400 meters I found myself swiftly running with a pretty good pace and bouncy legs. I was  averaging about 4:44min/km. At this point I knew I was home bound and just enjoyed the run. It was all smiles especially as I passed through the cheering crowds.My 10km time was at 46 minutes.

My final time was 2:41:35. I'm pretty happy with my finish time, taking into consideration that this way my first Olympic distance triathlon and barely my third official triathlon race. But as it always is, I know I can do much much better. There is still a lot of room for improvement and these will be the things I will focus on in preparation for next year's subit race.

Race Less. PR More!

Reading through my Facebook Feed I tend to read about people's cries on missing out on a PR (personal record) or not being able to to establish one during a certain race that they did. Weirdly though this seems to become a trend and that same cry is being shouted out every week or every month. Question now is ,why? Why is it so hard to have a better PR? Here are my two cents on this subject:

1. Preparation - Failure to prepare is preparing to fail.


- Remember how when we first started running or training, we usually had this online program that we would follow to help us achieve that goal? Some of you may be familiar with the couch to 5k program, this is a 9 week program to help beginners run their first 5k. Imagine that , 9 weeks preparation to run a 5k! Why so long? Well because the body needs to gradually be prepared for the distance or the intensity that it will be undertaking during the run.

Now as we become more atoned to running these distances we sometimes become reliant and think, oh hey I can practically run a 5k or a 10k any day. So why can't I just go and race one then hope to PR. See, that would be our first mistake. Yes we can run a 10k but don't hope to PR cause you were not able to prepare properly for that certain race. What I suggest is go back to the basics, follow a program and stick with it. There are programs out there which you can search for which are for more advanced runners seeking to get a better PR. Set a date to race and only race on that day. This way you not only prepare for a specific race and save your energy for it, but you actually save more money on registration fees.

2. Quality Training - Quality over Quantity


- For all you know you can be killing yourself running everyday and you still in no way don't get any faster. Quality is the key to getting the results you want. I've talked about this in a previous entry, so you can check it out here:

Training Log #11 - Training Quantity vs. Training Quality

3. Research - Knowledge is Power

- How many times have you asked yourself the following:

• Why do I keep getting a side stitch?
• How should I pace during my runs?
• What should I be eating before a race?
• I get so hungry and weak while running, why?
• My knee hurts when I go downhill, why?

There a lot of factors which can happen during the run. Things can get unpredictable and it can mess up your race. So when these things happen what do you do? Some people just suck it up while others give up. Both of which aren't the wisest things to do, thats why you have to research. Read running articles, search for questions you may have or ask other friends who run. With the knowledge in hand, you will know what to do the next time something happens.

Training Log # 16 - Falling off the Wagon

I didn't fall off a wagon perse but I did fall off the nutritional band wagon. I sometimes get stuck with this notion that:

"hey, I workout a lot. I'm out there doing my training for hours on end, so that should probably equalize to me being able to eat anything I want" 

During lunch today I ate 4 slices of pizza, 2 pieces of fried chicken, 1 serving of spaghetti, and few dozen pieces of mojos.While, last Sunday, I ate everything from lumpia, lechon, chicharon, tuna, pork barbeque, rice and chicken. This was all in one sitting if I may add.

Everyday, I burn about 1,800 - 2,000 calories cumulatively during just my workouts. This makes my calorie needs at about 3000 calories  per day or even more. Now you'd think, so why all this  mumbo jumbo then? You burn alot so why not eat alot too? Yes I think eat a lot is correct. But in part, eat the a lot of the right food is even better.

Food is the fuel that we burn during our workouts. Now just imagine putting in this type of garbage into your system and using that to fuel you during your workouts? It would most likely not give you the optimum performance that you would want.

So this is me promising to eat wiser and better.