Lake Placid Training Weekend
Had a fantastic training weekend up in Lake Placid. We went up on friday, and got in an hour swim in the afternoon. The underwater lines have been moved, set up now for rowing i think. swimming the loop felt long, and my time was longer than anticipated, so i'm not sure if it was truly just a 1.2 mile loop. but it's so nice swimming in that lake it really doesn't matter!
saturday we got out on the bikes. i did this same training weekend in 2007. that year, riding the course (112 miles) took me 7 hours. that was my longest bike ride ever. i continued on to ride it in 6:19 during the race.
this year, i felt more confident riding the course. i feel i "know it". i know where i can push, where i can recover, and i know i have the legs to go the distance.
the roads were really in bad shape, actually causing you to come to a near-complete stop in a few locations. but even with that, i rode the whole 112 miles in 6:29. not only was that a full 30 min faster than my training ride in 2007, but only 10 min slower than my race pace!! i felt good and strong, enjoyed the ride, and feel i'm well placed to approach that 6 hour goal during the race if conditions allow. they are currently repaving a large section of route 73 going by cascade lakes so it should be much better for the race.
sunday was the lake placid marathon and half marathon. it follows the IM course, except you run a full loop around the lake at the start. i knew i'd be on tired legs, but after biking 122 saturday and running 17 miles sunday last weekend, i knew i COULD do well.
well i pulled out the best long run of my life! i focused on a 9 minute pace, and was amazed that as 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 miles ticked by, i was still staying under that pace!! i've never broken 2 hours for a 1/2 marathon, and even with a few minutes in the bank, i was nervous if i could hold it together for the last few hills. running around the oval to the finish line i had the biggest smile as i saw 1:56 on the clock... a PR by 7 minutes!!! and a full 11 minutes faster than i ran it in 2007. i felt steady and strong, and we even ran another 2.5 miles after finishing... we are training for an ironman after all!!
another hour swim sunday night and monday morning completed a fun weekend. just a few weeks left and we'll see how it all comes together on race day!
wyckoff tri is saturday... good luck to all racers and i hope to have a great result there also!!
saturday we got out on the bikes. i did this same training weekend in 2007. that year, riding the course (112 miles) took me 7 hours. that was my longest bike ride ever. i continued on to ride it in 6:19 during the race.
this year, i felt more confident riding the course. i feel i "know it". i know where i can push, where i can recover, and i know i have the legs to go the distance.
the roads were really in bad shape, actually causing you to come to a near-complete stop in a few locations. but even with that, i rode the whole 112 miles in 6:29. not only was that a full 30 min faster than my training ride in 2007, but only 10 min slower than my race pace!! i felt good and strong, enjoyed the ride, and feel i'm well placed to approach that 6 hour goal during the race if conditions allow. they are currently repaving a large section of route 73 going by cascade lakes so it should be much better for the race.
sunday was the lake placid marathon and half marathon. it follows the IM course, except you run a full loop around the lake at the start. i knew i'd be on tired legs, but after biking 122 saturday and running 17 miles sunday last weekend, i knew i COULD do well.
well i pulled out the best long run of my life! i focused on a 9 minute pace, and was amazed that as 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 miles ticked by, i was still staying under that pace!! i've never broken 2 hours for a 1/2 marathon, and even with a few minutes in the bank, i was nervous if i could hold it together for the last few hills. running around the oval to the finish line i had the biggest smile as i saw 1:56 on the clock... a PR by 7 minutes!!! and a full 11 minutes faster than i ran it in 2007. i felt steady and strong, and we even ran another 2.5 miles after finishing... we are training for an ironman after all!!
another hour swim sunday night and monday morning completed a fun weekend. just a few weeks left and we'll see how it all comes together on race day!
wyckoff tri is saturday... good luck to all racers and i hope to have a great result there also!!
Comment
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Comment by Mark Dabrowski on June 18, 2009 at 11:35am -
Hey John,
Nice work up there and congrats on the PR!
Thanks for the report. I'm heading up there tomorrow, in the rain of course. As to the swim, yeah if you did the whole thing you went to far. The turn around point is at about The Cottage.
I'm looking forward to the swim and bike and meeting some friends up there but my run has been severly limited by my achilles. If I can do 1 loop w/o pain I'd be thrilled, My longest run since harriman is 7 miles :( This weekend will be a big test for me.
You seem to be well postioned for LP. Good luck at Wyckoff have fun and train smart the rest of the way.
© 2009 Created by Mike Llerandi
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