IM Canada: Basebuilding Week 3 – Chen’s version (i.e., “Those girls look like they’re going horseback riding”)

Posted by Chen

Horseback riding – that’s what someone in the elevator whispered when they saw us get in as we were on our way to go biking. It seems patrons of Vegas get their athletic activities confused.

I would classify this weekend as one of ridiculous extremes. Our 48 hours in Sin City had us toggling back and forth between training activities and what can only be classified as prolonged, excessive drinking, and it was awesome. Some highlights included:

• Staying up until 4am our first night there, which was approximately 7 hours past our typical bedtime
• Waking up at 10am the next morning to head to Red Rock Canyon, where we rented bikes and did a 24-mile loop with some amazing views. We also went to Dunkin’ twice during that excursion, because Dunkin’.
• Eating Shake Shack for dinner. Mmmmm Shake Shack.
• Touring the strip with drinks in hand that night for approximately 8 hours, including a pitstop at Hakkasan, where we definitively confirmed that we are far too old for the clubbing scene. We’ll stick to our sweatpants and wine bottles, thanks. That said, it was comical to observe, and a big shout out goes to Rachel’s sister for hooking us up and getting us in for free with free drinks! 
• Running 10 miles through the Clark County Wetlands Preserve this morning. Beautiful, though way too hot for us Bay Area folk who can’t handle anything outside of 55-65 degrees

Cabo Wabo drinks, consumed way past our bedtime

Red Rock Canyon

I've seen the Bellagio fountain show like 10 times now, but I'm still a sucker for it

Delicious seafood noodle soup, consumed post-run

On the training front, this week was all about the swim. Since it was a cutback week, I only biked twice and ran three times, but I swam four times for a total of 11,185 yards. For me, putting in this amount of yardage was much less about gaining fitness and speed, and much more about gaining comfort and familiarity with the water. I kid you not when I say I still have laps where I fear I might not make it to the other side of the pool.

I know for people who grew up swimming, breathing while swimming is probably just as comfortable as breathing while out for a leisurely stroll. For me, though, I’m still getting used to the fact that I can’t breathe exactly when I want to, which often leads to mental images of me drowning, which in turn leads to poor form, sinking hips, and major panic. It seems that every swim I do, my first 10 laps or so are all wonky and borderline panicky, but by the end of each session, I’m far more comfortable and streamlined. Which leads me to believe that I just need to practice, practice, and practice some more until it becomes second nature. So that’s the plan.

The good news is that I can already see considerable gains from just being in the water more and also from executing the form tips that my friend Julie gave me a couple weeks ago. When I first hopped back in the pool last year after decades of not swimming at all, my pace was generally 1:05 per lap (50 yards), maybe 58-60 seconds if I tried REALLY hard. But this week, I got my pace down to 50 seconds per lap for a 50, about 55 seconds per lap for a 100, and 58 seconds per lap for a 250, which I consider a big win (swimmers – don’t laugh)!

More important than the times, though, was that all of those faster laps this week actually felt a lot more effortless than any of my laps last year, thanks to being more streamlined and getting the most out of each stroke I took. Now, I obviously still have a LONG way to go, but I’m excited to monitor my progress over the next few months – it’s fun to learn something new again!

I don’t have anything noteworthy to report on the biking front (since I barely did it this week), but I was happy with my tempo run at the track on Wednesday night. That was actually my third workout of the day, having swum 3250 yards (longest swim ever!) and biked 65 minutes with intervals that same morning. I obviously wasn’t expecting much speed to come out of my legs after those workouts, but I surprised myself with 5 tempo at 7:34, 7:32, 7:30, 7:22, 7:10. Given that I hadn’t done a tempo run since November, I was pretty happy with those results.

This coming week, I’ll continue to spend time in the water while also gearing up for a hella hilly 60-mile ride on Saturday and an 18-mile run on Sunday that will include the Kaiser Permanente Half Marathon. I’m going to need a lot of Chipotle.

Basebuilding Week 3 Recap:

Monday: 

• Rest (traveling back from Tahoe)

Tuesday: 

• AM: Swimming 2500 yards, including kick and pull drills, 5x100 in 2:01, 2:01, 2:01, 1:58, 1:58, and 5x50 (0:55-0:54 each)

Wednesday: 

• AM: Swimming 3250 yards, including kick and pull drills, 5x100 in 1:57, 1:59, 2:00, 1:57, 1:57, 10x50 (average 0:55.6)
• AM: Stationary biking with resistance intervals
• PM: Tempo at track: 8.55 miles total with 5 tempo @ 7:34, 7:32, 7:30, 7:22, 7:10

Thursday: 

• AM: Swimming 2435 yards (mostly in the 50m pool), including kick and pull drills, 4x100m (2:05 each), 5x50 (0:56-0:53)

Friday: 

• AM: Swimming 3000 yards, including kick and pull drills, 5x100 in 1:57, 1:59, 1:55, 1:52, 1:51 (fastest ever!), 10x50 (0:53-0:50, average 0:51, again, fastest ever!), and a continuous 250 (which is long for me, ha) in 4:51. I looked at some old data and saw that I swam a 250 back over Thanksgiving in 5:40, so I’d say I’m making progress! I also used the swim paddles for the first time, and I think they’ll really help me strengthen my pull and force me to focus on finishing out my stroke (which is probably my biggest issue right now. Self-diagnosed, of course).
• PM: Running 7.1 miles mostly easy, except for the stretch where I thought a random runner dude was following me, and I started running for my life (8:38 average pace)

Saturday: 

• PM: Biking 24 miles through Red Rock Canyon

Sunday: 

• AM: Running 10 miles through the Clark County Wetlands Preserves (8:50 average pace)