Second Swim Meet Since College!

Over the weekend, I competed in my second swim meet since college (2001)!  I stuck with short races since even after 6 years of Ironman training I still can't swim distance races worth a crap.  In high school and college I was a pure sprinter even though I was a distance runner.  The meet went much better than I anticipated.  I was really concerned that all the long, slow distance Ironman training would destroy my ability to sprint.  Here's how it played out (times are for yards of course!).

50 free 24.19

100 free 54.17 (better than I thought)

50 fly 27.48 (worse than I thought)

100 IM 1:04:76


So roughly 1 sec per lap slower than my fastest times. One of the things I was surprised about was that I hadn't been off the blocks in years. Last week I practiced maybe 10 starts and they were very good from the first one- I guess it shows how some movement patterns can be hardwired into the brain.  I started competitive swimming when I was about 10.  I imagine I did a few thousands starts over the years.  I guess to some degree it is like riding a bike.

I had an odd relationship with swimming over the years.  I enjoyed doing it, but only swam for a few months at a time, because I always did cross country in the fall and track in the spring.  As a collegiate swimmer my best 50 times were in the low 22s.  I usually hit these times after only 4-5 months of practice.  I was definitely  better collegiate swimmer than runner (not even close).  I always wondered how much time I could shave off by training year round and lifting more.  Olympic trials cuts used to be somewhere around a high 19s for the 50.  Back then with a solid year of training I would have been in the mid-to-low 21s.  I don't know if I ever could have gone faster than that (I don't have a national-caliber sprinters build).  Still interesting to think about...

My mom, Cara and Jonah dropped by for the 100 free.  It was Jonah's first-ever swim meet and I managed to win my heat of that event!  I imagine most of my remaining swimming career will be as a spectator!

Triathlon Mythbusters Presentation at Spin City Open House!

I will be doing a fun new Triathlon Mythbusters presentation for the Spin City Open House March 5&6th!

Does lack of electrolytes cause cramping?  Will your tires blow up on a hot day?

Lots of other bike company reps will be there with products and presentations, plus free food! More info here: http://429-spin.com/articles/product-open-house-march-5th-6th-pg261.htm

Announcing new nutrition sponsor!

For the 2010 season and beyond, I have committed to racing with 1st Endurance.  1st Endurance is one of the biggest names in nutrition products designed specifically for endurance athletes.  After testing some of their products on my own the last two years, I approached them about a sponsorship deal.

There are a number of things that I really like about this company.  The first and foremost is that they are more research driven than anything else that I have seen.  All of their products are informed by current research from reputable journals.  As an information professional (fancy words for librarian) high quality research is very important to me.  Second, I feel absolutely confident that these are the cleanest nutritional products on the planet.  They are tested and approved.  Some pretty good riders from the Columbia HTC cycling team use this stuff, so you know it has to be safe and effective.

My favorite products so far are the Ultragen Recovery drink and the endurance-specific Multivitamin.  The research behind their Optygen product is quite interesting and compelling.  I have used Optygen for a few months before big races, but never long term.

I encourage you to dig around in the research on their site.  It really is impressive.  I will put in some regular updates about my use of their products.

Slides From: Introduction to Training and Racing with Power Presentation

The Power Point slides from the Intro to Training and Racing with Power presentation that Stan Watkins and I gave last night are linked below. You'll miss out on all the riveting commentary and anecdotes, but the presentation should be somewhat intelligible on its' own. Thanks to everyone that showed up on a snowy Monday night. I counted 30+ people! Awesome!

Introduction To Training And Racing With Power

View more presentations from Chris Sweet.

Introduction to Training and Racing with Power for Cyclists and Triathletes

Chris Sweet and Stan Watkins




When & Where:

Monday Feb. 15, 6-7:30pm in the Bloomington Public Library Meeting Room (lower level). Directions here: http://www.bloomingtonlibrary.org/use/get_to_the_library/



What:

This free presentation will offer a very basic introduction to training and racing with power feedback for cyclists and triathletes. Our target audience is anyone curious about the benefits of training with power. We will cover basic questions like: What is power-based training? How can I benefit? What options are available? How much is this gonna cost me? What can a Computrainer do for me? Various brands of power meters and a Computrainer will be on display.



Presenters:

Chris Sweet is a local triathlete with nearly 20 years of experience. He has raced all over the country and has competed in multiple World Championship events. He is also a certified coach with USA Triathlon. Chris runs a small coaching company called Revolution MultiSport: http://www.revolution-multisport.com/  and maintains a triathlon-related blog at: http://www.goalisthejourney.com/


Stan Watkins is a competitive masters cyclist. He is a level 3 USCF certified coach and part of the staff of Vision Quest Coaching http://www.visionquestcoaching.com/  You can read his Vision Quest coach's profile here: http://www.visionquestcoaching.com/coaches.php?contentId=840

How much truth can you handle?

I rarely put anything up on the blog that I didn't create.  Alas, my genius is overshadowed by the master who created this all too accurate look at the "online triathlete".  By that I mean that curious sub-species who spends more time on triathlon forums and websites than they do on the bikes.  Hillarious stuff:

New Home and my "Attic High Performance Center"

I believe I have made at least off-hand mention that one component of my crazy fall was buying a new home and selling off the old one. We had been looking to move to a smaller town that would reduce Cara's drive for quite some time. This move would also be much better for Jonah in the long term. We finally found a bargain on a big old house that met our criteria and had the highest bid. In an strange turn of events, this house actually burnt down before we closed on it! We weren't out anything, just had to go back to looking.

As it turns out, we like the house we did eventually find much better. What we found is yet another "handyman special" but this one is huge with a big yard and small garage (all significant improvements over our last place). As far as selling went, we were in the right price range at the right time (a few months before the home-buyer credit ran out). We were able to sell our last house in about two weeks...thanks in large part to a great deal of sweat equity that went into that house.

New house in Lexington, IL. Built about 1905.

The new house has lots of great features and just as many problems. The good: new roof, new attic windows, tons of space (4 bedrooms) massive attic, full basement, lots of unpainted original woodwork (including pocket doors that were boarded up and the sellers didn't know about).

Ughh, before.

Much improved, after.

The bad: every room has some degree of damage: cracking plaster, ceiling problems, layers of peeling wallpaper, etc., it only had a clawfoot tub and no shower when we moved in, both bathrooms need gutted, kitchen is gawdy, all the windows are original and need replaced, no central AC and massive, old furnace.

So just this fall we personally installed a new high efficiency furnace/AC system (thanks largely to my dad's assistance), we added insulation to all the walls, we converted the clawfoot tub into a shower, we added a gas fireplace (two actually) and have completed rennovations of two rooms (except hardwood refinishing). So I've been a busy boy....

Before we moved in. Notice the orange carpet over the old hardwood floors.

After with new gas fireplace.

My favorite project though, has been the conversion of the attic into a new training area. One of the features that really sold us on this house was a huge, walk-up attic. It had only been used for storage in the past and had a single knob and tube light bulb. I re-wired the whole thing, ran a gas line up an unused chimney for a fireplace, lugged a 350lb treadmill up 3 flights of stairs (again with help) and finally had space for a proper computrainer/projector set-up.

Before.

We hosted an IM World Champs viewing party and had the inaugural ride in the attic beforehand. I think we had 5 or 6 riding, but I actually have space for up to 10 people or so!

I'm really not a fan of indoor training, but sometimes it is either train inside or take the day off. I've been taking too many days off.....time to nip that in the bud.