Saturday, September 15, 2012

70.3 Training - Week 1

On the heels of my first Olympic distance triathlon, I've been giving serious thought to: what is next? I've done Sprints. I've done 5K runs. I've done metric century rides. And I finished Rocketman without puking, crying, drowning, or otherwise dying. Thus I find myself asking: what is next?

One logical, but challenging answer is a 70.3. Often called, "a half." Or, better yet, "a half Ironman." Usually somewhere along the lines of: a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and 13.1 mile run. Somewhere around seven hours of effort (at my pace) at a cost of between seven thousand and ten thousand calories.

A half Ironman is like nothing I've ever attempted or done before. In fact, I've tried (and failed!) to train for a half marathon (the 13.1 mile run portion of the show!) and ended up injuring myself pretty badly. But I've had a really good season this year, learned from my previous mistakes, I'm much better with my training and nutrition. So I think I can do it, but where?

Turns out that in early November there is a new 70.3 a couple of hours east of here, in New Roads, LA: the River Roux Triathlon. It's the right distances and far enough in the future that I can focus on training my individual weaknesses between now and then.

So I talked to Luke. He is putting a plan together for me. I will train for the next 8 weeks, focusing on my run, then attempt my first 70.3 on November 10th. In the meanwhile, I've been sticking to my previous training schedule and looking forward to kicking it up a notch.

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