Another awesome weekend with Taupo doing its best to impersonate a tropical paradise with very hot temperatures and a fair bit of humidity as well. We are truly blessed to live here in Taupo, it is in my opinion, the best place to live and train in the NZ summer. The variety of rides and runs is tremendous and we get to swim in the water that most of the people in the upper North Island drink!
I was lucky enough this weekend to be a part of the Cam Brown training camp based in Taupo with around 25 athletes of varying abilities. Being based in Taupo allows the athletes to become familiar with the course and feel what its like riding back to Taupo into the wind and how massive those wee hills on the run course actually are when your fatigued. There were a number of Iron Virgins as well as some seasoned IMers and Coast to Coasters taking part. It was a really good bunch of people and nice to meet and be motivated by some fresh faces. As always at these camps there was one individual who fit the old saying of "all the gears and no ideas". It was very funny when after shelling out plenty of questionable advise to anyone who listened he promptly fell off his bike at one of the pre-ride briefings :-O. However, I'm sure he learnt a lot from the wise council of Brown and Watson and will go away a more educated and humble athlete;)
Friday was a pretty lax day with me just doing a normal squad session in the a.m and then a group 1hr run in the avo. This was more a meet and greet time and a chance for people to become accustomed with the environment and lodgings etc.
Day 2 was a biggie, Andy MacKay and I were given the task of swimming the IM course, and then meet the rest of the crew at the motel for a 200km ride, completing the full course plus a bit tapped on the end. We had our fair share of efforts to do as well so it was a full on workout. I have just changed saddles to a ISM racer that took a bit of getting used to but was very happy with how it felt and helped my position on my QROO Lucero. We then had a run off the bike that was pretty intense, I held Cam and Andy for 15 mins but even with my new Pearl Izumi Streak racing flats the pace was too quick for me so I chose to back off and run my own pace back to base camp. The shoes felt great and will be my choice for the IMNZ run. All in all a great day and I was very happy with how I scrubbed up.
Sunday came with the intimidating prospect of running for 2.5hrs with one of the best runners in the sport! After a leisurely start the group soon thinned to 6 with Coach Mark Watson half wheeling all of us, cranking up the pace to around 4 min kms. I found this quite fun and was happy with how my legs felt so went with him. Mark isn't in the best shape of his life at present so he had a 5 min rest just before the run turnaround before jumping back into the group and slowly turning the screw again! We went with him and were back into town before we knew it. Mark pulled the pin and limped off looking for a coffee and cream bun and the group thinned to 4, Brown, Cam Durno, Andy MacKay and me. We decided to do the last hour off road so ran the beautiful mountain bike tracks to Huka Falls and back up the other side to town. The sun was shining and the cicadas chorus was deafening, long may this Summer continue! It was a great run and I was rapt with how I felt.
There is still room to improve before IM so it will be a case of staying smart and listening to the bod before the taper starts and Race Day is upon us. I'm like a kid in a candy store at the moment and can't wait to get to March 7 and show myself how fit I have become!
Take care, tune in next week....
Dunc:)
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Jake the muss.......
Gordon Walker wrote an article in Multi Sport magazine a couple of years ago detailing a 2 week training camp he had been on in the Gold Coast. For most that attended this camp it was preparation for the Hawaiian Ironman, for Gordon it was leading up to the Motu Challenge here in NZ. In that article he referred to Cam Brown as "Jake the Muss" (for those of you outside of NZ and haven't seen "Once were Warriors" think instead of the roughest, toughest movie character you can think of). Last week I learnt that this description of Cam in relation to triathlon training was very apt!
The camp was to be 5 days, the top dogs were Cam Brown and Gordon Walker with myself, Andy MacKay, James Bowstead, Jaime Whyte and Wayne Oxenham along in an attempt to keep them honest. All in all we covered over 600km on the bike, Auckland to Whangamata (155km) on the first day, the infamous K2 cycle race course (192km) and the return ride to Auckland were the 3 biggies. We ran around 90km, most of which was off road and had 2 swim sessions.
One of the standout sessions was the first day, following the grueling ride down we had a 55min run, I thought this would have been fairly moderately paced but this was the session that would set the precedent for the rest of the week! We started out steadily and then turned off the road into a forest trail. This trail went up, and up, and up and up some more. After 15 mins of climbing, Cameron casually informed us that there was 5 mins of climbing left. At this stage we were blowing and the elastic was stretched to the limit! Andy and I hung in for 2 more mins before dropping and Cam, Gordy and James trotted off up ahead. I was close to redlining and with 4 more days of punishment left to go decided to save a bit over. Once at the top we admired the views of Whangamata below and then it was a rapid descent back to sea level stopping at a stream along the way to soak our hats in, as the temperature was over 30 degrees. We all met up at the bottom and ran back to town as a group, thankfully Jaime who had dropped on the ride was just getting out of the shower so it was pleasing to see he had made it safely (he called it a day after the next session laid up with a virus).
Following a quality run on the 2nd day we finished at the end of a Peninsular across the harbour inlet from town. There are 2 ways to get back into town, either run back the way we came, or swim in full running kit complete with fuel belts and sunnies across the channel to the harbour. Given we were already 10 mins over time on our run, the 2nd option was taken, it was a great way to finish and I recommend it to anyone (who can swim of course:)), the water was beautiful and it helped us all forget the pounding we had just taken trying to keep up with Cam on the 100 min run!
The last day had us retracing our steps from the 1st day. This was the 3rd time we summited the Kopu Hikuai, a 15km climb from bottom to top. I had dropped from Cam and James on the 2nd ascent during our K2 loop so was keen to hold them today. I managed this and as we went over the top the group was down to Cam, James and Me, not a bad effort given I'm lugging 13kg more body weight than both of them! Once home we had a short easy run of the bike to do, or so I thought. It was full noise for me, at times on the flat Andy (who had a Garmin watch to show our running pace) said we were running 3min 40s kms. To be doing this at the end of such a tough week and solid ride, in what was 30 degree plus weather was great. Awesome for me to push the limits some more and create some more mental toughness to use in IMNZ in 6 weeks.
We all collapsed into Brownie's neighbours' swimming pool with bottles of Electrolyte and water to cool off and reflect on what was a great week. Training with Cam and Gordy really showed me what it takes to be the best. Absolute commitment and follow through on every session is critical and the need to push the limits from time to time prepares them mentally and physically for the ardures of race day. Cam never dropped from any of the sessions and never showed weakness. The old adage of "if you haven't been there in training, you are not going to handle it come race day" fits well. This training approach for IM is new to me but it is clear that combined with rest strategies and periodisation, it is what is required if I want to develop as an athlete.
We have another 3 day version this weekend with "..the Muss" after a couple of easy days, I'm looking forward to it already and will update you all next week on what happens there.
Cheers
Dunc:)
The camp was to be 5 days, the top dogs were Cam Brown and Gordon Walker with myself, Andy MacKay, James Bowstead, Jaime Whyte and Wayne Oxenham along in an attempt to keep them honest. All in all we covered over 600km on the bike, Auckland to Whangamata (155km) on the first day, the infamous K2 cycle race course (192km) and the return ride to Auckland were the 3 biggies. We ran around 90km, most of which was off road and had 2 swim sessions.
One of the standout sessions was the first day, following the grueling ride down we had a 55min run, I thought this would have been fairly moderately paced but this was the session that would set the precedent for the rest of the week! We started out steadily and then turned off the road into a forest trail. This trail went up, and up, and up and up some more. After 15 mins of climbing, Cameron casually informed us that there was 5 mins of climbing left. At this stage we were blowing and the elastic was stretched to the limit! Andy and I hung in for 2 more mins before dropping and Cam, Gordy and James trotted off up ahead. I was close to redlining and with 4 more days of punishment left to go decided to save a bit over. Once at the top we admired the views of Whangamata below and then it was a rapid descent back to sea level stopping at a stream along the way to soak our hats in, as the temperature was over 30 degrees. We all met up at the bottom and ran back to town as a group, thankfully Jaime who had dropped on the ride was just getting out of the shower so it was pleasing to see he had made it safely (he called it a day after the next session laid up with a virus).
Following a quality run on the 2nd day we finished at the end of a Peninsular across the harbour inlet from town. There are 2 ways to get back into town, either run back the way we came, or swim in full running kit complete with fuel belts and sunnies across the channel to the harbour. Given we were already 10 mins over time on our run, the 2nd option was taken, it was a great way to finish and I recommend it to anyone (who can swim of course:)), the water was beautiful and it helped us all forget the pounding we had just taken trying to keep up with Cam on the 100 min run!
The last day had us retracing our steps from the 1st day. This was the 3rd time we summited the Kopu Hikuai, a 15km climb from bottom to top. I had dropped from Cam and James on the 2nd ascent during our K2 loop so was keen to hold them today. I managed this and as we went over the top the group was down to Cam, James and Me, not a bad effort given I'm lugging 13kg more body weight than both of them! Once home we had a short easy run of the bike to do, or so I thought. It was full noise for me, at times on the flat Andy (who had a Garmin watch to show our running pace) said we were running 3min 40s kms. To be doing this at the end of such a tough week and solid ride, in what was 30 degree plus weather was great. Awesome for me to push the limits some more and create some more mental toughness to use in IMNZ in 6 weeks.
We all collapsed into Brownie's neighbours' swimming pool with bottles of Electrolyte and water to cool off and reflect on what was a great week. Training with Cam and Gordy really showed me what it takes to be the best. Absolute commitment and follow through on every session is critical and the need to push the limits from time to time prepares them mentally and physically for the ardures of race day. Cam never dropped from any of the sessions and never showed weakness. The old adage of "if you haven't been there in training, you are not going to handle it come race day" fits well. This training approach for IM is new to me but it is clear that combined with rest strategies and periodisation, it is what is required if I want to develop as an athlete.
We have another 3 day version this weekend with "..the Muss" after a couple of easy days, I'm looking forward to it already and will update you all next week on what happens there.
Cheers
Dunc:)
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