Big Jo training Feb 6 -Feb 19

SWIM


I *may* have made a breakthrough in my swimming.  I think I can feel when I drop my elbow which causes my stroke to turn to poo so I am focussing on that at the moment.  I have always heard people say about reaching over the barrel when you swim and it never really made much sense to me but think I may have finally got it.  Now awaiting a breakthough in my speed....  I am back at the gym and pumping some iron after a small hiatus around Wanaka time so hopefully my new bulging shoulder muscles will start catching some water.

BIKE


Oh my goodness - 14 hours on the bike these last 2 weeks and around 400km holy bejesus!  Because Jared hyphen Razzle and I are so nice to our friend Ketzel Wetzel we have done his long Ironman bike rides with him for the last 3 weeks (well only really 2 weeks for me after the derailleur mishap on the first long ride).  So last week was 155km and this week was 165km - not on particularly easy courses either - whoever decided to ride the Waitaks at the END of a 5.5hr ride needs their head read although in saying that the Waitaks hurt no matter how much riding you have done so it wasn't as bad as I was expecting.  This last weekend we did the Coast ride which goes through Hunua to Kaiaua, Kawakawa Bay and back to Clevedon then home so I had a bit of a reccie for Auckland Half which I will be doing at the end of March as this uses the Kaiaua - Kawakawa Bay section that we did.  If only I could get Kezzle to sit in front of me at his Ironman for the Half - it would make it so much easier...
I have become very dedicated to Greatness and have decided to do one windtrainer session for efforts instead of doing them outside to improve my quality of training.  It's not fun but I can definately see how my efforts are so much more consistent than outside with so many other things going on.  And I get to have some quality Seinfeld watching time while I am doing it, although usually I am so much in the hurtbox that I can't watch it anyway.

Murfalfel keep a hand on things

 RUN

I have built up my long runs to be around the 1hr15-20 mark and will build up a wee bit more for Auckland Half.  I attempted the O'Hagan's 5km the other day with a terrible result but will hopefully get my fast legs back soon.  Funny thing is that my normal training pace is a bit quicker than what it was a couple of years ago but I am way slower for anything speed related.  Meh.
I am slowly making friends with the ASICS but it is a very delicate relationship and I even had to resort to socks the other day which is just unheard of.