Week 5 wrap, LT test and video

Week 5 - or back to base building. First things first. I'd like to tip my hat to those of you who have kept an interesting blog going while training for an Ironman. I'm only up to 11 hours of training a week (did I really just say that) and I'm having trouble finding the time and energy to do much with this. Maybe as I get further into the training I'll have more interesting things occurring.

As I said in my last post. I went in and had Larry at The Fix calculate my LT threshold. With that information I can tailor my training on the bike to make sure I'm getting the most out of my time in the saddle. The test involves a structured warmup, a slow build to close to your max (then the blood draws start). A little glucose meter like device measures the lactic acid in you blood stream. You get a short recovery and then start back up. Slowly increasing workload until you find the point where your body is producing more acid than it can clear - your LT balance point or LT Threshold. Here's my graph:

The blue line is my build up to near max - 168 bpm. The green line shows my second buildup heartrate v. watts and the red curve shows the acid buildup. Note how steep it went up once I got past my threshold. That's not good.

The test showed my threshold is at 153 bpm. That number is fairly accurate I would say. It also showed that it is at 180 watts. That number is wrong and here's why:

Wednesday Bike: 1 hour 15 minutes, 185 average watts and average heartrate of 130 bpm with no muscle soreness.

Friday Bike: 2 hours 45 minutes, 171 average watts and heartrate of 128 bpm. NS Rob came over and rode the whole 2:45 with me - what a trooper!

I think we had the rolling resistance calibration below the minimum for the computrainer resulting in skewed watts figures. If my threshold was really 180 I should have been wiped after 1:15 at 185 watts.

We'll see how this week's rides go. I'll probably get tested after my next recovery week and see if we can get better numbers.

Totals for the week:

Swim 6,400 yards
Bike 5 hours approx 75 miles test/course
Run 2 hours 38 minutes 15.4 miles
Yoga 2 hours

My swimming continues to progess - I had a long set of 1800 on Saturday. 500s of 8:03 (oops that's a little fast and going to hurt), 8:09 and 8:15. I think the speed work has been paying off. I should probably add a little to my running and see if that can improve too.

Here's this weeks video. I'm not sure which the Doc is more worried about - that I will end up in Scott's position or that the addiction will set in.