Salomon 5km Trail Run, Race 1 - Studley Park, Kew

Elaine and I ventured to Studley Park in Kew for our first ever Trail Running Race. We usually do the Kew Duathlon, but will miss it this year because of the Worlds in London, so it was good to discover another race at the same place. Studley Park is a beautiful location on the Yarra River, a small area of wilderness close to the city. Hopefully I'll be able to find and post some photos up later.

Other friends doing the race were Alistair, Courtney, Moran and Kevin. Alistair, Courtney and Moran were all doing the 10.8km race, Kevin had bravely entered the 15km event, whilst Elaine and I chose the 5km (who are the smart ones ?). Unlike normal fun runs, there were limited marshalls on the course directing people. Instead we had to keep our eyes open for coloured arrows and pieces of tape to navigate our way around the course. Last Sunday I did a course recon, but I decided to run the course again as a warmup (lucky it was only 5km) so that I could see exactly where all the direction markers were. I'm not used to this type of racing, and knowing the course would be one less thing I'd have to worry about during the race.

Despite the mercury dropping to 6 degrees (celsius) I still stripped down to shorts and running singlet for the race. Elaine ran in knee length running shorts and a t-shirt. Ideally I would have worn arm warmers and gloves, but hadn't thought of that when I packed my stuff the night before. Luckily the start line was in direct sunlight and I almost warmed up as I waited for our race to start.

Race organisers generally rely upon the competitors to self grade themselves on the start line, but it always amazes me how deluded some people tend to be. I placed my self about 1 metre behind the start line and in front of me walked a father with his son lucky to be 8 years old. Not wanting to trample the poor boy to death, I carefully maneuvered myself in front just before the gun went off only to find the mother had muscled in ahead at the last second. Admittedly she took off fast, but that lasted a whole 20 metres before I had to waste extra energy getting around her and surprisingly never caught sight of her again. In fact I didn't even see her collect any prizes at the presentations, so she must have finished at least 5 minutes behind me.

My pre race plan was to see how long I could stay with the lead pack. As it turns out, the lead pack was one person and he was very fast. After about 200m the rest of us returned to some form of sanity and resorted to a more realistic pace (as opposed to the 3m10s pace we were running).  Once we hit a small hill a pack formed ahead of me (it did not include me). After taking off so fast I didn't want to blow my race in the first kilometre. Before long 2 more runners dropped off the pack and I started reeling them in.  I caught and passed one, but then we hit a downhill and the other runner built a small gap. This pattern continued for the rest of the race - I'd slowly reel him in on the flat, but he'd pull away on the technical sections and hills (up or down). Speaking to Alistair after the race, he experienced the exact same thing. Maybe it's a coincidence that neither of us were wearing trail running shoes (Elaine has already picked out the Salomon Trail Running shoes she wants to buy).

The last kilometre of the race was the most technical. Kind of cruel really, hit you when you are at your weakest. One section of the path becomes narrow and slippery and gets dangerously close to the Yarra. At this point I was glad to be one of the early runners (in the short race) to go through this section, as I didn't fancy trying to get through it after 1,000 other runners had churned it up. In fact Courtney suffered the exact peril I was worried about and was luckily caught and pulled back onto the path by 2 other competitors. Needless to say the last kilometre was not my fastest. The competitor ahead was out of reach (and sight) and there was nobody really threatening me from behind. Under the circumstances it is very difficult to dig deep.

Being the shortest of 3 distances offered on the day, I expected most of the fast runners would be doing the longer races. With this in mind I had targetted an overall top 10 place - I finished 7th overall and 1st in my age group. Elaine finished 3rd in her age group. So we both took home prizes, a nice Salomon Polar Fleece for me and a pair of Salomon Socks for Elaine. My finishing time was 18m35s which I would have been extremely pleased with if my Garmin had not shown a distance of only 4.8km. With so many twists and turns along the trail (and mostly under tree cover), it is understandable that the GPS tracking would miss a fair bit of distance, but I'm not sure if it would miss 200m. Elaine's watch uses a footpod that would have been far more accurate under the circumstances, but sadly the watch's battery went flat this week.



Courtney has switched from Triathlon to Crossfit, so his running form has dropped away and Alistair had been up all night sorting out issues for his daughter overseas. Despite this they both ran quite well. Moran had a great race finishing 9th overall in the 10.8km race, but unfortunately only 6th in his category (so no prizes) and Kevin set a PB in the 15km run.

Icicles

It's been a cold week in Melbourne. No clouds in the sky and nice weather in the middle of the day, but without the cloud cover the overnight lows and morning temperatures have been literally freezing.
- Wed morning ride: 2 degrees Celsius
- Fri morning swim (outdoor pool): -0.1 degrees Celsius
- Sat morning ride: -1.1 degrees Celsius

Last week I pulled up sore after my ride up Arthur's Seat. After having rest days on Sunday and Monday I was feeling great on Tuesday night's run session doing 200s and 400s between 3m15s and 3m20s pace. Being a little over confident I then did the North Rd ride on Wednesday morning - a very fast group ride where I averaged over 43kph for over 17km. Unfortunately my knee pain returned which reduced Wednesday and Thursday nights' runs to recovery runs.

Friday became another unscheduled rest day before the Club ride on Saturday. Did I mention Saturday's ride was cold. Although the temperature only got down to -1.1 (lowest I can ever remember), the 'Feels Like' temperature was -3.3 (and that felt f#&king cold). Elaine bought me a lovely pair of Campagnolo winter gloves several weeks ago which have been fantastic on cold Winter rides, until Saturday. Turns out all their effectiveness disappears once the temperature drops below zero. I cut the ride short at 62km (when the ride conveniently passed my house). Considering that once home, it took over 30 minutes before my hands resembled anything like normal, I think it was an extremely wise decision to end the ride when I did. I'm told your capillaries shrink when your hands get really cold. Once you come back into a warm environment, the blood tries to squeeze through these shrunken capillaries - this is extremely painful. Once home, this extreme pain lasted for over 20 minutes.

To make matters worse, my knees were sore again after the ride. I've been using the foam roller and stretching my quads all week, but I've now discovered that it is my VMO (Vastus Medialis Oblique - shown in blue on the diagram to the right) that are the most tight and sore. In hindsight this is obvious, because the VMO is one of the main muscles used when cycling and I was already pretty sure it was cycling that was causing my problems. I'll now concentrate on massaging my VMO using knuckles, golf balls and any other objects of torture.

Next weekend Elaine and I have a 5km Trail Running Race at Studley Park in Kew. Today I did a course reconnaissance but I still struggled to identify the exact trails we'll be using next week. However I did get in a 12.5km run without any soreness which is very encouraging.

Originally I was planning to train right through without any taper for the Trail Run (what I would refer to as a 'C' race). But with the knee injury I'll now back off the training this week which will effectively result in a taper before the race. Not ideal, but not terrible either.

I'll still do all my swimming sessions, in fact I plan to do an extra swim on Wednesday night. However I'll drop all cycling sessions and only run on Tuesday and Thursday. Sometimes an early taper will trigger a premature peak in performance, but with 12 weeks of training left before the World Championships in London I don't think this will be a problem. And getting over the knee injury is far more important.

Mark's training for the Half Marathon at Run Melbourne has been going very well with Mark continuing his excellent habit of following the training program perfectly. I've had a recent addition to the training stables with Stef who is also training for Run Melbourne (she is doing the 10km). After only 1 week it is still very early days, but she's started off very well with a good first week's training. Unfortunately, Elaine's training was non-existent this weekend with a non-triathlon related issue on Saturday and other engagements on Sunday. She was very disappointed to have lost some of her training momentum, but on the bright side, she managed to avoid a ridiculously cold ride on Saturday morning.

Lesson Learnt

Last week I wrote "Unlike running, I very rarely suffer injuries from riding, so I can get away with more intensity". Well those words have come to bite me in the bum. In the last 3 weeks I have done Repeats of Two Bays Rd, The Wall in the Dandenongs and yesterday I rode up Arthurs Seat (once from each direction). It turns out 3 intensive hill rides in 3 weeks just exceeds what my body can handle. I don't have an actual injury (at least I believe I don't), but I had a mild ache in my knees after the ride. Whilst the ache was a bit less today, it was still enough for me to skip my usual Sunday long run, which is very annoying. I'll probably take a rest day on Monday as well, before swimming and running again on Tuesday. London is still 13 weeks away, so a few days off now will not hurt and much better to experience problems now rather than in the last 8 weeks.

In truth the knee pain is probably a combination of all the training I've been doing lately (biking and running). But it is still a timely reminder that cycling is not immune to causing injury. It also emphasizes how important it is too keep my quads and ITBs stretched and loose - more time needed on the foam roller.

Other than pulling up with sore knees, yesterdays ride itself went very well. According to Strava it was my 7th best effort (out of 14) up Balcombe Hill, my first time on record up White Hill Rd and my 2nd best (out of 3) up Arthurs Seat. Being a reasonably long ride with several climbs, I didn't set up to break any records, but I was actually surprised how easy all of the climbs seemed. I think my cycling has improved significantly in the last month.

For nostalgic reasons I took a photo from the same lookout area on Arthurs Seat as I did nearly 2 years ago when I first started my blog - Previous blog post. The view remains the same, but the sign has been replaced and the bike has seen close to 10,000kms.


Elaine posted another 92km ride, this time to Rosebud and back. She didn't do any big climbs but the roads between Frankston and Mt Martha are definitely lumpy - much hillier than her previous long rides up and down Beach Rd. So she is making great progress with her riding and unlike me has not experienced sore knees.

Love a ride in the Dandenongs

Today was the Queen's Birthday public holiday and Clint organised a club ride in the Dandenongs. I love riding in the hills and the Dandenongs is one of my favourite locations.

My recent bike mileage tends to be on the low side compared to other triathletes (and almost non-existant compared to a cyclist). Two factors let me get away with this - firstly I've built a good base by doing a lot of riding over the last 10 years and secondly I now focus on quality over quantity. Regular readers on my blog will notice this is very different to the approach I have taken with my running. Unlike running, I very rarely suffer injuries from riding, so I can get away with more intensity. However the main reason for the lack of bike mileage is the time it takes and also the Melbourne weather in Winter. Once Summer arrives and the days get longer I will definitely be extending my time spent on the bike.

I think of quality on the bike as riding at roughly 3 different speeds. First is easy riding which means riding at a relaxed pace. Second is prolonged efforts of 20 minutes or more at close to threshold pace (which for me is between 260 and 300 watts). Finally the last pace is going hard (300 to 400 watts). The easiest way to go hard is to find a hill. If the climb is between 5 and 8 minutes you can do repeats (refer to VO2Max Intervals). For longer climbs, I simply go as fast as I can. This means I am always trying to set a PB up every significant climb I do. Not only is this great training, it also sets benchmarks and allows you to compare your form against previous rides.

In the Dandenongs, one of these significant climbs is 'The Wall'. Just over 5kms long and averaging about 5% gradient, but with a nasty pinch in the middle that is around 10% for half a kilometre or so. Todays effort was 23 seconds slower than my attempt in December (when I was in pretty good form) but 1m42s quicker than in June last year. So even with my low bike mileage, I am very happy with my current form at this time of the season.

Elaine did a 91km Beach Rd ride on Saturday and followed it up by riding 60kms with Mark in the Dandenongs today. So far in June she has ridden 295km to my 205km. It is amazing what the fear of an upcoming Half Ironman will do to someone's bike mileage.

Replacing Mileage with Speed

I'm now moving into phase II of my running program. Previously it was as many easy miles as I could manage, now I have 2 days of running intensity each week and I'll slot in extra easy runs when I can.

Phase I didn't end as strong as I would have liked. After weeks of 64 & 63kms, I only managed 49km last week. This is because I skipped my usual Wednesday and Friday runs. I never felt injured, but the soreness and general feeling of heaviness was increasing and I decided it was better to be cautious. Still 176km in 3 weeks is way more than I've ever managed before, so overall I am very happy. I've carried this cautious approach over to this week and skipped running on Monday and Wednesday (and may skip Friday as well) - this week's intensity is more important than the mileage.

In Phase II my Tuesday runs will involve short, fast intervals with plenty of recovery in between - what Daniels refers to as Repetitions. So yesterday I did 5 x 200m efforts with 200m recovery after each, followed by a 400m effort - all at Repetition speed which for me is 3m25s per km pace. Even with a 15 minute warmup and 15 minute cooldown run, this is a pretty small session. But being the first speed work of the season, I want to build into it gradually.

My interval times were as follows:
    200m @ 3m15s pace
    200m @ 3m15s pace
    200m @ 3m10s pace
    200m @ 3m00s pace
    200m @ 3m25s pace
    400m @ 3m20s pace

The fifth 200m was the slowest and the only one done at the correct speed. After so much easy running my body was a little too willing to go fast. It may take a while before I get used to running at the correct speeds.

Elaine was given the same set and her intervals were:
    200m @ 4m10s pace
    200m @ 4m09s pace
    200m @ 4m32s pace
    200m @ 4m10s pace
    400m @ 4m29s pace

Her target pace was 5m12s per kilometre, so she was even more eager than me. However in Elaine's case it may be time to promote her to the next speed level (we might actually skip a few). She'll also need to brush up on her counting because she only did 4 (instead of 5) 200m repeats.

Mark has been training for the upcoming Half Marathon at Run Melbourne next month. As usual he has been training very well. Unlike last year when he was training for Ironman, this season I've introduced intensity into his running program. Four weeks ago Mark ran a 1km Time Trial in 5m11s - yesterday he managed a 6 second improvement with a 1km run in 5m05s. Both of these efforts were at the end of speed work session!

If Mark follows his program he will have an easy run tomorrow. But Elaine and I will be doing four 1km efforts at Threshold pace (around Half Marathon pace) with only 200m recovery.

VO2Max Intervals on the Bike

I've had a power meter on my bike for nearly 2 years now and I absolutely love it. It has made a huge difference to pacing, both in training and racing. When training sessions refer to Sprint, Olympic, 70.3 or Ironman efforts, I know exactly the wattage I need to maintain. With fresh legs it is very easy to go out too hard and blow up, but now I know the wattage I can hold in different situations (ie. hill climb or time trial). I often still try and push beyond my limits, but only by a sensible margin so the blow ups are usually only small.

However up til now I've ignored the more scientific training sessions achievable with a power meter. That situation changed today with my VO2Max intervals up a nearby hill on Two Bays Rd in Mt Eliza. In simplistic terms, VO2Max is a measure of how much oxygen your body can process - V = volume, 02 = oxygen, Max = maximum. The ability to process oxygen is probably the most important factor in becoming a good endurance athlete.

Although I refer to it as scientific, this session was actually quite simple. First you need to know your Functional Threshold Power, usually referred to as your FTP - which represents the highest power wattage you can hold for 1 hour (I'll let you use Google to learn more). From your FTP you can calculate your VO2Max training range which is 106-120% of your FTP. I estimate my FTP to be 300 watts, so my VO2Max range is between 318 and 360 watts. The length of each interval needs to be between 5 and 8 minutes. Less than 5 minutes is not long enough to receive the benefit and most people will not be able to hold VO2Max wattage for over 8 minutes.

Now the session itself. You need to find a hill climb that will take somewhere between 5 and 8 minutes and ride up this hill (multiple times) keeping your wattage in the VO2Max range. You will be relatively fresh for the first 2 attempts, so you need to take note of the average wattage for the 3rd attempt. Subtract 5% from this wattage number and that is the power you need to average above for every subsequent interval. As soon as you fail to average this power for a climb hill - your session is over.

The Two Bays Rd climb in Mt Eliza seemed like a good hill for this session. It is about 2km long with an average gradient of 4.7%, but the middle 1km is probably around 6%. I decided to start the first interval from the second speed hump as this is where the gradient starts to pick up. Unfortunately even though I pushed through to the round-a-bout, the lap ended up only being 4m37s long. I started the subsequent laps earlier and my second climb took exactly 5 minutes - perfect.

My first 3 intervals had average power of 348, 348 & 333 watts. So 5% deducted from 333 leaves 316 which is the wattage I needed to keep above for all subsequent climbs. The fourth lap was 332 watts, but on my fifth climb I really struggled and could only maintain 313 watts, so no more climbs. I was exhausted and glad that the ride home was not very long and mostly downhill.