Road to IRONMAN Blog #4 — A weekend of fixing, looking at or riding bikes!
As always I’d love your support on my fundraising goal — I’m raising to support MIND, they’re on a mission to ensure that everyone who needs support with the mental health, gets it.
A solid week of training
So this week was a big week of training, with several sessions in the morning before work, (which I often contemplated then and there if I could just do it in the evening — but got up and did it anyway!) with a long ride on the weekend on a moutnain bike and a long ‘ol run.
- Monday: strength and conditioning workout (45mins)
- Tuesday: 1hr 20min turbo trainer bike ride + 45min run
- Wednesday: 45min swim
- Thursday: 1hr 10min run — was super happy with this — covered 9.01miles in 1hr 16min.
- Friday: 45 min swim
- Saturday: 5hr bike ride, decided on 3hr on road and 2hr on turbo trainer
- Sunday: 2hr 15min run — also very happy with this one ~15.9 miles
Follow me on Strava if you’d like!
What I found quite tough this week was the brick session on Tues which I couldn’t do midday like I usually do during ‘lunch’ and I didn’t want to do this in the evening, so got it done first thing in the morning, which is fair to say I was not particularly looking forward to!
My run on Thurs I was really happy with — I felt like I was off to a solid pace and just felt like I could keep going, to start with anyway and covered a good amount of ground. It was also gorgeous weather and out in the back country roads I could happily take my vest off, which always feel quite liberating and free to just be running along no top, cap on, ear plugs in and especially when you feel like you’re holding a good pace.
I had ordered my new wheel and chain whip to put my casette from my currently broken bike wheel to my new wheel, but after trying to fit it on Firday eve, it ended up being the wrong one and after fitting the tyre and thinking I’ll get the right tool in store tomorrow before riding, the inner tube burst and I decided I’d spend no more time on that bike! So Saturday I was set to do a 5 hour bike ride on a mountain bike with fairly chunky tyres — but grateful I had a bike nonetheless!
Saturday morning was spent looking for a new bike, narrowing ndown my selection and then trying to find one in stock! After that and numerous coffees I set off at 3pm with my BMX helmet and Oakley glass — looking more like an army ranger than a cyclist for my 5 hour ride. I managed to cover 40 miles on the first 3 hours on the road— a bit of a grueling experience and was glad to get home. Sort of laughable that I still had 2 hours to knock out on the turbo trainer.
Sunday came around it was more looking for bikes in stock in the morning, and I set off on my run, probably under hydrated and just after quickly wolfing down a banana. I was however very very happy with this run. Although my watch lost battery about 20 mins from home, I managed almost 16 miles in 2hr 15min, which was tough but ‘comfortable’. But when I was near to being home I was so thirsty and hot, there was only one option…
After this it was into Bristol to check out some bikes and see what’s in stock — shoutout and thank you to Evans Cycles Bristol, TREK Bristol and MUD DOCK Cafe for your help — there were some gorgeous bikes in there!
Monday’s bank holiday was back to TREK to try out some bikes after only taking a look yesterday. After testing out 4 different bikes I new what I was after and a likely size, but with none of these in stock, I was a little stuck. Fortunately we found one in store not too far from me and will taking a look this week
But for the first time riding a proper road bike, some of which were carbon fibre — it was pretty nuts, very snappy and nimble — great bikes! And a huge shoutout to TREK Bristol for their help and wonderful service.
As tomorrow had a slight change of plan, I opted to do my 1hr 30min bike session into a 45 min run, today rather than tomorrow. Can’t say that I particularly wanted to do this workout this afternoon and was still aching a bit from the weekend’s workouts. But I got the turbo trainer back out, got it done and then went into the run and it was such gorgeous weather I didn’t even take a top, it was pretty much straight into back country roads so it was fine. What a grogeous run it was, it was around 6:30pm the sun was still out and it was warm and just a super nice run. 45mins and 5.78 miles. Pretty happy with that and a nice beer when I got back.
This week
So all in all a pretty solid week or training, with excitement and motivation to do workouts wavering a times, but also highs and enjoyment with others and getting rather close to getting my new bike!
Onwards to an exciting time ahead with another likely big week ahead!
As always I’d love your support on my fundraising goal — I’m raising to support MIND. MIND recognise the effect the coronavirus has had on people’s mental health and are on a mission to ensure that everyone who needs support with the mental health, gets it. Any donation in support of this cause will be massively appreciated and I will be incredibly thankful.
With that, thank you for supporting my fundraising journey — you’re a legend!
Cheers
Cal
