With a big race weekend coming, I kept to my training plan as much as possible until I decided it was time to taper, which was Thursday. Instead of my normal bike/swim, Joe VI and I did a super-duper sprint triathlon at Shawnee Mission Park. 250 meter swim, 4 mile bike, 2 mile run... all at an easy pace. I then took Friday off.
Swim: 4750 yards / 1 hour, 39 minutes
Bike: 62.4 miles / 3 hours, 22 minutes
Run: 23.64 miles / 3 hours, 15 minutes
Strength: 1 session / 1 hour
Total: 89 miles / 9 hours, 22 minutes
I came out of the weekend with a sore right lower leg. It almost reminded me of shin splints. I'm hoping it is a high ankle sprain because I rolled my foot while on the run at Tinman. I got a bit too close to the side of the trail and rolled it; however, it didn't start bugging me until Sunday afternoon.
Because of that, I am keeping it real light on the running this week. Today (Wednesday), it didn't hurt when I got up this morning so I did a brick workout. I did 4 laps at the downtown airport and then 1 lap (3.66 miles) by foot. I actually ran at a pace that was faster than prescribed and the leg still held up. Hopefully that's behind me now. Plenty of icing and rolling is being instituted though.
With starting the middle third of my training, I'm starting to incorporate some speedwork in my runs, so that's a nice change up.
As I mentioned in my Tinman race report, I got some new "shoes" for my triathlon bike. Based on some recommendations from fellow twi-athlete, Ryan from twitter, I had been eyeing a set of Karbon Speed 88mm deep dish rims. Back when I started looking at these they were priced upwards of a couple grand but with a two day sale and using a coupon code from Ryan, "MVT" for an additional 10% off I was able to snag these for a super cheap price.
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| Even standing still the bike is blurry.. it's that fast. |
I had actually planned to rent them for the races this weekend but when this offer came around, I took advantage of it. Based on Ryan's tests, they aren't the fastest race wheels out there but what they lack in seconds over the course of a race, they gain in price.
They arrived on Friday before the races, so I left work a few hours early and got them installed. I've learned a few lessons about race wheels like these:
- Deep dish rims require valve extenders so you can air them up. The normal tube valves aren't long enough to peek through the rims so they come with extenders. I knew this going into it and was prepared to do the necessary work but it made it challenging on Saturday when I removed the valve cap and accidentally unscrewed the entire extender. Oops.
- I never did "top them off" with air on Saturday because I couldn't get it to take any air. What I learned on Sunday afternoon (still didn't figure it out for Sunday's race) was that I need to actually let air out so the valve would let new air in. There may be plenty of air pressure in there, but there is some level of comfort seeing it hit 120psi before you head into transition.
- Making sure your tires are correctly seated. I had an issue with a bulge in my rear tire around the valve stem. The problem was the tire was partially sitting on top of the inner tube so it didn't get fully seated on the rim. That allowed the tube to push it a little further out when fully filled. I had to deflate the tube and make sure the tube was fully inside the tire before starting again. The sympton of this was my tire made a 'thump' every rotation.
Ironically enough, I thought I had ordered the rims with tires installed but when I opened the box there were none. I checked my order and, sure enough, I didn't. That turned out to be a blessing because it's given me the opportunity to learn all this stuff while in the confines of my pain cave and not in transition or on the road.
I have an order in for Continental Grand Prix Attack / Shield tires to put on there permanently. I have to install different brake pads when using carbon aero wheels, so it's not necessarily an easy switch-a-roo.
Upcoming
We have another race this weekend. It's a fun run called "Air It Up Run" It's a 2.5 mile course with 8 "bounce house" type of obstacles. I always said I'd hold off on doing any sort of Warrior Dash or Tough Mudder because I'm a big wuss and don't want to get injured. This is a bounce house, what could go wrong?
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