I just keep telling myself that this time next week I’ll be finished with my Ironman and hopefully enjoying a very large and very Austria Wiener Schnitzel and Pilsner. But as I get ready to leave for Europe I can’t help but worry.
In a perfect world I would have made some very important and very different decision to on my road to Austria, but instead I had to make a bunch of informed compromises. I figure when life gives you lemons, peel them, chop them into little strips and make the best darn vodka martini you can.
Here are a couple of the compromises I made along my journey to get to IM Austria.
Racing with the high altitude advantage versus racing jetlagged.
As I live in Colorado at about 6000 feet above elevation, I enjoy the advantage few more red blood cells caring extra oxygen around my body when I race at sea level. If you’ve never felt this high altitude buzz at sea level you should give it a try some day.
Basically, it feels like you can bite into the air when you walk off the plane at sea level. The air just feels so much more substantial and thick when you breathe. Running is especially rewarding, as you feel like you can never run out of air.
In fact, the racing benefits of high altitude training is one of the main reasons why so many world class runners and triathletes come to Boulder to live and train.
The newest research however suggest that the maxim aerobic advantage of this high altitude training last only a few days before your body adjust to life at sea level.
So for this reason I choose to fly to Austria on Thursday (arriving Friday morning) and thus racing on Sunday. This means that I’ll still have my maximum high altitude advantage, but I’ll most likely fall asleep on the bike if I get to comfortable in the aero position because of jetlag.
OK I’m lying. The real reason I’m flying so close to the race that I couldn’t find a plane ticket to Europe for myself and my family under like 10 zillion dollars on any other day besides Thursday. It must be all those world cup fans flying back to America this week.
But let’s face it, who really knows what voodoo science the airlines use to determine the ticket fare structures. Perhaps ticket prices were so high the beginning part of this week because of some celebrated and well attended annual German/Austrian mushroom festival in Bavaria? I’ll let you know if I see any suspicious mushroom hunter types on the fight over.
Quantity versus Quality of training time
Right from the beginning of my training for this race I knew that my swim would suffer. I made the conscious decision to cut back on my swimming to twice a week. Swimming is by far my best event of the three.
I figured that I could swim all day, every day, and perhaps save 5-minutes on the swim. In an Ironman I’ll probably spend 5-minutes in T1 just getting changed for the bike. It seemed like a waste of limited time to spend my days training for my best event.
As I’m sure you know by now the saying goes, “train your weakness and race your strength.” So I did and hopefully will.
On the other hand I spent a lot of time riding my bike and running in the mountains. But here I also made some quality versus quantity compromises. If you happen to be a 40-something-year-old dad with a job and wife…also training for the long course world triathlon world championships…while promoting a new book (click HERE to purchase a signed copy ;-) training time is a bit tricky to find.
This is especially true for the bike. As I’m sure you know, the bike takes the most time to train for properly. You just can’t go for a 1-hour bike ride three times a week and call it IM training. No, you need to ride long and far. Preferably you’ll want to do at least three-century rides before your next Ironman to get your body used to being on the bike for 112-miles.
I managed to squeeze in 2 long rides and whole bunch half-day rides climbing up and over various local mountain passes in the Colorado high county. I figure one hour of climbing is worth two on the flats.
Am I correct? Don’t know. But check back this time next week and you’ll see how I did in Austria. If I can find an Internet connection in Austria, I’ll file a full race report same time next week.
Do you suppose the Austrians will have Wiener Schnitzel on the run? Mmmm that would go would down real well with a cup of defizzed Coke and warm soup broth.