We've moved...

Dear all,

Just to let you know that H and I have moved our blogs. With Ironman coming to and end very soon we thought we'd go our seperate (blogging) ways...

H can now be found at www.helenturton.co.uk.

Tom is now at www.tomwilliams.squarespace.com.

Thanks for being such a great part of our journey so far, here's to the future ;)

T & H x

Snap...

As the end of my triathlon career rapidly approaches, and along with it my life on a road bike, there are regular 'this is my last one of these' moments... I've always wanted to do a 100 mile time trial and woke up at 4am this morning ready to really go for it in my my last ever official TT and my first ever over a century...

Going into the race off the back of a few easy days I was confident of going well and had planned a ten mile Ironman paced run straight off the back of it as my final big session... a great opportunity to practice my race nutrition strategy... just three and a half miles after the start my chain snapped and with it the chance to exit my cycling time trials 'career' on a high. Frustrating isn't the word really but there you go...

For the rest of the day I joined H and turned spectator / support crew for our mate Ady, who paced a perfect one hundred miles to come in just under four hours and 25 minutes. At 4:56 pace for 112 miles it was a great sign for his assault on the Outlaw both in terms of pacing a long ride and also having the strength to finish a five hour ride stronger than it was started :)

I'm off to bed...

T

Feeling fit fit fit...

I'll keep this short as I really should be doing some work... With a touch over three weeks to go until The Outlaw Iron-distance triathlon I find myself in the shape of my life, significantly stronger, fitter and (more importantly) less tired than the same time before Ironman Switzerland 2009 where I set my PB of 9.28... BUT... and this is a BIG BUT... there are still a touch over three weeks to go... too many to taper, yet plenty of time to over-cook things and arrive in Nottingham tired and worn-out.

This Saturday just gone I raced at Ripon Olympic Triathlon and despite the distance being a little fast for my short stumpy legs I ran through to 7th overall out of 700 finishers, Sunday morning saw six hilly hours in the saddle with Ady and Adam and then later that day Adam and I popped out for a 20 mile run with 16 very conversational miles thrown in at 7.10 pace, Monday morning I was in the pool for some hard interval work, Monday evening a chilled out seven mile run with H and then on Tuesday my mate Guy and I rode 80 miles of the Outlaw bike course including two laps of the main loop riding completely draft legal (minimum 15 metres wheel to wheel) and VERY comfortably in 2:37:17 for 58.8 miles (4:59:41 pace for 112) followed by a relaxed first ten miles of the run course in 75 minutes... apart from Ripon, where it was a max race effort, the rest of the sessions have all been comfortably within me. I can honestly say I'm in the shape of my life... a good place to be... a challenging place to be this far out of an 'A' race though. Ideally The Outlaw would ideally be a week earlier, the tough sessions would be over and the taper could start... there's just a little bit more to do though...

Today has been a complete leg rest day with just a short and very easy swim (10 x 150 easy off 3:30) with Hels and Ove, and tomorrow will be similar except with an open water swim and perhaps a short spin on the bike. Sunday I'll be on the start line of my first and last 100 mile cycling time trial, a ten mile Ironman target-pace run off the back of it will give me a chance to practice race-day nutrition.

Then, it'll be time to drop the volume, up the intensity and sharpen up for one final 140.6 miles of swim, bike & run.

I'm loving every moment but cannot wait to draw a line under my triathlon career, and move on to the next exciting chapter in the wonderful thing we call life...

T

Take two...

This week's picture was taken by H on her iPhone as our mate John Coleman pushed me off for my second assault on the same 50 mile time trial course within seven days. Last week my legs felt about as empty as they ever have in a bike race yet I managed to squeeze out a 1:58 and average just over 25mph... yesterday I was determined to give that result the kicking it truly deserved!

So... ?

Well, I kind of did... and I kind of didn't!

From the start to the finish I felt significantly better than seven days ago... my legs felt strong and pushing through each of the 50 somewhat windy miles I managed to nudge my heart rate back toward where it should be... averaging 149 and maxing out at 157 (compared to 141/150) and getting close to the low 150's average and low 160's max that saw me pb at the Circuit of the Dales back in April. Only having distance and heart rate on the display of my Garmin crossing the I had no idea what time I'd done... it felt MUCH fast than the first effort but had been really windy in places and was without a doubt a slow day...

Cruising back to the event HQ I flicked through my watch's memory reminding myself not to be disappointed if it wasn't the 1.56 I expected... 2:01:33 and a full two and a half minutes slower! Knowing that the conditions can make so much difference to bike time trials I put my disappointment to one side, replaced it with positive thoughts about feeling great, feeling fast and feeling strong and set out on a four mile run at my target Ironman pace... just under 30 easy minutes later it was time to check out the results and see how I'd really done...

A quick scan over the times of those who also race last week showed a fairly consistent 4-5 minute deficit over the previous event suggesting my ride would have been worth something between 1:56:33 and 1:57:33 on a good day... so all in all? A good day ;)

Other than that... I'm back in the pool / lake and with my nerve injury behaving itself am swimming faster with every passing session. Run wise things are fairly steady away, Ironman target pace (7:20-30 per mile) is feeling super easy with a very comfortable 18 miles done last week in 2:15 dead and an average HR of 137... I also seem to be running pretty well off the bike sessions. With three good training weeks left in my competitive triathlon life things are starting to get tough (5 hours on the bike this morning are about to be followed up with a 20 mile run) but I'm feeling strong and looking forward to Ripon Olympic Tri next weekend, the Yorkshire Cycling Federation 100 mile TT a week later and then Castle Howard Triathlon the week after that... in between I've got my normal massive brick session on the 13th of July (might reduce the run to ten miles rather than 20... I said 'might') and two more cracks at my Pool Triangle TT pb of 29:56 (I did ride a 29:58 this week so am there or there abouts).

In five weeks it will all be over... better make it all worthwhile ;)

T