"Official" Training Begins

I've been training for a couple of months now, but today it became official. I'm on the final 32 weeks schedule with all peaks pointed toward October and Kona. Today it was cycling drills (one leg drills and high cadence.) Cadence is particularly important for Ironman training. Ideally you spin at 90 rpms for the duration of the race. At lower rpms, but on tougher gears, you feel like you're cycling. Your legs get that burn that everyone associates with good and fast cycling. But that burn takes a lot of energy out of your legs, and you still have a marathon to run. So burn=bad in terms of long distance triathlon.

The one leg drills are designed to identify and fix dead spots in your pedal stroke. The stroke is a full 360 degree spin, not just a downward push on the pedal. By pedalling with only one leg you really do feel that full stroke for all 12 hours around the clock face.

It was a really good workout today. I think perhaps coach Paul was the most pleased, happy to see that I'm not a lost cause with absolutely no skills. My skills may be minimal, but they are there. Now if I can just get the lung and cardio power to go with them.

And if we could just get Ironman to issue their official invites all will be well. They stopped taking lottery entries for Kona on Feb. 28, so hopefully now that that's closed they'll start to move forward with filling their entries. But when that will actually happen is anyone's guess.