It's All About the Bike

I've heard people say that triathlons are all about the run.  You know, "Bike for Show, Run for Dough".  Many races are won on the run.  Of course some of that is due to the fact that the run is last.  Similarly as the swim is first, I've heard "You can't win it in the swim, but you sure can lose it".  Probably just an old golf expression when talking about the first round of a four round tournament.

But in this Olympic year, ITU style draft-legal racing has gotten a lot of attention. Those races always come down to the run.  But I believe it was Javier Gomez (2012 Olympic Silver Medalist in the Triathlon) who said you have to be really strong on the bike so you can maintain the pace with everyone else, and then still be able to kill it on the run.  Bike hard (or harder) than everyone else, but still have gas in the tank to have a good/great run.  Plus, you can train like an idiot on the bike and not get injured all the time.

So obviously in the past 2 week training block, I've gotten a lot of miles in on the bike:

Swim
16,100 yards, 6 swims, 6:21
Some good, some bad.  Endurance is there, just slower than molasses.

Bike
417.9 miles, 8 rides, 19:05, 21.9 average
Pretty evenly split between the weeks 208/210M.  Got some great rides in the first week.  Averaged 22.1 mph for the entire week.  61M on Tuesday night and then a 35M tempo ride on my FLO's at a 24.3 mph avg.  The second week, my hill workout was a bit of a bust on Tuesday, but the Friday night tempo ride on the FLO's again did not disappoint as I did 36M at a 24.2 avg with a 15M block at 25.5 mph avg. Then I did a 90M ride on Saturday at 21.7 avg.  Sunday's 50 miler was tough, but slugged out a 21.2 avg on that.

Run
47 miles, 6 runs, 5:23
The first week I only managed 15 miles.  Four miles into my 13 miler on Tuesday, my right upper thigh pain came back.  First flared up while doing 16M run in the mountains.  I think I strained it as there was 1,800 feet of elevation gain on that run.  So I took a few days off, but ran 8 that Saturday and felt ok.  Saw Dr. Kahn the following Monday and he didn't think anything was too bad.  So the second week I did the 13 miler, then some intervals on Thursday.  I had a good short brick run after my 90 mile ride on Saturday.  Just 3 miles at 6:19 avg pace.  Sunday afternoons tempo run finally went well.  I didn't try and kill it in the first mile.  I did two miles warmup at 6:50's then did 6 miles of tempo.  First mile was a little fast (6:02) but felt good.  Ran through Baxter so there were hills.  Still had gas left in the tank at the end as the final 2 miles were 6:15 and 6:05.  Averaged 6:15's for the 6 miles, which was my goal.

Lift
6 Lifts, 2:00

Totals
474 miles, 20 SBR workouts, 32:49

Now we have a rest week.  I won't ride much as we'll be gone over Labor Day.  Starting to feel ready.  Starting to get some more confidence in my run.  I better, though.  5 weeks to Augusta