Swim Stroke Video

Here is one of my favorite swim stroke video from instructor - Steve Tarpinian. He makes swimming so easy when in fact its quite a struggle for people like myself that have no swimming background. My goal for this year to consistently swim 2x per week and target my 1.2mile splits to around sub 33 minutes.

Swim Arm Cycle Video

Swimming Kick Drill

Here is a recent video taping of my swim stroke courtesy of Ben Greenfield. From the analysis, I need to focus on keeping my legs together when kicking, quicker catch, faster transition and breathing earlier.

Goodbye ole' friend - hello my new baby!

My story starts in 2001 when I did my first triathlon as challenge from my personal trainer at 24 Hour Fitness to help me loose much needed weight. So I bought a new bike, wetsuit and some running shoes and off to my first race at the Spokane Club.

So with much regret I am selling my aluminum QR Kilo bike or rather passing along 7 years of fond racing memories and lot of training hours to a fellow friend and newbie triathlete - Rachel Bauman. I feel a little like a father approving of his daughter's first date making sure the ultimate buyer/user would be tri race worthy and take care of my old and trusted steed. Rachel was so excited with the new purchase that she immediately rode 20 miles the next day and plans on doing 2 sprint tri races this summer so I feel happy that my bike has found a quality new owner.

With money in my hand or burning a hole in my pocket I started my quest searching for a new Road bike. Many of my friends, coach and fellow racers have suggested that I get a road bike to learn how to be a faster cyclist plus you can't show up with the local morning ride on a TT bike! I spent numerous hours and countless emails with Jim at Cyclemetrix Bike Shop going over new options which were all out of my price range for what I wanted for frameset and components.

I eventually turned to search on Ebay and found the latest addition (2005 Specialized Roubaix Pro) to my bike collection. It was almost too good to be true to find a bike in my little size (49cm), full carbon frameset, DuraAce component and in my price range. I had numerous fellow roadies review and approve before I started the bidding process. After a week of very patiently waiting for UPS to show up - it was like Christmas in March for me! Funny how a bike looks better in person than online. Can't wait to hit the roads with my stealthly black road bike - still working on a nickname though which I'm sure will come in time after a few outings.

Ironman Lake Stevens 70.3

Since being a very goal orientated person, I bit the bullet and commited to my first race of 2008 at Lake Stevens in July.

I have some very fond and not so fond memories of this race last summer. Fondness being the completion of my first half ironman race since Ironman CdA and doing it on my own personal training plan, racing against some famous pros (Heather Fuhr) and friends from Spokane and of course the wonderful support of my wife and kids standing in the sun for over 6 hours to watch me finish! The race was exciting since it was a 70.3 race so it kind of has the same feeling of doing a full ironman with only half the distance.

The not so fondness part was the lack of crowds (half the people living there didn't know about the race), the open bike course where you had to watch out for cars and people crossing the road and not looking, running out of gatorade on the second loop of the bike and my plantar fasciutus on my left foot.

So looking for some serious payback this July with a healthier left foot and smart training. It was fun to see my friend Steve Kramer qualify for Worlds in Florida - hopefully we will all have a good day as well. Rumor has it I have recruited some fellow team members to show up as well!

Metabolic Test

After a long 2 year hiatus after completing Ironman CdA in 2006, I decided to get serious or at least more organized in my quest to be a better and faster triathlete.

My last Metabolic test in April of 2006 showed with only 6 months of cardio training after my 5way heart surgery how I could safely train in the sub 150 beats per minute per my cardiologist orders and finish Ironman. Not very fast but definitely more like a diesel engine that chugs on for a long time.

On a small tangent - 2007 was frought with lots of ups and downs thinking I was smarter than the system and not using a coach to help guide my training efforts. I was pretty confident that with my large endurance base from Ironman that I could pretty much ease right into a half ironman race with little to no problems. Plus I honestly spent only a 3 months training on the bike and swim. Notice that I didn't mention anything about my run training - needless to say I tried to cram a few months into a few weeks and ended with a nasty case of Plantar Fasciutus on my left foot. I did two half ironman races (Lake Stevens 70.3 and Troika) both with mixed results and slower than expected times of 6:29 and 6:45. The highlight was a PR of 15mins. at the CdA Olympic (2:52) the weekend after Troika so who says angst doesn't count for speed and performance.

So I started back the Fall/Winter with a renewed dedication to running and to become a better runner. I started participating in very atypical workouts with early (5;30am) track workouts w/katie, heide and lora and long weekend runs by myself. I enlisted help and advise from my friends, coach scott roy and faster runners and crafted a new enthusiasm for my weakest link.

On Jan 22 - the metabolic test on the treadmill I took was both exciting and nervous. My running partner and testor (Katie Forsmann) was a great motivation to help push me to the maximum speed and effort. I almost forgot how hard the test is and my lack of pain tolerance - haha. The results very interesting showing a pretty small aerobic base (Zone 1 at 110-139 and Zone 2 at 139-151). My mid zones (Zone 3 151-159 and Zone 4 159-169) were even smaller aerobically. And basically zone 5 was at 170 or non-existent. The good news is my VO2 is at 50 is definitely not Lance Armstrong but great for my age and heart condition!

Overall, my metabolic test gives me a benchmark or a starting point for my 2008 season. Katie and Scott taught me that I need to focus my training efforts more in Zone 2 (long bike/runs) and add weekly Zone 2 (tempo bike/runs) which will increase the size of my aerobic engine - hence bigger the engine the faster I can go! So my goal is to work diligently over the next 3 months with this new heart rate training regime with a retest in mid Spring or March timeframe. Thanks to my sponsor Katie and Debbie at Metabolic Institute for making me smart and hopefully faster this summer!