First racing suit bites the dust

I've stopped posting to my blog regularly. There are assorted reasons for this but the main reason is I found another website that enables me to post my workouts and have people comment on them. I can also use that site at work and post things right away instead of waiting until I get home. I also get more consistent feedback there (no offense to my 11 Blogger followers, but I have 37 on the other website).

Anyway, despite the fact that I don't post much to Blogger anymore, I still think of lots of things to talk about here. For example, I was cleaning up my room and found my first racing swimsuit. I bought it a couple years ago and I posted the announcement on this blog. But the thing wore out so quickly that I had to buy a second one only months later.

My old suit was a Speedo "Lunar Twist" jammer, purchased for $45. It consisted of 74% nylon and 26% spandex. Apparently the Lycra spandex component is sensitive to pool chemicals, and one day I noticed that the fabric that stretched across my rear end was getting thin. I replaced this suit with a new suit made of Speedo Endurance fabric, and that has lasted more than a year.

I am NOT a hoarder but I do keep things with sentimental value and I put this worn-out swimsuit back in its box because I didn't want to throw it away. Well, it's been a while and I think maybe I should discard it. So, like I've done before, I am proclaiming how great its been to learn how to swim, to work with a coach every week, and join a competitive swim team. I swim at least 4 times a week, and putting on a racing suit is no longer an unusual event. So, thank you to my friend Dan who got me into swimming, thank you to my coach J.G., and thank you old swimsuit for giving me confidence in the water.

Now, regrettably, the suit is in the trash, and I can continue to clean my room.

November Birthday

I celebrated my birthday recently. For several days leading up to the big day, I was not feeling healthy or strong. I did a treadmill run (my first run in 11 days) last Thursday and again on Monday. But I cut short the Monday run because my back hurt and I had an abdominal cramp. Last Saturday I hurt my shoulder simply by angling my arm awkwardly while taking off my shirt. It had not fully healed by Tuesday when I tried doing a swim. Freestyle was out, but I could do breaststroke and backstroke. But I cut short the swim because my feet were cramping up. I was really fatigued and felt like doing nothing. So on Wednesday I went into the office for a couple hours and then came home to rest. I figured I had a virus that was affecting my joints and muscles. As I lay on the couch watching a movie (Contact by Carl Sagan), I realized that maybe I wasn't sick. Instead, maybe I was worried about my birthday and turning a year older. Yep, that was it.

I am another year older. The aforementioned shoulder injury is chronic and while I can be pain-free for months at a time, it keeps coming back several times a year. The muscle cramps are sometimes harmless, but sometimes not. If my calf cramps up, it does so with such great force that the muscle is damaged and it takes a week for the leg to heal and for the pain and stiffness to go away. My mother has this problem, too, so there isn't much hope that I will avoid it as time goes on. My body is aging and I can't stop it.

I also feel left behind by my age. Given my love for and skill in swimming today, I wonder what I could have been had I started swimming at a much earlier age. I seriously feel that I could have been an All-American swimmer or maybe even an Olympic swimmer if I had gotten the training as a boy. My body is made for swimming. I've also started doing triathlons this year. I love them! My training partner and I have somewhat joked about doing the Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii before we reach the age of 40. He and I can dream about it, but neither of us has the time to train for something like that. As hard as I work to keep to a workout schedule, my job requires me to work at odd times of day and on weekends, and so I can't make fitness part of a weekly routine. I just do it when I can fit it in. This is perhaps the most frustrating thing of all, because one big motivator for me with regards to being an athlete is that I am in complete control of this aspect of my life. I direct what activity I will do and how long I'll do it. If I want to get faster, stronger, thinner, or bigger, I know what I have to do to make the goal happen. But that darn job gets in the way. Or an injury. Or foul weather. Or the end of daylight saving time.

All of the above were the thoughts that crossed my mind as I lay on that couch earlier in the week. Woe was me! Of course, as soon as I realized that I was feeling this way, my mood improved. Obviously I was being silly. Age 37 is not the end of life or any limit to reaching fitness goals. Sure, my responsibilities at work will get in the way of training. Or an injury. Or foul weather. But all these are temporary set-backs. I have the love of fitness now. I love triathlons and swimming and riding my new road bike. A birthday will not take this love away. In fact, a steady progression of birthdays is what has allowed me these opportunities. At age 32 I had never commuted to work by bicycle. I do that now. At age 33 I had never lifted weights. I do that now. At age 34 I didn't know how to swim. I compete on a swim team now. At age 35 I had never ran a 5K race or competed in a triathlon. I run on a regular basis now, and I've done three sprint-length triathlons. The swim team and the 5Ks and the triathlons have helped me make new friends. If I had died at age 32 I never would have experienced these things. So now as I look forward to my upper 30s and 40s, I wonder what amazing things I'll get to do. It's a grand journey and a little shoulder injury, muscle cramp, backache, late night at work, or snowstorm will not get in my way for long.

My most recent 5K race took place in an October snowstorm. Clearly I'm now addicted to athletic competitions.

So what will age 37 (technically my 38th year) bring? I am a little wary to make predictions, but I know I'll be running longer distances, cycling over steeper hills, and swimming faster. I plan to do a 150-mile bike ride with my friend Dan. He and I will also sign up for at least three sprint triathlons, and I really want to do an Olympic-length triathlon, too. If I accomplish any one of those goals it will be enough to brag about a year from now when I celebrate my next birthday.

For the record, as a 36-year-old, I:

ran  98 miles,

biked 476 miles, and

swam 105 miles.

These totals include two competitive bike races, two sprint-length triathlons, two 5K races, and eight competitive swim meets. I plan to do more than this as a 37-year-old!

Introducing Trek 1.5 road bike

Introducing my 2011 Trek 1.5 road bike.

I haven't posted a blog entry in a while, so I guess I'll start with something that happened soon after my last post in July--I bought a new bike! It's a Trek 1.5 road bike with a 62cm aluminum frame with H2 geometry (for racing, but not elite racing) and a carbon fiber seat post and front fork to help with shock absorption. I've ridden the bike more than 100 miles since buying it, and I can say it is a lot of fun. It is zippy and smooth. It can take corners very tight, and I have reached a maximum speed of 42.0 mph going down one of the steeper hills near my home. It's my racehorse, both figuratively and literally. Well, not literally really, as it is still a bike. But I bought it for competition in the triathlons I have started to do. I continue to use my old Trek 700 hybrid from 1991 for running errands, commuting to work, and riding on gravel bike trails. This new road bike I only use in races and when training for races on paved surfaces. After riding the new road bike on a route that I often took with my old hybrid, I found that the new bike has resulted in around a 1.5 mph increase in my average speed. The hills on this route are short but steep. The new bike's gearing system (50/34 crank and 9-speed 11-26 cassette) really doesn't help me climb hills any better than I can do with my triple crank 21-speed hybrid, so the improvement comes more on the flat topography (not much of that around here!) and the downhill segments.

Note the new cycling shoes, too. I had to buy those since wearing regular athletic shoes do not clear the chainstays at the rear tire (see previous post). My cycling shoes are mid-priced Shimano mountain bike shoes suggested by the bike shop. Road bike shoes have no tread on the bottom, so they cannot be worn safely when dismounted from the bike. I got the shoes with tread so that I will feel free to dismount and go for a walk if I want. Of course, I haven't done that. But I could. For example, in June 2012 I am planning to do a 150-mile ride as part of a fund raiser for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. If my friends and I stop and get lunch at a restaurant in the middle of the ride, I won't have to worry about slipping on the floor. Have I convinced you yet? Doesn't matter. The shoes are great, even if "true" cyclists get the type of shoes without a tread. 

I have determined that I will never have the top racing equipment. Like all hobbies, there are many levels: beginner, intermediate, advanced, and steps in between. With each increase in skill level, there is a concurrent increase in the price of equipment used at that skill level. For instance, my new entry-level bike cost only a fraction of what I would need to spend for a high-end racing bike with state-of-the-art components. I'd love to have a $5,000 bike but my skill level does not warrant that. So it's an interesting situation for my personal finances: as I get better at cycling, I'll need to get richer, too. Both situations would be welcome!

Heel-strike while pedalling a new road bike

I'm in the market for a new road bike. My purchase is imminent and I'm very excited to have a road bike that I will use for racing and training. I currently have a hybrid that I use for trail riding and commuting. I plan to keep the old workhorse and just add a race horse to my collection. Since this will be my first road bike, I've decided to be sensible about its cost, and I'm only considering the entry-level bikes that typically cost $1000 and feature an aluminum frame, carbon fork, and Shimano Tiagra components.

I've gotten a lot of feedback from friends and fellow bloggers about how to go about choosing a new bike. The overwhelming majority of folks said "you just have to test-drive a lot of bikes and choose the one that feels right." While this sounds like excellent advice, in practice I have found it quite difficult. You see, I'm 6'4" and none of the three local bike shops near me had any bikes with a 60-62 cm frame that my body size requires. One bike shop is already out of consideration because they really couldn't get me much bang for my buck compared to the other two shops. One bike shop was really awesome and has worked with me several days in a row to get me a bike that fits. After my initial visit, they ordered it and will add it to their inventory if I decide I don't want it. After taking my measurements and adjusting the bike to fit me, I took the bike out of the shop and rode it around the neighborhood for about a mile. I really want it! But I put off the purchase for one reason: I found that my heels bumped into the chainstay (interestingly, just on the right side) quite a few times as I rode around the  neighborhood. It didn't happen every time, but it happened often enough that I worried that maybe the bike wasn't going to work for me.

[I pause here to define "chainstay." The chainstay is the metal bar of a bicycle frame that runs parallel to the pavement between the bottom bracket (where the pedals attach) and the rear axle. The rear part of this metal bar bends outward from the wheel axle to accommodate all the gear sprockets back there, and it is this portion of the chainstay--the part that sticks out--that my heel strikes as my foot circulates around with the pedals. See photo below]

The red bar is the chainstay. Photo from http://lizardskins.com/store/products/mountain/bike-protection/standard-chainstay-protector.

So back to the heel-strike issue. I pointed out the problem to the salesperson and he suggested that I try wearing different shoes (I was wearing running shoes that have a lot of material at the heel end). That made sense, so I looked over the shop's selection of cycling shoes. Many cycling shoes have a narrower heel than my running shoes, so with a narrower heel, I might not hit the chainstay as often. Choosing a pair of shoes, I discovered that the bike shop's inventory did not include my size. I wear size 13US. This isn't surprising, as I have trouble finding a good selection of shoes at any store, but it was a little funny that the bike shop had to not only special order a bike, but also shoes, for me. They ordered a couple varieties for me and I'll drop by tomorrow to see how the shoes fit and whether they solve the heel-strike problem.

But what if the shoes don't solve the heel-strike issue? Well, I figured I should go to a different bike shop and take a second bike for a test drive. I reasoned that maybe the problem with the first bike was its design, and maybe a different bike wouldn't cause this heel-strike problem.

The salesperson at the second bike shop couldn't find a 60cm frame, either. So I hopped on a 58cm frame and took it for a test drive. I wore the same shoes as before, since I almost always wear running shoes...even when I'm not running. This second bike still caused my heel to strike the chainstay (more notably on the left side this time). So it appears I'll have this issue regardless of bike make and model. 

So I'm strongly leaning toward buying that first bike, even if the heel-strike issue is unresolved by new cycling shoes. I expect I will quickly learn to position my feet in a way that will avoid the chainstay. For instance, pointing my toes inward will cause my heels to be oriented to the outside edge of the pedal, and presumably this will be enough to avoid striking my heel on the chainstay. But will this altered foot position cause me harm?

Is there anyone out there with this "big foot" problem?

Why don't bicycle designers make a frame that fits big people?!

Road bike suggestions

I'm about to start looking for a second bicycle. My existing bike is a Trek hybrid that I bought in 1991 as a high schooler. The price of the bike back then was $299.95 (I still have the receipt), and in today's dollars that would equate to around $585! Hybrids are really popular today, but in 1991 I didn't know of anyone with a hybrid...especially one with a 23" frame. Even today, I sit taller on the bicylce than I do when I drive my car. My bike has treated me well, and I plan to keep riding it for years to come. It's my workhorse. I ride it to work, I ride it to do errands, and I have ridden it on thousands of miles of gravel bike paths throughout the eastern USA. However, the bike's steel frame and treaded tires slow me down when trying to climb hills in my hilly neighborhood. I found myself at a competitive disadvantage during a recent triathlon race.

And since I had so much fun with that triathlon, I want to do more. Having a bike designed for road races will be fun and motivating, too. So, what kind of bike should I get? My budget is around $1,000 so what I'm looking for is an entry-level road bike for someone who rides on hilly rural roads and enters the occassional race. Do my readers have any suggestions with regards to brand or components I should be looking for?

My first triathlon!

On Saturday I participated in my first triathlon! It was AWESOME. I can't wait until I do this again. I trained with a couple friends and that made it so much more fun than if I had done it all myself. This was not a full-length Olympic triathlon, of course. Are you crazy? I have never in my life ran 10 miles or whatever the terrible sum would be. I'm not a runner. I'm just not. But swimmer? Yes. And cyclist? Almost. So here are the details:

Feeling confident at the start of my first triathlon.

200-yard SWIM

This is shorter than the typical sprint triathlon (where the swimming portion is usually 700 yards or so). It's not my fault. I wish it had been a longer swim, because I'm competitive in that area. Anyway, the swimming portion took place in a high school swimming pool, with two people sharing each lane. There were 8 or 9 heats, with the slower swimmers (based on seed time) going first. I was in Heat 6. Honestly, it was hard not to make fun of some of the people swimming in the earlier Heats. There was one man who threw his arms out like he was doing the butterfly, and his head was out of the water the whole time. Yes, so it was the butterfly-doggy-paddle. A very interesting stroke that I might try to patent. I had a lot of confidence going into the triathlon because most triathletes (seems to me) have little swimming experience. I swam with speed and energy, but of course I didn't want to burn out, so I did not go at top speed. I won my heat with ease, jumped out of the pool, ran over to my pool shoes, threw them on, and ran out the building to the bicycle staging area. My swim time plus "must-put-on-pool-shoes" time was 3:40. I beat my training partners Dan and Geoff. I was expecting to beat Geoff, as he is not a swimmer. But Dan and I both swim for a Master's Swim Team, and he is always faster than me. I think the 20-second difference between our swim times is more about how we transitioned to the bicycle than the actual in-pool swimming speed.

My training partners Geoff and Dan, before the triathlon began.

11.2-mile CYCLING

This was by far the most exciting thing I've done all year. I've never participated in a bicycle race. I completed the 11-mile hilly route in 45:09, though this includes both the swim-bike transition and the bike-run transition. I sat in a chair I had set up in my transition area, threw off the pool shoes, briefly towelled off my feet, and put on socks. The socks I had previously rolled up so that they would roll over my mostly wet feet without too much delay. This worked really well! I put on a shirt, my running shoes, my cycling gloves, and helmet. Then I jogged with the bike to the starting point, hopped on, and within two cycles of the pedals my right shoelace got caught in the chain and gears. It was ripped to shreds and I had to dismount to re-tie my shoes. What a way to start a bike race! It literally only took a few seconds so I'm not fretting about it. I zoomed down the road out of the high school parking lot and onto the streets of the town. Police or firemen were posted at most of the intersections to stop traffic and let the cyclists race through. What a blast to finally own the road and not have to worry about getting hit by a car. (This was only true at intersections though; otherwise we did have to share the roads with cars). Within a couple miles we were out of the town and on rolling country roads. There were 76 cyclists in this race, and we were well-separated due to the different swim start times. I passed a few cyclists going up the steeper hills, and I was passed by others going down some of the hills. Given the relatively few number of people who passed me, I really thought I was holding my own on the cycling and I'd be competitive in the event--like performing better than average for my gender-age group. But nope. I placed 12 out of 13 in my gender-age group, and I placed 37 out of 76 overall. Even Geoff and Dan beat me by a minute or two. What? The cycling was supposed to be my best event. But Geoff commutes to work most days, and he has a hill to climb. And Dan does a "spinning" class every Thursday where they work him hard. It seems I had not been training as much as I thought I had, at least compared to my comrades. But no problem. I had fun! 

3.1-mile RUN

Finished with the biking, I dismounted and ran over to my transition area. I took off my helmet, my gloves, and drank a few ounces of Gatorade. A student of mine (I teach at a small college) was in this race, too, and his transition area was adjacent to mine. He and I swam in the same heat, and he did not pass me on my bicycle, so I knew I was actually beating this 22-year old. In fact, looking at the results, I was beating him by 1.1 seconds. I was also beating Geoff by 8 seconds, but Dan was ahead of me by more than a minute and a half. The run would change all that, as I have very little experience running. I run a few miles each month, but it's not my strongest or favorite activity to do. So, I was competitive among my friends until the running portion. Geoff is a runner, and he ended the race 6 minutes ahead of me (all of this was acheived during the running portion). Dan ended the race 2 minutes ahead of me, so was running only 0.07 mph faster than me (his pace was 9.72 min/mile and mine was 9.84 min/mile).

As usual, the run was only bad during the first mile. I had trouble picking up my feet and my right calf muscle was tense. I have problems with muscle cramps in my calfs, and in my experience, if it got real bad, I would have to stop running and I'd have trouble finishing the race. So I decided to stop running and walk for a couple minutes. This was a good idea because my calf muscle loosened up and it didn't bother me again after I started running again. The running route was simply around the high school parking lots, down a hill, through another parking lot, and then it finished with 5 loops around the stadium's track. Once I was headed to the track, I knew I'd finish the race and I felt good. Geoff was done already, and he encouraged me each time I made a circuit. Dan was right behind me. And that college kid that I was beating? Well, he's on the college cross-country track team, so yeah, he beat us all, finishing 21 overall, out of 76 adults. He ran 3.1 miles in 20:48. To do this, he would have had to pass me several times as we circled around the high school buildings and the stadium track. But I never saw him, and after I spoke to him after the race, he said he never saw me, either. There was no way for him to cheat (and I wouldn't expect him to do that anyway), but it sure was strange that we were both focussed so much on our own performance that we failed to notice who we were passing or being passed by.

WRAP-UP

In sum, I finished the route in 1:19:18. Maybe I didn't win the race, maybe I wasn't better than my peer group, but I still surpassed what I thought I could do. My goal was to finish in 90 minutes. I never expected to run very fast, but it turns out that my pace of 9:84 was my second-fastest run, ever (as calculated by Dailymile.com). My average speed on the bike was 14.9 mph, which is quite frankly admirable, since this was a hilly route and my bicylce is not a road bike (it is a hybrid model with a steel frame). My swim was not at top speed, yet it appears that it was rivalling my performance at a Master's Swim meet on 11 Jan 2011. My time then was 3:12, whereas on Saturday it was 3:40 which includes running out of the pool to my bicycle. I did really, really well. I feel so strong. I must do this again sometime soon.

Introducing Speedo Endurance

My first racing swim suit did not last long. I started wearing it in late November 2010 (see related post), and I swam in it for the last time in May 2011. The fabric at the butt crack (wish there were a nicer phrase to use) was splayed and I had to retire the suit for fear of it splitting down the middle during a swim. I was completely surprised that the suit wore out so quickly, but in speaking with some swimming buddies it appears that the elastic Lycra material is damaged by pool chlorine, and my daily use of the suit led to its early demise. My swim buddies wear separate suits for training and for racing. I did not know this because I am new to the sport.

The "board shorts" style swim suit I wear.

So, what should I do? I thought my options were to go back to wearing a non-racing pair of "board shorts" while training (see left), or to train in a new racing suit that will wear out every season. There are also some training suits that are very short but feature a mesh outer covering. I've seen college swim team members wear these in the pool. These latter training suits seemed to be a good compromise between the bulkiness of board shorts and the sleek hydrodynamics of a racing suit. I can't swim as fast in board shorts due to the drag they create in the water. The drag is actually a good thing when training, as it makes the body work harder. Nevertheless, I am having fun at least pretending to be a competitive swimmer, so I want a suit that helps me show off and feel good about my progress. Anyway, all this discussion about trade-offs of different kinds of suits was a bit hypothetical because I was now without a racing suit, and my triathlon was coming up in mid June (in fact, it is tomorrow!). So my first purchase would be a racing suit, even if the thing doesn't last long in pool chlorine.

The racing swim suit I just bought.

Fortunately, a swim team member told me about Speedo's Endurance fabric, which is meant to hold up to chlorine a lot better. He swims hundreds of miles per year and he swears by the suit. So, I've now got one. I bought the Speedo Endurance Mercury Spliced Jammer in black and gold. It cost a pretty penny, but now I don't have to buy more than one suit. I plan to swim in this suit for both training and competitions. It contains PBT polyester in place of Lycra. AgonSwim.com has an awesome web page that compares these and other types of fabrics.

My initial reactions: (1) it is not as elastic as my previous jammer; in fact, it feels a little tight at the waist as I put it on. Once it is on, it does not feel too tight. In fact, the fit is really good. (2) the fabric feels thicker and more durable. (3) As mentioned on the AgonSwim.com website, the material does not conform as much to my body as the Lycra-containing suit. That is, it reveals less of my male anatomy, and I'm thinking that's a good thing....