Professional Triathlete Training Log - Weekly Swim, Bike, and Run Miles For Dec 24 - Dec 30

Christmas Morning Ride / Walk 

I have often said people really don't know how good they can feel until they feel REALLY good. Well, even though I already felt REALLY good, some how this week I took in to a whole new level. Now it makes me wonder in general if there are even more levels of happiness to achieve in this journey called life. I can chalk my even increased level of happiness to many things including amazing friends and family, workouts, music, clean food, and a little bit of sun. However, as I reflect on the theme of social media this week, I can't seem to think that I might be alone. It seems everyone is always talking about moving on to the next year or the next thing, while in reality I really don't want 2012 to end. 2012 has been an amazing year for me and I hope 2013 is even better, but I am sooo not ready to let 2012 go.

Anyway, I had a great holiday week and had many great runs and swims, including a repeat of the same treadmill workout I have done the past two Sundays. This time I did it on Saturday, the day after my long run, and I had a hard 5K swim right before this workout. For the sake of precision I also switched to a different shoe and I didn't get my lucky treadmill, but if you have followed this workout the last two weeks then here are my numbers.

5K: 16:06
Mile: 4:57
400: 1:09

I had no DOMS today and smashed it again today on the treadmill. I should be able to drop the 5K below 16 with no problem. However, seeing as the mile is never going to be straight mile TT and I'm already significantly gased by the time I get to it, I'm not sure I'll be able to get it down to 4:45.  I still have a few weeks left in this run block and I'm using this workout as a loose baseline.

Here are my weekly swimbike, and run totals:

Total: 167 Miles / 20 hours 29 minutes
Swim: 22,450 yards / ~13 miles / 6 hours 04 minutes
Bike: 103 miles / 7 hours 50 minutes
Run: 51 miles /  6 hours 04 minutes (not a mistake, same as swim)
Hiking: .75 miles / 30 minutes
Core:  0 sessions / 0 hours 0 minutes

Professional Triathlete Training Log - Weekly Swim, Bike, and Run Miles For Dec 17 - Dec 23

My Makeshift "Powerbar" Holiday Tree
While my Facebook feed was dominated by stories of the Midwest getting buried in snow, I found myself buried in work outside of the normal swimming, biking, and running. As a result the volume was down a bit this week, but I made sure to get in some intensity to shock the systems. This included ending each day with some hard efforts, on long rest, that were 4x30 seconds on/in the bike/pool. They were close to all-out efforts, but when you do them at the end of the day they are never what you are fully capable of.  Nonetheless they can be very effective in shocking the system.

As for running, well I never would do 30 second efforts at this period of the year, but I have been changing things up a bit. It has been many years since I ran on a treadmill, but I decided I am going to do a lot more treadmill work this year. I have always been a big fan of the treadmill, but the last couple of years I have really worked on my swim/bike and I haven't focused on improving my running. Those who know me, also know that I am big fan of repeating the same workouts over and over again. By doing the same workout over and over again, you gain a level of knowledge about your body that you just can't get if you are always changing things up.

Barrel Cactus Fruit Motherload Tucson
Barrel Cactus Fruit Motherload
Today I repeated a treadmill workout that I did last Sunday. Both sessions were just about developing the foot speed again to be able to run to my potential on a treadmill while still be challenging. After a long swim (5800 yards), I hopped on the treadmill and warmed up for a mile before doing a 5K, 1 mile, and a 400. Last week I did the 5K in 16:47, and the 1 mile at 5:00 flat.  However I was really hurting toward the end of the mile. This week I did the 5K in 16:25 and the mile easily at 4:58, and finished it up with a single 400 at 1:12. I'm going to try to repeat this workout for the next couple of weeks and drop that 5K to 16:00 flat and the mile to 4:45.


Here are my weekly swimbike, and run totals:

Total: 148 Miles / 19 hours 05 minutes
Swim: 18,950 yards / ~11 miles / 5 hours 38 minutes
Bike: 101 miles / 7 hours 21 minutes
Run: 36 miles /  4 hours 25 minutes
Core:  1 sessions / 1 hours 30 minutes

7-Day Food Log Journal for Ironman Pro Triathlete

Simple CARBS that sit well during training
"What gets measured gets managed" it is one of my all-time favorite quotes. Food journals are a a great way of measuring what you are eating to help manage body composition, macronutrient intake, and overall well-being.

Keeping a food journal is not something I do 365 days a year. I take breaks in the offseason but I find it is important for everyone, even if you only do it once a quarter. Simply put, it creates much greater conscious awareness, and tracking it even 7 days a quarter, will result in better eating habits for the other 12 weeks.

Personally I think I have a relatively clean diet, I also have a simple diet. I tend to vary foods over periods of time, but over 7 days the number of different foods I eat is low. On a typical day when I am training hard I will consume about 5,500 calories, however, since this is the off-season, and I'm only doing base training, it has trended down a bit.  

MyWeigh KD8000 Food Scale - My preferred scale
Lastly, I will say that the activity of eating is a highly social activity. However for me eating is part of my job and I have to take it very seriously. I eat to fuel my body and perform better on race day.

Below is a complete 7-day food log. This list does not show the amount of water, coffee, and tea that I consumed. It also does not include another small set of calories that I would get from supplements like fish oil and condiments like mustard, I don't eat ketchup. Everything I eat is weighed to be as precise as possible. These are the scales I use to weigh things.

Weekly Total of Calories (7 days): 32,606
Average Calories Per Day: 4,658




As far as timing of food goes. I am eat most of the carbs in the morning. Powerbar product is consumed during the day with Kona Punch as my go-to gel, and Strawberry Banana when I need a little extra boost of caffeine. At night I tend to eat more of the fats, proteins, vegetables and complex carbs.

Lastly if you are a triathlete or endurance athlete, I have set up a FREE Ironman Q&A group on Facebook. Feel free to ask any question you might have about Ironman Training or endurance sports.

Professional Triathlete Training Log - Weekly Swim, Bike, and Run Miles For Dec 10 - Dec 16

The "Sidewalks" of Northwest Tucson (Looking North)
The "Sidewalks" of Northwest Tucson (Looking North)
When I think about this week, I can't help but think how it was a "character building" week for me. I have always considered myself to be a rather hardened individual, but my Achilles heel has always been the cold. This is not to say that I am wuss for the cold as I'm not. But it is true that I have always preferred warmer weather.

For those that are not aware, I have a policy where I ride my bike everywhere. During the off-season I only use the car to make sure the battery stays charged so I can actually use it to travel to races. Last year there were a couple of times - I can count them on less than one hand - where I cheated on this. They were really cold and rainy/snowy Tucson winters days and I drove to the pool instead of riding my bike. #Fail

Anyway on to the character building.  So I have only been swimming at night here in Tucson because the pool I belong to is undergoing renovations and is only open at night. The rides have become bone-chillingly cold as of late. On both Monday and Tuesday I nearly froze and I could not close my hands when I arrived home. It may not seem like much to some, but when you hop out of the pool and have to change in open, dry air, your body loses an incredible amount of heat. Then to bike home with still wet clothes just adds to the losses. It doesn't matter how many layers of clothes you wear, you still freeze.

The "Sidewalks" of Northwest Tucson (Looking South)
On Wednesday I headed to the pool on a cold and rainy day.  It was certainly a day where last year I would have wussed out and drove, but I am determined to bike everywhere no matter what the conditions might be. I have the ability to do it, and I know I can set a good example for society, and I have always believed you should lead by example.

However, before heading to the pool I took out everything but the bare swim essentials. I replaced the "normal essentials" with a spare set of clothes and put them in a waterproof trash bag to ensure that I would at least start with dry clothes for the way home.

Along the way I got dumped on, and it was cold, but I knew that I would only have to hop in the pool to warm up. When I arrived I was greeted by 4 very unenthusiastic lifeguards. The pool was empty, and they were less than thrilled to man the guard chairs even though they were dressed to survive a week in the arctic. I could feel their death stares on me for the first 3400 yards. Then they pulled me out of the water. Apparently if they can't see the bottom of the pool then the pool has to close. With 4 lifeguards and 1 swimmer this seemed a little impractical considering I swim on the surface of the water. But there was nothing I could do but laugh at the situation. I put on my dry clothes and headed for home.

Living in Tucson I don't get a chance to ride in heavy rain too often, but I was quickly reminded of why bike fenders were invented. I could barely see anything with water splashing up everywhere, and I could barely make out my path. The only thing my enormous 600 lumen light was doing was creating a fuzzy beam which did more to distract me than illuminate any sort of road surface. I was frozen stiff and I all I could do was dig in to the well. I thought about a recent Bear Grylls "Survival Special" where he was showing people how to survive incredibly difficult conditions. In that episode he was being sprayed with cold water in a snow environment and he was trying to start a fire. After 1 hour Bear did something he rarely does. He gave up. He apologized to the film crew and his viewers. But he gave up. Although it was NOT nearly as cold as Bear's environment, in that moment, I realized that I can handle some miserable environments. I don't have to like it, but I can survive it, and that is a strength of mine.
My First Attempt at Eating a Coconut

After that epiphany, the ride became almost enjoyable. I had a rush of endorphins and I knew I would make it home. I started to embrace the cold and I knew every minute I stayed out there was a minute longer than my fellow competitors would have. It was a great experience and all I could do was smile. I conquered the cold.

Anyway this was a little different take on my normal weekly update but I thought I would share it. And for those counting, yes I didn't put out my food journal this week as promised. Truthfully I was going to put it out on Friday but in the wake of the shootings I decided against it. I will publish it this week however.

Here are my weekly swimbike, and run totals:

Total: 177 Miles / 22 hours 52 minutes

Swim: 20,850 yards / ~12 miles / 6 hours 06 minutes
Bike: 126 miles / 8 hours 43 minutes
Run: 39 miles /  5 hours 02 minutes
Core:  2 sessions / 3 hours 0 minutes

Professional Triathlete Training Log - Weekly Swim, Bike, and Run Miles For Dec 3 - Dec 9

My Saturday Night Dessert
After a couple of weeks of active recovery, I finally closed the books on 2012, and made the switch to focusing on 2013. If you missed my annual training update then here it is.

Anyway, this was the first week of training for my 2013 season and I must say that it started out rough. However, with ever day that past I got stronger and stronger. Even though no activity had any sort of effort much above a casual aerobic pace for me, it was clear that the long 2012 racing season had taken its toll on the body. As a result, I have already changed my training plan this year to include a little more base building than I originally planned. In addition, I am focusing mainly on the swim/run for now and I am going to let the bike take a back seat.

I have also started getting back to core in an effort to build up all the structures that I believe greatly helped me in 2012 seasons in terms of overall durability. I have put myself back on the calorie counting regimen as well, and although I'm not eating to it, I think it is good to have a conscious reminder of what you are eating. I am planning to share a full 7-day log with readers later on this week, but here is a sample of my dessert from Saturday night.

Here are my weekly swim, bike, and run totals:

Total: 173 Miles / 22 hours 46 minutes

Swim: 17,600 yards / ~10 miles / 6 hours 18 minutes
Bike: 102 miles / 7 hours 05 minutes
Run: 61 miles /  7 hours 53 minutes
Core:  1 sessions / 1 hours 30 minutes


Professional Triathlete Training Log - Yearly Swim, Bike, and Run Miles For 2012 Season

Moon Rise Over Mt Lemmon in Tucson, AZ
Moon Rise Over Mt Lemmon in Tucson, AZ
About a year ago I started writing these weekly updates as a way to force myself to reflect on how my week went and how I was feeling.  In retrospect it was a good idea. Whether you choose to make it public private, I would encourage everyone to look back on their training. With that being said, it is now time to aggregate all those weekly updates into the 2012 yearly report.

Here are my yearly swimbike, and run totals:

Total: 10,278 Miles / 994 hours 

Swim: 522 miles (920,000 yards)  / 259 hours
Bike: 8,348 miles / 491 hours
Run: 1,407 miles /  176 hours
Core:  68 hours 

Those numbers come out to an average of 82.83 hours a month, and 19.1 hours per week.  For reference it is about 502 miles from San Francisco to San Diego down the 5 in California, it is 7,793 miles by air from Chicago to Hong Kong, and it is 1391 miles by air from my hometown Madison, WI to Tucson AZ.

For those looking for a little more granular data by month then here you go:


Training Hours by Month
Training Hours by Month - Total
Training Hours by Month - Swim
Training Hours by Month - Swim
Training Hours by Month - Bike
Training Hours by Month - Bike
Training Hours by Month - Run
Training Hours by Month - Run

Training Hours by Month - Core
Training Hours by Month - Core