Wednesday 17/12/08 - Financial backing secured

I had a good reason not to train today, I swear. I spent the day negotiating an injury compensation settlement and received a favourable decision, a decision which will finance at least a year of triathlon training expenses (Pool entry/Track Fees/Coaching/Membership/Race nomination fees) with enough for a full carbon bike should I so desire - hmmmm... it is Christmas but I will hold off.

Stop the tisk tisking - I completed some cardio in an intense 7-aside soccer competition which is better than nothing and contrary to popular belief good interval training. Take a look at the stats of a soccer (football player) during a game and what percentage is spent sprinting, running, jogging, walking and running backwards. Note a soccer game lasts 90 minutes whereas a decent 10km race will be 40 minutes (less than half that) so the duration and ratio spent sprinting-running-jogging would most likely equate to at least 40 minutes depending on position.

I was watching the 2007 (I think - it was qualification for Beijing for some nations) ITU on foxtel the other night and paid special attention to the run and strategies employed by athletes. For example when athletes launched specific attacks (a la cycling) or whether they just completed it consistently fast. Javier Gomez was a prime example in his home country's race - he was about 200m behind the leader and gradually upped the tempo culminating in a 70m sprint to win by 2 seconds - he knew his energy levels and if he had sprinted the entire gap may well have no energy to continue to increase his tempo if his rival reacted. Worst case scenario - the South African would have only needed a slight surge to maintain the lead and ensure victory particularly over such a short distance. In comparison, I watched Emma Snowsill in a different race and she stuck to her individual gameplan and was 6th out of T2 and then put something like 10 or 20 seconds on her nearest rival over the 10km. She ran HER race, her PACE, her EFFORTS where she had planned them. There is so much information and so many contributing factors as to whether you RACE THE RACE or RACE YOURSELF such as fitness, confidence, energy levels, etc. The resources will shed more light on race tactics.

On Saturday I will publish an abstract of my training program / time bases and anything else I think appropriate as I will have a new training partner in Adele (if I can keep up :D ) so hopefully it will be informative.

Thanks for reading.

Joey D out.