80 mile bike. Rosenberg to Brookshire to Katy HS. 4:15. Good bike. Back a little sore but stretching helped. Felt good on the way back. Slight head wind. Had plenty of water and snacks for the road. Sore after the bike. Did a 1.5 mile run after to see how my legs felt. Feel good. Think I can do well on the marathon after the bike for the ironman. We'll see.

The cool weather really helped out today. Started very early - 7 am. In time to get home for a nice big breakfast. Used my Asics 2120s. Think I'm using these shoes for the Ironman with my speed laces. Started off at a good pace. Very nice relaxing, quiet, calm run. Used my MP3 player for motivation. Definitely sub 8 min miles all the way. Picked up the pace on last half. Last mile timed at 7:10 pace. Total time 2:36. A little over 20 miles. Felt good afterwards, not too much pain. Still had enough energy to go outside to cut the grass and spread some mulch and do some weed eating. Route was down Ricefield Rd.

Very good swim day. Went to the Y around 4 pm. Really concentrated on my swim form. It worked cuz I swam a 5:39 300 yd on my first one and a couple more sub 6 min 300s. All averaged 6:10 or less. I'm not sure exactly sure what I did different today. but my swimming was much improved. Concentrated on streamlining or being more "fish like". Total time 1:05.

Also, did some weights at work while working night shift. 30 min.

After my intervals yesterday, I didn't want to risk any injury so took a day off to let body recovery. Good call.

Ran at seabourne park. Warmed up with 3 miles then did 6 miles of 8 x 3 minutes of 90% MHR or about 3 minutes 800s. C/d with 2 miles. Intervals cause so much pain. You know what to expect and you would like to avoid it but it's necessary. Body held up pretty good. Morning was fairly cool. Used my ASICS 2120s. TT= 84 min.

Went down that Ricefield Rd again, except this time I went all the way down until it ended. Hit a familiar rd that hits HWY 36 between Needville and W.Columbia. Kept on going until I got a flat. Changed the tube and it was time to turnaround. Very HOT out today. Ran our of wate came back home a slightly different route. Much smoother rd. Stopped at George Ranch for a water refill. Slow avg 18.5 mph. TT=184 minutes.

Went swimming kind of late - 4 pm. Had to share a lane with a very big unfrinedly guy. He didn't want to go circles so did back and forth on half a lane. It was tough swimming. He was taking up so much of the lane I was afraid I was going to run into him. Definitely slowed me down a little. Worked on some flip turns once the big guy was gone. Did about 6 flip turns in a row but they were very ugly flip turns. TT= 69 min.

Mother's Day today!

62 mile bike. Rosenberg to Fulshear to Simonton, and turn around at Brookshire. Non-stop - 3 hrs 4 min. Averaged 20 mph. Didn't get any back pain while on the bike. Excellent ride, felt great the whole ride. Not much for wind. Maybe a light tailwind on the way back. Started pretty early for me - 7:20 a.m. Once again, it's difficult to start off with a high cadence. 85 rpm is tough to maintain, but once I get warmed up which is about 10 miles into the ride, I can maintain 95-100 rpm at a good speed. Another thing I have been doing is taking a water bottle full of caffinated coke. Bascally a 12 oz coke poured into a water bottle and then filled with water to the top. This is mostly because I don't have a chance to get my coffee in the morning before I ride. I need my caffeine or I'll get a headache. Of course my two water bottles of Gatorade are a must as well.

Stopped at Seabourne park after work for a quick run. 6 miles. I had been thinking about what I wrote yesterday - about no intervals or VO2 max workouts. Today I warmed up with 2 miles at about 7:45 pace, then did a somewhat tempo run. "Tempo for what?" I asked myself as I was running. Surely not for a marathon. Maybe a 10k tempo. Anyways, I ran 3 miles at 6:40 pace. If anything, it got me breathing hard for a longer period of time. C/D 1 mile. Total time 44 minutes. Felt good after the run. Could go longer but dinner waiting for me at home.

Had to work today. Took a well deserved day off. I feel good about my Ironman training so far. I feel confident about the run, I can finish the swim, I need to work on my long bike rides. I just need to find the time one morning to go out for a 4-5 hour ride. I've been pretty much ignoring any kind of high intensity workouts, intervals, or VO2 max training. I figure I need my endurance more than speed for this event.

Just playing around with numbers now but here goes.
I figure I can swim about 36 minutes per mile. x 2.4 = 86 minutes.
If I average 20 mph on the bike, that's another 5.6 hours, 19 mph is 5.9 hours.
The run, I hear is the toughest but my strongest sport. I think I can handle a sub 4 marathon, but will conservatively predict 4 hours for now. throw in about .25 hours (15 minutes)of transition. This comes out to a 11:17 Ironman finish time at 20 mph bike or 11:35 finish time for 19 mph bike.

I think I'll shoot for the 11:17 prediction.