Bike Gear

I recently purchased some bike gear to add onto my bike. I've read various discussion concerning buying a triathlon specific bike or road bike. Seems like the consensus is to use the right tool for the job. Road bikes are better for hills and climbing while triathlon bikes are better for flatter and faster courses. So if you can swing it, have both. Well, that's not an option for me. I'm on a tight budget. I'll keep dreaming of the Trek Speed Concept & Felt B12. Until then, I've got to work with the road bike I've got.

Trek Speed Concept & Felt B12

Triathlon & Twitter

What does triathlon have to do with Twitter? Well, there's a lot of good nutrition & training resources online. Many will tweet the info and if you follow, you can gain some valuable information for your training.

The other day I was sitting watching TV and checking on my Twitter feed on my iPhone and saw a tweet from @ministryofnuun. Nuun makes electrolyte tablets. I was introduced to them through the Atlanta Triathlon Club and purchased several tubes over the summer. You add them to your water or sports drink for additional electrolytes. Anyway the tweet asked to submit a holiday themed photo featuring one of their products with the first 3 getting some freebies from Nuun. I gave it a shot and was lucky enough to be one of the first three. I'm not sure exactly what I'll be getting, but I'll post here when I receive it.

Yes, that's a triathlon themed ornament I picked up from SwimOutlet.com a couple weeks ago. So do yourself a favor and follow @ministryofnuun, you never know what kind of goodies you'll get a chance to get for free. I'll post others that I follow when I get a chance to write about them or they become a topic of a post.

Weight Loss vs. Strength & Power

It's known as power-to-weight ratio and it's unique to each individual. Basically how much sustained power can a cyclist generate for each pound of body weight. Unless you have a way of actually measuring your power in watts, it's difficult to figure this out accurately. One theory behind this is the less you weigh, the more you can increase this ratio in power. Of course at some point too much weight loss can have negative effects on power. Since I don't have a power meter on the bike, I'm just going to follow the guidelines to figure out what works best for me.

The Holidays: Maintaining or Reducing Weight

This is always a struggle for just about everyone. This year it started around Halloween. Yeah, lots of left over candy. I could have thrown it out but, it seems like such a waste. Fortunately I was still training for the Atlanta Half Marathon and did not gain any weight.

Once I was done with the half marathon, I stopped running. I ran 5 miles a week after Thanksgiving and I was done. I had been running consistently for the last 12 months. I had a slight pain in my hip and I just needed a break. Meanwhile, I gained a couple pounds.  Typically I go up and down a couple pounds, but over the last 3 years I've lost approximately 26 pounds.

Peachtree City Sprint

Peachtree City Sprint

Date of Race: 08/21/2010

Distance: .3 mile swim, 14 mile bike and 3.1 mile run

Total Race Time = 1h 28m 57s

Overall Place = 440/1000 approx?

Age Group = Male 40-44

Age Group Place = 69/107

My First Tri - Lake Lanier Sprint

My First Tri -  Lake Lanier Sprint Triathlon

400m swim, 12k bike, 5k run

06/06/2010

Total Race Time = 1h 26m 14s

Overall Place = 83/?

Age Group = Male 40-44

Age Group Place = ?

Race Reports

I'm going back to find some of my race reports from this past year. In the future I'll be posting all of my race reports on this blog, this includes 10k's, half marathons, & duathlons. I'm also going to setup additional pages that will include my race schedule & nutritional info/recipes. Hopefully the information I'll be sharing will be of help or value to others that stumble upon this blog. I'm not a coach or certified in anyway to give advice, just passing along my own personal experience.

12 Days of Christmas Swim Workout & Swimming in a Cold Pool

It's the off season, but swim practice continues and it hasn't been easy. I'm not a strong swimmer, but I've improved this year. I've moved up from a beginner to intermediate, but this off season has me feeling like I'm moving back instead of forward.

First of many posts

I've been thinking of starting up a triathlon specific blog for a while now. Not sure why. I think it has to do with the practice of writing race reports after each race. Something I've never done until I started doing triathlons and joined the Atlanta Triathlon Club. Now when I race or train, I'm thinking of details to write in my race report. It helps keep my mind busy on long training runs.