Shawnigan Lake Race Report

The Shawnigan Lake Half Ironman was the first race of the 4 race Subaru West Coast Series, put on by Lifesport. It also doubled as the men's championship race, with prize money going 3 deep ($2000, $1000, $500).

Pre-race:

The elites were treated to a VIP meet and greet on Friday evening up near Shawnigan Lake, complete with free drinks and snacks. Outdoors on the patio w. a couple glasses of wine, looking out over the water. Awesome. They ran a mini meet and greet for the top men's contenders, calling up the 4 main contenders to say a few words. They included: Jordan Rapp (5th 2007 IM Canada, 3rd 2008 IM Arizona), Andriy Yastrebov (4th 2007 IM Canada, 4th 2006 IM Lake Placid, 1st 2005 IM Wisconsin), Jasper Blake (1st 2006 IM Canada, 4th 2007 IM Couer D'Alene) and Chris Brown (3rd 2007 IM Canada). I was told I wasn't going to be called up, as I was considered the dark-horse, which was fine by me. I had no credentials behind me like the other guys, and I was just looking to see what I could do on race day.

I'm fortunate to have not only an awesome coach and training group out here, but also some generous buddies as well. Simon hooked me up with an extra aero helmet of his, and Jordan pimped my ride by giving me an extra Zipp 404 front wheel as well as an extra Zipp disc that he had. I was all tricked out now, no excuses.


Jordan and I headed up on Saturday to take part in the "Ride w. the Pro's" ride that went on prior to bike check-in. It was cool to ride a loop of the course with about 20 other athletes who chose to take part in the event. On the way back I was saying to Jordan that I was hoping to go 4:15 on race day (2:25 bike, 1:25 run, and then 25:00 swim plus transitions). Jordan said he thought that I'd go 4:10

The course:

2 loop swim in Shawnigan Lake (temp around 16 C - wetsuit legal)
4 x 22km rolling loop around Shawnigan
T shaped out and back run along the Cowichan Trail

Race Day:

Up at 3:30am to eat, and scooter down to Jordan's place. We left Jordan's at 4:45am as the race was starting at 7am. Set up transition, short bike to make sure things were working, easy run, quick trip to the bathroom, and soon it was time to start.

The race started w. a cannon blast from the local military base. Quite the way to start. I quickly moved to the front on the first lap, easily getting clear from the group along w. Andrew McCartney and Brent McMahon (who was doing a relay as he has Worlds in 2 weeks). I led through the first loop, before Andrew came around me on the second loop to lead us out of the water in 22:10. This gave me a 2:30 gap to Jasper, and roughly a 4:00 gap to Andriy and Jordan.


Out onto the bike course, I quickly dropped Andrew, and settled into my pace on the bike, not wanting to blow up too early. Jordan and I had a friendly wager to see who would be first through lap 1 of the bike (that was my goal point to hold off Jordan). I was still in the lead through loop 1, and continued riding strong on loop 2. Riding with the disc was awesome, as was riding and feeling the aero helmet touching your back as you're down in the aero position.


I managed to hold Jordan off until almost 50km (into the 3rd loop), where he came by me, gave me a few words of encouragement, and was soon gone up the road. I kept riding my own pace, making sure to get my nutrition in. I managed to hold off Jasper and Andriy until about 3 km from the end of the ride. The three of us came off the bike together, roughly 4:00 back of Jordan.

At this point I was in the running (both literally and figuratively) for some money, but I knew I would have my work cut out for me, as both Jazz and Andriy are noted runners. I think I got a little caught up in moment, or perhaps I wanted to try and run w. a shot at the money for a while, as I ran the first mile with the two of them, before I had to back off as my quads started to cramp up on me. I was stuck in no man's land, and just tried to settle into my pre-race goal pace of roughly 4:00 km's (1:25 pace). I was on pace until 10km or so, until things started to catch up to me. I think I paid a bit for the slightly faster bike split on the second half of the run, as well as the fact that the second half of the run was a bit harder (looser footing, combined with false flats)




I managed to limit my losses pretty well, only losing 4:30 to Jordan on the run, and 4:00 to Jasper. I crossed the line in 4:10:40 good for 4th place on the day, about 4:00 out of the money. Jordan made the front page of the Sport section on Monday which was pretty cool.



Jordan Rapp 4:01:35
Andriy Yastrebov 4:05:42
Jasper Blake 4:06:40
Daniel Wells 4:10:40
Chris Brown 4:21:16

Full Results w. splits are here.

I'm pleased with my first foray into the long-course race scene, and am looking to race the next race in the series - New Balance Victoria Half Ironman, in 4 weeks. After that, I'll race a few ITU draft legal events (including Nationals in Kelowna) before venturing down to Panama City Beach Florida to race Ironman Florida in November along with my dad and sister.

Finally some decent weather!!!

We were finally blessed with a few days over 15 C here in Vic. Fri and Sat the temperature climbed up to the mid 20's which made it great for training. Today turned out to be a good day weather wise as well, but the next couple days look cool and wet again. But...there is hope on the horizon as later this week looks to be warm again.

Now on to the training. Thursday morning was an ez 3000m swim in the morning, a 90' run on the rolling trail around Thetis lake, and an hour ez spin.

Friday morning was our usual swim to bike workout, but we were short one windtrainer this morning, so I was the odd man out, and just did the swim workout and then an hour ride on my own later in the day (along with a 50' run). The main set was 50 x 50 on 45" every 5th fast, followed up with a 500 hard (5:45). Colin and I had an epic battle, where I opened up about 5 meters on him in the first 100, but he eventually battled back and we ended up sprinting the last 25 trying to out-touch the other. I think I won :)

Saturday morning we met up down at Bubby Rose coffee shop pre-ride, before heading out for a 2:30 base ride. With the warm weather we had, it was nice to ride in just a jersey and shorts!!

Getting ready to ride from Bubby Rose

Later in the day we met up at Thetis Lake for our first open water swim of the year. The water the week before was 13.5 C, so I'm guessing it was about 14-15 or so this weekend. It was chilly the first little bit, but then you got used to it. We swam 2 loops of the big island (1300m per loop) and it was nice to get in the water and try out my new 2XU Velocity wetsuit.

Colin and I seem to be taking our time getting into the water

Joel took some awesome pics while we were swimming

Sunday we headed down to Beacon Hill for a solid run workout. 20' warm-up, then 6 x 1 mile (or so) loop on the road. I felt good running today, and ran some solid times running solo each time.

5:14, 5:16, 5:12, 5:15, 5:09, 5:19

I fell off a bit there at the end. for comparison's sake, Paul/Kyle/Brent ran between 4:36-4:45 for each one. Simon was just a bit quicker than that.

I'm looking forward to this weekend when I get to put my fitness to use in my first race of the year. I'm racing the Shawnigan Lake Half-Ironman on Sunday, and there looks to be some solid competition, so it should be a good day of racing.

Highlights of the last 10 days or so...

I've neglected blogging for too long, and rather than bore you with 10 days worth of workouts, I'll highlight some of our more "key" workouts from the last 10 days or so

Last Tuesday we hit up Commonwealth for a good treadmill workout. 20' warm-up, then 4 rounds of the following:

3' @ 11.1 mph, 1' ez, 3 x (1' @ 11.4 mph, 1' ez)

I was dripping wet getting off the treadmill, always a sign of a good workout.

Wednesday we did some steady state riding on the Old West Saanich loop, with a 2km hard run off the bike, and a 3hr base ride on Thursday. Friday morning was swim to bike workout at the pool again..

Saturday we met up down at Beacon Hill to run the Harder than Hamish Loop (2km w. a hill in the middle). After warming up, the workout was 5 x HtH loop w. 2:30 recovery. I was able to build through the workout, without falling off pace at the end, which seems to happen.

Loop times were: 6:53, 6:51, 6:45, 6:40, 6:43

Team BAMF before the workout

Starting round #2

Sunday we were up at the Waddling Dog for our usual Sunday hard bike efforts, but Joel had a surprise for us today. Rather than our usual Motor pacing, today we were going to be doing team time trial (TTT) efforts. 4 x single loop. Round 1 we went in three groups of 3 w. 20" in between the groups. Groups were Dano, Connor, Kirsten - Colin, Jordan, Andrew - Simon, Paul, Kyle. The groups ended up coming together on the back side of the interval. Round 2, the groups were the same except for Jordan and Paul who switched groups. We were able to hold off group two a bit longer, with Simon's group catching us all right at the end on the line.

For the third and 4th rounds, we ended up going off in two groups (Dano,Connor, Kirsten, Andrew - Simon, Colin, Jordan, Paul, Kyle). With the amount of horsepower in the second group, Joel gave us a 60" buffer, and we were able to hold them off by 10" or so at the end. The 4th round we ended up with a 50" buffer, and our group was caught right at the end..with Paul catching the draft off a car to zoom by for the line. We finished the day off with our usual Sunday evening swim.

Tuesday was another treadmill workout, this one being a fairly long one!

20' warm-up
3 x 3' @ 11.2 w. 2' ez IBT
3 x 2' @ 11.5 w. 2' ez IBT
3 x 1' @ 12.0 w. 1' ez IBT
5' ez
Repeat
15' warm-down

This one was a killer for me...I had to grasp onto the treadmill for a few stretches throughout the second round through on the 3' and 2' intervals...

Yesterday we had another hard ride (Broadmead loop - 4km) with a short hard run off the bike.
We went three rounds of 2 laps hard, then straight into a 3km loop of the Bog at effort, and a 2nd loop ez warm-down.

The Singing Revolution

On Saturday afternoon, I went down to the U Vic movie theatre to watch a movie called The Singing Revolution.

My parents had gone to see it in Toronto, and as it turns out, it was the last day it was showing here in Victoria. I headed down after the run and ride, and caught the 2:45pm matinee. Here's a short preview of the movie.



It turned out to be a really interesting movie, chronicling the struggles that Estonia faced while under Soviet, German, and again Soviet rule. I had heard stories from my mom of what the conditions were like when her parents left Estonia for Sweden then onto Canada, but to see it in the movie put it into perspective.

"First occupied by the Soviets in 1939, then by the Nazis, and then by the Soviets again, Estonia lived through decades of terror. By the end of World War II, more than one-quarter of the population had been deported to Siberia, been executed, or had fled the country. Music sustained the Estonian people during those years, and was such a crucial part of their struggle for freedom that their successful bid for independence is known as the Singing Revolution.

"The Singing Revolution" is the first film to tell this historically vital tale. "This is a story that has not been told outside Estonia," said filmmaker James Tusty, who is of Estonian descent. "We felt it was time the rest of the world knew of the amazing events that happened here.""

Check out the website and see if it's playing in your area. I heard that it has been held over in Toronto. It's definitely worth seeing.

Catching up on training

Thursday morning we met down at Dr Rob Hasagawa's house for a 45' ez run where we warmed up for a lil bit and then he guided us through some specific running drills. We did a lot of key drills with strides, and then we also did some plyometric type exercises down at the water-front, and finished off with uphill bounding (running, trying to maximize hang time in the air). I thought this was a very good run session, as all we focused on was these key drills.

We followed up the run with a 3000m easy swim at Crystal. We were joined by Paul Tichelaar, who is in Victoria until Worlds in early June.

I headed over to the treadmill in the afternoon for the 20/20/20 workout. Right off the bat start out at 9.0 mph for 20 min, then 20' at 9.6 mph, and finally 20' at 10.2 mph (w. treadmill set at 2% incline the whole workout). I was feeling pretty good through-out, until the power went off at Commonwealth 11 mins into my final 20' piece. So I had an un-scheduled 15 break or so there, then finished off the workout once the power came back on.

Friday morning was out swim/bike interval workout again. A short warm-up and then into a tough swim set, total of 15 x 300 as follows:

5 Pull on 4:30
5 swim on 4:15 (3:45's)
5 swim on 4:00 (3:32-35's)

We then went straight onto the bikes for 3' hard, and then 12 x (45" hard, 15" easy). A 50' easy run finished off the day.

Saturday we headed over to Thetis Lake for our first run workout there this year. One loop of Thetis Lake for the warm-up (5km), and then we ran a hard 5km tempo loop (17:47). We jogged down to the Galloping Goose Trail, where we finished off the workout w. 12 rounds of (60" hard, 30" ez). Finished off the day, w. a 2hr ride in some light rain.

This morning we did our motor-pacing up at the Waddling Dog. The workout was single loop, double loop, single loop. The last single loop was a tough one...as Joel really upped the speed on the scooter going up the highway. All in all, a really good workout today. Now it's almost time for our favourite workout of the week....Sunday afternoon swim!!

Back to training....and photos from the TC 10km

Monday and Tuesday were easier days, let the legs recover from the hard pounding of the 10km on Sunday. Monday was an easy swim in the morning, and a 90' spin in the afternoon.

Tuesday we had a good swim in the morning. 400, 200 kick, 2 x 100 IM warm-up, followed by 16x50 on 45" (every 4th fast). 1500 Neg Split pull, 100 ez, 800 Pull on 11:00 then 8 x 100 on 1:20 (1:12's) to finish up.

I rode another 90' ez, and hit the treadmill for an easy easy run. The quads were still tight from Sunday, but the easy run on the tready and some rolling around on the foam roller at night seemed to help them loosen up, as they felt better Wednesday morning.

Wednesday morning's swim was another good one.

800 mix, 800 Pull, 8 x 100 on 1:30 (1:12's)
400 mix, 400 Pull, 4 x 100 on 1:25 (1:09's)
300 mix, 300 Pull, 3 x 100 on 1:20 (1:08's)
100 ez

Wednesday afternoon was a good hill workout on the bike. We rode up and over the Durrance Lake climb (and back) which was a lot tougher climbing up the backside, followed by a jaunt up the climb to the dump, and finished off with 2 reps up the observatory (2km).

The start of the race...I'm somewhere hidden on the right hand side

Running solo, somewhere around 5km

Times Colonist 10km

Today was the Times Colonist 10km here in Victoria.

The weather co-operated (the rain held off until late morning) and it turned out to be a good day to race... overcast, 9 C and not a lot of wind. Not too sure of the total numbers for the events (10km run, 1.5km Kids race, and a 10km walk) but there were just short of 9000 in the 10km run.

The course itself can be found here. The first K is fairly flat, the 2nd K starts out flat then drops a bit, and the 3rd and 4th K are net downhill (more so on KM 4). KM 5 is uphill, with KM 6 a slight uphill as well. KM 7 is slight downhill, with the remaining three km being fairly flat.

I was in the second row at the start line, off to the left hand side. I wanted to keep the first KM under control and not go out super crazy. A lead group of 10 or so formed at the front, and I settled into the second group, about 12 of us or so. I felt comfortable running in the back of this group, and we were moving along at a good pace (9:30 through 3km). At the bottom of Dallas Rd, we hit the turn around at 4km (12:41) and this is where the race got a bit ugly for me. I lost contact with my group of 10 or so, and was stuck running in no-man's land. I ended up running the remaining 6km basically solo, with a couple guys running through me in the last KM.

Looking back, I most likely went out through 5km a bit quicker than I would have liked to (16:10) but I wanted to hang in with the group and get pulled along. The official results have me listed at 34:00.....but I'm gonna go with the 33:59 that I had on my watch! It's a PB, so can't complain.

Splits:

3:14
6:22 (3:08)
9:30 (3:08)
12:41 (3:11)
16:10 (3:29)
19:49 (3:39)
23:28 (3:39)
26:58 (3:30)
30:33 (3:35)
33:59 (3:26)


Hopefully I'll be able to find a picture or two from the race.

Mid Week Training....

Wednesday morning's swim was a tough one.

10 x 200 w. 15" rest as the warm-up with #'s 4 and 8 being fast ones.
28 x 100 as 7 x (1:30, 1:25, 1:20, 1:15). The 1:15 interval was a tough one for the first five times through, until I finally came around a bit and swam a bit faster on the last two rounds.

A run was the other workout for the day, 50' on the treadmill, with the main effort being 10 x 1' "on" 1' "off". The legs were a tad stiff today, most likely from the long ride yesterday.

Thursday morning was an ez 3km swim, 1000 SKIDS, 100 Pull, 1000 SKIDS.
I rode the waterfront loop plus a bit more for my 2hr ride, and had a 40' ez run to finish off the day.

The tail end of this week is a bit easier workout wise, as I'm going to be racing the Times Colonist 10km on Sunday. I'm looking forward to running, hopefully it's not as windy as it was today!!

Winning The Vote (Is that a good thing?)

Joel posted a photo that was taken at the start of our run workout on Saturday morning, and posted it on his blog here. Seems I am winning the "dorkiest outfit award". In my defense though, it was cold that morning and I was prepared to run in the snowy conditions up at Lochside. That works, right?

I'll make sure I'm more fashion conscious next time.

Tuesday Training...and my new ride

5000m this morning in the pool, an aerobic endurance morning.

600 warm-up
1500 Pull Neg Split
5 x 100 alt swim on 1:30, IM on 1:45
5 x 400 Pull (1-5) on 5:30 (5:10, 5:03, 4:58, 4:52, 4:38)
warm-down

This afternoon, Colin and I headed out for a 3.5 hr ride. Colin took me up the Malahat towards Shawnigan Lake. A fairly steady climb up the Malahat, then descend down to Shawnigan Lake. A rolling loop around the lake (22km) then climb back out of the valley, and then down the Malahat. I got a flat just as we got going on the descent back towards Vic, so I ended up riding the last hour solo. A good ride today (105 km).

I've got a new ride out here in Victoria. I got it Monday night. It's a great bike...accelerates well, and cruises nicely at 55-60km/hr. Anyways, here a pic of my new ride.

It's a 2006 Yamaha BWS

Weekend Activities

Well...we got some of the white stuff on Saturday....we met for the run workout at Lochside, and it was really crappy footing, and still snowing a bit, so we headed down to Beacon Hill instead, where it wasn't snowing to run. We did a 4km tempo piece (2 loops of the harder than Hamish loop) and then 4 x 1 mile on the road loop. Decent run today considering the weather. An easy spin later on in the day finished things off.

Sunday was motor-pacing day at up the waddling Dog. 2 x single loop, and then I had a TT piece heading back to home (22 min effort). A total of 75km of riding. We finished off the day with our favourite workout of the week....Sunday afternoon swimming. A solid workout, with the main set 12 x 200 (2 on 2:30, 1 ez on 3:00) SCM. First three rounds were pull, and then final round swim. Got down to 2:13, 2:13 on the two fast ones during the swim round.

Monday was a recovery effort day...3000m swim this morning, and a 50 min run in the afternoon.

Is it Winter?

It certainly felt like it today. It was cool, and windy, and with a high of only 8 C today, it felt cold! We had off and on rain today, as well as a fair amount of hail. Check out the photo.


The forecast for Friday Night through Saturday isn't that promising either. Our daily highs should be around 14-15 C right now...not 8!

"Greater Victoria. Tonight..Flurries or rain showers. Risk of small hail and a thundershower this evening. Local snowfall amount 2 cm. Windy. Low plus 2. Saturday..Flurries or rain showers. Risk of a thundershower in the afternoon. Local snowfall amount 2 cm. Becoming windy late in the morning. High 6. Saturday night..Cloudy with 60 percent chance of flurries or rain showers. Risk of a thundershower early in the evening. Windy. Low plus 2."

KM repeats tomorrow on Lochside trail...should be a good one!

Back together

The group is back together now...Colin and Simon have returned from the Ishigaki World Cup. Good results for both of them there (Simon won, Colin was 23rd) as they were at the front in the swim and managed to get into a break-away on the bike. Simon ran like he usually does (fast) and got the win over Rasmus Henning.

Training the last couple of days has gone pretty well. Monday was a recovery day, with no morning swim for me! I had a 90' ride, with 6 x 15" sprints throughout the ride. I started out riding outdoors, but the skies soon opened up, and I scurried back to ride the trainer indoors.

Tuesday we had a standard 5000m swim in the pool in the morning.

600 warm-up
20 x 50 on 45" (every 4th fast) 100 ez
5 x 300 Pull (1-3, then hold 4,5) on 4:30 100 ez
15 x 100 on 1:35/1:25/1:15 (5 times through)
200 ez cool down

Early afternoon, Kyle, Kirsten, Andrew and I headed out for a 3hr base ride. We rode up through lands end up towards the ferry terminal in Sidney. Then back down to the waterfront downtown, and back home. 3hr 10min (93km). A 40' run finished off the day.

Which brings us to today's workouts. 5000m again in the water, as follows

400 mix, 200 kick
16 x 50 on 45" (every 4th fast)
12 x 50 on 50" (every 3rd fast)
8 x 50 on 55" (every other fast)
4 x 50 on 60" (all fast)
400 ez

8 x 200 alt fast(3:10), ez (3:30)
Didn't quite feel as "on" as yesterday in the water....but still managed to hang on to it.

We met later at the U Vic track for a bike and run workout. We ended up doing 4 x 5' hard on the bike, and then Kyle, Kirsten and I got changed and hit the track for some 400's. Felt good riding today, though the legs were a bit heavy from the 3hrs yesterday.

The track workout turned out to be fairly windy on the home stretch of the 400's. After a 10' warm-up, we ran 20 x 400 on 2:00. The first one was a bit off (getting the running legs back) but then I settled into 75's the whole rest of the way. I was happy with the run today, being able to hang on through to the end of 20. Kyle was rocking today...holding 68's basically the whole way through.

Randy Starkman (Toronto Star) has been in town here for the last few days, doing some interviews (including Simon and Kirsten) and such for The Star. He and his photographer were at the pool this morning, and also followed along in the car on the bike. I'm guessing there might be a story on Simon/Kirsten sometime in the near future. Keep your eyes peeled.

Yes...I am alive

I am still here, just a bit of a break from blogging.

I've been up in Victoria now for almost 3 weeks now. The first week back was just some easy regenerative training, and we've had two solid weeks of training since.

I won't go into specifics for each day of the last 2 weeks, just some highlights of training.

We've gotten right into motor-pacing again now, with 1 workout a week up at the Waddling Dog on our 12km loop up there. It's a great workout, zipping along the road at 45-50km/hr. We had a good motor-pace workout this morning actually. Running wise, we've been running Sunday mornings down at Beacon Hill, running our Figure 8 loop. It's just shy of 3km, along wood chip trails. We've also visited Elk Lake for a good 20km neg split run there around the lake (10km loop) and this past thursday we hit the Tim Don special on the track again.

The weather is getting a bit nicer here now..today we got up to 17 C which was a nice change from our usual highs so far of 10-12 C. It'll be a bit of a late night tonite, as the Ishigaki World Cup goes at 11:45pm PST for the men. Looks like I'll be going to bed around 2am. Simon and Colin are racing there. Tomorrow, Rappstar (Jordan Rapp) is racing Ironman Arizona...watch that guy ride a bike!!

Alrighty, that's all for now, I'll get back to blogging every other day (or better)

:)

Spring Time

More on the LZR suit

Some more headlines that the suit is generating:

"The NCAA has decided that the competitors will not be allowed to use the suit at this weekend's men's Division I Swimming and Diving Championships because of accessibility issues."

Swim News.com

2 more World Records set today in Australia..

Here are the new World Records since the middle of February. I'm sure many more will continue to fall through the spring and early summer in the lead-up to Beijing. The US Olympic Trials are the first week of July, not sure whether they will allow the suit or not. I'm thinking they will.

16/02/08: 200m backstroke - Kirsty Coventry (ZIM) 2:06.39
17/02/08: 50m freestyle - Eamon Sullivan (AUS) 21.56
17/02/08: 100m backstroke - Natalie Coughlin (USA) 59.21
08/03/08: 50m backstroke - Hayley McGregory (USA) 28.00
18/03/08: 4x100m freestyle - (NED) 3:33.62
(Dekker, 53.77; Kromowidjojo, 53.61; Heemskerk, 53.62, and Veldhuis, 52.62)
21/03/08: 100m freestyle - Alain Bernard (FRA) 47.60
22/03/08: 400m medley - Stephanie Rice (AUS) 4:31.46
22/03/08: 50m backstroke - Emily Seebohm (AUS) 27.95
22/03/08: 100m freestyle - Alain Bernard (FRA) 47.50.
23/03/08: 50m backstroke - Sophie Edington (AUS) 27.67
23/03/08: 50m freestyle - Alain Bernard (FRA) 21.50
24/03/08: 50m freestyle - Marleen Veldhuis (NED) 24.09
24/03/08: 400m freestyle - Federica Pellegrini (ITA) 4:01.53
25/03/08: 200m medley - Stephanie Rice (AUS) 2:08.92
27/03/08: 50m freestyle - Eamon Sullivan (AUS) 21.41
27/03/08: 100m freestyle - Libby Trickett (nee Lenton) (AUS) 52.88

Canadian Trials begin on Monday in Montreal, and no one there will be allowed to wear the LZR, as the supply of the suit is short, so not every competitor will have access to the suit. My old club (Newmarket Stingrays) are sending 8 members to Trials.

Swimming World Records

Some interesting news out of the pool in the last month or so. Speedo has unveiled their new suit (LZR Racer) in advance of the Beijing Olympics. Based on the last 4 weeks (13 World Records), there are going to be a LOT of World Records being broken in Beijing. The suit claims a 5% reduction in drag...which is massive in the pool. I can't wait to see what Michael Phelps will do in this suit!!

The Science of Sport Blog has a couple of interesting posts on the new swim suit.

"For those who've missed the story, in the last 39 days, 14 world records have been set in the pool, and 13 of them have been in the newly designed swimsuit by Speedo. Claims of 5% less drag, water repellant fabric, an "internal core stabilizer" which helps the swimmer maintain form towards the end of the race, and what are called "low-drag" panels where the flow of water is greatest have been made to explain what must be one of the more remarkable periods of record setting in the sport."

Read the whole article here

Last Day in Flag, and the Drive North

Saturday was our last day in Flag and also my 28th birthday. We did the group ride in the morning again, followed by a 30' run off of the bike. Maybe because it was my birthday, I rode my best ride of the camp, hanging into the group and the way back, and feeling strong. Figures on the last day I'd feel that way.

Runnin off the bike

Later that night we went out for dinner at Picazzo's pizzeria, which was a good way to end the camp. From there it was on to the Pay N Take downtown, where we met up with Paul Brinkmann for beers. Paul was nice enough to cover all our beers....Thanks again Paul! Let me tell you, their beer selection there is second to none! Over 100 different beers.

Simon and Paul

The beer fridge at Pay N Take...MMmmm

Sunday morning I hopped in the truck to begin the drive back up to Vic. On the road at 630am, and I made it into Oregon before calling it a night after driving 16 hrs (1750km). I slept like a log that night, and up and back on the road at 5am Monday to try and catch the Port Angeles ferry at 2pm later that day. Ended up I wasn't going to make the ferry, so I continued up through Seattle to the border and decided to take the ferry from Vancouver (every hour departures). Had a 60' wait to get across the border, which wasn't too bad. Got back into Vic at 6:30pm, unloaded the van and then dropped Kyle and Colin off at the airport for Mooloolaba.

The Peace Monument at the border

This week is just some easy recovery workouts until Friday morning, when we'll start back with structured workouts.

Video from Friday's Swim/Bike Workout

More video's from Simon's blog

Hair Cuts

Well, today was hair cut day for most of the guys. Colin and I hadn't shaved since the start of the camp (32 days for me). Enjoy the photos.

Tich sporting the nice mohawk

PK is scared of Colin

Pre Hair Cut

Shave #1

Shave #2

Shave #3 (and final look)