Stryka’s BodyBlog

Well I am back and am still yet to drown!!! Today the weather was ideal conditions for running and cycling at about 16 degrees with a light breeze however that light breeze was enough to chop up the ocean making my swim harder.

But despite the course looking decidingly longer than the advertised 300m (although that could just be my imagination) and me literally making the decision to quit about 10 times during the swim and swimming off course meaning that I added about 20metres to get around the last buoy I got there with a mix of what at times almost resembled freestyle, side stroke, breaststroke and backstroke and felt all the better for it when I eventually stood up in knee deep water back on the beach.

The bike felt good today getting up above the 30kph that I wanted to average, taking about 21 minutes for what my cycle computer said was 10.8km

Where the past runs have been nice and easy along flat roads today we went back onto the beach for 3 laps of a 1km loop that crossed back across the sand dunes twice per lap which really made the run tough. I have no idea but If I had to guess I think the run took about 13-14minutes - pretty slow particularly through the soft sand.

I don’t think they took split times for the legs but when the post the full race times I will let you know. I would like to think I beat the 47odd minutes from my first race but with the changes in conditions I am not sure.

After seeing both my parents extended families over the past week I started thinking about genetics and how much they play in our athletic abilities. Both sides of the family are large with mum and dad both having 5 brothers and sisters and that means that I have about 20 odd cousins on each side. So my informal study consisted of about 50 odd people with what should be fairly similar dna.

What became glaringly obvious was that there no direct link as to who was athletic and who wasn’t. Within the 3 generations there was short and tall, skinny and fat.  brothers and sisters were as different as chalk and cheese, highly athletic or morbidly obese.

Sure genetics make life easier for some than they do for others, I am not denying that at all. All I am saying is that some people make the most of what they are given…. Some don’t.

Make up you own mind what you do with yours.

One of the things that has always attracted me is the mental aspects of sports. Just what will go through Cadel Evan’s mind as he lines up for another 3 weeks of absolute torture on the bike as he lines up for the Tour de France after throwing everything he has at the race for the last two years only to come second place and also knowing that it just gets harder this year with Lance Armstrong, Floyd Landis and Alberto Contador back in the race not to mention somehow finding a way to get past the might of the CSC team with last years winner Carlos Sastre and Frank and Andy Schleck to somehow get past?

I wonder just what is currently going through his mind as he endures hours upon hours of training on the bike?

How does last years football wooden spoon team find it within themselves to get back out on the field against last years premiers? How do they put last years humiliations behind them to enact a game plan and somehow find a victory?

Finding the answer to these questions is what separates the true champions from the perenial also rans. It is the ability to put aside past failures and not them define who they are.

Sure they are bitterly disapointed but don’t dwell on it. They analyse what went wrong so they can do what any champion must do - learn from the mistakes.

Mistakes happen - that is just a part of life for if we didn’t make any mistakes then it is impossible to achieve greatness

"The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure" 

I know it is a bit corny but I will leave you with a video from Sly: Was it really your best?

First up let me apoligise for the rather sporadic posts lately. It has been a ridiculously busy few weeks at work (which is a good thing) the busier I am the more money I can make

On a sader note side my Grandfather passed away this week at the ripe old age of 79. Yesterday was the funeral at the other end of the state which took it out of me to drive about 600kms yesterday plus the funeral and memorial services, it became a long day. My grandfather was a Church Pastor who served his God all his life so I know he has gone home to a happier place.

Feb 15 was my line in the sand for a number of goals. I hit some, but missed some.

Squat - nailed 10 reps at 150kg no problems at all. I also got a couple reps out at 400pds the other week which wasn’t listed as a goal but certainly satisfying none the less.

Deadlifts - Still not satisfied that I am flat enough with these. The weight itself is no problem at all but I will keep working on them.

Bench - My goal here was 115kg for five reps with the ancillary goal of a 120kg lift. I got 4 reps out but got the 120 - just. Whilst I came antagonisly close I am still pretty happy here because I have added about 15kg to my 1 rep max over the last 6 weeks. Certainly nothing to be scoffed at.

Weight - Barely moved currently 78.4 at 8.4%. I really need to work on eating more. Simple as that. No excuses. Just eat more. Having said that - I have made some great strength gains on all my lifts using a 5×5 system which is a great base to now focus more on size as opposed to strength. Now I am going to switch to german volume training for the next two weeks.

Tonight was the first night of the gvt. We started with arm night because it will be the least intense to ease into the program but let me tell you I can barely lift my arms right now.

Leg night we will just do a 20 rep squat rather than the 10 x 10. The only other time I have done gvt I couldn’t walk for a week even with light weights.

Next goals are due by April 18th which is my birthday. I really need to shake things up to catch up on the weight goal in particular.

Well this week is the week I have set to reach my first 6 week goals for 2009 (scary that 2009 is 6 weeks old already!). I have a specific Squat, Bench, Deadlift and Weight goal that I was supposed to hit this week. Well tonight was leg night. I have had a real lack of energy this week. It wasn’t actually the tri that took it out of me but rather on monday morning I went for a ride with some friends and I had to work my butt off just to keep up. Then getting up early on tuesday morning for swim training.

I am not a morning person at all. For all of you that are up every morning before dawn to train, I definitely salute you!

So anyways I didn’t wanna squat. But I set a goal. If I just decided it is too hard to attempt this week then what is the point of a goal in the first place? My goal was 150kg x 10 reps. 10 good deep reps. It is not so much the weight but the depth that I was going for.

I didn’t want to train tonight, I wanted to stay at home and rest, When I got to the gym I wanted to stick to the warm up weights. When I put 150kg on the bar I wanted to stop on the 3rd rep. I wanted to stop on the 5th rep, and on the 6th, 7th, 8th, and the 9th.

You know I didn’t quit though. Tomorrow I tick the deadlift goal off.

Well I placed 15th in the tri (although only 22 competed in the super sprint, hard to tell because of the two races being held at the same time) 15th was my goal so I guess I passed that but it is a little hollow with only the 22 competitors.

The 300m Swim time was 10:15. Split placing 21 out of 22. (got out of my wetsuit faster than the other bloke )

12km Cycle was 25:07. Split placing 10 out of 22.

3km run 12:02 Split placing 13 out of 22

Total time  47:24.

:( Negatives: My swim was poo. As soon as the race started everything I had practiced went out the window. I didn’t go crazy like a bull out of the gate but my technique was virtually non existant. I do need to keep in mind though that I never swim so to complete 300metres on two practice sessions is a big effort for me.

My cycle was average. My cycle computer said 29.5 ave kph. The course was perfectly flat and I should have been faster. Again I need to keep in mind that it was only the second time out on the bike in a long time.

:) Positives: I have 6 scheduled swim sessions till the next race. Already I am learning to relax in the water and concentrate on my swimming rather than just fighting to get enough air to get me to the other end. THere is a lot of room for improvement which means that I can make big gains on this leg. A simple 2 minutes puts me in a very competitive position.

I will get out on the bike more between now and March 1. Again simply getting in the saddle should get me some easy gains. Another minute here and again I am a lot closer to the front of the field.

My fitness was fine for the 47 minute event. No problems here.

Despite my legs taking about 500 metres of running before they realised that they were no longer pedalling and were supposed to be running I still managed 4 minute kms.

Most importantly - I enjoyed the journey.

Well the race has run and won (certainly not by me, but give me time) and in the wash up I am a little disappointed. The weather was absolutely perfect with a warm 21 degrees and only a slight breeze keeping the ocean flat. My new wetsuit certainly helped me through as it inbuilt (but still legal) buoyancy meant I didn’t have to worry about sinking at all.

We started off and I kept to my race plan hanging back to let the pack fight it out at the first buoy. But that was about the only part of the swim that did go to plan. Everything I practiced in the pool went out of the window and I just couldn’t get any rhythym going. I fought my way through with a mix of freestyle and breastroke and despite having to rest two thirds of the way there I eventually did get there and came out of the water with two others. Not dead last!

Transition to the bike went smoothly and off on the bike leaving the two other poor swimmers in my wake. Again 12kms doesn’t sound like much but I couldn’t quite get the pace I wanted. My goal was to get a top 15 split for the bike leg but I think I was just outside that. I wanted to average mid 30kph but couldn’t break an average 0f 29.5kph. Definitely room for improvement there but it was only the second time on my bike for quite a while. I passed a few people on this leg which was encouraging and stayed on the same lap as the leaders.

Hoping off my bike my legs felt like jelly. I had never considered the effects of 25mins of peddalling would have on my run. But it was only 3kms to run and after about 500metres I got some rhythym going and whilst I don’t know the time yet it felt like a sub 12min run which was the goal. I think I achieved my top 15 split for this leg but will let you know the official splits as soon as they are posted on tues/wed.

Definitely room for improvement. Next weekend is a longer race (750/20/5) which I am going to do the run leg as part of a team. The next super sprint is March 1 so I have a couple of weeks to get the swimming under control. If I could get through without resorting to breastroke I think I couple shave 2 mins which will have me on the bike with the main field. I think I could have a minute or so on the bike as well which would give me a very competitive race. I enjoyed myself which is the main thing and it has given me new motivation to train hard so that I can smash the swim next time.

I do need to keep in mind that this is just for fun and whilst my competitiveness instinct wants to go harder my main goals are still to build muscle and get stronger in the gym (it goes through my mind the whole event - sure these guys can swim fast but they can’t squat what I can ) a 45 minute race fits perfectly into that for cardio purposes and being a race makes it so much more fun than running on a treadmill for 45minutes. Incidently I also added 5kg to my bench today.

Going back to my 2009 goals I have achieved my first 5km run under 20 minutes ticking that off way ahead of schedule. I will do an attempt on the bench next sunday for 115kg x 5 (115kg for 2 and 117.5kg for 1 today) which is my feb 15 goal. I will also make sure that I get my 10 reps for squats at 150kg on wednesday and 5 reps with 160kg on deadlift with a perfect form (will try and film that so you guys can be the judge). 

The only goal that I am behind on is my weight goal to get back above 80kg. I have been fluctuating between 78-79kg. I think I could get to 80 but not sure that I could do it without putting on more fat than muscle. 

Thankyou for your encouragement in getting me through the race today. I really appreciate it from you all!

Tomorrow I do my first super sprint triathlon. For all the support and encouragement that you guys have given me I am very grateful. But as a virtual non swimmer I am still very nervous.

But you know what? That is one of the reasons why I am going to do it. I want to jump in to the deep end. I want to prove the doubts wrong. And yes I do have doubts just like you do.

But I refuse to give in to my minds limitations, for I know that my body is stronger than I sometimes give it credit for.

I remember how nervous I was the first time I tried a barbell squat. It was weird and uncomfortable. I felt off balance and probably managed a grand total of 20kg. THe other day I squatted 400pds and whilst I was still nervous… I still did it.

I am nervous everytime I bench. But I still do it. Jeff has challenged me to catch his bench. His bench is impressive and a long way away. The thought of that much weight over my chest scares the bejesus out of me. But 2.5kg a week I am going to get there.

I was very nervous for my half marathon. I had never run that far before let alone run that sort of distance up a mountain. But I knew I could do it. And I did.

So whilst I have never before swam 300metres. I know I can do it because I know that whilst my mind tries to hold me back with limitations it also holds a resolve that never gives up. It is capable of pushing through unthinkable things no matter how uncomfortable they get.

It hasn’t let me down yet and it isn’t going to tomorrow because failure is even more uncomfortable.

Because to be uncomfortable is the only way forward.

I want you all to do two uncomfortable things: The first is to come up with something that will take you out of your comfort zone this week. Something that will be an achievement.

The second is to list it as a comment and be held accountable by the rest of us.