Blog 2

So after a weekend of fairly long sessions I relearned the same lesson I learn every time I get underway.  I just can’t do repetitive long intense workouts on poor stationary equipment.  The treadmills we have are very old and lack any sort of shock absorption.  In addition, the lack of terrain variety means I pound the same way on the same joints and muscles for the entire workout.  This increases the speed at which I feel the onset of overuse injuries.  I really do not understand the people that would pick a treadmill run over an outdoor run.  I find ‘DREADMILLS’ to be almost intolerable.  To allow for some recovery I took it easy on Monday.  I stretched out a lot, and did some trigger point massaging.

On a brighter note it was Saint Patrick’s Day.  I went a little overboard and put on just about every piece of green clothing I had onboard.  I also bought some shamrock antennae before getting underway.  I am not quite sure what you would call me…but I was VERY green!  I may have gone overboard, but I had fun and other people had fun laughing at me!!!

Tuesday was another rest day.  I did do a short run on the elliptical and some core work.  I followed it up with a lot of stretching and massage.  My hip and butt are feeling a little better, but not great. If I bend slightly past 90 degrees at the waist my left butt cheek screams.  It is difficult to explain the pain.  It runs the length of the butt cheek.  It does not feel like a pulled muscle, but more like inflammation or irritation.  All I know is I am all butt hurt right now.  I hate not working out.  It really throws me off.  I can’t sleep well and I don’t feel well.  In addition, we recently hit thicker ice.  It is so loud all night long.  Usually workout induced exhaustion helps me sleep through the violent vibrations and crashing of ice against the hull.  Now I lay awake watching the hours tick by until my alarm goes off at 0200 telling me to get ready for watch.  I am in a bit of a low, but I know it will pass.

I mentioned the thick ice, but that isn’t the only thing that has been difficult to deal with lately.  A low pressure front from the arctic is pummeling us.  Winds are between 25-40kts and temperatures reached -50 with the wind chill.  It is painful to go outside. Every day I have to do a round of the ship before I go on watch.  I only spend about 10-15 min outside, but within a minute I have brain freeze from the cold, I can’t move my face, and my hands go numb.  If I have to launch the helo I am stuck out on the flight deck for about 20 minutes at a time.  The only piece of skin exposed is my nose, but I am still cold to the core by the time I get back inside.

The ice is a nightmare right now.  We encountered a larger area of multi-year ice rubble.  It must have broken off the ice cap last year and then drifted south.  When winter hit hard and fast the old ice refroze into some first year ice floes.  The ice is anywhere from 4-8ft thick.  On top of the ice is a foot of really awesome snowman making snow.  Snow can actually slow the ship down more than ice.  It just grabs onto our hull and holds it tight.  I was driving early in the morning and hit a really hard section.  Every time I backed and rammed more slush and debris would fall in behind me.  It took me over an hour to get out.  My boss took a screen capture of my track line and sent it to the whole crew and titled it Master Card Moment of the Day.  It was pretty funny, but man I was frustrated at the time.  I didn’t make any ahead progress in 90 minutes.  See Below.

Mastercard Moment of the Day

Course made good: 310

Speed made good: 0.14

Attempts to break free: 14

Learning to break ice...priceless

Hey at least I wasn’t this guy!!

On Wednesday I did an easy spin on the bike and then a short run.  My butt doesn’t feel great, so I am keeping the intensity easy right now.  Hopefully by the end of the week I will be able to do some real training sessions again.

I did get an opportunity to show the ice who was boss.  I took the watch in a state that was similar to what I faced on Tuesday.  The previous watch was struggling with the same rubble, snowy mess that dominated me the day before.  This time I drove it like I stole it.  No section took me more then three back and rams to get through.  It was liberating.  It gets kind of personal when the ice dominates you.  I needed to redeem myself.  So the current score is Ice 1, Rachel 1.  Somehow the tie must be broken.  Below is a picture of us breaking ice at night.

Thursday I biked a 20mi hilly course on the CompuTrainer.  I keep the intensity level around Z2.  For me that is a wattage of about 130-140.  It felt good to actually do a workout.  The pain in the rear and the hip are not gone, but steadily improving.  I followed the ride up with a short run to see how things felt.  It was not great, but it was an improvement.  I stretched and then called it a day.

Finally on Friday I was supposed to take a 2x20 min flat time trial.  I set a pacer at a wattage of 215.  I warmed up and then started.  It was kind of cool to have a pacer, but I was holding 230+ for wattage and my pacer was right with me at a 215 wattage.  I know that is not a significant difference, but I wanted to drop my pacer like a bad habit.  He just hung around.  Then 7 min into the time trial ‘BANG…squeak, squeak, squeak..’  I thought I busted the CompuTrainer.  Luckily I just blew out my tire.  Not a tube, my actual tire.  I was sure I had spares onboard.  I would have to be an idiot to not take a spare tire underway with me.  After intense searching it turns out I am an idiot.  I contacted someone on land who is meeting our ship in Dutch Harbor.  Hopefully, he will get my message and bring me some spare tires.   Otherwise I am going to have to hunt all over the island for a bicycle tire.  I have actually never even seen a bicycle on the island so the chance that they have bike tires are pretty low.

On Saturday I warmed up with some runner core exercises.  If you have not heard of runner core it is a program that focuses on building core strength and flexibility in order to be a faster injury free runner.  It is far more in depth than that, but that is the quick and dirty.  My coach happens to be the creator of the program.  You should check out the program www.runner-core.com.  After circuit one, I got on the treadmill and did a :50 min steady run.  I followed this up with 50 min of spinning on the bike and then some stretching.  Then I went to my bike and switched the front tire with the rear tire.  Now I can at least ride on a trainer.  My fingers are still crossed that my buddy got my message and I will have some new tires when we pull into Dutch.

Sunday I got up late for watch.  I jumped out of bed and realized my left leg was asleep.  It could be related to the butt and hip pains I have been having.  Maybe my sciatic nerve is angry!  Anyway my leg was asleep so when I popped out of bed my leg buckled and I fell over.  I made quite the thud and followed it up with some profanity.  I managed not to wake the roomie up.  I got dressed with my defunct leg and did a speed round of the ship with an odd looking, left leg asleep gait. I still made it to watch on time, but man it was a close call.  I really struggle w/ the 0400-0800 watch because you actually get up around 0200 to do a round and then relieve no later then 0330.  This is just not a natural time to get up.  It requires going to sleep at a ridiculously early time which never happens.  Instead I sit in bed wishing I was asleep

After watch I took a much needed nap.  Man I love naps.  Woke up, got on my bike and did the 2x20 min time trial.  I warmed up for 10 min then began.  Again the damn pacer stuck with me the whole time.  I didn’t understand how I would average a higher wattage, but he would be going faster.  I’ll be looking into that.   I was beat after set number one.  I took 2 minutes of rest and then finished the second 20 minutes.  I was pretty damn tired.  I averaged 230 watts.  I really have no idea what is good, but I know that crazy ironman athletes can hold 200 watts for 4 hour workouts.  Luckily I am not an ironman athlete…yet!!!  After I did the 2x20 min TT, I attempted to do the actual workout my coach had written for Sunday.  It was a 90 min ride.  Here was the workout:

5 min warm up/2 min ez

5 min blow out,/5 min ez

10x 2 min at 230-240 where the 1^st min is at 90rpm, and the second minute is at 100 rpm/10 min at 110watts with high cadence (110+). 

Cooldown

I made it through :55 minutes of the workout.  I could have finished, but the workout was extremely difficult following the 2x20min.  I know it was not a good idea to combine the two workouts, but I hate missing a workout.  It was especially dumb since I have been trying to recover this week.  I followed up about 2 hrs of riding with an ez run.  I actually didn’t feel too bad running.  I’m still butt hurt, but compared to Monday I feel great.  Let’s hope this progress continues.  I’ll see how I feel tomorrow and hopefully the progress I made this week isn’t reversed by trying to do too much too soon.

Now for some cool pics: