Year in Training Recap

So it's the 31st of December and I thought I'd tally all my recorded training and races for the year in addition to the other items I could be focused on... My data was spread out across two devices (Adidas MiCoach on my BlackBerry and Nike+ from my iPod Nano) as well as inconsistent updates on my twitter feed. 

I'm barely cataloging swim distance. I only have a few pool sessions written up, nothing from actual workout data - need the right counter for that - and no total count on ocean swims at Zuma either. So this is definitely short by a few miles. (+/- 3 or so) Longest swim was 1.2mi during my IronMan 70.3, though some pool sessions were over 2k. 

Swim Races: IronMan CA, Malibu Tri (relay), Day at the Beach Tri, PCF Beach Cruiser Tri

Swim Total: 7.31 miles

Biking, a little different story. Most of my rides were tracked, though a new bike computer is a definite need for this next year. I've also slacked off lately quite a bit. No excuses, just an observation. Maybe a commuter bike purchase would add to my consistency? We'll just see. Long ride was 64 miles. 

Bike Races: IronMan CA, Day at the Beach Tri, PCF Beach Cruiser Tri (Watching the Tour of California finish Downtown does not count, but thought it was worth mentioning.)

Bike Total: 369.36 miles

Running is definitely the most often tracked activity for me, though not every run was cataloged. Also, I'm not adding any of the various 400's, 800's, 200's or track night distances from my CrossFit training, though the miles there have contributed well to speed work and improved form (efficiency?) since adding CF to my training. Longest run was 19.66 in just over 3 hours in February.

Run Races: Redondo Beach 10k, IronMan CA, Day at the Beach Tri, Rock-N-Roll LA Half Marathon (for Dino), PCF Beach Cruiser Tri

Run Total: 229.45 miles

That's over 600 total miles or about the distance from my house to Tuscon, AZ on Interstate 10. 

Curious now to see how far I go next year!!

Recent Workouts

Thursday
Did I run last Thursday? Nope.

Friday

2 Deadlifts with bands (approx. 65% of your 1 RM on the bar) ~205#? Not sure of weight...
5 Strict DB press, as heavy as possible ~started w 35# 2 rds, 6x 45#
Rest 60 seconds

4 rounds for total working time of:
Run 400 meters
20 pull ups
Rest 1:1 between rounds

13:09 total working time if I remember correctly (19:++ total). First three rounds under 3mins (2:43, 2:47, 2:51, or so) with the last round over 3.  Doing the math on this was maybe the trickiest part, adding rest time to each round’s finish time was mental with the clock running. I like that it added a mental exercise to the taxing physical workout.

Reminder that sprints are not my strong suit – distance baby!!

Saturday 

swim @ Zuma
New goggles performed well. No leaks, no isues. I think that and my new watch 

were motivation enough to swim mostly straight through. It was a bright morning with clear skies, no marine layer to speak of. Lack of clouds and the goggles made the water very clear and see-through. (It's strange describing the clarity of water, but I'll get over that...) I could see the bottom occasionally, which was a new experience for me in the ocean. Swim took just over 20 mins, so now I have a base line to improve upon. Calm waters and a few breaks for sighting, but no real stops to fidget with gear or because I was too winded. 
After that I changed and went for a run. Did the 10k route (down along the beach path all the way to the cliffs) and ran two flights of stairs on my way back. Finished that in 51 minutes and headed home. (Thinking ahead to PCF's Malibu Trail Run this Sat.)


Thought about riding w Roy Sunday, but instead walked on the beach with Katrina. (Also, I was kinda sore.)

Monday

for strength: 4 sets of 3 Heaving Snatch Balances

Did these the previous week as well, which I was already adding the heaving part. It was difficult not to jump, and my ‘shrug’ is still a weakness.

“Power” Elizabeth

21-15-9 reps for time of
Power Cleans (135/95) ~115#
Dips 

 -8 minute time cap-

Didn’t make the time cap @ 8mins, but finished my last three ring dips to get through it.

Wednesday

Back Squat 3-1-1-1-1 reps ~finished @ 275#

(Notes:  Rest no more than 2 minutes between sets.  Use 90-100-105-110-105 percents of your 3 rep max or heavier than last week.)

Workout:

3 Rounds for time and reps
5 Squat Clean into Thrusters (135/95) ~105#
50 Double unders ~scaled to 25 makes
5 Squat Clean into Thrusters
1 min rest
1 min Max Effort Burpees ~15, 14, 16
1 min rest

This was a terrible workout for me. Doing the ‘Clusters’ after the d/u s was tough, and got worse each round. I was outside, and could see my reflection in the windows. I was pulling with arms bent before completing the deadlift. Once into the clean position the squats went well, just slower as I went on and repped out mostly one at a time.  

Did some handstand work afterward while stretching for something fun/productive after a frustrating wod. 

Thursday
swam this morning @ Culver pool. a little warm-up and KB before
4x 200m (CF Endurance was 6x @ TT pace, but I didn't have that much time) with equal rest as the swim interval
First round was 4 mins and a little slower after that. last round was clocked at 3 and change, but that can't be right. Need to do this (full) regimen again and pay attention to timing. And figure out my watch better!!

And I'm headed to PCF for this later today: 

For time:

40 – 30 – 20 REPS OF
CLAPPING PUSH UPS
JUMPING LUNGES

Should be a good one...

I'm skipping Friday and doing this on Saturday morning.

Malibu Trail Race of Death Part 2

IronMan CA 70.3 Recap

...a recap of my race and the journey leading up to it...

After moving back to LA from Newport Beach for work, I was on the search for a new gym. I had never heard of CrosssFit, it was not even on my radar. My first exposure was from a page torn out of a magazine, something titled "A Six Week Intro to CrossFit". I was doing 100-yard sprint repeats up and down my street followed by push-ups, sit-ups or lunges in my driveway or bedroom. Not quite Rx WODs, but not exactly 24-Hour Fitness either...
I had done one triathlon, the Olympic distance race in Malibu, and I had set my sights on a bigger distance. My goal? The Ironman 70.3 in Oceanside. Bigger chunks in all three disciplines: a 1.2 mile swim, a 56 mile bike ride followed by a 13.1 mile half-marathon. I could train in the same climate and it was close enough to home I didn't have to travel far with all my gear. I had Saturday, March 31, 2012 circled on my calendar. In RED.


I was looking for something to help me build a strength base for my race; a way to train for my goal distance without adding mileage just for the sake of adding mileage. Shortly after CrossFit had entered my ether I discovered Paradiso CrossFit, literally up the street from my office, when I saw the sign for the first time last summer after I had driven past it, I'm sure, over a hundred times. I came by unannounced on my lunch break one day and met Diso and Martina, undoubtedly interrupting their lunch. They were professional, laid back, informative and welcoming all at once and I liked them and what they were about from the start. I came back the next day for my first On-Ramp session and was greeted with my first experience of wall balls and double unders. (Maybe that was within the first week, but both skills still hold a dark place in my heart from early on.) I was hooked on a feeling. 


I was still training for my tri, swimming one or two mornings a week, working in longer and longer rides and runs plus three nights a week at PCF. Most weeks I was doing some form of training 5 or 6 days, sometimes two times a day. But by listening to the coaches, focusing on technique rather than weight, DROMing or stretching before and after each WOD/swim/ride/run, and paying attention to what food/fuel I put into my body, I felt I had a good plan leading up to my race. All this coming from someone who's most athletic endeavor for many years was high school or college marching band!


By the time my race weekend arrived, I knew I was physically trained and mentally prepared. I had done each discipline's distance individually in the pool or on the road and I knew what the additive effects were when I put them together. I had placed a surprising third overall in the First Annual PCF Beach Cruiser Triathlon. I had practiced my transitions and knew what and when I would (and would not) drink and eat along the course. 


Race Day: 
Up at 4am and in the transition area by 5:30. Gear laid out and prepped by six, ready to go by 6:30, but one last important stop at the porta-potties before strapping into my wet suit. First hurdle: I missed my 6:53 swim start because of the slow-moving bathroom line. I had to rush to the entry zone, squeezing past and through a swarm of equally eager triathletes. 
I got in the water two heats late and quickly realized I was in the midst of a major goggle malfunction. Left side full of water after every two strokes, right side leaking but manageable. I tried to press them into my eyes to create a better seal as this had often worked in the pool. I kept moving forward treading water and frog-kicking while clearing my goggles but knew this was slowing me down significantly. I took them off to see what was wrong and realized in my rush to the front I had twisted the strap enough to dislodge the left clip turning it backwards. Fixed and back on my head, I thought I had remedied the issue. I could put my head down and stroke properly. Or so I thought. Still having to adjust every few strokes, once I made the turn at the halfway point I put the goggles up on my forehead (i.e. scaling the workout) and swam the rest of the way with my eyes closed in the water, opening up to sight the course buoys, eyes closed and head down again for a more efficient stroke. 
For me swimming is the part that presents the biggest challenge. Strapped into a rubber superhero getup, with a bright latex cap, earplugs (to help keep warm in cold water), and the aforementioned goggles, it is the portion of the race I am most in my head. With your face down in the water kicking and counting breaths and strokes, it's all about what's going on between the ears. 
Back in the race, faced with a long day ahead still after the swim, I knew if I pushed through the water I would be done with the hardest part. I kept hearing echoes from the box "Don't quit!" "Push through it!" "Chip away!" on repeat in my head. The sounds from the Arena locked into my subconscious kept me moving. I swam the course in 1:00:43, slower than I had hoped (between 45-55 minutes), and moved on to the next piece. 


The bike is the discipline I most enjoy of the three and the portion of the race I felt the most confident on. It is also where I have seen the most tangible gains since adding CrossFit to my training regimen. My riding buddy Roy has seen the difference first hand. Our second ride together he took me through Nichols Canyon, a great ride, but a challenging set of hills up and over the spine of the Valley, leading to Mulholland Drive. On that ride last summer I was winded to say the least. I had to stop, get off the bike and suck wind at least three times on the way up for fear of my heart beating through my chest. Like, serious, stop or I'm going to have a heart attack and I don't have my insurance card with me style. Fast forward to three months of CrossFit and some hill repeat training later, we ride Nichols Canyon again. I destroy the hill. Same route, same two guys, same gear, no stops. No on-call ambulance required. On our way back down he asks how I've been training, as he can tell a huge difference in just a short time. I tell him about PCF and the variety of deadlifts, squats, box jumps, toes-to-bar pull-ups, snatches et al I've been doing: constantly varied, functional movements at high intensity. I am a disciple preaching the gospel. I see small gains, but my friend sees a complete change. After we pedal our way back home I ask if he wants to finish our 30-miler with some hill repeats, but he declines saying he has nothing left in the tank beyond the few turns toward his house. I loop the block and climb up and down twice for good measure, knowing truly that CrossFit is changing my body and fitness level measureably and for the better.


My goal for the race was to finish on the bike in 3 1/2 to 4 hours, I had done a 60-mile ride with Roy in four hours with a few stops along the way so I knew that was a doable pace, even after the swim. On race day it was cool and misty, good temperature but wet roads and slick tires are not always the best mix. No flat tires, no crashes for me. I worked up and over each and every hill, at 6, 24, 30, 36 and 42 miles, resting or hammering on the downhills depending on where I was in the course. Going into a headwind for about ten of the last fifteen miles of the course was not the most fun, but again, working through and chipping away I could sense my goal was nearing completion. I didn't know how much time I made up, but I knew I had passed quite a few riders on the course (I had been passed by plenty too...). I smashed my projected time and completed the ride in 3:07:50. 
Just the run remained. 


This is the part of the race that feels most open yet most personal. Fellow runners passing within inches of you, spectators cheering, clapping, ringing cowbells, yelling your name from just reading it on your bib, all the while you know you have a solid 13 miles in front of you. Out and back twice, the course creates relationships with total strangers. With the miles marked clearly, you know how much you have marked off and just how much you have left to go virtually every step of the way. I counted the people I passed (and cheered those that passed me) rather than just the miles and calculated strange fractions in base thirteen. Apparently my mind tends to wander into strange paths when in so deep. Whenever I felt inefficient, I would channel my reading of the PCF blog. "Pose." "Lean." These simple words helped trigger my muscles to work more efficiently, to tread more lightly. I ran the entire way, no stopping or walking, again hearing the call "Keep moving!" I have heard so many times during a WOD. My goal was to finish the run in around two hours; I clocked a 2:07:42 with consistent splits, only fifteen minutes slower than my half-marathon PR. This after more than four hours of prior output. 


It is hard to describe the feeling of crossing that finish line. I know the medal I received is just a token on a ribbon, but when it was handed to me I know I heard the closing fanfare from Star Wars (Episode IV, that is) ringing somewhere in the back of my head. When the announcer said "Zak Graff from Los Angeles" I felt like a boss. My smile was huge and has been for days. I've thought about adding "Ironman Finisher" to my auto signature at work just because I can. 


All in, including transitions, my goal was to finish with a total time between 6 1/2 and 7 hours. I was slow on the swim, fast on the bike and right on pace with the run. Official time 6:27:35. Faster than my goal by more than two minutes!!


I know I'm not the fastest or strongest in class on any given WOD, but I am the fastest and strongest I have ever been thanks to the training I've received from PCF. And that training helped me push over the humps and break through walls on a voyage toward a goal set almost three years ago. 


Thanks to Diso, Zeb, Martina, Frank, G, Lara, Smidt, all my fellow PCF'ers, friends and family and everyone else that helped me along the way. It is in part because of you that I can say I am now, officially, and forevermore,


-Zak Graff
Ironman Finisher

The Difference

One of the things I enjoy most about training for triathlon is it satiates my (self-diagnosed) exercise ADD. If I rode my bike yesterday and I run today, I can still swim tomorrow. Something different every day. 

Even with that variety there is still room for more diversity in training.

In training for my next race, I have heeded many warnings I read about overtraining. 

Too many miles on the bike, too many laps in the pool, too much pounding the running pavement, they said, could lead to repetitive use injury, or worse, just plain boredom.

So with more than half a year to prepare, I looked for alternatives to adding mileage just for the sake of adding mileage. In an admittedly casual search for a regimen of strength training, I stumbled upon a page in Competitor magazine "6-Week Introduction to CrossFit Endurance", my introduction to CrossFit. 

What is Cross Fit?, I asked myself. 

I know now it is a discipline of training defined as constantly varied functional movements. The workouts described on the page torn out ranged from pull-ups and push-ups to squats and lunges or supine rows and sprint repeats. All of which were eminently doable individually and required very little equipment. I knew I could do this. I could attack these. Collectively, however, when strung together they kicked my ass. 

Monday: 10 x 100 yard sprints.

Wednesday: pull-ups followed by lunges followed by push-ups.

Friday: sit-ups, squats and rows. 

On paper these looked like no big deal. But after heaving in my driveway following eight or nine minutes of exertion, I felt like a puny weakling. 

CrossFit had been delivered to me. I did the program for two weeks. Plus, I rode. I ran. I swam. Still, I wanted more. 

You know when you first notice a new car then you see them everywhere on the road, seemingly all at once? Or when you learn a new tidbit of knowledge, something trivial you never knew before, and see it appear as a clue on Jeopardy! the next time you watch? CrossFit had entered the ether of my perception and started to appear in my life with regularity.

The most evident example? A CrossFit gym just up the street from my office. Not near the office, not on the drive home, not around the corner, not by the dry-cleaner. Literally. On. The. Same. Block.

So I decided to stroll over one day during the lunch hour. This is when I met David Paradiso, founder and chief trainer/coach at Paradiso CrossFit. I walked into "the box" for the first time and asked a few questions. I shared what I was training for and talked a bit about what I was looking for in a gym. I was instantly impressed with his answers and demeanor. Here was a gym that was wide open and laid back, yet also had a grit you could sense from the chalk dust, white board, well-worn barbells and pull-up bars, being run by and for people with a commitment to overall fitness. A different kind than I even knew. 

I was invited to participate in an "on-ramp" class, to see what CrossFit was like. So I showed up the next day after work. Since joining that first on-ramp class, this gym has become my destination for box jumps, wall-balls, pull-ups, squat cleans, split jerks, bear crawls, dead lifts, handstand push-ups, L-sits, double-unders and multiple variations of many more and varied functional movements than I am listing here. Some of which I dread. All of which have contributed to my overall fitness and better preparedness for my next triathlon. 

And that has made all the difference.

Back to Life, Back to a New Reality

Sooo... It's certainly been a while.
 I've decided to take over this blog again. (Not that all eight of you have been wondering where it went.) I changed the title a while back, so let me explain my motivation. The idea was to journal my training for the upcoming race I was preparing for: the 2010 Nautica Malibu Triathlon.

 Well that day has certainly come and gone. Preparing for that race I logged somewhere in the neighborhood of 8 miles swimming, 337 miles biking, and 308 miles running. All leading to a race distance consisting of a .9 mile (1.5k) swim, a 40k (24.8mi) ride and a 10k (6.2 mi) run back to back to back. (That's the same distance for the Olympics if you're scoring at home.) Going into race day, I set a goal of finishing in less than 3 1/2 hours. I completed that race in 3:01:14. [Official results here on p 12 of 39] Though I crushed my goal pace, if I was just a minute and fifteen seconds faster I would have clocked a sub 3-hour finish time for my first triathlon. It left a little something to be desired, with definite and tangible room for improvement. There's always next time, right?

 Fast forward to now, (I'll give you a moment to find the remote. Okay.) a year and five months later. I'm less than a month away from the 2012 Ironman California 70.3. My goal distance and target race event, which I have been working towards since February of 2009 when I began running.

Sooo... I'll be updating this page with photos, videos and words from along the way.
More soon. Promise!
-Zak
@zkgraff