photo by Steve Penland

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Second by Second...

...I am slowly getting faster.  (Is that an oxymoron?)

We had time trials at Roseville yesterday morning.  In deference to my upcoming weekend of racing on Jan. 5 and 6, as well as to my cold-cough-sinus-thing, I chose to do the 500 and 1500 rather than anything longer (which means that I have done exactly one 3K this year for my distance events, which does not bode well for the 5K next weekend; but I digress).

It was another beautiful day for outdoor skating--light west wind, light snowfall, and not super cold; about 15 degrees.  Even with the relatively good conditions, though, and despite my fun-and-kinda-fast workout on Thursday, I wasn't feeling optimistic about my chances for turning in good times.  My cold had crept into my lungs and whenever I wasn't occupied with blowing my nose I was busy trying to hack up a lung.

The 500 lived up to my lackluster expectations; at 52.7, it was one of my slower 500's of the year.  I wasn't too concerned, though; I suck at the 500 anyway, and since I was sick I hadn't been expecting stellar performance.  I had the last inner (meaning, for those of you who don't skate, that I was skating in the inner lane for the last, and therefore fastest, corner; I have a history of freaking out on the last inner and coasting or crashing) and actually managed to enter it in some sort of reasonable fashion, which was good.  So I considered the 500, if not a success, at least a draw.

Still, I was not terribly excited about the upcoming 1500. 1500's are hard at the best of times--too short to be a somewhat-relaxed long distance pace; too long to sustain an all-out sprint.  1500's are in that unhappy no-man's land of "how long can you make it hurt this bad?"  1500's are also notorious for being hard on the lungs; there's a phenomenon known to skaters as "1500 meter cough."  Since I already had a "sitting on my butt doing nothing" cough, this was not sounding good.

Before the race, though, Sprinter Boy reminded me of a truth which I often forget: just because it's a race doesn't mean I have to skate my hardest.  It's possible to just go out and just skate 90% or so and focus on executing a good race, pacing-wise and technique-wise.

So that's what I decided to do.

A "good race," for the 1500, was to look something like this: open hard for the first 300 meters; relax the first lap, working the corners a bit; work the corners hard on the second lap, but relax the straights a bit; throw whatever you have left (or, in this case, 90% of whatever you have left) at the last lap in hopes of not dying too much.  And that's pretty much how it went, with the exception of the "relax" part--after standing around in my skinsuit in 15 degree temps for just a bit too long before the race, my legs were in the "tense and cold" zone and were unable to produce anything close to "relax."  And the "90%" thing kind of went out the window, too; my pair was very close to my speed and I did everything I could in the last lap to make sure I crossed the finish line first.  Which I did.  Barely.

The race had felt OK, but I had also felt slow and clumsy.  I had absolutely no idea how fast I had gone and, being a data geek, I was unwilling to decide whether the race had gone "well" or "sucky" without knowing the numbers.  So, once I managed to stop coughing long enough to actually speak, I went up to the timing room and inquired about my 1500 time.

2:40.9, or my fastest of this season by a bit more than a second.  My previous 1500's this year have been 2:49, 2:45, 2:42.  A nice downward progression, and especially nice that my fastest one was on a day when I was definitely not feeling 100%.  So second by second, I seem to be getting a bit faster.

Of course, my fastest time this season in the 1500 is still more than 10 seconds slower than my fastest from last year...but progress is progress, and I'll take it.


Friday, December 28, 2012

Home Again

We're back from the cabin.  No more beautiful beach walks...


...or hikes up frozen rivers...

...or adventuring through the woods at the cabin.

No "skating" on frozen ponds while the dog looks on in bemused horror...

...and no more walks with my parents and their sweater-clad little yippers sweet little dogs...
My Dad has a pocketful of treats

We've packed up our mountain of crap...

...and returned to the land of furnaces and TV and Target.  It was a fun vacation, and great to spend Christmas with my whole family.  Unfortunately, now that we're home and I have a lot of stuff to do (including continuing to train for the upcoming Masters Single Distance meet on January 5-6), I'm sick as a dog--that is, if the dog has some horrid sinus-type-thingy that's trying to move south to become a horrid bronchial-type-thingy. By the way, who decided that dogs are the yardstick of illness?  My dog is almost never sick (except for the occasional grazing-induced barf).  So I don't understand the "sick as a dog" thing.  Now, "dog tired" makes sense.  This is what Keira has been doing pretty much non-stop since we got home from the cabin two days ago:
Yes, she's alive..we check occasionally for breathing.

Despite illness, last night's workout was great.  Wednesday night I quit my workout early (like, after 6 laps) because I felt so lousy, so last night I didn't have anything planned; I figured I'd just play it by ear. I ended up doing fast 200's ("candycanes") behind a variety of faster skaters.  It was a beautiful night--snowing, calm, and you could still see the full moon through the clouds--and my legs felt great.  The cabin is wonderful, but it's nice to be home!

Monday, December 24, 2012

The 12 Days of Christmas

We're at the cabin for Christmas again this year, as we were last year.  This year will be even more fun because, in addition to my sister Energizer Bunny and her husband Sherpa Boy, (and their two cats), my parents and their four dogs are also up here.  So we'll have the whole Fam Damily together for Christmas, which hasn't happened in a while.   After frantically packing a mountain of crap into the Avalanche Friday night after work, I dragged the Hubster and Keira the Wonderdog to the oval Saturday morning so I could race before we set out on the 5 hour drive. Races went OK, and Keira got to meet my skating buddies (the Hubster has met them before)  and Cross Boy awarded her Dog of the Day, so that was fun.  Now we're at the cabin, stoking the woodfire in our cabin every hour-and-a half (slight exaggeration, but not much) and enjoying hanging out with my parents at their cabin.  Unfortunately, I appear to have forgotten the camera cord so I can't post any photos--at least not until I get home--but there's nothing stopping me from posting a song!  Well, nothing but good taste, but that's never stopped me before.  So, without further ado, and with apologies to "The 12 Days of Christmas," here's my song..._


Our Trip to the Cabin

For our trip to the cabin,
This is what we need:
12 Diet Dews,
11 Hats and Mittens,
10 pounds of turkey,
9 kinds of chocolate,
pairs of boots (yes, really--for 2 people. And there's no snow)
7 different jackets,
pairs of wool socks ,
5 flannel sheets (OK, 2 pillow cases, 2 sheets, and a fuzzy blanket.  Plus 2 blankets from the cabin).
4 pounds of ham,
3 rolly things (You know, the foam roller and rolly stick and tennis ball for rehabbing myself),
2 jugs of water,
And a hairy dog in the backseat.

Merry Christmas!

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

I Get By...

...with a little help from my friends.

Actually, to be technically correct, that would be "I keep up, for a while anyway, with a good draft and a little push from my friends."

Last night was a fun workout.  Sprinter Boy, Hawkeye Boy, and Mel were doing a...I'm not sure what it was...long intervals? Fast endurance?  Anyway, it sounded like fun--two sets of four times four laps. It sounded like fun, that is, all except the pace they were planning.

40's.

Now, I can do 40 second laps.  I can even do 40 second laps without a draft.  I cannot, however, do more than one--or maybe two on a really good day--40 second laps in a row, and I cannot do more than about, oh, 10 total in a workout. So 32 40-second laps, in sets of four, sounded, well, daunting--even with a draft.

But what the heck, I'm not getting any younger (or, apparently, any faster or thinner), so there's no time like the present to push that comfort zone and start improving, right?

So off we went.  The Big Three--Mel, Sprinter, and Hawkeye--led, providing a nice draft for the three of us who were just hoping to hang on as long as possible--me, Cross Boy, and Skater Dad.  And, ironically enough, I would, at the request of Sprinter Boy and Hawkeye Boy--yes, those same skaters who had talked me into leaving my stopwatch in my bag for the month of December--be recording our lap times with my trusty-but-recently-neglected stopwatch.

Lap one--feeling good, nicely in the draft (my, those three skate low!), and a "we're just getting going" 41. Lap two was faster...but lap two also brought the familiar "why is there a dying carp flopping around in my chest?" sensation that means I'm getting PVC's--and also that I will, very very soon, be getting very tired and very short of breath.  Which I did.  So I had to drop out after lap three.

So for set two, there was a new plan...put me third in the pace line, with someone behind me to push me (ever so slightly, of course) if I should falter.  And it worked.  Despite more dying carp, I managed (with a bit of help) to hang in for all four laps, two 40's and two 39's.

Set three, though, the dying carp prevailed and, push or no push, I was done after one lap.  Very frustrating. After the Fast and the Fit finished the fourth set, we headed into the warming house, where I read everyone the lap times and indulged in a bit of overanalyzing.  I was starting to question whether I'd actually been feeling my heart arrhythmia or whether I've gotten so out of shape that I'm now confusing the sensation of "100% effort heartrate and fatigue" with "dying carp PVC's."  It's hard to tell what you're feeling when you're at 100% effort, and I guess I just don't trust myself anymore--am I really experiencing PVC fatigue...or unfit old lady wimpiness?

Still, there were four sets left so I had to try again.  And I'm glad I did.  The first two sets featured laps from 39-41 seconds, no PVC's, a nice natural descent into fatigue instead of the immediate breathlessness I get from PVC's, a helpful push or two when I started to falter--and me able to hang on for the whole two sets. Cool!

And then I was truly and totally done.  I coasted around for a few laps, resting my aching legs, and watched the Fast and the Fit finish the final two sets--with laps as low as 37's.  And I marveled, every time they whooshed by, that I had actually been able to keep up with them for a bit.

With a good draft and a push or two, anyway.





Sunday, December 16, 2012

Let It Rain, Let It Rain, Let It Rain

Yesterday we had the usual Saturday morning time trials at the oval. I had signed up for the 500 and the 3K but by the time I got to the oval at 7:45 Saturday morning I was thinking the 3K might not be such a great plan, for a couple of reasons.  First, there was the previously-reported Short Week.  Some might look on only one workout in the week leading up to an event as a "taper," but when you're out of shape it's best to call it what it is...another step down the descending slope  to "slow."  Second, there was this...
Yes, it was raining.  In Minnesota in December.  Our lovely Winter Wonderland was slowly turning into Winter SlopFest--and I was afraid the oval was about to follow. Seven and a half laps in the rain on potentially soft ice with a bad hamstring didn't sound like a good idea, so I went upstairs to the officials' room and snivelled my way out of the 3K and into the 1000, leaving the option open to scratch altogether if the hammy misbehaved on warmup.

I've skated many times in the rain before; I've even, as evidenced by this, raced in the rain before.
Skating in the rain is not necessarily a disaster; the oval refrigeration equipment does a pretty good job of keeping the ice hard, so unless there's a huge amount of water and excessively warm temperatures it's not too bad.  Still, I thought it best to err on the side of caution--but at least my "caution" only involved downgrading my race from 3K to 1000; as it turned out, every one of the other masters skaters who had signed up to race decided that "caution" involved "turning off the alarm, rolling over, and going back to sleep."  Wusses.

So I went out for my warmup solo.  It was indeed raining, see?

(It was kind of funny; when I came in planning to take the "water on jacket" shot, everyone I walked past kept brushing the water off of me--I kept thinking "stop, you're ruining my shot!")

But the ice was decent and the hamstring fairly uncomplaining, so I decided racing was a go.  Then one of the officials approached me and said I was the only 1000 meter skater and they had a solo skater in the 1500, so would I mind...  I said no problem, switch me to the 1500. I have two other 1500's from Roseville this year, so it would be good to see how I'm doing as the season progresses.

The 500 was first.  I felt fairly good and it went OK, but my time was, once again, a 52.  This is slow for me but still in the "reasonable" range, so I was fine with it.  The 1500 also felt fine; I kept my technique together (Mel, who was watching from the warm dry observation deck, confirmed this); there were no PVC's; and the lap times, generously shouted to me by Russian Coach on the backstretch, showed only a nice, reasonable one-second die per lap.  And my final time of 2:42 was three seconds faster than my last 1500 at Roseville a few weeks ago--but still six seconds slower than my slowest Roseville 1500 from last year.  Sigh.

Still, it was fun.  And my hat (yes, I actually was wearing one between races; it was an Epically Bad Hair Day) is off to the volunteers, who stood in the rain for hours so that we could race.  Thanks guys!

So today, it's off to the Roller Dome for a recovery skate with Energizer Bunny, and then I'll see how the hamstring feels next week.  I need to get in some endurance work before the 5K in the Masters Single Distance meet in early January, or it's not going to be pretty!

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Short Week

It's been a short week of skating, and it looks like the odds are about 50/50 that it will get even shorter.

Usually I skate Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights, and then race one or sometimes two days on the weekend.  This week started out well with a surprisingly fun skate on Tuesday. Surprising because 1) I didn't expect much after my sluggishly slow races in Milwaukee on Saturday and 2) because I had, just as I did last year, forgotten my jacket on the coldest night of the year (also my neck gaiter and warm gloves).  So I was expecting cold and slow.  What I got was 6 OK laps by myself, then 8 super-fun laps with Cop Guy and Aussie Boy and 60's Boy, then another 6 laps that started with the guys and ended well behind the guys...and then I got cold and slow.  So I quit a bit early, but it was a good skate.

Wednesday, though...Wednesday barely got started.  My hamstring, which has been bugging me off and on for a couple weeks, decided to go with "on" for Wednesday, and after three warm-up (i.e., "slow") laps, in which my left hamstring cussed me extensively every time I fully straightened my leg and pushed off the ice, I decided that discretion was the better part of valor and I headed for home.  In keeping with the "if you don't use your mind your whole body suffers" theme, I decided to completely skip tonight's workout.  I'm signed up for a 500 and a 3K (got to get right back on the horse again, right?) for Saturday morning, and I don't think my hamstring will be happy with me if I don't give it a rest.  It might not be happy even if I do rest it, but it seems like my best shot. I almost changed my mind about taking tonight off, though, when I saw a weather report...4 to 8 inches of snow possible by the end of Saturday?!  We just got 15 inches last Sunday (why, yes, yes I am sick of the phrase "Winter Wonderland," why do you ask?  Although, to be honest, it is a winter wonderland and I'm thrilled that we'll be having a white Christmas.  And that the leaves that have been blowing onto the oval ice for the past month are now safely secured under more than a foot of snow.  But I digress).  I figured that if I might be missing Saturday's races due to another Snowmageddon, I should probably get out there and skate tonight.  But then I saw another weather report and this one said maybe one inch of snow for Saturday, so I figure I'll likely be racing and thus tonight I should be resting.   So here I sit.

Oh, and I got my thyroid labs back.  Levels are within range, which is good, but not nearly as high as they were in September, which I find a bit ominous.  Hopefully they're stabilized and won't continue dropping.  And, the levels are consistent with the range in which I have to time my fast-acting med relative to my workouts--so my recent issues with timing have made sense.  On the down side, if my thyroid levels are roughly appropriate, then I need to find another reason for my current state of slow, fat, and cranky.  Any ideas?  Any cures? I mean, other than "skate more, eat less, think positive."  That one clearly is not working out so well for me...

Sunday, December 9, 2012

It's Official. I'm Slow.

I raced in Milwaukee yesterday, for the first time this season.

It was horrifically sucky did not go well.

Up until yesterday, this season's time trials had consisted of two 500's and two 1500's on the outdoor ice at Roseville.  The 500's were both 52 seconds, which is slower than any 500 I skated outdoors last year.  The 1500's were even worse; the 2:49 was my slowest outdoor 1500 since 2002, and the 2:45 wasn't far behind.  Workouts have been inconsistent; some have felt OK, but others have been slow and sluggish.  I'm back to having to time my thyroid meds pre-skate and have been having what I think are hypo symptoms again; I went in and got my levels checked on Wednesday (no results yet).  I've also had PVC's in a lot of workout laps.  Then, since I figured that battling thyroid-PVC's-overweight-underfit wasn't quite enough, I added one more factor.  I aggravated my left hamstring, which was already unhappy, by engaging in a full-out-sprint across the school playground in pursuit of a student who thought it was fun to head for the hills when it was time to come in from recess.  By the time I caught him I was so out of breath that all I could do was wag my finger and glare meaningfully at him while I gasped for air.  I'm not sure whether he was amused or horrified.

And then there was the Thursday Night Skinsuit Parade.

I have three "fast" skinsuits.  One I bought (for roughly the price of the Crown Jewels) in 2007 before I skated in the US Championships.  It's got a bit less rubber than the Nike Swift Skins, and is thus more forgiving of dietary indiscretions. So, although it was custom made from measurements that, thanks to age and hypothyroidism and an unbridled love of PopTarts, I will likely never see again, it nevertheless fit comfortably.  Unfortunately, it was not the skinsuit I wanted to wear.

My other two "fast" skinsuits are Nike Swift Skins that I earned from US Speedskating by skating the qualifying time for MAT 1.  Because I earned them, I really wanted to wear one of them--but I knew that my extra ten pounds of, um, muscle? might preclude that.  The older one is the gray one I've skated in for the past year; it was always snug before (and by "snug" I mean "as soon as the race is done I'm heading off the ice and ripping this thing off as fast as I possibly can") but it fit.  In the Thursday night try-on, though, it had progressed from "snug" to "OMG I can't breathe."  Since breathing is helpful, especially in the 3K, I sadly decided that the gray skin was out.  On to my newest MAT 1 suit, which, because I haven't skated a "real" race yet this year, I haven't ever tried to wear (I don't like to wear my best skinsuits for outdoor time trials because the risk of falling and damaging them is higher).

The new suit is a lovely red and black combo, and it is the first MAT 1 suit to have a "Masters" patch on it.  It is also, due to an unfortunate combination of circumstances, a size smaller than my gray suit.  So things weren't looking good before I tried it on--and they were looking even worse after I finally wedged myself into it.  My previously-injured shoulder ached from the contortions required to get the suit onto my arms; my thighs were packed into the rubberized suit legs tighter than New Yorkers on a subway car; and various (as the Hubster calls random bits of fat) "chunks of volupt" continued to defy my efforts to stuff them into the still-open zipper--a zipper which, barring divine intervention or fabric ripping, was going to remain open for all eternity.  It was not a pretty picture.

So all things told, I was not predicting fast times.

Still, I had signed up to race and so I was going to race.  So after work on Friday I picked up Sprinter Boy, who was also racing, and we headed for Milwaukee. The trip went well, except for the "aha" moment when I put together the facts a) car upside down in ditch; b) light snow falling; and c) shiny road and arrived at the conclusion that the "shine" was not water but ice--not a good conclusion to reach at 70 mph.  Ice is good on the oval but not on the freeway.

I was signed up for the 500 and the 3K; the 500 is typically my "warmup" race and the 3K is the one I'm really interested in.  It's fortunate that I'm not seriously trying for a good time in both races because, in an event like this one where the 500 and the 3K might be 3 hours apart, it is extremely difficult to time my thyroid meds to have them optimal for both races.  My solution to this dilemma is to just time the meds for the 3K and treat the 500 as a warmup.  So I wasn't worried about the 500, which turned out to be just as well since my pair, skating in the inner lane, fell on the first corner and slid into my lane, necessitating my stopping skating and coasting to avoid running into her.  Other than that my 500 felt solid, technically--I tried counting strokes on the backstretch to help me time my corner entry, and it seemed to help--and even though the final 50.65 time was slow for me, I wasn't too upset about it.

The 3K, though...the 3K was making me nervous.  The seven-and-a-half laps were looking like a mighty long way to try to skate hard, and for the first time in about 8 years the 3K was sounding like a long race.  Plus, I was in a quad with two men (my pair had scratched) starting behind me; men who would certainly pass me and might even go on to lap me.  So my confidence was not high, and when Sprinter Boy, who would be giving me my lap times, asked what lap times I was aiming for, I replied that I'd probably be happy with anything under 42's.  To put that in perspective, my Milwaukee 3K's last year featured laps from 36 to 40 seconds, with a couple of very low 41's in my slowest race of the season (5:05).

So, the race.  Slow start, settle into a skating rhythm, try not to look at the "7" on the lap card as I pass the finish line for the first time.  Around the corner to the backstretch, to see the "5.0" on Sprinter Boy's borrowed lap board.  This indicates that my "opener"--the first partial lap, from start line to finish line-- was 25.0 seconds...a good .75 seconds slower than usual.  Not off to a good start.

The first full lap brought a "9.3" on the lap board--39.3 seconds. I had felt good in that first lap; strong, energetic, smooth.  Unfortunately "strong, energetic, smooth" usually translates to a 36 or 37 second lap rather than a 39.

On to lap two.  Relax, use the glide, don't rush it.  Oh, and breathe.  This last was becoming increasingly difficult, and soon I was actually feeling short of breath and found myself gasping for air.  Now, those of you who don't routinely skate 3K's might think that "out of breath and gasping for air" is the norm when racing, but it's not.  Yes, you need to breathe hard, but it's a rhythmic, controlled kind of "breathing hard."  The out of breath feeling was not normal for me; usually I associate it with PVC's, but I didn't feel any.  And the fatigue I quickly felt in lap two I also associate with PVC's.  So I wasn't too surprised to see a "1.5" (41.5 seconds) on the lap board after laps two.  Or a 2.6 on lap 3, or a 2.7 on lap 4.  What I was surprised by was the 2.3 on lap 5, and moreso by the 1.6 on lap 6 and the 0.6 on lap 7.  Yes, I had a negative split of 2 seconds from lap 4 to lap 7.  This just does not happen to me--unless I have PVC's mid-race.

Still, I hadn't felt any PVC's.  I know it's certainly possible to have them and not feel them; many people do. So maybe that was it.  Or maybe it was a mental thing; I always get a bit re-motivated at the end of the race, and this time I had the added advantage of seeing that I was gaining a bit on the fellow who had passed me mid-race, so I had someone to chase.  Whatever the reason, though--fat, out of shape, hypothyroid, PVC's, mentally unable to push myself--my final time of 5:15. 94 was the worst I've skated in Milwaukee since an epic-fail-unmedicated-hypothyroidism 3K in March of 2009; prior to that I have to go back to 2005 to find a slower 3K (last year's Milwaukee 3K's were between 4:51 and 5:05).  Not good.  Interestingly, my description of my 2009 5:21 sounds very similar to yesterday's race--short of breath, tired early, felt better the last 3 laps than the first 4--and a negative split from lap 4 to 7, although only 1.08 seconds instead of 2.  Weird.

So not a good time in Milwaukee.  Sprinter Boy didn't have the races he wanted, either (although his 500 and 1000 were top-5 for him for Milwaukee, so at least not in the "epic fail" zone).   And, before the races, I spent a few minutes talking to fellow masters skater NewFastGirl.  She's in her first full-on season of long track, and is setting PB's left and right and loving it.  We talked a bit about inlining in the summer and about the upcoming Masters Single Distance race in Milwaukee, and I found myself envying her; her youth, her enthusiasm, her steadily decreasing times, her being in the beginning stages of the skating obsession rather than the midlife crisis phase.  I don't like envying people--there's always someone who has it better than you do and you always have it better than someone else, so it's best to appreciate what you have rather than longing for what you don't...but still, I couldn't help envying her.

All in all, not a great Saturday in Milwaukee.

So what's next?  Get the thyroid lab results.  Rehab the complaining hamstring.  A week's worth of endurance workouts before the taper starts for Master's Single Distance in early January.  Try to avoid the PopTarts.  Try to think positively.

And try not to obsess over how slow I've become.






Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Half-Fast Tuesday

In my quest to De-Data December (see two posts ago), I got talked into doing Fast Tuesday tonight.  Usually Tuesdays are endurance days for me, and what better time to record every lap time--to the tenth--than when you're doing 50 or so of them?  Endurance just isn't endurance if I'm not not clicking the stopwatch every lap.  So when Sprinter Boy mentioned Fast Tuesday, then, (at first I thought he said "Fat Tuesday" and I figured, hey, finally something I'll excel at), I figured it would be better to ease into my stopwatchless December by doing 200's tonight instead of an endurance workout; I never time my 200's anyway, so it wouldn't be much of a stretch to leave the watch in the skate bag for this workout.

So this was the plan:  four 200's, then some easy laps, then a warm-the-toes break inside and then four more 200's.  I can't keep up with Sprinter Boy and Mel and Hawkeye Boy on anything remotely high-effort and these 200's were supposed to be close to 100% so I knew I'd be skating "behind" rather than "with" anybody.  And I hadn't felt the greatest today, so I wasn't expecting great things on the ice.  Still, I wasn't prepared for just how bad tonight's workout would be.

The wamup laps started out well, because they started out slow.  As the pace picked up and the laps ticked by, though, my back got more and more sore and I finally had to quit while the others went on to do two more laps.  Then we started the fast stuff, and the nagging headache that had begun as soon as I started skating got worse with every 200.  Just as bad as the headache was the fact that I just could not produce anything resembling a hard effort.  Just like my races last weekend, the fast 200's were flat, sluggish, slow.  I really need to get my thyroid re-checked...

After the 200's--it took me half of the 600 meters of rest to catch the others after every one, that's how far behind I was--we did 6 slow laps.  I did manage to stick with the others for the whole 6 laps; it was fun trying to match everyone else's strokes and I do think it's good for me to skate behind and try to mimic these very good skaters, and to forget about lap times for a bit  (although my right forefinger did twitch a little every time we completed a lap).

Then we went inside for our warmup break, and I gave in to the headache and the sluggishness and the general fatigue and decided to go home instead of going back out to complete the workout.

And that's how Fast Tuesday became Half-Fast Tuesday.


Sunday, December 2, 2012

Hockey!

Last night, just for something different, I agreed to play in a hockey game.  Well, I might be using the term "hockey game" a bit loosely.  The Hubster had set up some ice time for people he plays broomball with--mostly the women from the women's team he coaches--to give hockey a try.  After he assured me that most of them had never skated before, and after I realized that, with races now on Saturday instead of Sunday, I could play a Saturday night game without messing up my time trials, I agreed to join the game.  After all, I skate 4-6 times a week and I played broomball for over 20 years (for the uninitiated, broomball is like hockey but played in squishy shoes instead of skates, and with a plastic broom and a ball instead of a hockey stick and a puck); how hard could it be to put skating and broomball together and call it hockey?

Pretty difficult, as it turns out.  There were, of course, the expected differences between speedskates and hockey skates (What?!  These things don't glide at all!  And where's the 3 inches of steel sticking out from in front of and behind my skates?  Someone has cut the blades off!).  Then there's the fact that my skating skills are pretty much limited to going straight and turning left.  While these are certainly skills that are relevant in hockey, there are apparently a few other things that are nice to be able to do, as well, including turning right, skating backwards, and crossing over in both directions. Oh, yeah...and stopping.  Turns out that in hockey, you can't just plan ahead and start slowing for your stop 50 yards before you need to cease forward motion.  Who knew?

Then, too, there's the fact that a hockey stick is not a broomball broom and a puck is not a ball.  Between the narrow stick and the tiny puck, there's a lot less surface area for contact than there is with broomball equipment.  Couple this with not being able to get to where I wanted to go very effectively, and there were a lot of missed passes.

On the other hand, it was nice to see that all of my old bad habits from broomball transferred seamlessly to the hockey rink.  I picked right up where I had left off with diving for pucks I had no hope of reaching, slashing peoples' shins as I flailed blindly for the puck, whiffing on passes and shots alike, and deftly flipping my hockey stick to switch from right-handed to left-handed in a skillful attempt to avoid having to use my non-existent backhand.

But it was fun, and everyone did a great job despite a lack of skating experience.  We actually managed to play a semblance of a game, and I don't think there were any major injuries.  Still, I'm a bit sore today, and it didn't help that the game ended at 11 pm and the post-game festivities didn't end until 1:30 am.  A bit past my bedtime.  Today is a good day to put into practice some other advice that I got yesterday at the races, this time from Sprinter Boy.  Despite his young age (35), he's a big proponent of recovery exercises and he's convinced me to dig out my foam roller and rolly stick and try to whip some muscles back into shape.  And after time trials and hockey yesterday, there are a lot of muscles to choose from.  Good thing I don't have to skate again until Tuesday.

Here's me in my old broomball days...


And in last nights's hockey game...
The Hubster pointed out that I somehow managed
to "ankle skate" in stiff plastic hockey skates.

So it was fun, but I don't think I'll be giving up speedskating to switch to hockey any time soon...

Saturday, December 1, 2012

De-Data De-Cember

I think I'm going to De-Data December.

In other words, I'm going to stop focusing on workout lap times.  Go by feel, not by time.  Leave the stopwatch in the skate bag.

Skate naked.  (well, sort of).

I had an interesting conversation/advice session with Hawkeye Boy today between the time trials.  Hawkeye Boy is an extremely talented skater, and about my age.  I've skated a few workouts with (actually, behind) him, and he's one of the two skaters who were kind enough to allow me to tag along with them for the team pursuit at the end of Pack Nationals last winter.  Hawkeye Boy has been skating forever, is very nice, and I think he finally decided, after my whine-fest after my lackluster 500 this morning, that perhaps a bit of advice was in order.  Also, he and I were (inexplicably) paired for the upcoming 1500, and he probably knew I'd be even more depressed after that since it was distinctly possible he'd lap me in the race.

Anyway, Hawkeye Boy suggested that I was perhaps over-focused on data, and that I might try abandoning the stopwatch for a while and just focusing on how I felt during workouts--and on having fun.  He himself, he said, almost never timed his workout laps--and he is, as I said, an extremely successful skater.

Of course, I immediately had a lot of "yeah, buts" cruise through my head.  Yeah, but I need to know if I'm getting slower or not.  I need to know my lap times to help me figure out if my thyroid medication is properly tuned.  I'm an obsessive compulsive anal retentive control freak and I love my lap time data.

But after a few moments of pondering my "yeah buts," I realized that Hawkeye Boy had a point.  Lap time data has not been good to me lately.  Rather than using it as information to be evaluated and used to help adjust upcoming workouts, as I used to, I've become more focused on "are my times good or bad?" and then letting that information dictate how I felt about the workout.  Lap time data has also been coaxing me away from doing my workouts as they should be done; in  fact, Thursday night I ended up doing my "80%" intervals at 100% just because I wanted to see the faster lap times.  Not good.

So I think I might try Hawkeye Boy's advice, at least for a month.  I'm also going to try to skate with my friends more.  I've been having a frequent dilemma of whether to skate my planned workout or ditch my plans and skate with friends.  My workouts tend to be opposite of theirs--I do fast stuff when they're doing endurance, and vice versa--so it's been hard to skate with people.  So maybe I'll skate with others when they're there, and do my regular workouts if I'm solo.  It should be fun, and good for my technique, and I'll be able to evaluate the effectiveness of the strategy by seeing how my races turn out by the end of the month.

After I De-Data December.