Two More Days: Ironman Race Trainer Kit

Don't forget! I will be raffling off one Timex Ironman Race Trainer Kit courtesy of Timex on Valentine's Day. If you have not already signed up for the giveaway, the process is simple. You can check it out here.

I have one. I love it. You want one too. Admit it. Don't lie.

Feeling like an Ironman

I met Manuel at the gym today for a little LSD—NO, not the trippy 1970's hallucinogenic drug made popular by such psychedelic rock bands as The Greatful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and The Jimi Hendrix Experience, but rather some Long Steady Distance. We averaged just under 8 minute miles on our hour run. We were not pushing it at all,  but I still felt incredibly strong today. We opted to run inside today on the treadmill. Although it was a blistering 12 degrees out, and the wind was whipping pretty fierce, we decided that our lungs and nerve endings would thank us in the long run (no pun intended,) if we ran inside on the treadmills. I always put the treadmill on an incline of one to one and half degrees, as I am told that this will more accurately simulate running outside (sans -5 degree wind chill.)  It is amazing how much more energized I felt with a little rest and some quality tunes rocking out on my iPod. I also did a little bit of daydreaming/visualization on my run today. I don't know if any of you have ever done this—and I embarrassed to admit this—but I often think of me racing while I am out training. I get these images in my head of me on the bike passing by onlookers—and other bikers—and running strong the last 10K of a race to while listening the music and excitement at the finish line. I might sound lame, but it is that little psychological espresso that I need to keep motivated. This week was pretty hectic with a lot of time spent writing music, and a heavy swimming volume. By Friday evening, I was pretty spent, but I managed to find a second wind Saturday morning for my run/bike. I can not believe that I am already entering week 5. Here are the number comparisons between weeks:

WEEK #4 - 2nd Week of 1st Pre-Season Cycle
Swim 2:30 - Bike 4:30 - Run 2:20 -- Total: 9:20


WEEK #5 - 3rd Week of 1st Pre-Season Cycle
Swim 2:30 - Bike 5:30 - Run 2:50 -- Total: 10:50


The bike is not daunting to me at all—boring as hell sometimes—but never daunting. Actually, for the first time since I have started training  for triathlons, I am actually really excited to get out there and perform whatever discipline is on the docket. I use to dread swimming, but I enjoy it once I am there. The hardest part is waking up at that scorchingly obscene hour—4:45 a.m.—to get to the gym.  The long steady swims are still difficult, especially when it comes to keeping my technique solid on long swim, but when I can break up the workout with different drills and strokes, it makes it a lot of enjoyable and manageable. 


Running is extremely contagious. Once I get bit, I want to continue piling on the volume. For some reason, I noticed last season that I perform better as the running miles increased (with the notable exception of the Cats Half Marathon Course, which was ridiculously difficult. Adam, Vanessa, and I counted fifty hills. My hamstrings were pretty much ripped to shreds by mile 10.  So, say if I were out for a 13 or 14 mile run; I would start to really get into a rhythm—and start to run negative splits—at mile 8 or 9. Crazy, right? That high is so intoxicating when you know you feel strong at the end of a fairly long run, and you allow yourself to use that adrenaline to motor the rest of the way. 

The Team:

I have wanted to introduce the team for some time. For some strange reason, we either never had a camera around, or we are never all in the same place for very long. I mean, let's get real, you can not have all the Superfriends in the Hall of Justice at one time for very long. Who would be out there fighting crime?

From front to back: Me, Scott, Adam, and Manuel.

A big thank you to my Spinning instructor (that's Lori in the pink,) who kicked our tails so hard Saturday morning that I thought oxygen masks were  going to deploy from the ceiling.

Left to Right: Me, Jodi, Lori, Adam (training partner.) I have to use that caveat, because we spend so much time together outside of the gym, there are some who think that we must be domestic partners.

Giveaway: Don't forget, I am giving away one (1) Ironman Race Trainer Kit  (courtesy of Timex) on my blog. I own one. I love it. You are automatically entered if you are a follower, but you could increase your chances by following the directions here.

Good luck everyone, and happy training!

Timex Triathlon Race Trainer Kit Giveaway!

Guess what folks?  The fine folks at Timex have agreed to send me another Timex Triathlon Race Trainer Kit to giveaway on my blog. I have enjoyed my Timex Triathlon Race Trainer watch, and it has helped me make some pretty substantial gains in my training. Who knew monitoring your heart rate would help you control your pace? Good thing I have my wife to continually remind me that, despite my "rarified air" level of education, that I am essentially, an incredible moron. Or as she sometimes puts it, "You are the dumbest smart guy I know." 

The Race Trainer Kit  retails for approximately $230 and it could be yours!  So, in the manner of other blog giveaways I have seen, here is how we are going to go about it. You have an opportunity to have up to four entries into the drawing depending on how much you you desire this cool piece of gear:

1. Go to the Timex website and then come back and leave a comment
telling me which products you like AND when you would wear it. (1 entry) 

2. Be a follower of my blog, leave a separate comment letting me know
who you are. (1 entry) 

3. Become a fan of Timex Sports on Facebook. Leave a seperate
comment letting me know. (1 entry) 

4. Post this contest on your blog, leave a separate comment letting me
know you've done so. (1 entry) 

So, you will have as many as four chances to win the Ironman Race Trainer Kit. The contest will  end on 14 February. Nothing like telling the love of your life that you just won a Timex Race Trainer Kit to monitor your heart. Ah... love!

Good luck everyone!

Some thoughts on Cowboys, Luke Skywalker and Parenting

Ready for an hour run this morning with the team: Manuel, Scott and Adam. It should be great fun. Then we have a 35 minute spin to shake out those muscles. The rest of my day will be consumed with rehearsals and writing music. 

I am loving my Timex Ironman Race Trainer Kit more and more. You can not really cheat with a heart rate monitor on. There is no "dogging" it. You cannot estimate your exertion with the HRM on—it lets you know. You know exactly what intensity you're putting out. The best part about the watch is that it actually logs all of your heart rate date for you  online.


Alaina decided that we should go out this afternoon and get one of those Wild West type pictures taken because some local place is offering one free 16X20. You know,  you get dressed up in cowboy gear. Dad gets to hold an old musket with a coon cap while sporting some old tattered long leather deer-skin coat. The boys will wear some caps and vests and the girls will all be wear little gowns with gloves on and flowers on their hats. Invariably, no one is smiling in these pictures, because apparently in the Wild West, no one was ever happy. Alaina spent about five minutes explaining to the kids how everything was going to unfold when we go to take the picture. When she finished Luca said, "Cool, I want to be Luke Skywalker," and Amalia said she wanted to be a "butterfly." I don't think they quite understood the concept.


My wife and I are often amazed how we can both work out really hard and feel like we have more left in the tank, only to leave the gym and be mentally exhausted in less than three minutes in the car on the way home with the children. 


I have to admit, I am feeling unusually stressed out right now. I am pretty laid back (for a Jack Russell Terrier,) but I have some looming writing deadlines that I have to wrap up, all while I am preparing for a sleuth of concerts in the spring. I am also doing quite a bit of traveling this spring out of town for gigs and guest lecturing. I love it—it is great fun—but trying to work out child care for five children when Alaina and I have to be in two different places can be really stressful. I get especially stressed out when I know it is going to impede on my normal workout routine. As selfish as that sounds, I am a much nicer human being when I don't miss a workout. I have been known to get kind of crabby. 


Okay, more soon. Happy Training!

Timex Ironman Race Trainer Kit Review

A couple of weeks ago I submitted an email on the Timex website asking if they would send me their Ironman Race Trainer Kit to review on my blog. With all the watch manufacturers on Earth, what made me want to review Timex first?  As a child, growing up in the 70's, I remember the infamous Timex slogan "It takes a licking and keeps on ticking," and I always wanted a Timex watch to put through an airplane propeller, trample with a bulldozer, or submerge in a vat of  molten lava to test that theory. The first watch I ever bought when I started running was a Timex. Ten years later, it also turned out to be the last watch I would ever need. Two years ago, I handed that one down to  my oldest son and bought a new 30 Lap Ironman race watch.

About a week after I submitted my request, I received a personal email from the director of Catalyst—a public relations firm that works with Timex. He told me that Timex would be happy to supply the watch  to review—per FTC regulations. Ah, building brand loyalty starts with great customer relations. Even if they had responded with "Hi Mark, thanks for your interest, but due to the enormous amounts of requests we get similar to this, we are unable to provide you with our product," I would have been disappointed but impressed that a human being actually took the time to respond. Here is what was in the box:


Okay, let's get down to it, shall we. Here are the pros and cons of the Ironman Race Trainer Kit:

Pros: 

Cost: At $220 USD, the Ironman Race Trainer Kit it competitive with all the other leading heart rate monitor watches.


Ease of Use: For me, I could end the review right here. I like things simple. No one with a busy life—i.e. everyone—has the time or energy to sit with an instruction manual for an afternoon figuring out how to operate a television, computer, or watch—let alone someone with five children. The watch came with a pretty beefy instruction manual. If you are like me, and like to read instruction manuals as much as dinner-time calls from telemarketers, you're in luck. With as little as a second grade education, you can operate this watch with ease. How do I know? I asked my second grader, Luca, if he could figure out how the heart rate monitor system worked without the instructions. I then asked him to repeat it twice more. I am embarrassed to admit that he figured it out quicker than I did. The steps getting the actual heart rate monitor to sync to my watch was simple. That took about five minutes, but I actually had to read the instruction manual for that one. You can upload all your information to your computer wirelessly via the usb antennae , or what Timex fancifully dubs the "Timex Data Xchanger," pictured in the foreground. The process took seconds, not minutes, to upload my workout details. You can then store all of your data, say for an entire Ironman training season, to document your progress. Your information is stored on the Timex Training Peaks sight. Not only will it document all of your data (i.e. heart rate, calorie expenditure, favorite color,) but it allows you to see elevation profiles of routes that you've created. I imagine that you can sync miles and eleveation changes with their GPS watches. Hmmm, might have to check that out.

Reliability: The watch seems durable enough. You know, the usual water resistant up to 100 M, and according to the company slogan, it can "take a licking." I personally do not feel that you can call it a race watch until you get a couple of battle scars in it. Judging by my previous two Timex watches, I can vouch that the battery life is pretty good. I've only changed the battery on my first watch once in the ten years that I've owned it. The heart rate monitor was very accurate, supplying new data to the watch every two seconds.

Comfort: Honestly, I do not know the exact weight of this watch, but I can tell you that you will forget you are wearing it. One very simple feature that the watch employs is a breathable rubber strap. It seems like a little thing, but the last thing you want is your wrist to start itching midway through a race because the sweat is causing an reaction with your strap. I've been there, not fun. The heart rate monitor is comfortable to me. I am very particular—some might say 'compulsive'—when it comes to comfort. I am the kind of person that will adjust his shorts to the left or right, or pull his shirt back an inch from where it is sitting on his shoulder in order to be completely comfortable running or biking. The heart rate monitor is  comfortable and lightweight. The sensors are curved to match the physiognomy of the body and it sit just below your sternum. You know you are wearing it because it needs to be snug against your body, but the strap did not chafe at all, although I did not run more than 7 miles with it on.


Features: The watch does everything you might suspect: chronometer to track splits, three alarms, timer, interval and recovery functions, and review your HR workouts. One pleasantly convenient feature of the Timex Ironman Training watch, is that, well... it's a watch! Believe it or not, there are companies that make heart rate monitor and GPS "watches" that do not actually tell time. Anyone who has run a half or full iron distance event knows that it is nearly impossible to figure math in your head when you have been racing an entire morning and well into an afternoon. Unless they start building sun dials through my town, I am happy with the clock feature on my watch.

Style: Here is a picture of my previous watch on the left and my new Timex on the right. The bigger face makes it easier to read while racing. It will display the time, date and HR simultaneously as well. It is a pretty sleek design. I tell all my friends that I will be much more 'aero' this season because of the lower profile on my watch.








Cons: Presently, this watch can not do my taxes or operate as an ice cream maker, and as such, I am not sure should cost $220. I think if you take full advantage of the Training Peaks software, it might be worth it. The problem is that most serious, dedicated athletes are already tracking their miles, routes, and HR data somewhere else already, and unless they can easily export all of their data, it might not be worth it to start tracking that data elsewhere. 

Overall, I like the watch and the HR system a lot. Adam and I were keenly aware of our running and biking tempos this week because of the HR monitoring. It allowed us to push it, but still feel like we could have gone a little extra if we needed to at the end of our runs. Last season, we pushed every single run and had no idea, nor did we care if our HR was near or above threshold.