Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 6 run and 4 swim activities in this week. On Monday (27/06) I had a 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.16 K, 5:59 min/km, 133 bpm, 38m elevation gain). On Tuesday (28/06) I had a speed run 4×1200 with the following averages: (13.57 K, 5:42 min/km, 143 bpm, 45m elevation gain). On Wednesday (29/06) I had 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.23 K,  5:18 min/km, 153 bpm, 40m elevation gain) and a 300m swim with average pace 2:04 min/100m. On Thursday (30/06) I had a speed run 4×1200 with the following averages: (13.40 K, 5:40 min/km, 157 bpm, 44m elevation gain) and a 500m swim with average pace min/100m. On Friday (01/07) I had 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.02 K, 5:58 min/km, 144 bpm, 36m elevation gain) and a 400m swim with average pace 2:13 min/100m. On Sunday (03/07) I had 3K easy run with the following averages: (2.69 K, 10:54 min/km,  91 bpm, 30m elevation gain) and a 2K swim with average pace 2:23 min/100m.

VO2Max and weekly mileage

My VO2Max this week in my (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday) activities were (51, 51, 51, 51, 51, N/A) ml/kg/min respectively. Also my weekly mileage this week was 75.0 km run and 3.2 km swim.

About individual runs

On Monday (27/06): backpack through the entire run. 10 min Hot tub, 10 min Sauna. I was trying to have this run with the easiest possible pace in order to have enough energy to do the Tempo/Speed workouts of this week while keeping my weekly mileage. I have to be careful about dehydration by having enough water during the day (3-4 liters a day) and I also need to monitor my sleep and nutrition.

On Tuesday (28/06): 10 min Hot tub 5 min Sauna, Stretch later after run (in the pool, I should do it earlier). In the first interval, I was confused with the data screen of the workout in my watch (it wasn’t the same with what I had in my last speed workout), so I thought the watch doesn’t work properly and I just decided to complete a 12K easy run, after the first interval when the watch told me it’s recovery time I found that this is the way that it works, so technically it was a 3.5×1200 cause I had an easy run in the second part of the first interval. Again I was sleeping too much last not cause my body really needed that and when I scaled myself this morning I noticed that I gained weight 1-2 kg (I can’t exactly say how much did I gain weight cause there is a 1kg difference between my upper and lower weight). I was also surprised why I didn’t realize that before specially during my SOS workouts past couple of days. The reason was not clear to me and I was still thinking about it till I found it when I was in the way back home. Usually the imbalanced sleep/nutrition is the very first symptom of increasing intensity of workouts. In past, I was experiencing that immediately after I was increasing my weekly mileage and I was expecting that to happen 12 days ago as I mentioned this in the comment of this activity https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1214504547 . Usually when you experience overeating, you would gain weight. Apparently my body was feeling OK with the 90km weekly mileage but as soon as I added the SOS workouts to my weekly plan, the reaction of my body was oversleeping and overeating. Now I feel better when I know the reason of my imbalanced sleep/weight, I know that it’s temporarily and it would be back to normal in 7-10 days, but as a result of professional training, I try to lose weight mainly by not eating high calory foods until I feel that my body is adapted to the situaion.

Wednesday run activity (29/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. 10 min Hot tub 5 min Sauna. I immediately changed my diet by cutting off fat and sugar (even from my coffee and tea) and I’m gradually trying to change my diet to high protein-low calory foods to drop a couple of pounds. Im trying to drop 3.5Kg from what I scaled myself yesterday within 2-3 weeks. That’s what I was training with it last year. Fortunately my body would drop weight as easy as it gain it but it’s more difficult to do it without losing your strength while you are training. Finally my middle toe’s nail (left foot) was as lose as I took it out completely, now I feel more comfortable.

Wednesday swim activity (29/06): At the beginning of my marathon training, I added a 1km of daily swim to my schedule cause I thought 20 min of swimming won’t impact my daily training. Later I found in practice that it’s too much so I decreased it to 500m swim with a slower pace and then I finally decided to cut it off. Now again I’m trying to resume my swimming and at this point I feel that I’m OK with 200m-300m lap swimming per day or at least a few days a week. Past few days when I was in the pool just for pool exercises and not for swimming , gradually I started to feel strange with swimming and after awhile I was so reluctant to go for swim which is very bad, as a triathlete I really need to be comfortable with swimming all the time. I guess I need to clarify about the reasons of my daily swim here. I have three reasons for my daily swim based on it’s priority which are as following: the first one is for it’s advantage for my muscles both because it release stress from my muscles and also it activate my upper body muscles which are both awesome. The second reason is because it makes me happy for the rest of the day , even if it’s as short as a 300m lap swimming. Finally because it also prepare me for ironman triathlon race but that’s something that I never want to think about it at this moment. Preparing for a sub 3 hour marathon takes such a focus and mentality from me that I really dont want to (and I also can’t) think about anything else such as a traithlon race. The reminder for my daily swim is, it should be slow.I dont know why whenever I get into water I want to swim fast which usually won’t last more than a few minutes.

Thursday run activity (30/06): 10 min Hot tub, 5 min Sauna, Stretch after swim and Sauna (again I forgot to stretch right after the run) It was a very tough activity in a hot and sunny day along the busy sea wall. I experienced a new Max HR in the new set of my training which was 196 bpm. and it totally explains how hard was the workout today, I was totally wet after the run. In general it was a good speed run but at this point, I am not going to have more than two Speed (SOS) workouts per week cause I actually can not do it. Usually it’s recommended to slow down the pace in hot days or basically just train early in the morning during summer but I was busy this morning and I couldn’t do it in the morning so I had to run in the afternoon. Fortunately tomorrow is a holiday (it’s Canada day and congratulations to everyone:) ) and I can resume my regular morning training from tomorrow.

Thursday swim activity (30/06): Breathing every other cycle in an easy paced swim. Length lane was closed so I had to swim along the width. I don’t know why width swimming is much faster than length swimming. My ave. pace today was 1:50 min/100m and I am sure if it was a length swim it would be something around 2:10-2:15 min/100m

Friday run activity (01/07): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. My both knees are improving, first my right knee then the left one.

Friday swim activity (01/07): Breathing every other cycle. It was such a nice day that I got creative and find a theory to explain why I burned out from swimming in my daily schedule and what’s the right amount of swimming for my training plan, it’s all about the 10% rule. So far and before the new level of my training, the highest level of weekly workout that my body used to it was 8 hours weekly workout.Therefore based on the 10% rule, whenever I wanted to increase that level of training, I shouldn’t increase it more than 10% of 8 hours (8 hours and 48 min) and in a safe training plan, I should stay on 8 hours weekly workout at least for 4 weeks. 10% of 8hours weekly workout is equals to 48 min and with my regular swimming pace which is 2:10 min/100m , it is equals to 2.2Km weekly swim. So in a safe training plan I should add swimming to my weekly plan after week 4 and with a 360m (2.2km/6) daily swim. When I look at my excel analyze file, I can see that I burned out from swimming on July 22nd which is in week 2 of my training when the ratio of my swimming over my running was over 20% for a week. That totally make sense cause first I shouldn’t add swimming to my plan from week one and second my weekly swim shouldn’t be over than 10% of my weekly run where in my case it was 20%. Based on the above calculations, a 2.2Km weekly swim (360m daily swim) is safe for my training plan, and therefore I created a new colum in my excel analyze file for the ratio of my weekly swim over my weekly run and in future it shouldn’t be over 10%. I really got excited with the new discovery that I had today, good job!

On Sunday (03/07): It was an easy run/walk cause since last night I cannot even walk properly due to taking out the corn of my little toe (left leg). Awhile ago I had a blister in my little toe, I drained it in order to be able to run and it grow up larger the day after and I again drained it. Usually in that situation a corn will grow up in the position of that blister and it would remain there untill you take it out from the root (I have previously experienced this and I knew I can clean the surface of the corn which would make me ready to run but again after awhile I would have the same problem and apparently in the background the corn would get deeper but I’m not sure about the latter one) Having that in my mind, I decided to take out the corn from the root and since it was a bit deep, I cannot walk properly since last night. In my previous experience where the corn was deeper, I was able to run 36 hours after taking the corn out. I had an easy 3K run/walk ( I was running till I found that it’s absolutely impossible to run so I walked the rest of it) just to have an active (running) day and then in order to keep the weekly hours of my training, I had a 2K swim afterwards. I also had 14500 steps during the day which was a good step to make myself ready for my next run sooner. In general it was a very positive day which mentally prepared me that no matter what, I’ll continue my training and swimming is the best cross training for runners and triathletes.

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 6 run and 2 swim activities in this week. On Monday (20/06) I had a 13K run (tempo 6K) with the following averages: (13.00 K, 5:07 min/km, 153 bpm, 29m elevation gain). On Tuesday (21/06) I had a 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.40 K, 5:13 min/km, 153 bpm, 36m elevation gain) and a 1K swim with average pace 2:09 min/100m. On Wednesday (22/06) I had a 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.13 K, 5:15 min/km,  151 bpm, 36m elevation gain) and a 500m swim with average pace 2:19 min/100m. On Thursday (23/06) I had a speed run 6×800 with the following averages: (15.20 K, 5:31 min/km, 148 bpm, 41m elevation gain). On Friday (24/06) I had a 12K easy run with the following averages: (12.14 K, 5:37 min/km, 142 bpm, 37m elevation gain). On Sunday (26/06) I had a 20K long run with the following averages: (20.01 K, 5:10 min/km, 156 bpm, 62m elevation gain).

VO2Max and weekly mileage

My VO2Max this week in my (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday) activities were (50, 50, 51, 51, 51, 51) ml/kg/min respectively. Also my weekly total this week was 90.8 km run and 1.5 km swim.

About individual runs

On Monday (20/06): Finally I shifted my training time to early morning. I decided to have a tempo run today and like always with 3.5K warm up and cool down each. I didn’t have a good idea about my pace for the tempo run at this level of my training so I just started to run and the only thing that I did was increasing my cadence. After 2K I looked at my watch and I noticed that ave. pace is 4:33 min/km so I decided to have the entire 10K tempo run around that pace. I successfully completed a 6K tempo run with that pace and after that I decided to finish the tempo run cause I was tired. This workout gave me a better idea about the appropriate pace I should train with right now. When I look at my Lap Ave. Cadence I can see that it’s (187,190,188) spm which is much higher than 180 spm.Unfortunately I forgot to add Ave. Lap Cadence to data screen of my watch and therefore I couldn’t keep it around 180 spm , hopefully next time. The final issue is my swim after the run. It’s almost impossible to train properly for the SOS workouts when you have a backpack with yourself and therefore I couldn’t have my swim after this run, I have to find a solution for this problem.

Tuesday run activity (21/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. The major improvement in this workout was improving my ave. running cadence to 178 spm which is pretty good. Also my heart is performing much better, Ave HR 153 bpm for ave. pace 5:13 min/km plus carrying a backpack.

Tuesday swim activity (21/06): Transition time: 17 min. 5 min pool stretching exercise , 10 min Hot tub, 5 min Sauna. When I swim after my training, my happiness is in a totally different level compared to the time that I can’t swim after my run.

Wednesday swim activity (22/06): Transition time: 23 min. Today for the first, I changed my swim breathing to every cycle instead of every other cycle and I significantly slow down my pace. The idea is I wanted to go for a speed run today but I wasn’t 100% sure this is the right time for this SOS workout after the tempo run the other day and I didn’t feel that it’s the right time neither. I was thinking if I slow down my swim, then it would be easier for my heart to do the speed workout tomorrow. 5min pool stretching exercise, 10 min Hot tub, 5 min Sauna.

On Thursday (23/06): In the first two speed intervals plus in the second Km of the cool down run, my heart was not comfortable with the run and it was hurting a bit (not sure if it was my heart, it was right under left side of my chess and the area around it). I see two possible reasons for that, one is because it was the first speed run of the season and my heart was not adapted to the situation and the evidence for that is because I didn’t have that problem in the next four intervals. The other reason is becuase of the intensity of my trainings. Past 7 days I was training 87 km run plus 4km swim where two of the runs were Tempo/Speed and three of the swims were relatively fast, as a result my body needed to sleep a lot last night for the recovery of my trainings. I have already made an adjustment in my training yesterday by slowing down my swimming pace and the immediate second adjustment is to temporarily stop swimming and also slow down the easy runs in a way that my weekly ave. pace and weekly ave. HR would decrease a bit. I would still go to pool everyday right after my run just for pool stretching and also using the Hot tub and Sauna which would be very useful for releasing the stress from my muscles and also making me very fresh for the rest of the day, but I wont swim to see how things would happen in future. As soon as things were settled down, I might gradually resume swimming too. Today: 10 min Hot tub, 5 min Sauna. I also want to mention that I planned to complete the speed run with the ave. pace 4:00 min/km that I succeefully did it. (Check out the update in the comment of next activity)

On Friday (24/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. 10 min Hot tub 5 min Sauna. Now I can say that possibly the pain in the left side of my chess is just a muscle pain and it’s not about my heart cause I had the same pain sometimes during the day in the right side of my chess. I also double checked my heart rate during my speed run in my recent workout compared to the last time I had speed run with the same speed and I actually found that my heart works better this time compared to the last time. This time my Max/Ave heart rate during the intervals was (179,178,181,181,184,186) bpm and (172,172,171,172,176,176) bpm respectively and the last time I had a “4×1200-400 recovery” speed run on Oct. 7th 2015 here: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1151438278 my Max/Ave heart rate was (187,188,187,189) bpm and (181,181,179,181)bpm respectively, to be fair and complete in the comparisson my Ave. pace in the intervals this time vs last time is (4:01,4:04,4:02,4:03,3:51,4:00) min/km vs (3:54,3:52,3:55,3:55) min/km. Anyways I made an adjustment in my training plan and that looks to me pretty positive and I guess it was necessary.

On Sunday (26/06): 25 min Hot tub, 10 min Sauna (Later in the afternoon)

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 5 run and 5 swim activities in this week. On Monday (13/06) I had a 12K easy run with the following averages: (12.10 K, 5:30 min/km, 158 bpm, 60m elevation gain) and a 1K swim with average pace 2:09 min/100m. On Wednesday (15/06) I had a 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.21 K, 5:14 min/km, 162 bpm, 39m elevation gain) and a 1K swim with average pace 2:12 min/100m. On Thursday (16/06) I had a 15K easy run with the following averages: (15.01 K, 5:07 min/km, 160 bpm, 34m elevation gain) and a 1K swim with average pace 2:11 min/100m. On Friday (17/06) I had a 16K run with the following averages: (16.27 K, 4:58 min/km, 169 bpm, 49m elevation gain) and a 1K swim with average pace 2:18 min/100m. On Saturday (18/06) I had an 11K easy run with the following averages: (11.23 K, 5:12 min/km, 157 bpm, 34m elevation gain) and a 500m swim with average pace 2:11 min/100m.

VO2Max and weekly mileage

My VO2Max this week in my (Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday) activities were (48, 48, 49, 49, 49) ml/kg/min respectively. Also my weekly total this week was 69.8 km run plus 4.5 km swim.

About individual activities

Monday run activity (13/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run.

Monday swim activity (13/06): Transition time: 11 min. I was pretty comfortable in my breathing (for swimming) after the long run and like always I was breathing in the entire swim every other cycle. I had a good improvement in my swimming technique (I’ll explain it later with a youtube video here) For a few days I was struggling in running and swimming at the same time cause some of my muscles are not active in one sport which is active in the other and it would take awhile to activate all necessary muscles. It seems that I’m almost comfortable now. In the swimming part I was mainly using my hands rather than my legs so the running part didn’t affect the swimming part that much and when I look at my overal pace it certify it as well (ave pace 2:09 min/100m almost the same as my general ave pace for swimming) I am still struggling with my lower backache but it’s getting much better by the exercises that I do in the pool and at home with my gym ball. In general I’m trying to approach 80 km weekly mileage by adjusting my pace (running with whatever pace that I feel comfortable with it) and then I’ll add the speed/hills workouts to improve my strength and speed.

Wednesday run activity (15/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. The very first symptom of increasing my weekly mileage is overeating, that’s the way my body reacts to it and I am aware of it. Past two days I was hungry all the time and I was eating as much as I could. Apparently things are back to normal today.

Wednesday swim activity (15/06): Transition time: 15 min. The water was warm (like indoor pool) and it was awesome to swim in an open pool when one side is stanley park and the other side is ocean. However, it was windy and cold outside and I had to immediately get out of pool when my swimming was done. The swimmers in the fast lane of second beach pool are very fast. I prefer to swim here when it’s very warm and I don’t want to exercise after my swimming in the pool or use the whirling pool.

Thursday run activity (16/06): Blister in my left little toe. 2Kg backpack through the entire run.

Thursday swim activity (16/06): Transition time: 19min

Friday run activity (17/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run like always. I was feeling my left shoe is very tight for me because of the blister in my little toe (I drained the blister yesterday but it grow up in the same position, this time much larger). My thighs are still pretty heavy and I am not sure about the reason. Finally I reached the 80 km weekly mileage. I’ve heard from multiple resources that 6 months of training with 80 km weekly mileage included lots of hills/speed workouts is required for a sub three hour marathon. Gradually I’ll add the speed/hills workout to my plan but I still do not have a week by week plan for my training. I have to contact my connections to have a better idea about it.

Friday swim activity (17/06): Transition time: 16min. After the hard running workout today, my legs where as tired in swimming as I even couldn’t push the wall after each length and I was just using my hands.

Saturday run activity (18/06): 2Kg backpack through the entire run. Blister in the middle finger of my left foot.

Saturday swim activity (18/06): Transition time: 17min

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 5 run and 2 swim activities in this week. On Thursday (09/06) I had a 3K easy run with the following averages: (3.00 K,  5:24 min/km, N/A bpm, 28m elevation gain), a 500m swim with average pace 2:08 min/100m and another 3K easy run with the following averages: (3.54 K, 5:20 min/km, 161 bpm, 32m elevation gain). On Friday (10/06) I had a 10K easy run with the following averages: (10.64 K, 5:07 min/km, 166 bpm, 98m elevation gain). On Saturday (11/06) I had a 10K easy run with the following averages: (10.50 K, 5:30 min/km, 160 bpm, 91m elevation gain). On Sunday (12/06) I had a 10K easy run with the following averages: (10.51 K, 5:41 min/km, 151 bpm, 99m elevation gain) and a 500m swim with average pace 2:05 min/100m.

VO2Max and weekly mileage

My VO2Max this week in my (Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday) activities were (49, 49, 48, 48) ml/kg/min respectively. Also my weekly total this week was 38.2 km run plus 1.0 km swim.