I decided to change things up for training this year. In the past, I simply used workouts from previous coaches. But in November, I bought a Kickr trainer, a fully computerized bike trainer however, to my dismay (and astonishment), it can only be controlled using an iphone, ipad or android phone. Both Tammy's ipad and iphone were too old to support the app and the only way to use my laptop was to subscribe to a third party software, otherwise I just paid $1,200 for a dumb computerized bike trainer. After a little research (highly unusual for me), I signed up for Trainerroad. It had over 800 bike workouts including full training plans ranging from Sprint to Ironman. I started off with a 8 week base building program and then 6 week build and finally into a 6 week Ironman training program. Some of the workouts were brutal and almost puke worthy. In fact, later on in early summer I had to change my workouts to allow for more recovery. I was hoping these V02 max workouts would translate into a faster bike split.
Heading into the final week before leaving to Mont Tremblant, I needed a bike tune up very badly. In fact, the last tune up I had was a year ago. I used Velofix the mobile bike shop. Mike P gave great service and actually came back a couple of times so I emailed him and I got an "out of office" alert. He later emailed me and said he would be back on Monday. No problem, I was leaving on Thursday so plenty of time. I didn't hear back from him on Monday so I emailed again. No response. I started to panic. It would be almost impossible to get a tune up if I took the bike to a bike shop. Because Velofix are franchises, I emailed another guy I knew of, Nick D. At first, he was a little reluctant because I lived in Mike's territory. I explained I emailed Mike twice and never heard back. With that Nick came over and after a short 3.5 hours and $400 bill, he had my bike cleaned and ready to go. I highly recommend Nick.
We arrived in Mont Tremblant on Thursday afternoon and booked the same place as last year. We enjoyed it so much, we booked before we left, however this year, the room wasn't as great as we were in the basement/ground floor. It was quite dark and gloomy. We tried to change but everything was sold out.
One good thing about being on the ground floor is that the deer aren't shy and will come right up to our patio door.
One of the things I like about Ironman Mont Tremblant, is that I usually know a couple of people racing as well. This year, Scobie, Peter A, Cathy S and Mike M were coming up. Misery loves company. And Sunday's weather looks like its going to be miserable. The weather kept changing but it looked like it was going to rain...lots.
On Saturday, I met up with Mike M and we did a quick 23 minute bike ride up Ch Duplessis to the last big descent from the bottom. I usually hit over 70 km/hr and did so this time. I warned Mike to back off on the speed if it was raining. After that, we did an easy 1,000 meter swim to the Kona Koffee Boat. The water was really chilly at first but after swimming a bit, it felt really warm and we weren't wearing out wetsuits. I hate coffee but there is something about swimming 500 meters and having a coffee while treading water.
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