Detraining, weight gains, life gains

6 months of focussed training towards my season goals and I had reached a point where I needed rest. My year is split in two. I allow six months where Ironman takes shall we say a higher precedence in my scheduling and then six months where I push it further back and focus on the rest of my life. Summer holidays are my time to focus on my family and as a consequence training is allowed to be completely random and non focussed. This meant I ran about 3 times a week across the month of August in a variety of scenic and invariably hilly locations, such as the bay in Brittany pictured above. Cycling was almost largely limited to slow pootling about at the pace of a fit 9 year old and swimming was mostly surfing and bodyboarding.

At the end of IMUK I weighed 76kg. This increased to 78 kg when I rehydrated. By the end of August after some serious quality  barbecues supplemented by red wine I had boosted my weight to 83.6 kg. Healthwise this is probably my ideal weight. I know when I train the weight will move again but feel that below 80 kg I become susceptible to colds and general illness. The month off was clearly necessary to put my body back together after a punishing schedule of races and working but the payback when I went round Regents Park with the Rouleurs was to be spat out the back afer 4 laps of tempo riding and swimming felt more like controlled drowning.

Experience however is a wonderful thing. With the return of school and work schedules comes the more regular training slots and sessions with London Fields Tri. I know that slowly the muscles will get acclimatised again and the specific fitness will recover. That said I am in no rush to do anything other than keep ticking over. I have started back doing weights to build a bit of muscle mass as a buffer against age and injury, and after much decision have decided this autumn I will mostly be doing cyclcross (of which more later!).

Next years goal is simple. I plan to try and qualify for Kona.