Lake Effect

Part of the fun of doing a triathlon, once you get over the initial stages of pure panic, is the swim. I remember the first tri I did back in 2001. It was in Midland Ontario and the swim had been changed from the traditional 'out and back' to a course that paralleled the beach. Bad idea. It was too shallow, too muddy, and way too crowded. I finally managed to drag myself onto the beach at the end of it all but not without a few 'wtf' moments. Horrible.

Anyway, I'm a much stronger swimmer now and I actually like the swim, especially if the conditions are nice. A sunny day, flat, weed-free water, plenty of room between swimmers... you can't beat it. I can't swim all that fast, so I just relax and enjoy it. It's way more fun swimming in open water than plodding along in an over-chlorinated pool filled with other people who are swimming either too slow or too fast and where the chances of a 'fouling' always lurk. If I could train in open water all the time I would.

'But wait', I hear you say. 'Don't you live in Toronto, right next to one of the largest freshwater lakes on the planet?'

Why yes, yes I do. It may be one of the largest, but it's not necessarily one of the friendliest. At least not right here in the city. Lake Ontario has a longtime reputation as a polluted cesspool of a lake, a reputation that it no doubt earned over several decades of mismanagement and indiscriminate filth-dumping by industry and inadequate waste treatment facilities. It has cleaned up quite a bit lately, however, to the point where there is even a tri right in downtown Toronto again.

Last night some fellow Lake Placid-bound friends and I decided to try our luck with an open water training swim in the Beaches. We wetsuited up and hit the water on a clear night at about 6pm. A stiff breeze was blowing in from the southeast, which around here means bad weather is on the way. It also means that waves have been travelling right across the width of the lake before hitting our shores, so the seas were rough, as they say. About a 3 to 4 foot swell with a few bigger waves in the mix too. Interesting. Also 'interesting' was the water temperature. Interesting as in 'I'm more interested in standing on the nice sand here than swimming in that frigid water'. I waded into the surf last, and instantly my hands and feet were numb and my breath was taken away. Not good! I jumped right out again after 30 seconds and a few strokes.

Standing there on the shore though, watching as my friends splashed away, I decided that cold water or no I had to go back in. So in I went and took off after them. And you know, it wasn't all that bad after a while. I got used to the cold (the wetsuit helped of course) and my breathing slowed down enough to get into a half decent rhythm. The waves were big, but they were real rollers so I was able to ride them up and down.

We were all having a grand time out there and feeling quite pleased with ourselves when the police arrived. I looked up to see the police boat bobbing beside us and a cop talking to one of my pals. I didn't really catch all that was said, something about taking an oar in the head. Also apparently we were advised to stop doing what we were doing. Something about us being in a boating channel or something. Huh. I guess the buoy we were using as a marker wasn't just for swimmers.

A couple more 'lengths' of our giant pool and we headed for the shore, cold but feeling quite chuffed about it all.

The local tri shop runs an open water swim there twice a week, so we'll be back.

Package Deal

Most athletic training 'bibles' will recommend regular massage as part of a serious or semi-serious training program. Putting your muscles under constant stress is hard, of course, and a good massage can not only ease some of the resulting pain but can also prevent future injuries and make training a little less painful.

Since my wonderful shiatsu therapist left town at the end of April I have been sans massage, so I thought it was about time to find a replacement. An inquiring email to a shiatsu clinic close to my work went unanswered (I hate that) so last week I asked my osteopath to recommend someone. Without hesitation she said "oh, you have see C. She's great". No problem. Phone call made, appointment booked for 2 days later.

I get to the clinic. It's in a part of Toronto that's like a little piece of Vancouver Island broke away and lodged itself here, complete with organic markets, hippies, birkenstocks and 'alternative lifestyle' practitioners. Whatever, I needed a massage and I wasn't going to be picky about the touchy-feeliness of the neighbourhood.

C. as it turns out, was (is) a large, solidly built woman with a no-nonsense demeanor. A few pointed questions about me and my ridiculous training regimen, my complaints, my hopes and desires as to the outcome of the forthcoming massage, and off we went. And when I say "off" I'm referring mainly to my clothes. All of them. Which is quite different from the fully clothed shiatsu sessions I had been previously enjoying. Too late to back out now, so I doff the togs and climb under a full length sheet to wait for C. to come back into the room.

Was the massage good? Yes, yes it was. Was it painful? Yes, several times. But it was a good kind of pain. The one thing that stands out in my mind about it though is that for the first half hour while she worked on my legs and butt, all I could think of was "For sure she can see my balls". Even after a fast and discreet tuck, I was convinced that she was getting an up close and personal view of my junk. It was very distracting, I can tell you. And not at all arousing, thank god. Had C. been a lithe and youthful nymphette fresh out of massage school it would have been a very different experience, but as it was it was just kind of weird.

Afterwards I felt like I was about to have an out-of-body experience. My body felt like a ringing telephone and my brain was floating about 10 feet above my head. I had to walk around Hippie Town for a while because I was afraid to get back on my bike. It took a good hour to come down completely.

Highly recommended unless you have an irrational fear of strangers getting an eyeful of your packaged goods. Which I'm sure didn't really happen anyway. I think.

There and Back Again - A Cyclist's Tale

Just a quick note about the Rideau Lakes ride over the past weekend.

Unlike last year when the temperatures approached 40 degrees celsius, this year's version started off on saturday with a brisk NW breeze (25 kmh) and a startling 9 degrees C. Cold and wind, my two worst enemies on the bike.

Being of slight frame (~150 lbs after dinner) I find gusty days can be a real challenge. I'm sure heavier riders fight the wind too, but I don't think they get blown around like an autumn leaf the way us 'climbers' do. But what can you do but carry on and wait for a tailwind?

The weather sunday was even worse. I swear the breeze picked up but did not change direction, which meant we would be riding straight into it for the exit from K-Town. On the other hand, it rained for about 2 hours. So that was nice.

Ride times each day were 6:25 and 6:39, about where I thought I'd be for the 180k. Fuel was not an issue, and on day 1 I felt like I could put on the running shoes and run. That's good news. The cool weather may have had something to do with that, so now I'm hoping for a cold front on race day, but only after the swim.

Fit to Be Fried

With little more than a month and a half to go before IMLP, I've increased my workout frequency, upped my run mileage, and upped the bike mileage. Most weekdays I'm now doing two-a-day workouts; gym + run / swim + run / gym + swim plus the daily bike commute. The commute doesn't count for much though, it's just not that long. I'm going to have to work in a bike ride mid-week, either a fast 50k or a good set of hill repeats.

I've started a stroke improvement swim clinic once a week too, and I think it's going to have a positive effect on my swim. I'm a decent swimmer but haven't had any real instruction since 2001 when I started racing. Time to correct any bad habits that've crept into my stroke over the years.

The only downside to all this training (and I'm really not doing this in a scientific way at all) is that I'm feeling like my body is right on the border between fit and fried. I'm sure I'm not getting enough sleep most nights - when 3 cats decide that they want to be let out at 5am every morning, it's hard to sleep in. Even when B gets up to take care of the little darlings, it's hard to get back to sleep. That together with late nights taking care of web design clients and the racetracker.ca site means not enough shuteye, a situtation I'm going to have to resolve soon if I want to stay healthy.

Rest is a large part of proper training, sayeth the triathlon oracles, so that will be my challenge. A week spent in London wasn't much of a rest - B loves to walk, and we put in a total of 140k over the 7 days we were there, taking the tube only once. A great way to see a city for sure, but definitely hard on my back. Run 20k? No problem. Walk 20k? Agony, the kind of agony that can be relieved only by frequent pub stops and liberal application of English ales. Not much mention of that in any of the tri books I've read.

Next up: the Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour, a 180km x2 bike ride from Ottawa to Kingston to Ottawa. A perfect training session for IMLP.

www.ottawabicycleclub.ca/rlct.php