2017 - Week in Review - 13 March - 19 March

Finding my good angle - post session

Weekly Reflections and Focus

A bit late, but here we go! So I have been at home and not travelling. I am getting to this update late so the details are a bit hazy. I had a good week with my training. The uptick in volume is manifesting itself in my nutrition, a bit in my steady weight and sleep. From a life balance perspective. it has been nice to be home with my family. To revel in the nonstop growth of my children. I have an 11 year old and a 20 month old and one baking with an inbound arrival expected of September-ish.

To be honest I don't recall much but two major themes. My swims have been great and on point. I am feeling how to better lead with my hips and get more sideways. My overall times and RPE (Real Perceived Effort) is quite noticeable. I am not a great swimmer but I am putting in the time and efforts to try to become fundamentally ok. I am learning that just going all out is not going to make me faster - yes I have known this. And the more I concentrate on my 'feel' - I can definitely feel the difference in my speed in the water and the ease by which I arrive there. I have been blown away by some of my times as of late.

2nd theme. Let's talk about something referred to as a 'Right Hook'. Now I hadn't heard this label before but I thought it worth sharing. Before the event occured, about 4-5 days prior i was talking with my friend - Konrad, about this phenomenon. He says 'I call that the right hook'. Little did I know, that conversation prepared me to be 'heady' enough to anticipate and come through it without a problem more than being bewildered and confused at the actions of another human.

So what is the right hook?

A picture demonstrating more or less a 'right hook'.

Here's a resource Click here to consider to understand the dynamics of a 'Right hook'. As I was talking it through with my sister in California a bit b/c she didn't understand what I was referring to, she stated

Oh! I get so nervous when I see any person on a bicycle when I need to turn and I'm not sure if I'm far enough ahead of them.

To which I offered the following simple advice -

slow down and go behind the cyclist....

Yes, that's right. A bit annoying, but treat the cyclist like you would another vehicle - you know the ones that Louis CK refers to as weapons, moving metal weapons of 2 tons with a human an an attitude to drive them. See clip here (beware it is not censored and has language. I am sharing the link I found to the clip, I do not claim any ownership or rights just a link, it may disappear over time.

So my scenario. I was on 1000 West in Logan, Utah traveling south nearing the 200 north intersection. There is a Maverick station on the North West side where I was riding and I moved out with hand signals in order to safely cross the intersection. I glanced back to make sure I was ok and made my move and began clearing the intersection. I was moving with a tail wind at approximately 20 mph and the speed limit is 50 mph in this particular section. On the South west corner is an LW's. There are two entries on this street to the LW's and this is where the problem began. As I approached the the first entry (approximately 30 yards past the intersection) I sensed something was wrong, and out of my left comes a Silver Suburban encroaching on me. It all happened so fast. The suburban pinched me she came to an almost complete stop pinching me to the curb. I can't recall if I un-clipped, or track-standed while she made her decision to barely turn into the driveway hitting the far curb. Why she didn't go behind me or to the next entry is beyond me. To be honest I was more focused and concentrating on my life. I was bewildered. As I pulled myself together and rode on shaking my head, I said a I am grateful that someone was watching over me today.

In all honesty, in each of the activities I do while running and cycling and even swimming. At the end of the activity, I just want to make it home safe. To return to my wife and children and their kind smiles or devious grins of "we're about to ruin your day, Dad" moments. I don't care, I am home, I am safe, I am with them. This is the ultimate goal I guess of my #familybalancetri concept that I follow. Triathlon and training is but a component of things. it provides me a place where I can release all of the stress that is mine that I harbor and absorb in various things. It allows me also to keep mentally, physically and morally fit (moral b/c I am too busy training to get distracted from family :) )

I guess I will keep it to this for the week in summary. lastly, my shoes each have over 500 miles on them and i am noticing it as I run, especially as i uptick the volume. I will say, I am more mindful of injury prevention dynamic stretches, and good biomechanics while running. I am even slowing down a bit so I can run faster later :) Keep on tri-ing folks. Cheers!

Activities - Strava Logs (Shane's Strava link)

(Look for rollover links if you are Strava stalking me :) )

Monday
Activity 1 - Run
Activity 2 - SWIM

Tuesday
Activity 1 - RUN
Wednesday
Activity 1 - RUN
Activity 2 - Cycle
Thursday
Activity 1 - RUN
Activity 2 - SWIM
Friday
Activity 1 - RUN
Saturday
Activity 1 - Cycle
Activity 2 - RUN