Oh s#%t,

 Whilst driving around at work today my mind started to wander and I found myself going through the 1/2 race in my head, when suddenly the stark realization that the race was infact only 2 weeks away hit me like a speeding train. All manner of thoughts rushed through my head...have I done enough, am I going to be able to complete the swim, will I be competitive? Yes I had an attack of nerves, and the race is still 2 freaking weeks away. I had to pull over and text everyone, I felt like I was taking my school exams all over again... 2 weeks, is that normal.

OK, rode the course at weekend and "oh my God", now I ride these roads most weekends but never the opposite way around like the florida challenge course,(I guess we are creatures of habit), so imagine my suprise when I realised that it was virtually uphill most of the way. I think its time to ride the course more often, the back half especially.

Six gap is approaching in two weeks so that will be a good workout and hopefully make the hills of sugarloaf and buckhill feel somewhat flatter.

Gonna change my rear cassette to a 13/29 for the ride but wondering whether to leave it on for the 1/2, not sure yet, will have to ride the course and check time differences and averages ect.

Well this is the final hurdle now, no more practice races for me at least, just head down and train, train, train. Starting to get excited and anxious a little and its still 6 weeks away.

Well here we are 1/2 way into our training for the florida challenge/ epic challenge event. Last week was our third group get together for a 40 min open water swim and 1.25 min run. Thought the swim was going to be a challenge... 40 mins straight with no turns or rest... got to the end suprisingly fresh and ready to run. Felt great on the first 3/4 of the run then it got hot, so backed off a touch. The training is definately showing, just need to start stretching as its something I am not consistent with.

Have had two races recently, the first at Pirates cove in Ruskin, Tampa. A nice low key event, previously fantasy of flight, the cousre was great, a beautiful bay swim with dolphins jumping around the swimmers ( thats what I was told anyhow). A great fast flat ride on almost traffic free roads and a semi cross country run in partially shaded parkland. Placed 1st in my age group and 5th overall.

The 2nd event was the NTC Lake Louisa sprint series, more a fun event but none the less a good speed workout for 30 mins. Placed 1st overall thanks to Kevin Grogan not being present from gear for multisport, one of the fab 5 sponsors. You cant help but have fun at these races.

My next event is the Moss park on the 24 aug, then on to 6-gap Georgia in septemter.

Darrell

Well here we are 2 months into our training for the Epic challenge Clermont 70.3.

Training is going well, definately starting to see the benefits of working out using the vo2 max results. Before I used to ride at what I thought was a comfortable pace, occasionaly pushing hard for a harder workout. By training in my new low zone at 65% I am noticing that I can ride for longer and faster without my HR rising much above 71-72%. before it was always at 80-85%.

I am racing this weekend at pirates cove in Tampa, previously the Polk City tri event which was moved. This is an olympic distance with a bay swim. Looking forward to this as it will be my first ocean/salt water swim. Will post results after the race.

Ciao for now...

Darrell

First off, I would like to thank all the guys at fleet feet, Zenergy and gear for multisport for all their help in fitting us out and making all of this possible, we all had a great time getting analysed for shoes and VO2 max testing, talk about tough.

Well this week has been considerably better than the first week of training, we are slowly bulding our workouts up with less rest days than I had anticipated.

VO2 max testing showed my max HR to be at 177 where I have been using 184, I need to train more in the fat burning zone as I go aerobic/ anaerobic to soon and most of my workouts are in those zones. This is easier said than done, I am finding it ok to keep there or there abouts on the bike but running is really difficult, running a slight incline with my new training figures means my HR jumps to 90-95% unless I walk, so I may need to re-adress this somehow.

Anyhow first group open water swim session this weekend so looking forward to that.