Off Season

Before I get to my off season plans, here are a couple pics from my really nice mountain bike ride today.

I didn't see any other riders.

Someone had been through earlier though, I didn't run into any spider webs.

I'm making plans for the off season.  I was considering P90X, a weight program, Jorge's winter cycling plan, or nothing until my friend Doug pointed out I should really set my goals for next year and let them point me in the right direction for the off season.  I was hoping my goal for next year would be a full Ironman triathlon but after my two half triathlons, it's obvious I need to work on my nutrition before I attempt a full IM.  With that decided, I had no idea what my goals would be just a week ago until I read this thread.  I would love to run faster.  I get passed by people seemingly putting out much less effort than I am all the time.  So how am I going to run faster?  I'm going to build my running volume up to 30 miles per week and hold it there for a few months.  30 mpw means 5-6 runs per week, Ouch!.  My goal is to run a 5k in under 23 minutes.  I'm probably at about 26 minutes right now, so sub 23 will be a tough goal for me.  If When I reach that goal, I should be able to beat my half marathon PR by at least 5 minutes as well.  We'll see.

I have decided to do triathlons again next year.  This was not a given since racing is definitely outside my comfort zone, but it does make me feel alive (so maybe it was a given).  My cycling goal for next year is to hold 20+ mph in an Olympic distance race and 18.7 in a half Ironman (sub 3 hours). That means cycling 3x per week in the offseason.  My swimming goal is not to drown.  I'll need to hit the pool once a week to accomplish that :-).

So that is 9-10 workouts per week and if you follow me on BT you know I have trouble getting in more than 6.  I'm also not a morning person, so I'm trying to figure out how to get all these workouts in after work.  The only way I've come up with is to brick all my workouts, which wouldn't be ideal.  So if I do all my workouts in the evening my schedule would look like this.

Mon PM - short run (add a swim once MNF is over)
Tue PM - trainer ride followed by a medium run (medium = an hour)
Wed PM - swim followed by a short run (short = 1/2 hour)
Thur PM - trainer ride followed by a medium run
Friday PM - short run
Sat - long run
Sun - long trainer ride
  
An hour ride followed by an hour run after work would be tough. Alternatively, I could try to become a morning person.  The problem (besides not being a morning person) is that I need to be in the shower by 6:30 in order to drive my son to school then head to work.  That means I would need to get up at 5 am on medium run days and 5:30 on short run days.  Oh yeah, it will be dark and cold too.  Yuck!  If I try to become a morning person, my schedule could look like this.

Mon AM - short run
Mon PM - swim (once MNF is over for the year)
Tue AM - medium run
Tue PM - trainer ride
Wed AM - short run
Wed PM - swim
Thur AM - medium run
Thur PM - trainer ride
Friday AM - short run
Friday PM off
Sat - long run
Sun long trainer ride

Hmm, I'm getting tired just thinking about it :-). I'll massage this a bit more and get at it in November.  I'm enjoying a down month in October but keeping a run base to start from.