2 days on 1 off

it's what has been going on lately and it feels strange. For two days I'm absolutely on fire and then the third day I'm feeling totally dead no matter what. It feels strange but it seems like I have to learn live with it for now.

Only 11 days to go for my epic trip :)

trying to get healthy

that's pretty much all I have done in the past week. The trip back home on wednesday was really painful. It lasted about 16 hours and my knee pain got really bad from all the sitting, dehydration and stuff. The nice airline hostessess were kind enough to not give me water in my own bottle! Seem like the airline is really having economic trouble!

The knee was so bad the next morning I was unable to even ride my bike 3km to school. I had to take a couple of days completely off any heavy leg work and sitting. Then once the knee started feeling better I started having the strange afternoon fevers I have had every now and then. And now I seem to have some sort of chronic dehydration. So strong I had to cut my swim short this morning because veins in my arms felt like they were going to explode and my hands started to get totally numb!

I just don't get it why getting healthy has to be soooo difficult and I'm seriously starting to worry that I may have some sort of real illness but my doctor never wants to take any further interest and check what's going on! Well I have to hope it's just in my head but I seem to sleep right, eat right, not train too much so it feels strange that I always have something going on. The only mistake for sure is I take too much life stress. But I just have to stay positive and that's what I've learnt to do!

end of camp

There might have been better ways to end the camp than ride 40km one-legged into a headwind and uphill! but of course could have been even worse...

On friday my knee/quad was feeling a lot better and I got in a very good hard 2h ride and a run in a crazy strong wind.

Then on Saturday it was time to try something very new: a long run day broken into 3. A good way to get a lot of quality running done without totally overtaxing the legs. Plus I got to icebath between runs so it was great. Also managed to squeeze in a 4K very fast swim in the day too.

Sunday was meant to be hard riding in honour of "L'Enfer du Nord". It was probably the most brutal wind I've ever ridden in. And it didn't help that the day had pretty good climbing in it too! fortunately managed to avoid getting dropped off some cliffs! Needless to say the afternoon was spent watching Boonen win pretty handily.

Monday, my penultimate camp day was my bread and butter "uniting passions" day. I have had too big passions in my life: golf in the past and triathlon now. This ride was spent memorising good moments from the earlier life and riding through the many golf courses around Torrevieja.
Did a good fast run afterwards too.

Today, Tuesday was then my last traing day. The weather was the best is has been and all seemed good on my ride until I arrived at the base of the climb I had planned on doing the test climb. After just a little climbing I felt a very strong pain in my left knee. I saw that my shoe was once again unclipped from the pedal and I just somehow twisted my knee in a very unnatural way making me scream of pain! After inspecting the pedals I noticed that the left one wasn't workng properly at all so no doubt I felt pain! The trip back home pedaling one-legged wasn't easy but the very warm and beautiful weather certainly helped.

It all still looked good at this point...

Once again pain fortunately stopped pretty much after the ride ended so I'm hopeful it is just some minor tear. It seems to be some kind of meniscus tear, but since the pain only comes at very specific points I don't know how serious this is. I did however go buy new pedals afterwards and will spend a couple days off heavy leg work to see I that helps.

Anyway the camp was good. It was filled with ups and downs but I managed to put in some very good work I wouldn't have been able to do back home.

but it's nice to get back home too!

l8ters,

-JH

paying my dues a.k.a Torrevieja camp part dos

I usually don't have things coming to me too easily but ever since I decided a month ago I would go over to the Big Island to race I have had issues thrown into me pretty constantly. I guess the Hawaii gods are after me and I'm not even going over for the Ironman...yet

After couple of good training days my training got literally quite a hit while riding on Sunday. I was already feeling the previous days efforts in my legs and was into another hard ride when all of a sudden my left leg got unclipped from the pedal and I hit my knee into my handlebar. I must really be one of a kind to achieve such a stupid thing and then my quad just completely got locked. I was unable to do anything with the left afterwards and had to pedal home one-legged. All of 45km and boy was that hard (most of it was uphill). One legged drills are great but already my left leg is weaker so I should do them on that one!

Fortunately the wort pain was over pretty quickly Sunday evening and I though it was just a shock my quad had gotten. So Monday morning I went for a ride but had to call it quits after 30mins as the pain was just too big. I went for a swim in the afternoon but felt like sh!t in an overheated pool and being completely demoralized I ran back to the apartment. Had no pain doing it so it was a positive after a one week layoff from the run. Tuesday mornings ride was quite similar but only now the pain started later. Run in the afternoon didn't hurt.

I faced the same story on Wednesday and Thursday but was still able to run and swim well and with no pain. This is just completely weird but a friend suggested that I might have some minor muscle tear in that quad. Hopefully it goes away quickly so I can finish this camp strong and then continue my preparations healthy when I go back home next week.

One thing I discovered today was ice baths after training and those really feel like heaven after a hot day!



Food for me on this camp has been pretty similar as always. Attached is a picture of a killer grilled chicken and carrot-onion-bean mix.



back next time with hopefully a better-working quad!

-JH

Torrevieja Camp part uno

I arrived at Torrevieja Thursday afternoon after an uneventful trip that started at 3AM with driving from Tampere to the Helsinki-Vantaa airport with my awesome sister. Thanks Sara again!

First thing when I arrived at the apartment was of course to put my bike together and go for a ride. I was planning on riding just an easy 1h but riding outside for the first time without 10 layers...and well ended up riding 2h too hard :D And of course I had only eaten a quick on the go breakfast and plastic airline sandwitches so plenty hungry I was afterwards! Fortunately the people renting us the apartment had prepared loads of spaghetti bolognese!
I'm sharing the apartment with two other triathletes Panu Lieto (not relative to Chris I suppose :) who is a top Finnish ITU guy and Tuukka Miettinen who is a top ironman guy! So at least training company isn't too slow :D

Second day was my regular test climb. I have always done the same climb at an almost pass out effort at the beginning and at the end of a camp here. The climb is 11km long and quite steep with sections of 13% or more. Going easy on this climb is not possible so it's a good way to test one's fitness. This time I rode the climb almost 2 minutes faster than best effort last year so at least I've made solid climbing progress without any climbing :D and also my bike now is a lot heavier! After doing the climb I rode at quite a good tempo to make it a 4h10min/123km ride with over 1,5K of climbing. After the ride I went swimming 3,3K to a pool witch water is awefully warm. The swim was pretty toasted but just got the work done.

Third day (saturday) I rode with Panu. We did the same climb I did Friday and effort was quite similar. If nothing else I learned that two tough climbs on back to back days might not be the safest way to start a camp! But fortunately I had recovered enough to make it a good ride today too! 125km and 1,7K climbing. Weather couldn't have been better for starters. Three days of sunshine and about 20C temperatures. Wind is quite strong at times but that just makes stronger legs!

Where's the running? Well I started feeling some dull pain in my left shin again last week back home. I had the same feeling in the leg last fall for a couple of weeks before I got the stress fracture. That time I ran through the pain with no good consequences but fortunately I'm a quick learner and hopefully this time with a little precaution and no running I will avoid further damage!

I have uploaded a couple pictures from the rides taken with my new Olympus . Enjoy them and I talk to you next time!






-JH

P.S. If you're from Finland (and even if you're not) go check out http://swimshoptriathlonchallege.blogspot.com and take on the challenge :D