Open water swim practise!

Today at 10am was the KW Fighting Koalas first open water swim practise! The weather was little bit cooler than it has been with a light drizzle and east wind of less than 10km/h. We finally got into the water around 10:30am and went over some beach starts, then sighting and then rounding buoys. Then exiting the water running up the long hill and then getting the wetsuit off. All good stuff and the Koalas that came out learned a lot, especially the sighting and learning how to pace themselves at the start of the swim.

Then out for a 20km ride. Nothing like getting on the bike with tired swim legs! For some this was a new experience and one member commented on how tired they felt after just doing 20km ride! In a few weeks I will expand the practise to full on transitioning out of the water and unto the bike as quick as possible. The bike for the first 10kms was just to each stop sign. Then at the turnaround it wasget up to race speed back to the park. Still cool and drizzily and good experience for the ones who have not biked in the rain too much. We then packed up and changed into some dry clothes and that was it for today! Next up the Binbrook Du-relay tomorrow!!!

Good week of training for the KW Fighting Koalas

Yes it has been a very good week of training for the KW Fighting Koalas! All of them have been working really hard at practises and on there own. Tuesday night run practise they ran great as we did 2 laps hard including the hill, then 4 laps of progressively faster laps. You know that they are running hard when one of the members is dry heaving off to the side! Then Wednesday nights bike was a challenge for some of them as we did cruise intervals. Started off from Rim Park and heading to Conestogo, then to Crowsfoot road, then out to Maryhill and looped back to Crowsfoot and back home. While riding this route I lead and would increase the speed slowly for about 4 to 5 minutes while we rode in a line. Object was for them to ride faster than they normally do, take them out of their comfort zone, then slow down for a couple of minutes then ramp it back up! Tough workout for a couple of them until they started to realize that they could actually ride that fast. This was then followed by a 20 minute run off the bike, gotta get those legs used to running off the bike, no question.
Then tonight at 8pm was our swim practise. I love coaching on deck. So good to show them good form and do the drills and correct their strokes and to work them to build endurance and some speed! They all our doing really well in the water and up next is this Saturday's open water swim practise. Four to five months of training in the pool for some of them is now coming to fruition as we now get outside and do the open water swims! So much fun. I know they will love it as I truly love swimming in open water. After swimming we plan to go biking for a bit. I believe one of the underrated workouts is the swim/bike brick. I don't think a lot of triathletes really focus on doing this type of workout, but I do and here is why. It can be very difficult some days to ride hard after a swim. Sometimes I get out of the water and my legs feel like lead weights, other times not. So I have been doing alot of biking this year after I have swam. It is a bit harder to get going on the bike after swimming and a lot of races have you running from the water exit to the transition area, sometimes with a hill to climb, not easy.
One of the hardest thing to do for many, including myself, is to get my wetsuit off quickly. This needs to be practised. The more you do it the easier it becomes. Transitions are a key part of races.No need to spend a lot of time in transition. Get in get out!
Bike/run bricks are huge as well and we will be doing more intense brick workouts soon. I've already given them fair warning of what to expect soon. But, they are all doing great and can not wait for them to start racing! Oh yes, this Sunday we have a duathlon relay team entered in the Binbrook tri/du! Cant wait, it will be so much fun. I am doing the bike portion and two others are doing the first and second run. Results to be posted!