Catriona Morrison

With July around the corner I feel ready to officially start some triathlon specific training again. I have had a month of consistent aerobic training – 30hrs a week, with one day off for knee TLC. Everything seems to be holding together and for the past two weeks I have been running every alternate day and biking 2 days on, one day off. My calves are on strike and reacting to weight bearing exercise again and I need a few more emergency gears for the bike! This week I am planning fewer hours but some increased intensity to see what happens………

Today I met with Dr Phil Skiba – the man behind Physfarm: coaching and technolgical support for triathletes. I was given the lowdown on how to use my training output data and the physfarm softwear to inform and guide my training schedules. Given that I am currently starting from one step above scratch I am delighted to have some top class advice and support to kick start my return to racing. Phil even took a trip into our garage to check out my bike set-up on my new stealth!

With the racing season well and truly underway it has been hard to be on the sidelines. However, last week was a breakthrough week – not only did I start running again, I got out on the bike on the road for a couple of hours. This week I am looking forward to getting at least one long bike ride done and I’m also hoping to push the running up to 40mins by the end of the week. All going well, there should be some intensity entering the training plan soon and dare I say it?! – some race plans….stay posted!

The weather continues to amaze and I am still sucking it up in the gym. This week managed a total of 30hrs training and one day off. Almost all indoors asides from an hour (yes a whopping 60mins) on the turbo in the garden yesterday. Still on rehab duties so being out on the road is verbotten. Hopefully that will change after I see the surgeon this Tuesday. There may be some running action coming my way….

The weather outside is gorgeous: blazing sun and blue skies. Meanwhile, I seem to be spending most of my daylight hours within the boundaries of the pool or the gym. I guess that there is no risk of sunburn but I am starting to empathise with the populations of hamsters out there who go round and round on the spot! The good news is that I am now up to 20min on the bike without any discomfort and heading for the big 30 this afternoon. Hopefully I will be able to start thinking of racing again sometime soon……”