End of season down time and Start of season ramp up!!

Gosh, it has been such a long time since I have post on this site but life has just been so busy! Adam returned from his tour of duty in the first week of November and it was such a joy to have him home. Of course, my schedule has now become a lot busier as I have other things to do of an evening than just train and I have to think about his needs as well as my own. So these first few weeks have been a bit of a juggling act especially as Adam has had post-deployment leave so has all day at home by himself so by the time the evening comes round he wants to get out and do things whereas I either need to train or am knackered! We had booked a holiday so that I could get a proper break from training and say goodbye to the 2010 season and so Adam could have a bit of a relax after having worked 24-7 for the last five months.

We headed off for two weeks in Cuba which was just what we needed and we had a fantastic time. Training was chilled out but consistent. We run for 30-60minutes every morning along the beach and coastal path which was warm even at 7am, did some press ups and sit ups and then finished off with a dip in the sea. A pretty blissful way to start your day off! We took some time out from our resort to drive the length of Cuba up to Havana (our tour guides thought we were bonkers) which was an amazing way to see the country and Havana itself is really interesting. We took a tour of the Partagas cigar factory and Adam indulged himself in a number of Cuba's finest! Getting back was a bit of a shock as the country seems to have entered a deep freeze! Leaving Cuba in sunny 30 degree heat to return at 6.30am into a dark Manchester with the mecury hovering around -5degrees was not such a happy welcome home! I returned back to work the next day to find I have been posted up to Lincolnshire which is great news. Adam started up there early last week and we have had all our fingers and toes crossed that my posting officer will find somewhere up north for me too so that I can join him. I start my new job on January 17th and life is more and more hectic! We are both in new jobs, trying to find a new house, preparing for Xmas and thinking about getting a dog, so training is being squashed in around everything as best I can.

The Lanzarote Ultra however looms ever closer so I have tried to remain as focused as I can. Cycling is still pretty much non-existent however I am up to 5miles in the pool and this week will attempt my first 10k pool swim. This was a target I wanted to meet before Xmas so all appears to be on track. Running is going ok too, I am upto a 30mile run split over two days. So yesterday I ran for 20miles and today I was run the remainder. Having spoken to a lot of respected ultra runners this is apparently the kindest way to get your body used to the endurance required for long distance running. Doing a 30-40mile run straight off means you are more likely to be injured and will certainly need a long recovery period whereas doing a 20-25mile run one day followed up with a 10mile run the next means the recovery is much quicker and also you get used to the feeling of running tired. I have to say I have no real ill effects for doing the 20miler yesterday and feel ready to go again for the ten miles this afternoon. Other than that I am just trying to sort logistics and keep calm!! I cannot wait for Xmas - Adam and I am heading home on an epic road trip to France to see my parents and it'll be lovely to see them and my sister and eat, drink and be merry!

Banning Channel Swimming....?!!

According to a news report on the BBC last night, 'Channel Swimming should be banned according to French Coastguards' with swims being likened to a pedestrian attempting to cross the M25! To be fair this shouldn't come as a surprise as the French banned Calais-Dover Channel swim crossings over 17 years ago. However, fingers crossed no-one on the British side listens too hard, at least until August next year has passed!!

Reflections on the Daily Swim Challenge.

Firstly, here are the stats from the last month:

Week 1 (Days 1-9): 11,250m
Week 2 (Days 10-16): 22,500m
Week 3 (Days 17-23): 35,000m
Week 4 (Days 24-31): 56,000m (extra 250m just to round up the session on the last day to 8,000m!)

Total for October: 124,750m.

I must admit I was actually shocked by how much I had managed to swim - nearly 125kms or a little of 78miles is just shy of an IM distance swim on average every day. I am really really pleased with this swim block and really think it will help contribute to the success of the challenge.

However, this swim really was about quantity over quality and I spent a lot of time just finding a rhythm and churning out the lengths. This is ok up to a point as that is ultimately what I will be doing when I finally swim the Channel however, going forward it will now also be important to build up to some proper structured sets with time trials to measure progress, drills to improve technique and speed work to build overall speed and give me a few fast twitch fibres for when the command to 'Sprint' finally comes!

There were many positives to take away from the challenge. It helped improve my mental strength as I had to find the motivation to go and exercise every, single day without fail and I had to learn to complete some pretty long and boring sets plodding up and down the pool. Surprisingly this have never been SO much of an issue for me. I love to train in the pool and on the treadmill, I like the consistent environment, the constant calculation of new statistics and the distraction of whatever's on the tv! Plus it's always warm and I always have access to loos, nutrition etc! But I do know that I will need to get used to both running and swimming outdoors and my key sessions will always be done in this environment so I can begin to understand the challenges of the race.

The swim challenge has also improved my efficiency and feel for the water. Even during the longest of swims I rarely felt tired and especially on the long evening swims felt strong and smooth in the water. I need to swim at least three times a week, preferably four or five to try and maintain the type of efficiency I have built up. My shoulder strength has also hopefully improved. I have also managed to lose nearly 11lbs during the month which is a huge bonus. I wanted to try and keep a restricted calorie amount whilst training hard in swimming(something I am less comfortable doing during heavy run periods as I believe the immune system gets so depleted it needs more support from food and its requisite vitamins and minerals). As I am training so hard I normally justify that I can eat whatever I want which means I have never lost weight even during the hardest periods of training but it would certainly help the run if I can be lighter so I will continue to restrict a little until I am somewhere between 10 and 10.5 stone (about 3lbs away) and then look to maintain that weight and see how it feels.

I am certainly looking forward to a more varied approach to training but I really enjoyed the challenge and it has made me appreciated that swimming is my first love and, having neglected it so heavily, to focus predominantly on biking for the Double, I look forward to putting many hours and miles in over the next nine months!

Hallowe'en and the conquer of 1/6th of the A2A - Part 2!

After the second set of 80lengths I stopped for half a fig roll as a treat and then proceeded to start on the 40s - the first of which was pull. This forty lengths I thought about all my amazing sponsors and the support they have given me over the last year and the support they are continuing to give as the A2A grows ever closer. I also thought about the charities I am choosing to sponsor, notably HULA which is the closest to my heart as I volunteer there and see first hand the difference people's charitable donations make - SPONSOR HULA!! (www.justgiving.com/rachaelcadmanHULA). The next 40lengths I though about my family notably my Mum who has supported all my endurance events including crewing through the night at the Double - I remember how absolutely dead tired she was when I finished. I also thought of my Aunty Sally who is having to start a new chapter in her life after losing my Uncle last month. I may have mentioned that I though a lot about my Uncle whilst I did the Channel relay and asked him to look out for me and I did feel his presence out there on the wind. The second to last 40lengths I thought about my fiance, Adam and how much I love him and how lucky I am to have him in my life. I giggled along in my head as I remembered speaking to him last week and saying I was having real problems keeping my mouth shut when I swim - I sort of enjoy funneling water through my teeth(!) - I've always done it but it is not going to work in the sea where the salt will ravage the inside of my mouth and throat! He sighed despairingly and said, "See you're a real life whale, floating along sifting for plankton" - Charming!! That's love for you right there!! And the last 40lengths were foe me - thinking about the A2A and how I am going to cope with it mentally and how positive I am about how today has gone as I felt really strong throughout the swim and surprisingly not at all bored during it as I had feared. I did the last 1,000m at pace to try and mimic how I would feel if I was told I needed to 'sprint' during the Channel swim as can sometimes happen if the pilot is trying to 'break' the swimmer through a strong tide. And I still stayed strong, managed to pick up the pace a finished a really happy bunny! The eagle-eyed amongst you will note that I swam 8,000m tonight instead of my alloted 7,750m. The OCD in me did struggle with that as I wanted to do the target no more no less but I reasoned that I often swim a few lengths at the end of a session anyway (again the OCD in me making sure I have done the whole amount in case I miscounted a length or two somewhere) so really doing 8,000m tonight was ok. I wanted to round it up to 8,000m (5miles) as give or take with the Isle of Wight that is my longest swim to date and I am really chuffed by how easy it felt. My feel for the water is much improved and though I still worry about my low stroke rate I can feel how strong I am getting in the water. Reflections on the whole swim challenge will come in the next post but it has been a great experience.

Lastly, the best thing happened as I did my traditional few extra lengths at the end 'just in case'. The pool at my gym has glass walls and just as I was moseying along enjoying the last few lengths of cool down, the local park opposite began its fireworks display! Now I am a massive fireworks fan and 'ooh and ahhh' with the best of them so it was like a wonderful celebration of the completion of the challenge. I floated along on my back just watching the explosions of colour and feeling pretty content with the world!!

Roll on November!

Hallowe'en and the conquer of 1/6th of the A2A!

So today as I have said, I wanted to try and complete 1/6th of the A2A by running 14.5miles this morning and following it up with the last of the swim challenge, 7,750m, this evening. Fair eough there's no cycling but we can't have everything! The clocks going back allowed a leisurely wake-up and by 8am I was munching on porridge with raisins and syrup. By 9.20 I was in the gym and ready to start my run. The plan was to do 9min run/1min walk for the first two hours and then switch to 5min run/1min walk for the remainder. The first hour was probably the hardest but the second hour went well. Switching to 5:1 ratio at that point was a good idea as I could start feeling myself fatigue. The longest run I've done since the Double is 11miles so this is a step up. Still just over 2.5hours later I was done. First part of the day, check! Back home to refuel and have a short 75mins nap.

Part 2 of the challenge was the final session of my month of swims - 7,750ms. By 4.20 I was back in the pool and with provisions (1xH30 Pro, 1 x Orange Squash, 1 x Fig Roll) stacked neatly by the side I was off. I felt really really good during the swim - strong and smooth with a good feel for the water. I remember I felt the same in my evening swim post-run last Sunday which is encouraging for the A2A and means I am recovering well. I decided to do 2 x 80 length and then 4 x 40length alternating pull and full stroke. The first 80 passed quickly and with a quick swig of juice I was onto the second. People often ask me what I think about during long swims and it can be any manner of things but today I decided I would have a set figure of support or inspiration to think of during each section. The first 80lengths were dedicated to my friend Mimi Anderson (www.marvellousmimi.com) who is the most inspirational ultra-runner I know and who has just broken the WR for the furthest distance completed by a woman on a treadmill in seven days. Mimi only took up running in her forties and her journey is quite incredible - just check out her blog for the massive list of her achievements. We first met in 2006 when we both competed in the Libyan Challenge. I think Mimi was first woman home, I think I was second to last! It was my first foray into ultra events and her advice, support and humour made the whole experience a pleasure! Anyway, just before I went out I needed some motivation so went and looked on her blog for the video posted last weekend of her in the last two minutes of her run (completed may I add on a broken foot) and that was all I needed to get me heading straight for the pool. So she was a great help today and got me through those first 2,000m. The second 80lengths was dedicated to the two wonderful (and competing!) forums I use - tritalk and runnersworld. I have met a number of people from both sites 'in real life' and they are nothing but supportive of my crazy ventures - always leaving messages of support and following what I'm up to. A runnersworld forumite 'Symes' first planted the seed of the daily swim by completing the same thing but running based - 1km x day of the month. I think he got the raw end of the deal but I'm sure most runners would disagree!

Day 31!

So it's the morning of the last day of this crazy swim challenge and I am just loading up on porridge in advance of what is going to be a tough old day. I want to replicate 1/6 of the A2A run and swim today so in an hour or so I am off to run 14.5miles on the treadmill and then this evening sees 7,750m of swimming and the end of the infamous swim challenge. After which I am going to have a nice glass of wine to celebrate. Having not drunk all month it'll probably floor me! Still I've lost nearly a stone since Adam again at the end of September which I am chuffed with! I'll let you know how it goes.......!

Powered by figs....!

So the swims continue! Over the last few days it has been very weird swimming in the pool on camp as a lifesaving course is also being held there. On Thursday I was swimming along minding my own business when I noticed a prone plastic figure submerged on the bottom of the pool. Obviously it was apparent that is wasn't real but it was a bit disconcerting (especially given my weirdness about things under the water) to have to swim back and forth over this little drowned figure!

I was going to save a post on lessons learnt from the swim challenge month until after the conclusion of the big swim on Sunday and I will come back to the topic then but I realised today that endurance events are slowly but surely teaching me to be more 'present'. I am constantly planning, organising and scheduling future events that I hardly take the time to be happy in the moment and appreciate my life NOW! I find this is very pronounced when I am doing long sessions especially in the pool. During long runs it usually hurts too much for me to have much time contemplating but during these longs swims I have found myself always trying to rush through the training to get to the next thing on my list. I'm not scared of really long training sessions, in fact I really enjoy the challenge of 'going long' but I view the time spent training for such events in a peculiar manner. It's not resentful of the time spent as such but like I said I am always focusing so much on what's next, what other things I need to accomplish in the day, that I am not really concentrating and thinking about the training I am doing then and wishing that 5kms took only 10mins to do not 90!

Some people would see doing a 3hr swim say as a real challenge, I don't view it like that at all - the training doesn't both me, it is the time spent doing it that does. And I don't even mean I resent the time spent because I could be using it to do better things like clean the house, spend time with my fiance, catch up with a friend, I mean I 'resent' (not quite the right word) it because it is stopping me from getting on with the next thing on my list. Weird eh?! Anyway, doing these events is help me to develop my patience and to appreciate what I am doing in the here and now instead of always rushing off to the next thing in my day!

Two more big days of swimming to go. Figs got me through the days today, strange though they are. I got some dried figs in the supermarket the other week because I love dried fruit but if I get apricots I can literally eat a whole bag of them in one go which has literally hundreds of calories and a lot of sugar. I don't quite like figs as much and they are pretty filling so I am satisfied after about three which is a normal snack size. Anyway, had a few before my lunchtime swim of 4,250m and then had a fig roll (the endurance biscuit of champions for cyclists out on a long ride) before my evening 3,000m. No unpleasant side effects as of yet! ;)

Two days to go........!!