January training plan

2 of my running events are in January, so my plan was to weight my training toward those.  I’ve been aiming for 5 training sessions a week if possible to include a minimum of 2 runs plus either 2 swims and a cycle or 2 cycles and a swim.  I daren’t run much more than that as I have arthritis and the impact isn’t great for me (hence the reason I run off road).  My weakest discipline is cycling which is ironic in triathlon as being good at it can make a significant improvement to your overall position.

My first swim this year wasn’t great.  I always think you lose swimming fitness the quickest and my arms felt like they had lead weights attached.  The sensible swimmers who had trained more in December cruised passed me.

Almost all my cycling in January has been high intensity spinning at the portacabin we affectionately call the Hut at the back of Plymstock School.  A shameless plug here: the bikes have been painstakingly cleaned and serviced by our coach, Dawn Turner and there is always good banter to be had at one of her classes.  For anyone who hasn’t done spinning, it’s cycling on a stationary bike to music.  You control the resistance on the bike to imitate climbing a hill or doing a sprint or a mixture.  We stand up and sit down to train different muscles and, Dawn’s favourite, do something called a “hover” ie hovering (over the saddle) to work your core.  At least that’s the theory.  I don’t really want to know what my hover looks like.