I have been squeezed for time the past two days so I skipped my physio exercises.  Seems that was a mistake!  Last night I started feeling really tight in my left hip and back and this morning, my SI joint was really sore on the left side.

I was a good boy and did all my exercises today, and afterward, it felt a lot looser.  It still gave me a bit of a twinge if I finished with too much layback.  Probably useful since I need to be more consistent and use a bit less layback in general.

The session for today is one that I have done at least 3 times now.  I like it.  At r24, it’s pretty easy to crank out 500s.  They sting a bit at the end, but you can really focus on stroke mechanics because the rate and pace are pretty reasonable.

The target pace for these was 1:52.

To make the setup simple, I programmed this as 500m intervals and 1′ rests.  Then after 5 hard intervals, I did the next one as a very light pause drill, stopping at body over on every stroke and trying to isolate and feel the body recovery.  I ended up cheating myself out of about 20 seconds of the 5 minute rest this way, but there was plenty of recovery time.

I started with a 2k warmup with 4 x 300m or easy and 200m of hard.

          Workout Summary - media/20180110-1436060o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02000|07:56.0|01:59.1|211.2|20.0|145.4|160.0|12.6
W-|02000|07:56.0|01:59.2|207.2|19.7|144.7|160.0|13.0
R-|00000|00:00.0|00:00.0|000.0|00.0|000.0|160.0|00.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00300|01:13.6|02:02.7|177.9|15.9|109.7|129.0|15.4
01|00200|00:46.0|01:55.0|223.7|21.4|137.9|144.0|12.2
02|00300|01:15.4|02:05.6|182.2|17.8|146.2|147.0|13.4
03|00200|00:44.7|01:51.7|252.1|23.6|147.2|151.0|11.4
04|00300|01:14.6|02:04.3|185.7|17.9|153.5|154.0|13.5
05|00200|00:44.3|01:50.7|251.2|23.5|154.1|156.0|11.5
06|00300|01:14.2|02:03.7|189.8|18.3|158.3|159.0|13.2
07|00200|00:44.0|01:50.1|257.5|24.7|158.1|160.0|11.0

Then I tightened the foot straps, programmed the PM, and got going.  Not much to report.  I was really trying to hold both rate and pace, while focusing on fast hands away and full body recovery before breaking my knees.  It wasn’t too hard, but I was glad when the 5′ breaks came along.

          Workout Summary - media/20180110-1435320o.csv
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|-Pwr-|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|11037|50:31.0|02:17.3|186.9|21.8|149.4|167.0|10.0
W-|07500|27:57.0|01:51.8|252.0|23.5|149.6|166.0|11.4
R-|03546|18:33.0|02:36.9|076.3|19.1|150.6|166.0|07.0
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|-Pwr-|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-
00|00500|01:50.1|01:50.1|246.7|23.8|137.3|158.0|11.5
01|00500|01:53.2|01:53.2|251.9|24.2|148.8|161.0|11.0
02|00500|01:51.6|01:51.6|250.9|23.9|150.0|161.0|11.2
03|00500|01:51.4|01:51.4|252.5|24.1|152.4|164.0|11.2
04|00500|01:51.7|01:51.7|247.2|23.0|153.6|165.0|11.7
05|00500|01:52.5|01:52.5|252.0|23.4|140.7|160.0|11.4
06|00500|01:51.3|01:51.3|253.9|23.8|150.8|162.0|11.3
07|00500|01:51.4|01:51.4|255.7|23.2|152.2|164.0|11.6
08|00500|01:52.1|01:52.1|246.0|23.7|153.3|164.0|11.3
09|00500|01:52.5|01:52.5|252.4|23.6|154.0|163.0|11.3
10|00500|01:51.5|01:51.5|253.7|22.8|139.2|158.0|11.8
11|00500|01:51.6|01:51.6|256.7|23.5|149.9|163.0|11.4
12|00500|01:51.8|01:51.8|255.6|23.0|152.0|165.0|11.6
13|00500|01:51.9|01:51.9|248.9|23.2|154.0|165.0|11.5
14|00500|01:52.4|01:52.4|255.5|23.8|154.8|166.0|11.2

Compared to last week.  My HR was running a bit higher today, not sure why.  Last time I opted to push the pace on the last one, I didn’t today.

After I finished, I was curious to see if all the effort I was putting in to technique was actually doing something or if I was just deluding myself.  Somewhere in between, I think.

I still have to hold the knees down longer.  Here’s the offending screen capture.  Arms bent, body halfway there, but knees already up.  Bad Greg!

Tomorrow:  4×20′ / 3′ Cat VI, r18, 2:05