Best Triathlete Follow up + Bike Test #2 of the season a success!

Friends and family,

Welcome back and thanks for catching up. There are a few good links imbedded in this post I encourage you to click to. Some of racing and some of great product (that I am not in anyway paid to endorse!!!!)

As a follow up to my previous post re: Best Triathlete ever; thanks for the few emails. Seems pretty much 50/50 - people say Simon or Macca. I will say this, the best 3 finishes I have seen in triathlon all belong to Simon; Sydney, Beijing, and with $200,000 on the line wins a 4 way sprint in Des Moines Iowa. All 3 finishes Simon was dropped and got back on, then won. Yeah, our boy from Kingston's a stud for sure! And too boot, a really approachable genuine guy.

Training update:

this morning I did my second bike test of the year. I am following the Vision Quest Coaching protocol whereby I get a really good warm up in, hit an interval up to a hard effort, recover then do a "step test" of 3 minute intervals one after the other adding 20 watts each interval. So, 3mins at 200 watts; 3 mins at 220 watts and so on until failure. Below are some snap shots from my CycleOps Joule 2.0 computer to show the progression from this morning's effort. The final interval actually felt pretty good but I don't think another 20 watt jump was available to me, I was getting pretty out there physically.

What's important to for the upcoming season is the improvement from the January 21st test. January 21 my last 3 intervals were 301, 315, and 325 watts vs. here being 300, 320, 350. In other words, I made a 7 to 7.5% jump in 6 weeks. That won't be replicated! It will look more like 1 to 2% increases I suspect through to the main races of the season.

Quite happy with the results, now it is time for some food!!!!

MACCA - maybe the best ever Triathlete?

Inspiration comes in many forms in my sporting pursuits. When I really need some juice to get going I will hit you tube and look for something. Usually that is in the form of a really good boxing match. This blog won't be about that but for those sports fan reading, I recommend you do a You Tube search on these key words "Ward, Gotti, Round 9, HBO". And yes, Ward is the same Ward The Fighter movie is about. That round is quite possibly the greatest round of boxing ever. Better than Hearns vs Sugar Ray; better than Ali vs. Foreman; Better than Holyfield vs. Bowe; it's an epic battle of 2 warriors.

Which brings me to this blog. MACCA is a champ and a big boxing fan. I was listening to some interviews on them trusty podcasts this week about his meticulous preparation, his focus on how to beat the 'threats' and his views on the history of the sport.

Yesterday Inside Triathlon magazine listed their top 15 triathletes of all time. Sadly, they forgot Peter Reid who is frankly, LEGEND. But included were the greats; Simon Whitfield, Simon Lessing, Hamish Carter, Mark Allen and Dave Scott, Crowie and Macca to name a few. It got me thinking top 3, which got me thinking can anyway claim to be ON TOP ahead of Mark Allen?? Is that possible? Mark won ITU World's, Nice (when Nice mattered) and Kona 6 times. He won everything! But here is my argument that MACCA sits a top Allen as The Best.

Depth of competition.

Lets face it, Allen was beating Hellreigel, Kiru and co. His most famous win was Dave Scott on Dave's best day; but, his competition in Kona was only 3 to 5 deep. His competition in ITU was only really 10 deep. The sport was new, he was the best, and proved it every weekend. Macca on the other hand? Like Allen MACCA is an ITU world Champion and Kona Champion and winner of key prestigous races around the world like Roth , IM Germany, Wildflower. But Macca's competition is STIFF! When he was ITU world champ he was beating 20 deep competition then Australia screwed him and he missed out on the Sydney Olympics and a new star was born; Simon Whitfield! So MACCA turns to long course, gives the finger to the Australian federation and kicks ass for 10 years. At first Kona beat him year in and year out just like Allen, just like a boxer in a real war, to only conquer it in 2007. He repeats in 2010. What is different though is depth in Kona vs. when Allen raced. 15 deep every year in Kona. 15 guys each year can win that race now vs. 3 to 5 in the 90's when Allen raced it.

How good is MACCA? 2010 proved in the 15 minutes of the video below that when the boxer gets hit and punished and pushed to the limit, THE BEST fight like THE BEST and win.

Now, what would be the dream "match". The big "fight" in Kona terms? Remember that guy I mentioned Simon Whitfield? Yeah, I would love to see the Kona lava fields with his leg speed...then maybe a new blog can be written.....-:) But, being Canadian I sure am glad his focus in London 2012!

I vote MACCA the best ever (till 2012 or 2013 anyway) and 2010 we finally had a Kona finish worthy of big time "best round" racing!

Thoughts and debate are welcome!

And thanks Macca...I might just get in the pool this spring-:)