Coach Iron Pete - Men's Success for Tough Times

I still see so many people in this country (USA) willfully locked down since early last year. It is a shame that they have allowed fear to overrule their judgement and critical thinking processes. And I'm talking about healthy, younger people here, not the ones that are old and frail. I recently took a trip to Aruba. My aging parents (79 and 72 years old) have a timeshare down there and booked airline tickets early after I made an initial analysis of the #Covid19 situation. And they invited me to come, in which I said yes. Living the life in Aruba For a short background, I have been a scientist of a consumer products company with exposure to the FDA for 12 years before I became a coach, so statistics and analytical reasoning is my strength. I'm not "blowing this out of my ass" like some people claim when I tell them that the #Pandemic is overblown. Everything evolves around the CDC figures. Namely, 99.8% of the people survive this virus if infected. For my parents...

There are a lot of evidence that suggests that a regimen of good health, diet, exercise, and Vitamin D is enough to ward off Covid-19 Just like any other viruses that came along in the past.   I've posted the evidence multiple times before. Treat your body well, and it will treat you well in kind.

Note: Men, one of the best things you need to do in becoming strong is to be productive. Time management is HUGE in this regard. If you get a handle on this issue below, you will be well on your way to taking your time back and being efficient again! How many people do you know spend most of their times in front of a screen? Phones, desktops, laptops, you name it, a lot of people live and die with what happens in front of a screen.   I believe that there is such thing as internet addiction. With so much information at your fingertips, it has a "sensory overload effect", numbing and scattering your thoughts to the winds. This will render you largely unproductive.   And it's having a very negative effect on society. All of our genuine bonds between family and friends have been frayed or even destroyed by our "new connections" to the internet. The internet was supposed to be the game changer that was supposed to bring all of us together, make us a lot more producti...

This excellent article comes from a women's website from the UK. I'm not surprised to see this because it is women that are the most resistant to a certain "mystery liquid in needle form" if you get my drift.  Most women do know that there seems to be a chance that this lethal liquid  can render a woman sterile as the it  can develop antibodies that can attack the proteins that develop the placenta during pregnancy. Please look at all viewpoints so that you can make well-educated decisions on whether to get the vac...er, the liquid or not. https://bit.ly/37yOzZZ https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/covid-fascists-are-demonising-the-non-vaccinated/

Most men need to be healthy and be productive in order to be happy. I know it's an insult in some ways, but we're tools. 😁 I mean it as a compliment though! We need to give ourselves goals so that we, as tools, can be used to work towards that goal.   We're only useful when we are being used. Not that kind of used! But used in a productive way in which we are proud of our results. A lot of men have lost that usefulness in 2020 as their goals were either destroyed by government lockdowns or forcibly modified as a result of this "new normal." As with the former, we are goal oriented creatures, and we lose that motivation when the goal is removed. A tool that just sits there isn't making itself useful. As with the latter, sometimes the new goals don't reflect what we are used to doing, and we feel at best awkward when trying for these modified goals. Using a knife to loosen a screw doesn't work very well, doesn't it; a knife is used in cutting things...

 So I heard the Super Bowl happened yesterday. I only know because I'm hearing Tom Brady getting flak from angry people that he wasn't wearing a mask. Folks, I give you real evidence of what you do NOT want to be if you want to be a strong leader during tough times, these angry people. These people are always looking at other peoples' business and being perpetually angry about every little thing. First off, stop wasting time looking at other people. Focus on yourself instead. Remember that self-improvement is the most important priority that you have to address in order to be successful. Secondly, stop being angry all the time. Anger is a negative emotion, and it is easy to convey that anger to others. People can sense it, and will try to avoid you whenever possible. You need to be a beacon of light, not an infectious carrier of darkness. Having a positive attitude around others will make other people gravitate towards you. Yes, you can still be angry sometimes, ...

 I got back from my wintry run this morning in time to see the whole Punxsutawney Phil "celebration" on television. What a sad state of affairs. 19 years ago, I and some other runners in my club went down to Punxsutawney to see the spectacle in person. Gobblers Notch was a little outside of the town, and there were buses that took us from the town to Gobblers Notch. Groundhog's Day past - huge enthusiastic crowds! The overnight festivities were awesome. It was cold when we were there, so there was a lot of alcohol that was passed around that night. If you think of it as a metal concert, complete with mosh pit, this came close. The crowd was cheering the loudest when they took Phil out, and derisively booed him when he said that we had 6 more weeks of winter to go. It was all in good fun though. This year? When watching it on television, the first thought in my head? How sad. No wild crowds, no enthusiastic cheering. Just a virtual ceremony. It was so quiet there!...

    I'll be posting a separate blog for Men's advice, strength, and fitness apart from the endurance training blog. I think the two are related but are significantly different, and that warrants a separate blog page. Creating a new blog page away from the Google Sphere is a bit more complex than expected, so I'm going to temporarily repurpose one of my older blogs to accommodate the new direction we're going. I'll hopefully be getting a more permanent blog in either this week or next; I promise to keep people in the loop here. I've had one long time friend commit suicide when he was fired from his job. We didn't talk for about 5 years but it came as a big blow last year. I also had to talk one "off the ledge", so to speak. He's a local bartender here and was also recently let go from the job when the restaurant went tits up under the Cuomo authoritarian regime here. He also went through a very nasty divorce. Luckily we put our heads together an...

So, I have this conundrum about The Beast Series , and now I'm back to square one again. Everything has to do with transportation to Virginia. I do not want to drive for 8 hours to an ultra, do the exhausting race, then drive the 8 or so hours back to Staten Island. That leaves 2 options, commercial transportation and carpooling. Commerical transportation is a stretch at best. The best option is Amtrak, and the earliest train arrives at 8:30PM before the race (pdf) . The race venue is 25 miles away from the start, so that puts me in a bind. Renting a car is an option, but an expensive one. The bottom line is that commercial transportation turns out to be not very feasible when it comes to expense. So that is out. That leaves carpooling. I honestly don't know of anyone in the NY/NJ area who is doing The Beast Series. I will send some feelers out to see if anyone else here is doing it, but it doesn't look good. So that leaves me with my original plan. Forget about The Beast ...

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off Off - - - - - 0 Bike Off - - - - - - 0 Run 4mi. 10mi. - - - - - 14mi. March 1 - AM Workout - 10 mile run Course: Bayonne Bridge Time: 1:32:55  Pace: 9:18 min/mile Weather: Northerly wind on way out with fierce headwinds on the Bayonne Bridge. Coming back was much easier with wind at the back. Comments: 47:28 going out, 45:26 coming back. Definitely wind aided on the return trip. Legs were strong throughout the run. I never felt any tiredness from the 21 mile run 2 days ago.

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off - - - - - - 0 Bike Off - - - - - - 0 Run 4mi. - - - - - - 4mi. Monday February 28 - AM Workout - 4 mile run Course: College Ave. Time: 38:45 Comment: Rest day from 21 mile run yesterday. Will be doing a longish run tomorrow after the easy day today.

Second Mesocycle is from January 10 to February 6 This 4 week period concentrates on holding my running to about 45 miles per week. I hope to break 50 miles on the third week, then recover on the 4th week with lower mileage. This should help set myself up with a nice strong base for the rigorous build phases that come after this 4 week period is over. The bike and swim, support disciplines at this time, will remain about the same weekly mileage (4000-5000m of swimming, and 50-60 miles of cycling per week). Weight training is still 2 days per week, with all 4 weeks in its strengthening phase. In summary, here is the portion of the training framework I'll be concentrating on...the swim is in meters, the bike and run are in miles.

This first 4 week period, or mesocycle, was designed to "get back into the routine" of training again. Did I achieve this goal? Yes I did. There were some hiccups along the way, with a big one happening when that epic snowstorm hit right after Christmas, but the hours of shoveling I did *was* a workout in itself, and, although it cannot be officially posted in my training journal, does have to be mentioned. And, although I did not finish the ultra, I can take to account that I did finish 21 miles on a very slippery, snowy, and rough-footed course in 20 degree weather. I have always been vunerable when the thermometer dips below 30 degrees, so I feel that I am really toughening up here. I am sure that if I'm met with the same conditions in the future, I can definitely tackle it better. I have found good rhythm to my daily routine and hope to continue it to the next 4 week period.

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off 2000m Off 1000m 5000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi 10mi 10mi Off Off 50mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi Off 21mi 6mi 40mi AM Workouts: 1000 meter swim and 6 Mile run on the treadmill No stats on the swim, 1:03:00 on the 6 mile run. Both training was done very easy, all designed to loosen up a pair of tight legs from the run yesterday. And with that, I finish the 4 week training period and start the next tomorrow (January 10).

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off 2000m Off - 4000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi 10mi 10mi Off Off 50mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi Off 21mi - 34mi RACE: WATCHUNG WINTER ULTRA Result: Did not finish (finished 2 of 3 laps for 21 miles) Conditions: Hazardous ice rutted trails covered with newer snow. Weather: Cloudy sunless day with temps ranging from 18 to 26 degrees. Little wind. Time: 5 hours 15 minutes. Pace was 15 min/mile. I had to make the decision to stop after 2 laps and is never easy to do so. These were easily the toughest conditions I've ever been on, although I have a feeling that this is the norm in the ultra world and that these conditions are tame considering where other ultras are held. That's OK though. Training in tough conditions will help me toughen up, right? Who knows, maybe I'll be out there one year at the Arrowhead 135 in northern Minnesota with temps as cold as 10 degrees below zero because of this race, right? Still, the positives I can take from thi...

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off 2000m - - 4000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi 10mi 10mi Off Off 50mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi Off - - 13mi PM Workout: 10 mile bike opn Computrainer Course: Apple Duathlon (miles 0-10) Time: 32:02 Speed: 18.7 MPH Avg. Watts: 180 This workout was a final tuneup before the Watchung Ultra 50k tomorrow. With this, I have finished my cycling for this week. The ultra tomorrow would be a good first tune-up to the 100 milers later this year. If I do well here, it would be a good sign that I am on track right now just 4 weeks into my training. Wish me luck.

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off 2000m - - 4000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi 10mi - - - 40mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi Off - - 13mi AM Workout: 2000 meters of swimming, including 5x200m free with fins with 30 seconds rest in between reps. 200m times: 2:43, 2:46, 2:46, 2:45, and 2:44. Rest of workout was 800 meter warmup and 200 meter cooldown. As for weight training, even though it's a day before the ultra, the training was normal and pulled no punches. Even though 50k is a lot of mileage I cannot keep my eye off the big prizes, Massanutten and Leadville. If that means I go a bit slower on tomorrow's 50k, so be it.

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off - - - 2000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi 10mi - - - 40mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi - - - 13mi Thursday PM, Bike on Computrainer Course: Ironman New Zealand (Miles 0-10) Time: 34:18 Speed: 17.5 MPH Avg Watts: 180 A very short session on the bike today. From here on in, all sessions are short until the 50k run on Saturday. That will be an extremely long session. :-)

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off Off - - - 2000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi - - - - 30mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi 4mi - - - 13mi AM Workout this morning was a 4 mile run on Richmond Ave. toward the Staten Island Mall. Course is flat. Time: 37:43 Pace: 9:26 min/mile Try to keep it real easy since this is my last run before the Watchung 50k Ultra. Weather conditions for ultra...tomorrow is predicted 1-3 inches of snow, which shouldn't affect my race. Praying it stays that way.

M Tu W Th F Sa Su Total Swim Off 2000m Off - - - - 2000m Bike 15mi. Off 15mi - - - - 30mi Run 4mi. Off 5mi - - - - 13mi 15 miles of cycling on the Computrainer Course: Ironman Canada, Miles 0-15 Time: 55:34 MPH: 16.2 Avg Watts: 180 The beginning of the course has some very noticeable hills. Otherwise, this was a pretty nice workout. I have 20 miles of cycling to go this week, all easy due to the upcoming ultra.