A day with coach Kev

Well I'm finally here! I still can't believe how fast this weekend has come. I also can't believe it's already 6:30 PM EST. Where has the time gone?

So for starters, so far my time spent in Nebraska has been fun...but that almost wasn't the case. I arrived Friday night (late of course) thanks to United airlines, and coach picked me up at the curb. My bike had made it in one piece, and my luggage made it too. Once coach picked me up we headed to his gym, a very nice 24 hour fitness. Once at the fitness center coach wanted to see me swim. OH NOOOO!!! "Let me see you swim 100" he said. After I swam a 100 he began to tell me everything I was doing wrong. haha. That's what I came here for right? He videotaped my swim, and played it back to me. All of the sudden I saw how I was swimming, and he then began to show me some drills that would help improve my stroke. I think my main problem is I don't keep my elbow bent as I start to pull. Anyways, we swam (mainly coaching stuff) for about an hour and then changed into our running clothes. A nice path lead straight from the 24 hour fitness center in Omaha, and we ran an easy out and back 40 minutes.

After the run it was time to set up the bike. Coach has a little off-site biking studio equipped with big screen TV, and two Computrainers. It was pretty cool. It was time to take out the bike and get it together for the long indoor ride tomorrow morning. You see, the rain must of followed me from Pittsburgh, and the forecast for Saturday called for rain all day. I began to put my bike together, pedals on, aerobars on, seat clamp on........SNAP!!! The seat clamp sheared right down the middle and broke into two pieces. OH NOOOOO!!!! What now we thought. We had the night to sleep on it, but our options looked pretty grim. Who else in Nebraska has a Felt DA? Bingo, we'll go to the local Felt dealer, and just get him to loan us a seat post clamp for the day. Problem solved! Time to go to bed.

I got a really solid nights sleep and after we woke and ate breakfast, we headed to the studio. Kevin was meeting another tri guy there and told him that the plan was to start at 8:00 AM. No worries Kevin said. You can just run a quick 8 miles while we start our bike ride. I ran a very solid 8 miles and by the time I got back to the studio it was time to head off to the Felt dealer.

It was about a 20 minute drive and we pulled into the parking lot right on schedule. We told the mechanic my situation, and he said you're in luck. I have a 2008 DA bike and you're more than welcome to use it for the day. We took off the clamp and what do you know.......Felt changed the design for 2008. You see my bike is a 2007, and the new clamp would not line up.

Plan B.....we didn't have a plan B. Our plan A was flawless. After much deliberation, we finally came up with an idea. I'll just say it was a combination of Saran wrap, and zip ties. I bet you have never seen an expensive bike held together with Saran wrap!!! I'm sure you'll all laugh at this one, but here are the pictures!
So I was in business. We headed back to the studio and biked on the trainer for just about 4 hours. So in a hard days work I got a solid 5 hours of training in with Coach Kev!

posted by Chad Holderbaum @ 6:23 PM Comments: 1