Granted, I cheated during the 300 yard kick and did a breast stroke kick the whole time. Hey, my kick sucks and it would take me 30 minutes to kick that whole thing.

The Aquaman Super-Hero 3,000 Yard Swim Workout

500 yds Free
4 X 100 Free on 2’
2 X 3 X 50-yd Drill (each 50 yds do Fingertip, Fist, and Catch-up Drill; then repeat)
400 yds Free — Build by 50s (start slow and with each “50” go a bit faster)
400 yds Free — Swim Steady (comfortable exercise pace)
300 yds Kick (with board, zoomers, fins or on side)
500 yds Pull-buoy with Restricted Breathing (RB) by 50s (on each successive 50, breathe every 2, 3, 5 and 7 breaths stroke
200 yds Warm Down (easy swim)

Enjoy!

So I got an email the other day that went something like this…

“Hey Jamie, remember the Phonak pro cycling team?”

“Yeah! Floyd Landis is the man! What a BAMF!”

“Agreed. Well Phonak primarily makes hearing aids, but they have some pretty sick earphones. Wanna test ‘em out?”

“Heck yes I do!”

Unlike last winter when I was still teaching spinning classes a few times per week, I’ve been spending a TON more time listening to music by myself on the bike trainer (and even more once I really ramp up my running) so I thought this would be the perfect piece of new gear to review. Soon I got a nice surprise in the mail and started putting ‘em through the SwimBikeRun product testing gauntlet.

Introducing the Phonak PFEs.

PFE stands for “perfect fit earphones.”

For such tiny little earphones, they sure promised a lot (a perfect fit and and incredible sound quality – without the distraction of ambient noise) so I wasn’t really sure what to expect.  After poking around and finding some pretty impressive reviews, including this one from CNet, I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I tried to stay as unbiased as I could and give ‘em a fair shake.

Giving ‘em a good sweat test on the trainer.

FIT/COMFORT TESTING:

Pretty tiny, right? The wires are held back behind your ears by these thin silicone ear guides (little plasticy tubes which can be easily taken off if you want). They are really light and comfortable, but most importantly of all, with the ear guides you don’t have to worry about the earphones jumping out of your ears while you are running.

Most people use the standard iPod earbuds that came with it, but if you listen to music at all with your iPod while working out, I’m sure you can associate with my frustrations. I’ve tried everything from wrapping the earbud wires around the sides of my sunglasses to tucking the wires into the sides of my hat to help hold them in my ears. But that doesn’t change the fact that the inside of my ears are not round little circles, but iPod earbuds are. It is no wonder they are such a pain to keep in place. Any mild jostling is going to shake them out.

The PFEs came with a three different sizes of silicone ear tips (small, medium large) and one set of Comply foam tips to help you get the right fit for your ear shape. The foam tips are by far my favorite. Think of the same type of material as earplugs. You smoosh ‘em down, place ‘em in your ears, and they expand, fill in the gaps, block out noise and give AWESOME sound quality. Plus, they basically hold themselves in place from INSIDE your ear. I am loving that. Sure, something expanding inside of your ear does sound pretty uncomfortable, but trust me on this one.

It was pretty hard to hear anything else with these on. I loved that for the sound quality, but for that reason I doubt I’d ever use these while riding my bike outside or in the car. If I’m on the bike and being overtaken by a car, I want to be able to hear it and give them plenty of room before it is right on my wheel, but everyone has different comfort levels with riding.

Okay. Fit and comfort gets an A, but let’s talk about actual sound quality.

AUDIO QUALITY TESTING:

Just by looking at their size, I wasn’t expecting huge sound quality from these little buggers, but I was pleasantly surprised. Songs that I had listened to thousands of times in my car, computer stereo and iPod earbuds (note: none of which are all that fancy, except my Harman Kardon computer speakers) sounded clearer than ever there were even all these background notes and sounds that I had never even noticed before. Some parts sounded like a brand new song, it was pretty crazy.

The one and only part where these earphones fall flat a little is the bass, and unfortunately this failing is pretty obvious. Highs and mids sound amazing, but on hardcore spin fest intervals where I was trying to tear my legs off and blast some beats to keep me pushing hard, the music couldn’t keep up. Now, it wasn’t awful, and I may not have even noticed if everything else didn’t sound so great, but even at low volume the lack of bass thumb-ability was pretty obvious, even when listening to acoustic stuff. It wasn’t only noticeable when listening to techno or rap either, but for such tiny earphones this is forgivable given how clear everything else sounds.

Sound quality: B+

SIDE NOTES:

The version I tested also has a microphone built in to the wire that is compatible with the iPhone. It was great for taking calls while on the trainer and not having to get up, pause my workout and hope that it is actually someone important. I haven’t tested the microphone quality as much yet, but was pretty impressed with how much it picked up and I didn’t feel like I had to talk awkwardly loud just to be heard over the background noise from my bike trainer. Plus, the microphone button works to pause the music so you don’t have to worry about your sweaty hands all over your iPhone. Happy camper.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

All together, I was pretty impressed with the Phonak PFEs. They definitely have a reason why they are named “perfect fit earphones.” If you spend a good portion of your training time listening to music, these would be a good choice of upgrades from just about anything else that you are plugging in to your MP3 player and sticking in the side of your head.

They aren’t super cheap at $139 for the regular model and $159 with the microphone, but the quality definitely justifies the price. Plus, let’s be honest. I’m sure you have spent a lot more money on more frivolous training gear that barely got any use. Lets just say that after reviewing these over the last two weeks, I’m not sure if I’m ever going to use those junky standard round earbuds from Apple anymore.

If you want to check ‘em out and get your own pair, start here: http://www.audeoworld.com

Disclosure: These earphones were provided to me by Phonak to review. Phonak had no part in contributing to the content of this review.

I mentioned our ski weekend video taping schenanigans last week and the final footage is in.

Ladies and gentlemen, enjoy.

Click here to view the embedded video.

No candies were hurt in the making of this video. Just my ego.

So get off the dreadmill and get outside people!

Despite being a little chili out there, winter is still a beautiful time to get out! Today was a bright and sunny 30 degrees so I decided to get some snowy trail running in while it was still cold and before a big thaw comes tomorrow and it all turns to mud.

I took the frankenshoes out for another test and loved ‘em. The screws made my feet sore with too much running on ice or pavement, but packed snow is definitely their sweet spot. I logged somewhere between 5 and 6 miles and almost excusively packed snow and they performed like rockstars. I was flying down steep descents and climbing up snowy hills without hesitation.

Enjoy it while it lasts. Before you know it, spring will be on our doorsteps and all that soft white stuff will be a distant memory.

I wanted to just post a quick note that I had to get off my chest.

As you may have noticed on the right sidebar, I’ve managed to pick up a whole mess of sweet new sponsors. I’ve always been more into sharing the funny stories between training rather than reviewing the latest products and promoting my favorite brands. That isn’t going to change. I’ll just have the opportunity to put some new products to the test that I haven’t (in most cases) ever used before.

So this whole “representing companies online” thing is pretty new to me and a little awkward. But the point of this post is that no matter what my affiliation with any company, if something sucks, I’ll say it. Or I just won’t blog about it. What I post here is all my own.

The good news is that I’ve been able to shake off some less than ideal affiliations that I had last year and am already a HUGE fan of all my 2010 sponsors, so I don’t expect to have to hold back blogging on anything that lets me down.

I care what all my bloggy peeps think of me, so I’m not going to go whoring myself out just for some free gear.

Plus, whenever I can. I’ll try to hook up my readers with some new toys too! Stay tuned.

One of my favorite things about heading up to northern New Hampshire is the scenery. Driving through Crawford Notch with huge mountains on either side so high that you have to crane your neck just to see a slice of sky is so inspiring. We even saw some ice climbers out on Sunday morning off to conquer some frozen water falls. SICK!

Bretton Woods is right in the shadow of Mount Washington and is right at the end of the killer 90 mile/4 mountain pass bike ride that I’ve done the last two springs with my team’s training weekend. Just driving that route and thinking about doing it again makes me smile.

But back to snowboarding….

Given that I average (at best) one trip up to the mountain per year, I definitely wouldn’t call myself an “expert” but I’m definitely good enough to have a blast ripping up the mountain. Doing that just sometimes involves getting a butt full of snow…

We even each got a roll of mentos and decided to film our own “freshmaker” commercial while jumping over this fallen tree. Pretty cheesy. Pretty hilarious.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I’ll try and post a fully edited version with music later this week.

There is also a second video of us ducking under the other side of the tree and popping out the other side. I think I caught a branch or something and took a digger, but still came up smiling with the roll of mentos in my teeth. GOLDEN! Once I find out where that video is, I’ll try to share that too.

Last post, I joked about logging both days in Training Peaks. NOT joking about it anymore. After two days of snowboarding pretty challenging (for me) runs, my entire legs are torn up and I love it!

This whole ironman training thing can be pretty fun if you let it…

So, how do I look? Meredith thinks that I could have some “smashing” some finishing photos. I’m not sure about that, but time will tell. Drop your thoughts below.

Pink is punk. Right? Maybe?

Thankfully some green and black ones came with it, so if I’m not in the mood to look “cute” I can just rock the traditional Trakkers colors.

More fun team news coming soon too. Hold tight.

And on a separate note, I think I may have kicked my winter training slump! A workout every day of the week so far. Nothing major, but I’m giving myself credit for at least suiting up and breaking a good sweat every day.

Next up: snowboarding weekend up in New Hampshire! WooHoo! Can I count that as cross training in Training Peaks?

Right now, I’m stuck in one of those “other” parts.

It is only January! I feel like I’m in a slump before I even started! My training has been struggling to take off. Between the freezing cold, and being dark when I leave for work and when I get home, I’m in a funk. F-U-N-K. Funk.

I have even been having trouble sleeping lately. Normally, I’m a sleeping champion. Like the kind of sleeper whose head hits the pillow and immediately dozes off into dream land? Now, not so much. Waking up in the middle of the night to stress about random things that don’t deserve losing sleep over is NOT something that I’m used to.

But the thing is that when I do get myself out and training, I feel great. I’m hitting my zones, feeling strong and just cruising. I even had fun during a 1:30 trainer session and 1 mile brick run this weekend. I have no idea why, but it was probably the most fun I’ve ever had on the trainer. Now If I can just figure out how to keep it up, I’ll be SOLID come spring.

So I guess my main problem is just getting off my lazy rump and getting my shoes on and working up a sweat. Once I am there, I’m golden. At least The days are getting warmer and longer from here on out. (or at least that is what the calendar tells me…)

Even though my training was pretty light in December, with the craziness of the holidays I feel like Sam and I have had barely time to just sit and talk and figure out how each other is doing. We talked about how I got addicted to triathlons (a story I will share here once I have the corresponding embarrassing pics from high school to truly tell it well), career plans, speedos vs jammers vs trishorts, vacation ideas… all the good stuff.

On a separate note, Sam and I threw a killer New Year’s Eve bash at our apartment this weekend. This picture pretty much sums up my night.

We also figured out that we have a magic refrigerator. We somehow woke up the next morning with a ton of empty bottles of champagne, but the refrigerator had even more beer than when the party started the night before. MAGIC!

Who can say “Another Party At Jamie’s House?!”

Gotta enjoy that off season while it lasts…

The last month or so has been pretty lame workout wise. I’ve only been doing about 3 hours of workouts per week, but with the holidays and wanting to make sure that I don’t burn out before I get to the ironman. I was a little burnt out for Timberman this August when I started hard-core training in November. Looking back at my training log from the same time last year, I was a lot fitter and was putting in a lot more hours, but I don’t think that that is a bad thing that I’m already compared to my 2009 fitness.

I want to make sure that the burnout doesn’t happen again, so I’m hoping a January instead of November start does the trick.

Day 1 started off with a 90 minute trainer ride, with some short 2-3 minute all out efforts towards the end to fatigue the legs a little for a 20 minute brick run. Another snow storm was rolling through Boston, so I had the chance to lay some fresh tracks out in a few inches of fluffy snow. Tons ‘o fun! I’ve got a strength training session planned for later tonight too.

To keep me motivated during what will inevitably become a ton of trainer riding this season, I’ve decided to take after Bree Wee and take some company with me on my rides. She has her hula girl…

… and now I have my moose!

Happy training everyone.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

I hope everyone was good this year and everyone’s 2010 is filled with PRs, sunshine and fun post-race parties with great friends.

In preparation for the storm, and with the intentions of not letting a few feet of the fluffy white stuff getting in the way of my Ironman training, I dragged my butt down to the local hardware store for some new winter running gear. Sheet metal screws.

Yeah. Screws.

I remember back when KT the PT wrote about screwing her shoes last winter, and decided to figure out what she was raving about. I’ve seen a lot of people rock YakTrax, but I’ve also seen them get pretty torn up by lots of running on asphalt, so they were out of the question.

Running in the snow has never been an issue, but when the sidewalks get packed down with snow and then it melts and refreezes, it isn’t pretty. It pretty much forces me to run in the street or hug the sidewalk, taking tiny little strides and hoping that I go flying on my butt and crack my head open. Neither sounds very appealing, right?

14 screws in each shoe and a speedy test run around the neighborhood and I’m a big fan. FrankenShoe. Get it?

Bolts in the neck: Frankenstein :: Screws in the sole: Frankenshoe

And yes, I just formatted that like an SAT analogy. NERD!

Running with screws in my shoes was actually a lot more comfortable than I expected (but I’m glad the screws I got weren’t any longer). I even make a little click-clack on the sidewalk as I run. Now I’ll be a little bit more confident when I’m bounding over snow banks with no idea what the terrain is on the iter side. They are like the cyclocross equivalent of running shoes, they are just begging to go off road and tear it up. I can’t wait to take ‘em out on the trail.

Originally I was hesitant about tearing holes in my shoes, but after one run, I’m sold. This should be fun.