Boris Fernandez

Sunwarrior Ormus Supergreens Made From the Purest Probiotic Greens Grown on High Altitude Volcanic Rich Soil

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 17:40:00 +0000

Very good product. Try it in your smoothies and you are going to feel a great difference in your energy level

Strength and Technique For Better Time Trail

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 17:36:00 +0000

Strength and Technique For Better Time Trail

In cycling the formula to measure a cyclist’s power output is P= Work/Time, in other words the amount of force that is applied to the pedals divided by revolutions per minute(RPM). Power is expressed in Watts, for James Watts the inventor of the steam engine. Power increases in three ways, one is more force applied to the pedal stroke, the other is to pedal faster (time for revolution of the crank is decreased) or a combination of the two. In order for a cyclist to go faster in a time-trial event he/she needs to be able to move a bigger gear at the same cadence or a faster cadence at the same gear size or both. So let us see how we can improve these qualities so we can go faster in the bike leg of a triathlon. In order to improve force you need to hit the gym. There are two ways to improve force, one is by developing strength with weight lifting and the other is muscle fiber recruitment with jumping exercises (plyometrics). Plyometrics are more advanced and more prone to provoke injuries so they should be done after the lifting phase. Strength exercises for cyclists are squats, step-ups, leg-press, and abdominals. Do at least two months of those before going into plyometrics. Make sure to go gradually with an adaptation phase: very little weight with high repetitions, then working up to a medium weight at 12-15 reps at sub-max effort, then a maximum effort phase of 1-2 reps with the maximum weight that you can lift. Plyometrics should start with jumping in place, to hops, to the more advanced jumping up on boxes and down from boxes. After you develop force and power in the gym you need to transfer it to the bike. You can do high gear/low cadence intervals of 8 to 12 minutes to develop specific bike strength in your legs. To develop cadence you need to develop pedaling technique. Pedaling technique is no more than pedaling in the most circular way you can. It is not pushing down, it is moving around in a very smooth way. This results in force being distributed efficiently around the whole circular motion of the pedal stroke. By doing this you are also distributing the work that your legs have to do among more muscle fibers making the movement more efficient. Doing high cadence drills in order to improve neuromuscular connection will really help you to develop a cadence between 90-100 RPM. For example, you can do 5x6 minutes at a 105 rpm focusing on keeping your pedaling circular and not jumping in the saddle. You can also do downhill maximum fast pedal drills. You can use the Key Biscayne bridge for these drills so on your way down go to an easy gear and pedal as fast as you can until you start jumping in the saddle. You can also do a one legged drill where your focus will be on developing a smooth pedal stroke with each leg individually. When I say smooth, I mean circular without any dead spot. Be as strong as you can be, don’t neglect going to the gym, because otherwise you will never have the strength to move the gears at the cadence needed to really become a lethal force on the triathlon circuit. I have not seen any good time-trialist with skinny legs. Look at Grant Potter, one of the best time-trialists in Florida and you will know what I am talking about.

KEY BISCAYNE SPRINT TRIATHLON TRILOGY STRATEGIES

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 03:38:39 +0000

Key Biscayne Sprint Triathlon Trilogy Strategies

The Key Biscayne triathlon trilogies are ready to start. They have become a classic of Key Biscayne. These sprint races are very fast, and any mistake can cost you many positions in the final standings. That is why it?s important to have a sound strategy before race day. Here are a few hints that might help you.

Get there early. By being at the race site early you will be ready to tackle any last minute problems. You will also be able to get a good position for your bike in the bike transition area. This will allow you to save some important seconds that can make a difference at the end. Set you bike and running gear as close to the running channel as possible. That way, you will avoid running all the way to the end of the rack to get your bike. You will also avoid other athletes messing up your stuff in their hurry to get out of transition area.

Get rid of extra weight. If you are confident that you can finish in under an hour, take everything extra off your bike (that includes water bottle cages). The race is so fast that you can handle hydration by drinking water before the race, after the swim, and during the run. Eliminate all extra weight from your bike so you can attack the bridge as light as you can be. The bridge is the defining moment of this race. If you are light and powerful you can really attack it and make very valuable seconds on your competition. But, if you are heavy, carrying all the extra weight, namely water bottles at a pound each, you are not going to be able to explode up the bridge.

Attack the first mile on the run. The first mile of the run is the most difficult one, so attack it as fast as you can. Do not let you brain tell you that your legs are tired from the bike effort. At that point, it is more a mental game than a physical one. Will your way in that first mile. Force the legs to wake up. Imagine that you are running on fire and that the bottom of your feet will burn every time you touch the ground. It will be much better in the second mile. Do not lose the time in the first mile by allowing your body to slowly make a transition from one sport to the next. This is a sprint triathlon, everything is fast, and there is no time to think or judge. The last mile of the run is the time to take your body to its maximum capacity. You will know the feeling when it hits you. Slowly star picking up your pace, until you hit that feeling, stay there as long as you can and enjoy the feeling of transcendence afterwards. Remember, the worst that can happen is that you will fade from the effort but you will be a better person afterward for having given it your all. At least that is what a coach I had used to tell me. He said, "There are three stages in racing: pain, anguish, and agony. If you are not ready to reach agony you will never know your true self!". He may be right, he may not be, I am still finding out.

After the race, do not stay there just talking or standing. Drink lots of water and go for an easy swim or an easy jog. That will help your body to recover faster. Take a shower and you?ll be ready for the post-race party. Enjoy the race to its fullest!

Enduring the Triathlon Season

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 03:34:54 +0000

Enduring the Triathlon Season

Boris Fernandez

The triathlon season is a very long season and getting prepared for it takes years of training. Many athletes have asked why I train so much for short distance events like the Olympic distances and the sprint distances. My answer to them is it helps me to be able to endure the triathlon season, to be able to compete more, and to avoid setbacks due to injury or illness. However, the most important reason for all of that training is to build to a new level of fitness in the long term.

The season starts in April and ends in October. In order to compete consistently well throughout the season you have to have a very strong foundation of training hours. The more training hours you have, the better you recuperate from one effort to the next. It also allows you to compete more frequently. For example, I have done eight races in the last eleven weeks. In 2002, I could barely race once a month without getting sick or fatigued. Right now my body is a little tired but nowhere near as fatigued as it was back then.

Another benefit of cumulative training hours is in avoiding setbacks. If you train well and develop all of your energy systems it will be easier for your body to compete, train, and withstand the heat and humidity of Florida. That is why I start the preparation for my season at the beginning of November. I do very long easy rides and runs to get my body ready for the season. How do you think that the Tour de France athlete can compete twenty-one days in a row without getting injured or sick? They train a lot and they make it to the Tour after many years of preparation. I do four to five hour rides on Sundays even though my bike leg in the triathlon clocks in at only thirty minutes to one hour. These rides are like putting money in the bank. Racing is like making a withdrawal. The more long rides you accumulate throughout the year, the longer you will compete successfully and the less chance of injury or illness you will have.

See your training as long term. That is the best approach. Build, build, and build your mileage year after year. You will reach a point where you will jump to a different level. Olympic athletes do not become champions from one day to the next. It took Deena Kastor six years to prepare for her Olympic bronze medal in Athens. She went from training fifty miles a week to one hundred and twenty miles a week. Plan your training and within your limitations of time and work gradually increase your total training hours. It will help you to improve and stay at that level for longer periods of time. You have to be very organized because you, like me, do not have all the conditions that Olympic athletes have, so with limited time we have to optimize to the best of our ability.

Remember I said build your mileage ?year after year? not from today to tomorrow. A gradual increase over time will get you there. It is not recommended to increase total mileage by more than ten-percent per week for any given sport and you are doing three different sports so the increases will be extremely minute and incremental. Your body and your family need time to adjust to the added stress or you could suffer from burnout or over training that we will discuss in my next article. Until then, keep the long-term perspective in mind and enjoy whatever your triathlon experience is today!

800 m Long Course

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 23:10:00 +0000

I swam a 9:59 for the 800 meters long course. In a month a have another shot at this distance. I would like to improve this time. Swimming under 9:50 would make me very happy! I am going to train very specific for it!!

Principles of Training

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 23:09:00 +0000

PRINCIPLES OF TRAINING

Here are some principles of training that are very simple and will help you in directing your training plan into an effective, efficient program. Athletes that have a full schedule will benefit from following these principles in order to have an overall purpose for their training-year. SPECIFICITY OF TRAINING. The system you train or the sport you train is the one that is going to benefit the most from the training session. In other words, if you want to improve your swimming you have to swim. If you want to improve your run, you need to run and if you want to improve your bike, well you guessed it, you need to bike! Also, the improvements in a particular sport can be counterproductive to the other sports. That is why it is very important to have a balanced training plan that addresses the need of the particular athlete especially geared toward any of the weak spots. Triathletes need to train as a triathlete not as an individual runner, cyclist or swimmer. PROGRESSION. In order to improve your results you need to increment your training. There are many ways that you can change your training. You can change the frequency (amount of times that you do a particular set during a week) or you can change the amount (how much or how long you do it). You can change the recovery (how much you rest) and finally you can change the intensity but be careful with this one as it could lead to overtraining or losing the intended purpose of your workout. For example, I recently did a progression swimming set with the athletes that I work with where we went from 4x3x100 to 3x4x100 to 2x6x100 to 12x100 and finally to 16x100. We played with the recovery and finally we played with the amount. Intensity was always kept the same. REVERSIBILITY. This principle says that consistency is a very important part of your training program. If you stop training for two weeks you might reverse back twice as much. As an example, I had a bike accident that sidelined me from swimming for a month and it may take me twice that much time to just get back to where I was at the time of the accident. TEDIUM. Triathlon is a very demanding sport. It requires the improvement in three disciplines that contradict each other. They do, however, have a characteristic in common and that is monotony. Fortunately, there are many ways that you can vary your training. You can change locations. Instead of swimming in the pool you can swim in the ocean. You can change your running venues to give you a change of scenery unlike me, who loves to run in circles around the Village Green. I am sure by now I must hold the record for the most times run around in circles in the park. You can have good training partners that support and keep you motivated. So to sum up be specific to what you want to achieve in the training session, week or year. Progress you fitness gradually. Be consistent and don’t forget to have fun!

Protein Health and Sports

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 21:24:00 +0000

Protein comes from the Greek word “proteios” which means "of prime importance". Protein has many functions in our bodies. Proteins may function in enzymes, hormones, muscle fibers, and blood cells to name just a few. Proteins are used up daily and must be replaced. They can be replaced by eating foods that contain protein. There are two kinds of foods that contain protein. One kind of protein comes from animals. This is considered complete protein because it has all the essential amino acids. (Essential meaning that our body does not produce them) The other type of protein comes from plants. These are considered incomplete proteins because they have to be combined in order to obtain all of the amino acids our body needs. This is why people consider animal protein of a higher quality than plant protein. They consider them of a higher quality because they do their job faster. However; according to T. Collin Campell in his book “The China Study" maybe the slow and steady job of plant protein wins the race in the long term. According to Campell animal protein is a real problem in people’s health. In his research in animals, as well as in human trials, animal protein is linked to the diseases of affluence with a statistical significance of more than 95%. These diseases include cancers, coronary heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, and obesity. One study in India showed that rats predisposed to get cancer that had 20% of calories coming from animal protein got cancer 100% of the time, while the same animals having just five percent of their diet coming from animal protein did not develop cancer. Campell is also a strong advocate of a plant-based diet that he showed in one of his research studies as being able to reverse diabetes, coronary heart disease, and even early stages of cancer. Another advantage of a plant-based diet is that animals that were predisposed to get cancer and consumed 20% of their diet in plant protein did not get cancer at all. In other words, plant based protein did no harm, animal protein may activate genes for a particular disease you are predisposed to. What does this all means from the standpoint of your sport? I have been trying a plant-based diet with very small amounts of animal protein. After passing through the adaptation phase, which was a bit challenging, I can tell you that I feel better and better with the changes. I had my blood checked recently. I had 15.9 hemoglobin with a 45 hematocrit. These counts are related to the blood cells in charge of taking oxygen to the muscles. This is very important because the popular belief is that the iron in red meat is more absorbable than iron found in plants and that people who eat red meat have higher hemoglobin count than people who do not. I have also noticed that it is easy to maintain my competitive weight. Another improvement that I have experienced is that my digestion is better and I have more energy during the day. One thing you do have to make sure of is to eat a good quantity and quality of food because otherwise you will not meet you athletic energy requirements. You have to buy a lot of vegetables and different types of grains so you can have all the carbohydrates you need. (quinoa is great!) Animal protein may get you recuperated from one workout session to the next a bit faster, but the negative health implications are far too dangerous for me to want to risk it. Eating more plant based proteins is not only healthier for you it’s also healthier for the planet. Try it, you never know, you just might end up liking it!

One Thought

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 21:19:00 +0000

Sometimes I’m a Doubting Thomas. It has taken me a great deal of time and many interesting experiences to finally accept the fact that “I’ll see it when I believe it” has more power than “when I see it, then I’ll believe it”. We have a quote in our kitchen attributed to Goethe that says, “Until one is committed, there is hesitancy. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and wonderful plans. The moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have happened. A whole stream of events issues from your decision raising in your favor all manner of unforeseen incidences and meetings and material assistance which no man would have dreamed would come his way.” The other day we rented a movie called “Emmanuel’s Gift”. It was a documentary based on the life of a man labeled at birth an outcast due to a deformity in his leg. In his country, Ghana, he would normally be relegated to begging on the street for the rest of his life. However, with the help of a determined mother and the conviction he held that this was not true for him and against all odds he was able to start to change the reality of his country’s thinking and policies regarding the handicapped. And how did he do this? He rode a bike. Not the same way you or I would but with one leg and tons of determination to follow his dream. What seems like such a simple thing for you or me, asking for a bike, in his country was like asking for someone to give you one the mansions on Mashta Island. He wrote to an organization in America to get help and the only thing he asked for was a bike, nothing fancy, just a bike, no money, no pity, just a mountain bike. So in this case, a $100 mountain bike and an intention followed with sheer determination and a burning desire to realize a dream resulted in “all sorts of things occurring to help him that would otherwise not have happened”. What is a common theme you hear from Olympians, no matter what the sport, when they are interviewed? Most of them say that they always saw themselves as being in the Olympics or dreamed of it from when they were small. The seed was already planted and the years of dedication and hard work that followed to get them there was all worth it to them. What dream or intention do you have for your sport? It doesn’t matter if it is to just finish a marathon or place top three in your age group, or maybe just lose those extra pounds that have piled up keeping you from feeling good about yourself and enjoying participating in more activities. The principal is the same. It all starts with an intention, a dedicated thought that you could go beyond the ordinary and accomplish something out of reach of your current comfort zone. I write this column to help hold that space of possibility open to you as others have held the space and possibilities open for me when I never dreamed things could be possible. For example, I was never a runner. When I did run I looked like a black bear ambling through the forest, but others were able to see what I was not able to see. They saw my potential, something invisible to me at the time. Little by little I was able to grasp that my dreams could become real and I stepped into that space grateful for them having held it for me when I could not. I hold open a door for you here hoping to help you see the potential that resides in you and to help you step up and say “yes” to your dream. In the words of William Shakespeare,“ Assume a virtue if you have it not”, in other words “act as if” you have it and then the door of possibility will start to open.

The Little Things

Tue, 01 Jun 2010 02:02:00 +0000

THE LITTLE THINGS BY:BORIS FERNANDEZ

I’ve been swimming with a friend of mine for seven years. I’ve always admired his technique and feel for the water. One day he took a very expensive and intensive triathlon seminar. When he came back from the seminar he started swimming with a bilateral breathing pattern. I asked him about it and he told me that it is more effective. Even though I knew this breathing pattern to be more efficient I was unable at that time to do it. He said, ”Boris, if I can do it, you can do it.” Two years later I was still unable to do the bilateral breathing during hard efforts. Then, something wonderful happened. I was invited to be an assistant coach at a Total Immersion Swim seminar. During one practice session of the seminar the head instructor was speaking about finishing the end push of the stroke to the side and a little short. This went completely against what I had learned during all my swimming years. I was always told to finish the end of the stroke next to my hip with a vigorous effort. However, always willing to try new things in search of an edge I tested the new technique. When I applied his suggestion to my stroke much to my surprise the stroke felt smoother and I was able to breathe easily to both sides. When I asked the head instructor he told me that I had been overreaching in the push phase of the stroke. With this new information incorporated into my stroke I now understand why it had been so difficult for me to recover my arms at high cadence during fast triathlon swims. So, half an inch shorter and half an inch to the side really made a difference. So simple and seemingly insignificant and yet it made all the difference. Another example of a seemingly insignificant change that made a big difference in my stroke was my head position. I always stressed the importance of keeping the head flat looking straight down toward the bottom of the pool. This was done in order to keep a horizontal body position in the water. As a swimming coach I understood this on an intellectual level. As a swimmer I did not understand it on a kinesthetic or experiential level until my friend from the Olympic Training Center brought me back to reality. He told me I did not, in fact, swim with my head down although I espoused this particular technique and swore that I practiced it diligently. However, when we did an experiment with my legs tied together at the ankles and I swam forward my legs began to sink like a cement block. He then told me to put my head further down than before, which to me seemed like I was in a diving position (of course it only felt that way to me). I then swam and my legs rose back up to a horizontal position effortlessly. What an eye opener it was for me all these years thinking I was executing this particular facet of my swim and yet I was far from it. Seemingly small, a half an inch deeper in the water with my head position made a huge difference in overall body positioning. I share these two anecdotes with you to relay to you the importance of the little things in sports and in life. The old saying, “It’s the little things in life that count” holds as true today as it did when originally written. So pay attention and don’t be afraid to ask for and accept a neutral party’s outside help. Be willing to change even just a little and the results may indeed surprise you.

Master swim Meet

Tue, 01 Jun 2010 01:47:55 +0000

I just came back from the Master swim meet at Coral Spring. I swam the 500 in 5:12. I believe is a good effort, considering than I am preparing to swim around Key West in two week, and I had been doing 4:00 hours long swim in the ocean with jeens and bands. My friend Ramses swam in 5:05, very impressive. We will compete together in Key West and then in the long course meet in the Hall of Fame pool.