Well, the past week of training was so-so, I missed a swim, skipped out during my long ride on Saturday and my runs were sub-par.  Apparently my right hamstring has decided to join the party with my right hip and now my right leg is kind of a mess.  Nothing feels horrible, but lots of twinges and weird aches.  Ugh.  I have been doing my stretching but haven’t been great about all of the strengthening exercises.  I was hoping that once my hip felt better and my mileage was increasing without issues, that spending 1+ hours each day doing my strengthening exercises wasn’t necessary.  I. was. wrong.  Ugh.  More on that in a bit.

I had a very busy weekend this weekend!  Friday night I went to the baseball game with JMR, a friend and her husband.  The game was a ton of fun, although a long one, and with a stop at a bar along the way, I didn’t hit my pillow until 1a.  Boy was I testing my limits with a 5:30a wake up call for a group ride my coach had planned  Apparently I thought I was 19 again and didn’t need much sleep to function (some people can do that, I haven’t been able to for years).  5:30a rolled around and I was up, tired, but up.  I made my usual breakfast before a ride, 2 egg whites, 1 whole egg (usually an avocado as well, but the one I had wasn’t good :() and a banana, packed up my gear / bike and headed to the ride which was 40 minutes away.

Once I arrived it really hit me that I knew no one there… for some reason I thought I had checked the email list of the group that was attending and thought there were mostly females riding, but I was wrong.  There were around 10 guys riding and me and three females.  Oh great.  It was also raining.  Did I mention that?  It was 50 degrees and raining out.  Lovely.  After getting instructions for the route and workout we were off.  The plan was to ride 20 miles, run 4, ride 10, run 2, ride 5 and then run 1 mile.  Which sounded like a lot of fun, and I was looking forward to the challenge….until mile 15… it was pouring, freezing, my bike shoes were filled with water, my gloves were a soggy wet mess and water kept dripping off of my helmet and dripping/flying into my face.  We kept trucking on (I was in the back of the pack with another female and male), eventually got back to the cars and proceeded to change into running shoes, etc to head off for the run.  For a moment I was just confused.  Do I take off my cycling gloves?  It’s cold, they could help but they’re soggy? My cycling coat is pretty wet/uncomfy too – should I change?  Finally I decided to take the gloves off, swap for a (temporarily) dry long sleeved tech shirt and then headed off for the run.

.5 miles in I knew that 4 miles wasn’t in my future.  I wasn’t sure if it was the cold, or the tri running shoes with not a ton of cushioning causing the issue, but regardless, my hip and hamstring were not thrilled with this experience, so eventually I turned around at .75 miles and headed back to the parking lot.  Then I got cold. Really cold.  When I got back to the parking lot, I just could not fathom putting on my cold, wet cycling shoes, my cold, wet cycling gloves and head back out for a ride in the freezing cold rain.  I debated, and wavered, and then, I just decided to go back home.  I hate to say this, but part of me kept thinking, ‘Yes, it could rain on race day, but it sure as h*ll won’t be 50 degrees in Arizona!!’, which made me not feel as bad for being a wimp and ducking out on the rest of the ride.  At that point, it really wasn’t fun.  I didn’t want to ride solo, I didn’t want to be cold and wet anymore, and I really wanted a hot shower.  So, I put peaches back on my car bike rack, and we headed back home.  I was disappointed in myself, but also a bit relieved to be escaping the awful weather.

Once I got home I took a super duper long shower, an hour nap (I shivered the whole way on the 40 minute ride home – that’s exhausting! ;)) and then got ready for my tri club’s annual picnic.  Of course the weather was still gross when it was time for the picnic, 50 and rainy, but we still had an absolute blast.  Lots of good food, conversations (and catching up!), and a few funny games as well to add to the amusement.  Afterwards JMR and I layed low for a bit, changed into dry clothes and then grabbed dinner at a local mexican restaurant, and at 10p I was fast asleep.  Busy day!

Sunday I got up for a short run (as long as my stupid right leg could tolerate) and then got ready for brunch with my grandma for my mom’s birthday.  I probably ate enough for two people, but it was delicious 🙂  After brunch I did some laundry, cleaning, and then headed to my parents for another celebration for my mom’s birthday and another family members birthday.  Busy weekend!!

So, back to my training.  Due to my recent hip fun-ness, I talked with my coach and we’ve decided I should take the week off of running and just focus on cycling, swimming and possibly some aqua jogging (and of course stretching, foam rolling and strengthening).  I am going to REALLY make an effort this week to get up early and hit the pool before work because now that’s all I can do other than the bike.  So the theme for me this week is water.  Lots of it.  If I’m really good, six times in fact – although I will probably doing my aqua jogging workouts after my swim, so really it’s just a long @ss time in the pool, but ‘technically’ it is two workouts in the pool 🙂   Good thing I bought another suit a couple of weeks ago (and have yet to wear), because I will be needing it when my other suit isn’t dry from all of this swimming!

Off to bed!!  Patrick is as well and says goodnight!!