Running in the Moment

Happy first day of March!  Man is time flying… that means that I only have 2.5 more months to train before my first race…and I DO not feel very prepared, mostly because I’ve been doing all of my biking on my trainer, and the course is *very* hilly.

Things have been busy as usual since my last post.  Last week I managed to have a solid week of training, got in all of my workouts for a total of 8.5 hours of training (my coach had estimated 9.5 hrs, but I finished my run and swim workouts faster than the time she listed on my workouts).  It’s scary to think that by September/October the number will be closer to 18-20 hours for several weeks…wow.  I’m going to not even think about that right now….too far ahead 🙂

This week was an easy week training-wise, I had a 5 mile run on Tuesday, an hour Trainer ride on Wednesday, 1800 y swim on Thursday and a 5 mile run today.  This weekend isn’t too bad volume-wise, but Patrick has his vet appointment Saturday morning, so it will make things a bit hectic.  The plan is to get up early and be in the pool around 6a to swim 1700y, take Patrick to his appt at 8a, and then pack up and head to a group trainer ride at 9a (although I might be late).  I have a 1:30 planned trainer ride followed by a 3 mi run brick.  Phew!  Then I get to hang out with JMR the rest of Saturday and the only other thing I have left on the workout agenda is an easy 5 mile run on Sunday.

JMR loves his sports, so this month, which is March Madness, is a pretty special one for him.  In fact he used to take off work during part of the tournament just so he could watch the games.  Wow.  Which inspired me for the title of this post.  I’ve decided to do my own ‘March Madness’ competition, but it doesn’t involve basketball.  My eating during the weekdays is pretty clean, but at nights/weekends it’s hit or miss.  There is a lot of grazing, as well as having more than just one adult beverage on the weekends with JMR.  Over time, all of that, plus still not working out as much as I was before my hip injury, has really added up and I am starting to be very far from racing shape!  So as a result, I’m going to try to eat clean the entire month of March, which means eating pretty strict Paleo (with the exception of dairy occasionally and the nutrition I need while training, such as gels) and no alcohol.  Hence the ‘Madness’ part to my ‘March Madness’!  To make things even a bit more difficult, I am going on vacation in less than two weeks, and to me a vacation isn’t a vacation without a few festive drinks, but this time around I will have to do without!  After March I plan to follow more of a ‘everything in moderation plan’ (while still trying to stick to mostly eating Paleo), but for now, I think I just need to go cold turkey with my eating habits because I can’t seem to stick with it!  I’m blaming Whole Foods for their delicious oatmeal raisin cookies….they are so good.  And so addicting!

Additionally, JMR said he would try to do it with me which will help because the weekends are the most tempting for me and that’s when we spend the most time together.  We also agreed to not eat out this month (we have been spending way too much money on eating out on the weekends), so I am really going to be cooking a lot this month!

So far so good…. but it’s only been 9 hours of day one 😉

Phew!  Once again, things have been busy since my last post!  I think that’s how things are just going to be until IMAZ, so I’m going to just stop saying that altogether 🙂

Last week my focus was on training, training, training.  Since I missed so many workouts when I was sick, I was determined to actually have a good week and not have a sad-looking training-peaks week (a website where my coach lists my workouts, and I enter what I completed and the details of each workout).  I was successful!  I did miss one swim workout, but I finally got in all of the other workouts!

I also tried a new spin class last week, I probably won’t be doing many spin classes during training so I can get my planned workout in, but it’s a nice change-up in my routine.  This class was crazy!  The bikes moved to simulate outdoor riding!  My friend Suepac and I got there early, so I decided we should take two bikes in the front.  I am used to being in the front at my regular spinning class, so I figured it would be the same.  I was wrong.  First, it took me a while to get used to the bikes, then I realized there was a mirror on the wall for the whole class to stare at us while we (fine, while I) looked uncoordinated (how I missed the mirror originally, I’m not sure, but it was dark when we walked in) and then, after 15 minutes…I thought I was going to throw up!  I haven’t done a spin class in months, and it was super intense compared to the trainer rides I have been doing.  Also, because the bike moved from side to side, it was an ab workout, and my abs are lame right now, so it was painful!  Oh boy.  I gutted it out and made it the full 45 minutes, but I’m not going to lie, it hurt!

After the spin class I met some friends for Mexican food (who doesn’t love to gorge on mexican food after a good workout? ;)) and then went to the grocery store to get supplies for the dinner I was making JMR for Valentine’s day.  I’m not usually a big fan of Valentine’s day (why show your love one time a year?!) but for some reason, this year I was excited about it.  Perhaps it was because it was close to the weekend and we were celebrating on the actual day?  Usually we never do anything on the actual day.  Regardless, I got up early the next day, put together a dry rub of delicious spices and put a pork loin in my slowcooker for pulled pork tacos!  (Ok, I admit, I love mexican food, and could probably eat it every day)  When I got home from work my house smelled of pork goodness… and dinner was pretty darn good!

Friday night I stayed in because I had a big day on Saturday, which was a good thing because I was up at 7:30a on Saturday, on my trainer by 8a, followed by a 2 mile run and then off to the pool by 10a!  I met a friend for lunch and then had a tri club meeting at 2p.  I got home around 4:30p, and then went out with Suepac and her husband for …. drumroll….. mexican food for dinner at one of my favorite places, Pueblo Solis.  (Note: I am avoiding all mexican food for at least a week so I can detox :))  The margaritas and burrito I ordered were both delicious!

Sunday I layed low for a bit, had some friend/family gatherings and prepared for a busy week at work, as we had a new department going live on our electronic health record system.  Even with the busy start to the work week, I did manage to get my workouts in.  Meet my new best friend:

She’s so pretty!

Lola on the trainer.  I used to loathe the trainer….cringe, in fact, when I thought about it.  But lately, my coach has given me some awesome workouts to do on it, and I am loving it!  Also, I have turned on the closed captioning on my tv and just listen to music which really helps as well.  I have a hot date with Lola and my trainer tomorrow morning – I can’t wait.

Today I had a swim and run on my training schedule, but based on the weather reports I saw yesterday, it looked like we were going to get some serious snow mid-day, which meant that the local Y where I work out would probably be closed by the time I got home from work.  Which meant one thing….early @ss morning workout. Ugh.  I struggle with those.  However, when my alarm went off at 4:45a, I was up!  Put on my swimsuit and was off to the gym!  I knocked out my 1600m swim, followed by a 4.5 mile run.  It always takes longer than I think because showering after swimming and then putting on running clothes never seems to go smoothly (not showering after swimming and then running is the worst, it’s like running in a pool because you reek of chlorine), however, I managed to still get to work on time, which was a relief.  What wasn’t a relief was that when I got to work it looked nice out, sunny in fact!  Did I give up my precious z’s for nothing?  Then… it got cloudy… and then….. eventually this happened:

View from my deck

Man was I soooo glad to have gotten both workouts in this morning!  I think my motivation to get my workouts in were fueled 100% on the fact that a big storm was coming and this morning was my only chance to get them in (and it was, the Y ended up closing at noon).  Perhaps I should trick myself into that thought every morning?  Regardless, I’m still on track for my workouts this week…. my coach has me doing 9.5 hours of training this week – I’m hoping to get pretty darn close to that number!  However, for the rest of today, my rump is parked on the couch, followed by an early bedtime so I’m rested for my hot date with Lola and my trainer tomorrow morning!

Phew!  This was a busy weekend, and most of it wasn’t related to training!

Friday night I met up with some of the ladies in the tri club for dinner at Mai Lee, a Vietnamese restaurant near my house.  I don’t know how I’ve managed to not eat there for as long as I have, the food was delicious!  I ordered a shrimp and vegetables stir-fry dish, which was really good, but based on some of the dishes other people ordered, I plan to go back this week and order one of their soups as take out because I was having food envy 🙂  I’m not sure how time flew, but after arriving at 7 and eating, before I knew it, it was 10:30p!  A much later night than I had planned for, but had a great time.

Saturday I was up at 6 and out the door by 6:15 to head to a local 4 mile race to volunteer (ok, I didn’t think it was local because it was 45 minutes away!  I’m so used to everything being within 15 minutes of me :)) I was working packet pickup/registration, which was much more amusing than I thought it would be.  There were some other funny situations that I won’t bore you with (you probably had to have been there at the time to find it funny anyways), but as always, volunteering was a lot of fun.  After the race started, my duties were over and I headed back home to change and run 4 miles at the gym.  Later JMR came over to pick me up for dinner and on our way we stopped by the packet pick up for the 5k we were running the next day.  I had signed us up for the race as something fun for us to do, especially because it was valentine’s day themed race, appropriately called, ‘Run for the Chocolate’.  All finishers receive a chocolate medal and also a cup of hot cocoa, so it sounded like a fun idea!…

Rainy view from my car while waiting for the race to start

…If it wasn’t freezing and pouring down rain the morning of the race.  We were debating even heading down to the race as for a while it was lightning and thundering, but after that died down, we got into the car and headed downtown.  The race was located in an area I wasn’t familiar with, and after going down a one-way street the wrong way (yeah,yeah, I was driving) and getting very lost, we finally made it to the race with ten minutes to spare.  Although I doubt we would have lined up early anyways because there wasn’t anywhere with shelter to avoid the rain, so most people were still in their cars until the last couple of minutes before the race.

When the gun went off, we jogged over the timing mat and started at a pretty good pace, around 9 min/mile, and continued at that pace for a bit while we weaved around people (we started in the back).  And then it happened.  JMR’s left shoelace came untied.  We pulled over to the side, and he tied and then double-knotted his shoelaces.  Then we were off again! Eventually we settled into a 9:30/9:45 min pace, and kept at that for the first 1.5 miles.  I was surprised to see that during the first 1.5 miles FIVE other people with untied shoes?!?!  Do shoes come untied more easily in the rain?  Did everyone just decide to tie their shoes loosely that morning? Regardless, we hit the 2 mile mark around a 10 minute pace and then it happened again.  JMR’s right shoe-lace came untied.  He tried to stop and re-tie and double-knot, but his hands were so cold it was like watching someone attempt to double knot their shoes in slow motion.  Finally he gave up and it just looked like one big knot and we took off…until it happened again…not once, but two more times.  It was becoming comical at this point.  I vowed that after this race, JMR would have to be officially checked for double knotted shoes before starting a race.  Soon we could hear the announcer at the finish shouting out encouragements, finally we were in the home stretch, and before I knew it, we were crossing the finish line!

Between the rain, wind and lots of shoe-tying, it was not exactly our fastest 5k, but we finished it together!  I’m actually pretty impressed that we only had one brief walk break (and four shoe-tie stops) during the whole run, especially since JMR hasn’t run more than a couple of miles in eight months.  Yeah, perhaps this was a little lofty of a ‘fun’ outing for us that I chose, but JMR’s fit, so I figured he could do it, and finish it we did!

After the race we headed right back to the car as it was still raining and freezing (especially now that we had stopped running), and skipped the chocolate medals and hot cocoa because the lines were so long.  After showering and putting on dry warm clothes, we headed to a local Mexican restaurant for brunch, followed by watching golf on tv (I took a nap).

That evening I headed to a local bike shop, Big Shark, with my bike, Lola, to take an Intermediate bike maintenance class.  Big Shark had offered a few special classes just for tri club members, so I had signed up with 7 other tri club members for that evening.  I had regretted choosing a Sunday evening because I was dragging from getting up early for the race, but figured it would be worth it because I would learn a lot about my bike.  Boy was I right!  We learned a lot!  Derailers, Chains, Breaks, Cables…ohmy!  I’m still not sure if I could completely fix it if I had an issue with one of those things, but now I know a lot more about them and could at least troubleshoot the problem 🙂  By 7:30 (the class went from 5-8p), my brain was getting fuzzy from information overload.  Finally at 8p, we packed up our bikes and headed across the street for dinner and drinks at Pi, a pizzeria.  It was a late night for a Sunday, and I didn’t get home until 10:30, but had a great time in the bike class and an even better time hanging out with everyone afterwards at Pi (and eating delicious deep dish pizza).

Yesterday I had PT in the am, then work, followed by laundry when I got home (and had leftover Pi for dinner, yum!), and was in bed by 9p!  Now I’m off for a busy day at work followed by a swim at the Y – ha, my second swim of the year (I didn’t even bother getting into the pool while I was getting over being sick…being congested and swimming sounded downright horrible).

Happy Tuesday!

…well, so much for waking up refreshed and healthy on Monday after all of the nothingness I did all weekend in hopes that it would get me well.  I tried to rally and got ready for my ortho appointment at 8:30 and planned to head to work after the appointment.  As soon as I got on the highway I knew it was a bad idea.  I was glad I brought my box of kleenex with me for the trip because I ended up using half of it on the way (or it seemed like that much).  I figured since my ortho was also a family medicine dr, he wouldn’t be too freaked out by my appearance since he probably sees sick people all of the time too.

The appointment went well (much improvement and I don’t need to see him again), but my state of being was anything but well.  He said he couldn’t prescribe anything since he wasn’t in his family medicine clinic, but recommended Mucinex D, lots of water and rest.  I had been taking Dayquil, which apparently didn’t do much, so I’ll stick with Mucinex D in the future.  However, because I was feeling so awful, I also made an appointment with my PCP’s Nurse Practitioner that day.  When I saw her, she also suggested Mucinex D to help with the congestion, and in case it was an infection, she also prescribed antibiotics before things got any worse.

The Mucinex D seemed to help after a couple of hours, but I still wasn’t feeling great.  JMR came over after work and brought me dinner.  He took his FINAL architecture certification test that morning, so he was pretty tired -bonus points for him coming over being tired and KNOWING I was pretty sick (I really hope he doesn’t get sick).  It was nice to have his company, but I probably wasn’t the best company because I was in bed by 8p.  Today I woke up still not feeling great, but better than yesterday.  Hopefully after another 24 hours on the Mucinex D, plus the antibiotics I will be feeling like a new person.  Meanwhile, this has been my current set-up in front of my couch for the past five days: some form of liquid, Aquaphor for my nose and cracked lips and of course, a big box of Kleenex (imagine tissues everywhere as well, but I figured I’d spare you that gross image and threw them away before taking the picture):

Minus all of the gross used tissues.  Yes, the bike on my trainer is becoming a permanent fixture in my main room.

My parents just got back in town from a trip, so my mom is coming over soon to bring me food and my antibiotics (there was a mix-up with the prescription getting the pharmacy, so I wasn’t able to get it filled until today).  Sometimes I miss living at home, being sick while living on your own is no fun!!

That’s about the only update I have, nothing training-related, although I’m hoping to be back in the game tomorrow before I lose all fitness (of what little) I have gained.  I also emailed my coach to get her opinion, based on having missed a lot of training and being so close to my first race (Triple-T), if even completing it is a feasible task.  Ugh!  Hopefully if I can stick with my training going forward it can still be on my schedule!

…where I have spent most of my weekend, there or in bed.  Wednesday night my throat felt kind of scratchy and by Thursday morning it was more than just a scratchy throat.  I had a lot of things to get done at work on Thursday so I sucked it up, drank a lot of orange juice and washed my hands a lot.  Finally by 4p, I couldn’t take it anymore and headed home.

While waiting at the stop-light at the exit ramp to get to my condo, the person behind me must have slipped on the rain/slush that was forming on the ground and rear-ended me.  At first he thought there wasn’t any damage, but I wanted to exchange information just in case.  After I checked the bumper a second time, and rubbed the salty water/dirt from the snow we had (I don’t wash my car a ton during the winter) and noticed there were two dents from his license plate screws.  After getting information, I pulled into the nearby grocery store parking lot and filed a claim.  I felt bad, because it was a really small scratch, but at the same time, it was a scratch!  After I made an appointment to have the damage appraised, I went back out and looked at it again, and sure enough it had also chipped the paint on both ‘circles’, which made me feel a little better about filing a claim.

Once I got home, I immediately changed into comfy clothes and plopped on the couch for a couple of hours and went to bed around 8p. I woke up the next day feeling like a bus hit me (and sounded like a man), called in sick to PT (bummer) and work and headed back to bed.   JMR came around noon to drop off some chicken noodle soup and after eating most of it, I headed back to back and slept the rest of the day.

Saturday I woke up around 9:30 because Patrick had a haircut appointment that he could not miss, the little guy was a furry furry beast and his eyebrows were out of control.  After dropping him off, I went back to bed and woke up several hours later to pick him up.

Looking spiffy with his new red bandana

I watched a short movie and was once again in bed by 9p.  Such a wild weekend!

Today I managed to drag myself to the store so I had some food for the week other than just frozen vegetables, cleaned up the kitchen and put together a load of darks that I need to eventually wash.  Other than that, I am once again, couch bound, with kleenex and gatorade at my side at all times.  Ugh.  I hope I wake up better tomorrow!!

I don’t know about other people that work out in the morning, but after my workout, I feel energized for a bit, and then want to go back to sleep. It’s only 9a and I’m dragging at work today…more on that in a bit.

Last night after my appointment, I did some cleaning (much-needed vacuuming) around my condo and then plopped on my trainer for my first ‘technique’ focused ride of the season.  After a 15 minute warm-up, I did 21 minutes of alternating pedaling: 1:00 with my left leg, 1:00 with both, and 1:00 of my right leg.  The purpose is to help you smooth out your pedal stroke and find your weak spots.  At the beginning my strokes were horrible and not smooth at all, but by the end (21 minutes was a long time!) I had gotten the hang of it and could really notice during my cool down that I was pedaling more evenly and stronger.

This morning I got up at 5a and headed to the gym to do a walk/run combination of 4 miles.  I warmed up with .25 and then set out to do at least 3, and ended up doing 3.5 with just a .25 cool down.  My hips felt great the whole time, but my left ankle was starting to bother me, I must have done something while doing the drills last night.  Hopefully it’s just sore from not used to doing that drill and just goes away, and I guess next time I do that drill I will pay more attention to what I’m doing with my left foot.  Regardless, it was still a great run, and afterwards I headed to PT.  After an hour and a half of PT, I ran home, showered and drove to work.  Which is where I am now, falling asleep at my desk!  A coffee run right now is a must, it’s going to be a long day!  I hope my body adjusts to working out early and this ‘sleepy’ thing will go away!

Coffee and then work!

Sidenote…is it a bad thing when the barista knows your order and has it ready before you even get up to the counter to place your order?  I think I need to start cutting back… 😉

The weather here is downright crazy, it’s 66 degrees today, in JANUARY?!  It’s supposed to cool down starting this evening, but for now I’m trying to enjoy it while it lasts, even though it’s grey and rainy out.

Because it was also nice out last night, I did my planned run outside, and it was perfect running weather!  Nothing like doing a run in shorts and short sleeves in the middle of January 🙂  I was able to do 3 whole miles without any walk breaks and without any pain!  On top of that, two of them were at a 9 min pace!  As great as it felt I won’t get carried away, and will stick with only running 3 miles for a while.

The next few nights are going to be busy, after work today I have an appointment with my headache specialist because of my recent increase of migraines.  On a more fun type of busy, tomorrow night I am going to a knife skills class (the kitchen type :)) which I cannot wait to go to and learn how to actually chop vegetables and other foods, and Thursday night I’m going to yoga with a friend followed by a drink to catch up.

So this week is busy, which means I *have* to get up and get my workouts done in the mornings.  Fortunately I have PT two of the mornings, so I will have to get up early anyways, what’s another hour earlier? (ha).

Off to a meeting!

I would say that this weekend, I was either REALLY productive, or a complete couch potato.  Saturday was the productive day and Sunday was the complete opposite!

Saturday morning I woke up and ran some errands with JMR, grabbed lunch, and then headed over to ride my trainer with my training buddy, R.  After setting up my bike, the hour ride went by so quickly, what a difference it makes to ride with someone on the trainer!  Last Thursday I was ready to be done after 20 minutes.  Also, this time the seat was a bit less uncomfy and riding in aero also felt less awkward.  More time in the saddle, and hopefully in another week or so, it will actually feel good!  After the hour ride, we hopped off the bikes to go for a run.  I only had a mile planned on my schedule, but my hip felt good, and we were running at a relaxed pace, so I decided to keep going until I felt fatigued.  R had a 30 minute run planned, and I ended up sticking with him the whole way, a full 2.5 miles without walking breaks, hooray!

After a successful first brick of the 2013 training season, I headed home to shower and get ready to meet another friend for happy hour.  Boy did we have a lot to catch up on and ended up having drinks and chatting for four hours!  Afterwards I headed home to watch a movie, ‘The Five Year Engagement’ (it was pretty decent) and ended up falling asleep on the couch.  Couch sleep is the worst!

Sunday, other than updating a few things on my blog, taking Patrick out and going to the grocery store, I was pretty much on the couch most of the day!  That will probably be the last Sunday like that for a while, since training has really started to pick up and I’ll have workouts both days on the weekend.  Knowing that, I didn’t feel as guilty and also the weather was pretty gross too, so it was a perfect day to stay inside!

I did stay up too late last night watching the ‘Sex in the City 2’ movie (I’m not usually a big movie watcher, so I’m not sure what the deal was this weekend) and ended up going to bed around midnight – way past my bedtime for a ‘school’ night!  So as a result, I’m dragging today, and promising myself that I will be in bed early tonight after riding my trainer followed by a quick run.

Back to work!!

(Written Friday)

I haven’t posted in a while and figured I should post an update before months went by!  Even though I haven’t been posting, I have been busy!

Last week was pretty hectic between work, my first week of official training, and organizing the volunteers for the annual tri-club 5k and 10k race.  By Friday night I was wiped out, but I did manage to hang out with some girlfriends I haven’t seen in a while for a few hours.  I was up at 6:30a the next morning and went to pick up bagels for the volunteers and then headed to the race site to help set up.  Packet pickup and Registration was pretty hectic, but after the race started and all of the volunteers were accounted for, things had finally calmed down.  We ended up with 47 volunteers this year, which was awesome, and we needed every single one of them! I even convinced my parents to volunteer, good thing the weather was nice!!

After the race clean-up was over, I headed home to get a swim and run in.  I had an hour to relax afterwards and then JMR and I were off to a trivia night.  The tri-club had gotten enough people to reserve three tables, so it was a lot of fun catching up with people I haven’t seen for a bit and also eating lots of good food that everyone brought. 🙂  I will say, I am horrible at trivia – I only knew the answer to three questions.  Oh well, at least we had fun (JMR was awesome at the sports trivia)!

This week has been pretty uneventful compared to last week, just work and training, although I did go back to the bike shop to get a new seat on Wednesday.  After riding my tri bike a couple of times, I realized that my seat was *very* uncomfortable.  It would have been fine riding upright, like I do on my road bike, but leaning forward in aero position it puts pressure on, ahem, uncomfortable areas.  So I finally went and got a new saddle to try out.  It looks kind of strange, but as you can see, it should help with the uncomfortable pressure I just mentioned.

I rode for 45 minutes last night, and it definitely felt better, but I’m also not used to actually sitting on my sit bones, so I’m a tad sore this morning.  Hopefully after a couple of weeks of riding, I will get used to it!

This morning I walked/ran 3 miles before PT and they were pain-free for the *first* time!  Hopefully my run on Sunday will feel the same way and I can increase the time I run and walk less.  Although, after PT this morning my right hip is a bit grumpy, so hopefully that goes away by tomorrow.

Well, I guess that’s about it for now!  Tonight I’m hanging out with JMR, and other than training and meeting a friend for dinner on Saturday, I have no other plans, which I am very happy about!

Happy Friday!

Yep, you read that right, I’m back in the game and ready to train!  It’s been a few days since I’ve posted and a lot has happened since my last post!

Work has been ridiculously busy, I helped lead 12 hours of end-user training on Tuesday, 4 hours on Wednesday and had many many meetings on top of that.  Plus, I had PT at 6:30a on Monday and went to the gym to run at 5:30a on Wednesday, so by yesterday evening my head was spinning.  On top of that I’ve been really good about cooking all of my meals and sticking to eating Paleo since Saturday.  I think that’s a record for me!  Usually after the five day mark the weekend rolls around and I get too tempted and end up eating bread (pizza!) or rice.  I guess starting on a Saturday was the trick!

Back to the title of my post, training!  Probably the most exciting news of the week, ok well, there were two pieces of exciting news, I’ll get to the second in a minute, was that I finally met my coach last night!  We’ve talked on the phone, but I’ve never met her in-person before.  We met after work and we went over my current fitness, what my goals were, what my typical schedule was like and what days would work best for various workouts (long rides, speedwork, etc).  After going through what my race schedule looked like for 2013, we then discussed what my nutrition strategy would be, as it usually takes awhile to figure out what will work for long rides, the run afterwards, etc.  She gave some recommendations for nutrition that she like and worked for her, so I might start out with that in a couple of months when I’m done building my base and getting into more intense workouts.  One thing I know I want to aim for IMAZ is doing liquid nutrition rather than solids or just gels/honey stinger chews, because that’s all I did for Redman (other than water) and by the end of the bike I was so sick of them, and that’s only half the distance of an Ironman!

Overall I felt really comfortable around her and think it will be easy to communicate to her what is working for me and what isn’t so that we can keep modifying my training plan to be as manageable as possible (as manageable as an Ironman training plan can be!). Because Triple-T is coming up soon, we decided that she would start putting together my training starting next week, so technically my first official workout for IMAZ starts next Monday, hooray! (I’m sure by September I’ll be wondering what I was so excited for)

The second piece of exciting news this week is that my tri-bike has arrived!  I am going on Sunday to get fitted and get new pedals and triathlon specific cycling shoes, and of course take it home.  I cannot wait!!  It will be interesting riding my trainer in aero position for the first time!

So, despite it being super duper busy this week, lots of good things are happening!