I'm in Verona, Wisconsin

I'm settled into my SMOKING room (damn), but it's not that bad and I scored some Febreze to spritz the furniture.

It was an uneventful drive here except for some construction on I90 through Rockford.

Earlier today, my gimp hand was really swelled up and my wrist started to puff up, too. So I thought it prudent to call my Doctor and ask if I might be in trouble. I spoke with the nurse who said that if I was having a bad reaction it would have happened yesterday, and that I should ice and elevate. DOH!!! I had iced it, but not the elevation. I didn't tell her I swam 5,000 yards this morning! I guess that's what got the swelling going bigtime. So I iced and elevated before I left for Wisconsin, and things came down, and then once I stopped packing and started driving, I tried to keep it up as much as possible, and I can see it's getting better. I'm starting to see my veins again!

I'm about to head to dinner at Grumpy Troll in Mount Horeb for dinner. A couple of fine microbrews and a good meal, and I should be all set for tomorrow's race rehearsal.

Weather calls for low to mid-70's, and no rain until late in the day! There will be wind (of course), but I'm not worried about that. I may need to, in a sort of tradition I've established for myself, ride with swimsuit bottoms so I can get my leg tan fixed up. It will depend on how cool it is in the morning. If it's upper 50's at least, on come the panties!

Of course, there will be a bunch of pics...so watch here for updates.

I don't really have expectations for tomorrow's 112-mile ride followed by 1 hour of running. Why? Because I just came off of a fucking hard-ass week of training! Although it's nice that my legs got a big rest today, so you never know. I've learned that it's better to have the crappy workouts in training, eh? Last year, my race rehearsal was for shit, but I had a great race! So to those of you getting ready for IMLP, know that good workouts will come and go--at this point, you have your fitness, the money is in the proverbial bank, and now you are just maintaining it!

I'll check back in either later tonight or tomorrow after about 119 miles!!!