The Truth About Tapering, Part III

First, check out my new bitch! Sorry, Cindy, she's mine! I pre-ordered her a few months ago and completely forgot and then she arrived on Tuesday! Here's another tip for your taper, while you're at home, anyway: arrange to have gifts delivered to yourself! It's really a mental boost to get something brand spanking new during your taper, considering that by this time everything you have for race day should have been tested out already.

Yesterday was another gorgeous day. I awoke after another good 8-hour sleep (I guess my evil plan of cutting out any mid-day training caffeine is working) to a crystal clear blue sky (once the sun came up, that is!). For some reason, on my training plan, I had a hefty swim workout planned for Friday, but that is the day before a swim race, so I had decided I'd do the big workout today (yesterday) because I only had to do a :45 run later in the day.

I have successfully not worn bike shorts on LGL or Bitchie for 2 weeks now, and as it's July, I stopped wearing a shirt over my swimsuit on the way to the pool effective yesterday. I'd rather not wear shorts, either, but CF has a wide saddle, and I need something over the bottom! It was almost 70 when I left for the outdoor pool, and I was glad to not induce extra sweating from wearing a shirt.

I got to the pool by about 6:20, and my posse of cops in training were there. We started chatting right away, and when I finally got in the water (apparently I was in no particular hurry), I demonstrated a bunch of drills to the guys. I'm trying not to bombard them but I did want to show them where this is all going. They are all brutally strong, but they already realize that swimming is about technique more than strength. After all, me, a tiny Yard Gnome, can move through the water pretty well!

Well, the cops were finished, and by the time we went through the drills and all it was 7:00. No worries, I have plenty of time to get in 3300 meters! So I was just about done with my warmup, and Chuck shows up. I stand corrected--he has not done an Ironman--he's done a number of HIM's--but still from what he tells me he trained like a complete fucking maniac when he was doing them. He picks up my baggie with swim workouts in it and inspects what I'm doing. I pointed out that I'd do the big workout today so I'm a little rested for Saturday's swim race (although I could care less how I do--it will just be nice to swim in Crystal Lake, which is beautiful). Chuck got in, I finished my warmup, and now it was time for my main set:

30 x 50 (20"), as odds very Hard, evens very Easy.
3x300 (20") pull at race pace

I haven't done this workout since last year, and for once, I was looking forward to all those 50's! Plus, I had Chuck in my lane, and that was plenty motivating. So I actually blew the carbon out of my arms and was surprised that I had some speed in me, but I tell you, after about 20 of those 50's, even though half of them are easy, your arms are pretty much screaming from the lactic acid buildup. And then I just rested 20" before getting onto the 300's, although I did one 300 and was sick of turning (in a 50-meter pool, go figure), so I swam 600 straight after that. And my pace wasn't bad at all! I was sort of in shock that I was able to swim well, especially since the water was pretty warm.

Chuck and I finished about the same time and then we just hung out in the water talking about who knows what, and we live near one another and so we agreed to meet for our ride home. I'm laughing thinking about us riding home because we rode pretty much two abreast and were just talking and talking and it was beautiful outside (bright sunshine, no clouds) and we both had good swim workouts and it was fun. Chuck peeled off about 1/2 mile from where I live, and he may make it to the pool on Friday, as will the cops, so that will be fun.

One of the things we talked about on the ride back was how there's a lot of riding uphill, because it seems much easier on the way to the pool, but we laughed that part of it is that we've just done a serious workout. But my legs were now letting me know, hey, dumbass, you pretty much did a race yesterday, what the fuck are you doing? Too bad, I just can't justify driving to the pool when it's so nice outside. Although since Chuck and I were riding side by side, I think we both may have been pushing the pace a bit even though we were both on hybrids--ya think???

Back home to work, and I'm feeling a little tired, like I actually worked out or something (go figure!). When it was almost time for me to go run, I could tell my legs weren't going to be too happy about it, but I only needed to go out for :45, so no worries there. I decided to go into the wind, which took me west and north. It is odd for this time of year to have winds out of the NNW, especially when it's in the 80's, but hey, I don't care.

Running this direction took me through a whole bunch of rollers, and I also made sure I ran right out in the open just to make it harder on me even though my legs felt like crap. That run had everything--tired legs, wind, hills, bonkiness and heat. You can't beat that! When I got home, all I could think was fuck, that felt kind of hilly, so I went to this website to check it out (I don't own a Garmin and don't really want one), and what the fucking hell, I guess I was right:





See, even though I live in Illinois, which everyone thinks is pancake flat, the nice little suburb I live in has a good amount of rollers. And I live in a little valley, so pretty much anywhere I go from home is up and then rolling, but this particular run was about one of the rolliest routes I've picked in a long time. But it's all good, since I run on rollers pretty much all the time, that I'm used to it, and I actually don't like completely flat runs (well ask me that in about a week!).

So I laughed at what I had done to myself, and then my legs were pretty much toasted and I wanted to take a nap or at least lay down, but I couldn't. I finished up working for the day, and then I headed to The Bike Shop to get my tubulars checked out, a final derailleur check and just to hang out a bit. On the way, I felt compelled to stop at Binny's to get some booze for the guys at the shop who take such good care of me and my bikes, and also a few liquor-filled candies, which Anthony and I enjoyed. I had Anthony reattach the X-nut on my Hydrotail, which had fallen out on Sunday (I needed a lock nut on the screw), and it was hilarious because he needed my small fingers to get the nut inside while he inserted the screw, and I'm telling him, "Wait, don't stick it in yet!" while I was positioning the nut over the hole. Well, it was funny at the time...

As soon as I got home, I had to mow the lawn, and I must say, I've never seen a better looking lawn in July, but of course, that's from all the rain we had in May and June, and I'm not complaining! My flowers are looking stupendous, life is just fucking awesome!

After mowing, I came inside and chopped ingredients for my dinner salad, popped a beer and stretched for :25, then sat down to eat dinner finally around 7:30. Last night's salad was greens, 2 hard-boiled eggs, a can of albacore tuna, 2 apricots, a handful of blueberries and a tomato, liberally doused in olive oil, balsamic glaze and a freshly squeezed lemon. Yum! I've gone through almost a dozen eggs in the last 5 days.

This morning I'm sensing a little sadness, as I can tell the days are shortening up, but that helps me to sleep a little longer, and I got almost 8 hours again. I'm going to do a flop around in the pool swim, and then I've got another brick workout to do, but I am not going (famous last words!) to go out at sprint pace--I don't think I can today, but we'll see. I'm going to ride Bitchie with the disk on and maybe the aero helmet. Scratch that. If I go out like that, I have to ride hard! We'll see how my legs are--while I ran hilly yesterday, I didn't run very fast.

It looks to be another gorgeous day. Have I said this is my best summer ever? Sometimes when I stop and think about that, I think how could that be when I just lost my parents so recently? But then I think they know how much I am kicking the living shit out of every day, and in the end, we all make our own happiness, right?