On a Roll?

So yesterday I did the same bike workout as on Tuesday. When I did it on Tuesday, I thought I executed pretty well, but the challenge yesterday was that I'd done the track workout on Wednesday. Plus, I had dinner with a friend Wednesday night, and she and I split a bottle of wine, and I'm such a lightweight I had a slight hangover. I guess wine after a track workout isn't the best idea!

Anyway, I knew I'd have to have supplemental caffeine for the workout, and I wavered between Coke and Ultra Violence and decided on Coke. In retrospect, I should have gone with the Ultra Violence, but whatever.

As soon as I started the warmup, I could feel my legs were a little fatigued, but at least I hadn't lifted weights or shoveled snow! When I began the first FT interval, though, I wasn't feeling like I had much power, or at least not as much as on Tuesday. But I pressed on, and as it turns out, I did slightly better than on Tuesday! I was so happy with myself that after I got through another couple of meetings at work, I decided to polish off my strength training for the week by doing legs and back.

Let's just say my muscles weren't all that happy to be subject to the weights, but I got through things pretty well--it only took 34' to do 5 exercises for my lats/traps and 6 legs (3 sets of 20 reps). I was highly motivated, too, by the fact that starting next week, the strength workouts will get a little easier (yeah, right!) as I move into max power phase.

While I was doing the back stuff, I noticed that I was able to twist pretty freely to both sides! And despite putting the hurt to myself, I actually felt better after lifting than before I started! I laugh at various triathlon training regimens that tell you not to bother with strength training. While that may be good advice for someone in their 20's, I think that from your 30's and beyond, you will benefit from it (or some sort of functional training) and should do it in order to protect yourself from things that can happen as part of daily life. While we can and do get injured from sports, most serious injuries that us recreational athletes experience are from other causes. I guess I should give a big shout out to my buddy Louis for espousing functional fitness along with organizations like Crossfit. In the spring through fall, I garden quite a bit, and do a lot of bending, twisting and squatting, and trust me, swimming, biking and running do not fully prepare your muscles for that! Oh yeah, and don't forget the stretching and massage!

I stretch for 30' last night, and this morning I feel pretty darn good. Of course, I won't know the condition of my legs until I run in the middle of the day. But it will be an easy run.

I stalked all my competition for this Sunday's indoor triathlon, and I have one confirmed possible competitor and one unknown---the other 6 in my AG should be no problem. But we will see, as anything can happen, right? I need to get my long bike workout done early tomorrow so I can get some quality recovery before I go on Sunday. I'm sure it will be interesting, and it will be fun to reconnect with other athletes for a day. Even though it's just a silly little indoor race, they have become quite competitive, and a couple of local pros show up and we get free massages afterwards, so what could be more fun on a winter day?

Finally, thanks to Jamie for pointing out that I have a fan on Flickr. Cracks me up! I did not know I was a MILF!

Have a great weekend, and catch you after my first official race of 2009!