Weekly Workout Totals 02/16/2009-02/22/2009 and stinky race

First about yesterday's race...I had a bad day. I sucked. I should have had the volunteer write "loser" on me before I started. I did have a good swim, and felt really strong there, no doubt from using the paddles a lot, so that was the silver lining. When I got on the bike, the thing felt way harder than it had 2 weeks ago, so either the thing was miscalibrated...or...I just sucked. At any rate, I was demoralized and figured why bother trying to push it much on the run. I was in the elite women's wave, so I got passed plenty of times, but there was one woman who was slightly ahead of me for quite awhile, and at least I got psyched to finally pass her and lap her. When it was finished, I just about puked, so I'm going with the bike being off, because it sure felt like I had pushed some serious watts. Oh well...I still won my age group, but I'll call this an ugly win. In 2 weeks, I am going to do everything I can including taking a day off before the race to see what I can give. Some of this is just my body adapting to the sum total of training I've been throwing at myself, and I can't expect to be on every time, but still it was a pretty dramatic degree of suckage compared to 2 weeks ago.

Every time I've done this series, I have one off race, so this was it, but it was still a good day. I got to watch some other people I know race who did really well, and hey, a bad day racing is still better than a good day working, right? Plus, I couldn't do my long run right there at the club where the race was held, so I had to drive home and fire up a treadmill on my Y. My race was at 10:05, and I started running again at 1:25, had a short massage in between, but still man, did it feel NOT GOOD to run later! I could feel all the lactate (or whatever it is, depending on who you ask) in my legs, and it was just torture to keep going. I wanted to stop so badly, asking myself why the fuck am I doing this to myself? A normal person would just have gone home and taken a nap or at least put their feet up. But NOOOOOO....the voice in my head that knows that it's better to suffer like this now in training because it will toughen me up for the stuff to come, namely Triple T, Horribly Hilly, Rockman 1/2 Ironman and IMLP all in the space of 10 weeks. So I had better be plenty tough to not only withstand all that but also try and do well at each of them. At least once every 5 minutes I told myself that I had done enough, but then I would tell myself that I could make it through another 5 minutes, and so I kept going and got in 1:20 more of running, and I thought about stretching a little bit before I went home, but that went out the window as my body was screaming for calories. I went home and drank some Endurox and made some guacamole and did some dinner prep and washed the dishes and then I finally got around to some serious stretching around 5PM and my body was so thankful for that, and I knew I would feel like I'd been pretty well torched this morning.

I was pleasantly awakened today by a male cardinal singing right outside my bedroom, and I just laid in bed with my eyes closed listening to him sing, and thought what a nice way to be woken up (not that there aren't better ways--there are--but still) and how that bird's song is a surefire sign that spring is just around the corner (I saw a robin last week, too), and I kept laying there for a few minutes assessing how my muscles felt, and not too surprisingly, I felt like I "did something" the day before. I got out of bed, made some coffee, and thought about just taking a rest day, but again, the point of what I'm doing now is to get up and do it again, repeat weekly, and force the body to adapt. I only swam for 1/2 hour, and it felt absolutely wonderful to be in the water, and I could tell the swimming was helping to flush some crap out of my system.

The next item on my agenda for today was a :50 run, and of course, my legs were protesting violently to this possibility, but I told them to shut the fuck up and I was going to run. I decided to don my compression socks, because I knew that if I looked like a complete and total dork that I wouldn't cheese out on the run, I mean how lame would I look if I only ran for like 20 minutes? I can't say the compression socks made any difference whatsoever, but just knowing they were there acted like a whip to keep me going. I actually had a pretty decent easy-ish run, although when I was finished I immediately went home and jumped on a conference call and my body was screaming for more calories, and luckily I could throw something in the microwave while I was listening in on the call, and then I had 5 minutes in between calls, so I got my shower in, and I'm laughing at how this is what I choose to do.

This stuff is so conducive to flip flopping mental states. This morning I was chatting with a friend at the pool about how it feels really good (to him and me, at least) when we are just really fucking tired from a good day of training and whatever else life has thrown at us. I've figured out that for myself, when I am in that tired state, there is nothing else I can think about but how tired I am, and that frees my brain to let go and really relax. I mean like I know I was watching the Oscars last night, but I don't remember a whole lot about it because I was so wiped out and it felt so good and I didn't really care who was winning or what the award was for and even though my own race sucked, I HTFU'ed and ran afterwards. So in one day I started out optimistic, felt bad that I performed like a total loser slacker, but then kept going and got that end of the day bliss that makes all of this worth it.

I am really nobody in the big scheme of things, but this is what I choose right now for myself. At least a few times every year I run into someone I haven't seen for awhile, and get asked the question, "Are you still doing all that hardcore training and stuff?" And now I just smile at them because what I'm thinking is asking them about how great is their life is and how do they feel about their choices? It's almost as if people expect you to just fall down and give up, and what the hell, is that the norm? Oh yeah, that's right life is hard. It IS. I'm not in it to win an award, but I am in it to LIVE IT and I intend to keep doing that. Pushing myself makes me feel alive; being exhausted after pushing myself makes me feel alive. Sure I don't have to outrun bullets or survive horrid living conditions, and maybe that's why I choose this for myself because I DO have it easy relative to a lot of people. I just really, really like feeling alive. I love moving around, I love the sun shining on my face, tending to my little piece of land that produces so much incredible beauty for much of the year, tuning into the nature that is presented to me, enjoying good food and drink, putting in a good day's work, and maybe, just maybe putting a smile on someone else's face or getting them to think about what they could do to enhance their own life.

I'm rambling, but I get to that every now and then just so I remember what all is swirling about in my head. Life is good. No--life is great! I am once again back to feeling like problems are just small things, and that is the best part of all of this. I am really looking forward to riding my bikes outside soon enough, but also sinking my hands into the dirt in my yard and seeing what I can make grow and give me pleasure there. I guess I'm a hedonist of sorts--I love the beauty of nature, and I love colors (duh) and tastes and smells and sounds. I think we were given our senses and neuromuscular system to experience and enjoy everything around us and not taking advantage of that seems to me a grand waste of a life.

Anyway, here's what I did last week:

Weekly Workout Totals	02/16/2009-02/22/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by the coming of spring!
Swim:	7850 yards (4.46 miles) in 2.75 hours; 19% of weekly workout time; approx. 962 calories burned Canadian: 7178.04 meters
Bike:	Approx. 101.02 miles in 5.63 hours; 39% of weekly workout time; approx. 2812 calories burned; Total TSS=295 Canadian: 162.58 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 28.12 miles in 4.33 hours; 30% of weekly workout time; approx. 1956 calories burned Canadian: 45.25 kilometers
Strength:	1.87 hours; 13% of weekly workout time; approx. 468 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 133.6 miles in 14.58 hours; approx. 6198 calories burned Canadian: 1.25 kilometers
Sleep:	7.61 hours avg./night
Stretching:	2.78 hours. Massage: 1.25 hours

Race Toes

For this Sunday...

Getting Used to It

Since my training has been focused on accomplishing a number of things, it's only normal to expect not everything to line up all at once. My strength training has been going well, and since I'm just this week almost to a maintenance (i.e., no increase in overall load), I know that it is impacting s/b/r in various ways. Throw in every 2 weeks races with a 1:30 run afterwards, mix things up with a few group bike workouts to throw off my training/recovery schedule, add in a virus, and it's been quite an experience. Nothing that I didn't expect, though! The whole point of what I'm doing is to make me very strong so that once I kick up the volume in mid-March, my body will be fully prepared for it.

So on that note, last week I had some pretty good bike workouts, although Saturday I wasn't on. Sunday I had a great 1:40 run. Monday I didn't get enough sleep, but still managed to run, which was the thing I needed to do. Yesterday my bike workout sucked--I just had dead legs--but I didn't obsess over it. Today I had a decent swim even though the pool was stinking hot, and then this afternoon I had a really great track workout.

I'm going to lift tonight because I normally start on it on Monday, but work has been in my way, so I'm starting tonight and will do some more tomorrow and perhaps Friday. I should have a good bike workout tomorrow, and then Friday and Saturday are all about a holding pattern before I race again on Sunday.

I am definitely feeling the intensity of everything I'm doing, and I'm only 2 weeks away from the last indoor sprint tri and then my lifting goes into maintenance mode! That's always something I look forward to because it just changes my physiology. My massage therapist commented to me yesterday that he could feel the changes in my muscles from the progressive work I've been doing, and I've also added 500+ yards of swimming with paddles to each workout now, so I'm intentionally putting the hurt to myself.

Periodically I ask myself whether it's worth it to put myself through all of this because right about this time of year, I am very up and down with workout success, but as long as I keep moving in the right direction, which I am, I'm OK with being tired or cranky or a little extra sore. This is the price I pay to have the strength and endurance to do all the crazy shit I like to do starting in May, and that is my definition of big fun!

I suppose that as long as I can race well again on Sunday, it doesn't matter whether I'm "on" for each and every workout, does it?

Hey, it's all good, even the crappy workouts. I won't even remember the crappy workouts. All I will remember is that come May I was out there kicking ass and taking names.

Weekly Workout Totals 02/09/2009-02/15/2009

Someone on Slowtwitch asked why so many triathletes blog. I responded in there, mostly to reaffirm what a big, giant dork I am since I post training totals and stuff. But this blog ain't all about training totals, is it? Things will get spiced up no doubt once winter is over and I'm out riding and causing general mayhem (or at least I hope to be) and wearing less clothes. Until then, I still don't care if anyone reads this, and I still don't care what anyone thinks who reads this, I don't mind the people who stop by only for the pics, and I'm going to keep on writing as long as something strikes my fancy.

I had a solid training week last week and felt pretty much back on my game after a race. It was interesting leading the bike workout on Wednesday night and then doing a track workout Thursday morning--not really enough recovery time in between 2 key workouts! But I only had to swim on Friday, so no worries. I just did not feel great on the bike on Saturday, which I'm owing to antibiotics that I'm taking for a minor thing, but the brick run was solid. Yesterday I ran 1:40 and ran strong and well, and did an easy :50 swim afterwards that felt great.

This week will be a "normal" training week; i.e., I am not moving workouts around like I did last week, and I've got another race on Sunday. This time, they put me in a wave with the top 10 women overall, so at some level I am going to get my ass handed to me! That's OK--it will be seriously motivating to be up against the talent. I may even beat 1 or 2 of them! Plus, at this race, the bikes are in the center of the 8-laps-to-the-mile running track, which makes it even more exciting. I'm going to get my lucky Brazilian wax the day before because thinking about that pain while racing makes it seem not so bad!

In other news, my back is feeling pretty darn great now. I am pronouncing myself healed! And I'm over the URI I had for about 1.5 weeks, and starting tomorrow, I'm off the antibiotics (which mess with my gut and also sometimes make me drowsy). So putting all that together with my (hopefully) third solid training week in a row, and the stars could be aligning for me to have a great race this Sunday. I'm already looking forward to the post-race festivities--food, massage, beers, a nap, more food, more beers. Or maybe champagne...depending on whether I can take my AG again and stay in the top 10 overall. And maybe hit 7 miles on the bike. Why do I keep raising my own celebratory stakes? Why not?

Here's what I did last week:

Weekly Workout Totals	02/09/2009-02/15/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by the awesome feeling of being 100% healthy!
Swim:	9200 yards (5.22 miles) in 3.25 hours; 23% of weekly workout time; approx. 1138 calories burned Canadian: 8412.48 meters
Bike:	Approx. 102.15 miles in 5.43 hours; 39% of weekly workout time; approx. 2774 calories burned; Total TSS=323 Canadian: 164.39 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 25.94 miles in 3.97 hours; 28% of weekly workout time; approx. 1797 calories burned Canadian: 41.75 kilometers
Strength:	1.4 hours; 10% of weekly workout time; approx. 350 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 133.31 miles in 14.05 hours; approx. 6059 calories burned Canadian: 2.13 kilometers
Sleep:	7.75 hours avg./night
Stretching:	2.13 hours. Massage: 1 hours

For no particular reason...

This should really be titled "Ode to Facebook"

Bringin' the Pain

Last night I led a group of triathletes in a trainer workout at my bike shop, The Bike Shop. Most of the attendees are members of the Elmhurst Triathlon Club, to which I do not belong (I don't belong to a tri club). The way I ended up with this gig is that I know a few of the club members, I attended a workout 2 weeks ago led by Anthony, my wrench, declared it "not that hard," and so Anthony said I could lead the next one.

I don't know if I've ever gone into my pseudo-athletic, pre-triathlon past, but once upon a time, I got back into the cardio thing by attending step classes. Yes, step class! A male colleague suggested I try it out (this was in 1994 at a gym inside my office complex), and at the time, I wasn't in great shape cardiovascularly (I'd been mostly just lifting for about 3 years at the time), and so I agreed to try it out. Well, I guess it brought out my competitiveness, since even though at many sports I'm a complete and total klutz, I was good at this, and not only was I good, I began bringing music, and the instructor asked me to sub in when she couldn't make it.

Step class morphed into this circuit class where you'd spend one minute at a "station," and then immediately move onto the next, keeping this up for about 30-40 minutes at a time. The stations consisted of step hurdles, jump rope, jumping jacks, step class moves, etc., and then this same (male) instructor added an abs class, and I got into that, too. Once again, when the instructor couldn't make it, I would sub in and make stuff up, and usually make it harder. Some attendees would grimace when they saw that I was going to lead a class, as they knew I would give them a run for their money.

When the weather warmed up, I suggested we take the circuit class outdoors, and we did. This let us add fun things like 1' sprints, running jump rope, skipping, etc. I have really fond memories of this class since we looked pretty silly doing this stuff, but all the while we'd see people leaving in their cars to go eat lunch out, many returning with fast food bags in their hands. Also, we got some suntan!

Well, it was an off day for this class once in 1998 when I thought, "I wonder how far it is around this building complex on the running path?" I had never run before, and since I had been doing running jump rope and sprints, I thought I should try and go all the way around. So I did, and it wasn't that bad, so I did it again. That was the start of my running, and well, you know where that went...

So I have a history of mastering something and then trying to step it up to make it more challenging. The same is true with other non-triathlon things that I do. When I learned to sew, I found that the more difficult the garment to make, the more I enjoyed it. I actually love sewing really intricate things with lots of details to them. Same with gardening. It's easy to grow many plants, but for awhile I experimented with stuff that's a little more finicky, but in that case, Mother Nature won and I realized that it's just better (I think) to only try and grow what naturally likes to thrive in my little piece of Earth (and I don't do indoor plants). Same with cooking. I generally cook pretty (to me) simple stuff most weeks, but when I have the time, I really like making something that has all sort of ingredients and steps to it.

OK, so when I was asked to lead the trainer class, I thought I could just lay down one of my usual workouts which would be plenty hard, but yesterday, about an hour before I needed to leave, I made something up that I thought would be good and a little different for me. I train with power, so everything I do is expressed as % of FTP, but others can use % of 40K TT HR or pace.

I got to the shop around 6PM, set up LGL and did some easy warmup myself. I ended up doing about 15' on my own, and then when we officially started, gave everyone 5' to warm up, while I explained the zones we would be using, that I didn't care what gears you used (use whatever gets you to the prescribed effort level), and then we reviewed the workout itself. Anthony had given me a flat box that had held a bike frame, and I wrote the zones on one half and the workout on the other and stood it up against the counter so everyone could see it while we worked out.

Here's the main set of the workout we did:
3xspinups (30" spin, 30" easy)
3x(2' 105-110%, 1' cd)
2' cd
10' 85-90% (tempo)
2'(1'), 3'(1'), 4'(2'), 5'(2') 100% or FTP
3x (60" squat, 45" rest)
2' cd
13x30/30 (30" @ 110%+, 30" easy)
2-5' cd

During the spinups, I asked people to call out their cadence, and we got some pretty amazing numbers. I had called the 105-110% "balls out" level, just because it's easier to say plus, well, that's what you want to do! Everyone got their sweat on pretty quickly, and at one point, a couple who lives in an apartment above the shop came down and made us turn down the music! As they were leaving, I told them they could just come and join us, but I guess they didn't want to.

I was facing everyone so I could see their faces and all the sweat pouring off of them, so I hoped they were getting a good workout. After we finished, several people came up to me and said that it was a good workout, and I was happy because I worried that maybe I wouldn't make it hard enough for some of the folks.

When I downloaded my power data this morning, I had evidence that it was, indeed, an awesome workout. For you power junkies, here's how it panned out. Please note that my FTP on LGL is currently pegged at 205 watts, so you can see on the TSS line that I ran at 89% of FTP for that workout!



If I am asked to lead the workout again, I will gladly do it. I made myself work harder even as I was yelling out intervals and stuff, and it was really fun.

This morning I am going to do my track workout on legs that may protest, but I don't care!

Weekly Workout Totals 02/02/2009-02/08/2009 and Another Race Win!

I'd been reluctant to say anything about the state of my recovery from whatever virus attacked me a little over a week ago because I didn't want to jinx my race yesterday. I was up and down this past week, sleeping a lot, including naps, completing most workouts at less than 100% prescribed intensity, coughing every now and then and feeling mucousy. I held myself back on the hard stuff biking (sort of) and running, and swimming was just there. I completed my strength workouts, but was left completely exhausted after them. Anaerobic stuff is always tough on me when I'm fighting a virus, and it was pretty obvious that if I felt I needed to go to sleep after 30' of lifting that I was still fighting one!

Friday morning I felt pretty good in the pool, and did a short run that left me feeling tired, but I snuck in a nap, slept long and well, and Saturday morning felt pretty good. It was a warm day, and there was just no excuse not to ride a bike outside. But the snow melt combined with all the built up crap on the roads would make for a messy ride, and besides, I thought it would be wise to hold back my intensity, so I decided to ride Clipless Fuck, since I didn't want to do a full road bike cleaning after the ride (I like my bikes clean!).

Well, just heading up the stupid little hill out of my house I was like, whoa, I suck really bad, but then again I was riding into a stiff headwind. I rode west first, just to enjoy the headwind even more, and rode on my usual weekday interval route, and all I could think was I suck, I suck, I suck!!! I didn't feel like my lungs were completely present, and neither were my legs. OK, so I can cut the ride short (my goal was 1:30), right? No. After I turned around and was going like twice as fast with the tailwind on the way back home, it didn't feel so bad, so on one of the hills I like to use for short, hard hill climb intervals, I decided, what the fuck, I'm going up. And as soon as I made the turn to start the climb, I said out loud, "I hate myself!" I mean, who else could I blame for making me do this when I wasn't feeling 100%? I actually did OK on that climb, because the sun was shining, I was slightly sheltered from the wind, and hey, I'm riding outside in February!

When I was almost home, I decided I could knock out another 7.5 miles even though it would mean the last piece would be into the winds. No matter, I finished up, I was filthy, my legs hurt, and I was coughing up a lung. I had to leave my bike shoes outside, and as soon as I went in the house, I had to strip down in the laundry room since I was a filthy mess, but smiling about it! I cleaned off my helmet, grabbed some Endurox, then went and cleaned my bike shoes and finally the bike (not a full cleaning, but enough), and thought that I didn't need to do anything for the rest of the day, which was nice. I laid in bed for about an hour but didn't fall asleep because I had slept so much the night before and napped the day before, but still just laying down was great.

When I woke up yesterday morning, I didn't feel bad, but I didn't feel the usual "oomph" that I feel on a race day. I knew I wasn't 100%, but anything can happen, so I did my usual routine of Ultrafuel, a little stretching, and headed off to race.

As I warmed up on the track and then the bike, I could tell I just wasn't feelin' the love, and even though I had assessed my day's competition and thought there were 1 or 2 women in my age group who could beat me, I just let go and figured I was going to have an off day, so may as well get the show on the road.

My swim was a bit slower than 2 weeks ago, although I think they miscounted laps, but whatever. I could tell that I just couldn't push it in the water, and my stroke didn't feel that great either. Oh well, onto the bike.

I didn't have high expectations for the bike, but biking is my thing, and I just started in and fired up my legs and sucked it up. I guess for me, biking is the sport where I'm really good with pain, and I went faster than 2 weeks ago(6.89 miles in 20 minutes), and cleaned up in my wave (including beating all but 1 man), and when I got off I was light-headed and once again laid on the floor for about a minute, and then walked up the stairs to run.

I was a bit wheezy right away, and I could tell that I just didn't have speed in my legs to run today, and I was suffering right away. This was the first time in maybe 5 years where I felt so bad that I just wanted to stop, but I told myself to HTFU and just do whatever I could. I was totally OK with not winning my age group, but I had done so well on the bike it might be a wash for me anyway. As it turns out, I was just 1/2 lap off from 2 weeks ago, but man that run hurt like a mofo. It wasn't that I couldn't run; it was just I couldn't run fast.

Oh well, I still needed to run for another 1:30, and I didn't want to wait too long in between, so I chatted with a few friends and got on the treadmill, and got it done. My legs didn't really hurt so much as I was only doing a Z1-Z2 run, but it was B-O-R-I-N-G. Still, I knew it wouldn't do me any good to try and run any faster.

Next, I went and watched the elite wave, which included my friend Adam, and also Lauren Jensen, a local pro. Lauren and I chatted in the locker room before she started her wave, asked me about the bikes, and I told her she'd clean up, that these bikes seems a bit easier than in the past 2 years.

Not that I'm competitive or anything, but while everyone was on the bikes, I walked around to see how everyone was doing and what resistance levels they were using, and even though a lot of these people are way faster than me, I knew I'd done a solid effort on the day that would be hard for anyone to beat me in my age group or neighboring age groups ;)

After watching the elite wave, I finally grabbed some pizza and got a short massage (the best part of the race!), and prepared to watch another friend race. In the meantime, I was checking the scores, and it looked like I was going to take my age group and be fairly high again overall, but you never know...it's not over until it's over, right?

I had fun watching my friend race and cheering even though I was pretty wasted, but hell, he had done another race before this one, so what could I complain about? He did really well, too, and then finally it was time to go eat some sushi and have a beer or three.

Before leaving the facility, I had to check once more, and I think I was 6th woman overall, first in my age group, and pretty happy. I'm going to try and hit 7 miles on the bike in 2 weeks, as I should be done with this stinking virus, back on a full week of training for 3 weeks solid, and I really want to have a solid swim, bike and run.

It's going to be nice and warm again today, so I'm going to do a short run outdoors, even though I know my legs are going to protest mightily, but that's OK.

I am pretty happy that at least my biking legs have returned to where they were 2 years ago, and I think I can pick up my swimming, and my running is good except for the glitch of the virus I've had for about 1.5 weeks.

Yesterday was just an awesome day, and even while I was suffering I know I had some sort of stupid grin on my face because, well, this is what I like to do, isn't it?

Happy Monday!

Weekly Workout Totals	02/02/2009-02/08/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by my usual February illness and another race win!
Swim:	7800 yards (4.43 miles) in 2.78 hours; 21% of weekly workout time; approx. 976 calories burned Canadian: 7132.32 meters
Bike:	Approx. 95.48 miles in 5.08 hours; 38% of weekly workout time; approx. 2636 calories burned; Total TSS=315 Canadian: 153.66 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 27.14 miles in 4.23 hours; 32% of weekly workout time; approx. 1918 calories burned Canadian: 43.68 kilometers
Strength:	1.28 hours; 10% of weekly workout time; approx. 320 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 127.05 miles in 13.37 hours; approx. 5850 calories burned Canadian: 1.25 kilometers
Sleep:	8.07 hours avg./night
Stretching:	2.95 hours. Massage: 1.25 hours

Weekly Workout Totals 01/26-2009-02/01/2009

But first, the results of my Pirate Personality Test:

You are The Cap'n!

Some men and women are born great, some achieve greatness and some slit the throats of any scalawag who stands between them and unlimited power. You never met a man - or woman - you couldn't eviscerate. You are the definitive Man of Action, the CEO of the Seven Seas, Lee Iacocca in a blousy shirt and drawstring-fly pants. You're mission-oriented, and if anyone gets in the way, that's his problem, now isn't? Your buckle was swashed long ago and you have never been so sure of anything as your ability to bend everyone to your will. You will call anyone out and cut off his head if he shows any sign of taking you on or backing down. If one of your lieutenants shows an overly developed sense of ambition he may find more suitable accommodations in Davy Jones' locker. That is, of course, IF you notice him. You tend to be self absorbed - a weakness that may keep you from seeing enemies where they are and imagining them where they are not.




What's Yer Inner Pirate?
brought to you by The Official Talk Like A Pirate Web Site. Arrrrr!

And now back to our regularly scheduled blogging...
I came down with a virus last week. I could feel it on Thursday, and Friday morning I woke up and went "Nope." I was down for the count all day Friday and most of Saturday, but I came around Sunday and ran almost 11 miles (slowly, Zone 1). I hated being in bed for so long, even though I did sleep a ton, but it was the right thing to do. I usually come down with something in late January/early February, so this wasn't unexpected. I am mostly better, and I can tell because the lymph glands on the left side of my neck have almost vanished. I know I needed sleep, and maybe this will remind my body that I should actually try and sleep more. One can always try!

So I guess I got a rest week last week--enforced rest! I took things easy yesterday, and today I will see if I can punch it on the bike or not. Either way, I know I'll be good to go for the weekend and another race, especially since I'll have a target on my back!

It's nice to notice the days getting longer and occasional appearances by the sun. Only one more month until March, the month where the weather can be pretty much anything where I live, but the chances of being able to bike outdoors are increased, so that's good. Plus, March is when the first flowers in my yard will poke themselves out of the ground! Knocking out 2 more races in February will make it a good month, and I'm pretty optimistic about some other good things happening in my life, too.

Overall, I have no complaints, and while being sick sucked, that moment when I know I'm back to 120% (my back seems to be 100%!!!) is a great feeling, too. It's like...you want to feel good, you want to feel good, you want to feel good...and then all of a sudden, you do! There aren't many feelings like that in life, huh?

Weekly Workout Totals	01/26/2009-02/01/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by my usual February illness
Swim:	6100 yards (3.46 miles) in 1.73 hours; 18% of weekly workout time; approx. 607 calories burned Canadian: 5577.84 meters
Bike:	Approx. 56.67 miles in 3.13 hours; 32% of weekly workout time; approx. 1571 calories burned; Total TSS=181 Canadian: 91.2 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 23.23 miles in 3.64 hours; 37% of weekly workout time; approx. 1646 calories burned Canadian: 37.39 kilometers
Strength:	1.25 hours; 13% of weekly workout time; approx. 313 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 83.36 miles in 9.75 hours; approx. 4137 calories burned Canadian: 1 kilometers
Sleep:	7.64 hours avg./night (does not include all the hours spent sleeping on Friday/Saturday)
Stretching:	1.65 hours. Massage: 1 hours

Spot the Crackhead!

I snagged some pics from the website for last Sunday's indoor triathlon. I did not know someone was taking pics while *I* was on the sideline cheering and taking pics of some guys I know. Count the hotties in each pic below:

Recovery (continued)

So yesterday morning I was on my way to the Y to do a track workout, and I didn't realize until I was out the door just how much snow had fallen--about 2". Which meant I had to move it. It was pretty fluffy stuff, and I didn't feel like firing up the snowblower and smelling all like gasoline/oil and stuff, so I just shoveled. I think it took me about 1/2 hour to do it, and then I was off to run.

The warmup piece on the treadmill felt fine, except that I was nearly overheating from my little shoveling warmup. Then I moved onto the track where it wasn't as cool as it usually is, but still fine. I had brought a can of Coke (poured into a bike bottle) to drink.

When I did the piece of the warmup that included some 5K pace work, I just took off and was enjoying the fast running, but I ran faster than I needed to, and it was just enough to make me realize I was still a little tired. I did the first 10K/5K interval exactly to pace, but was disappointed because last week I had run faster, because I was definitely fresher last week, and yesterday I didn't have a full 24 hours between a hard bike workout and a hard run workout, which is significant for me.

I completed the second 10K/5K interval exactly like the first one, only it hurt more to do it. I figured I'd slow it down slightly for the last interval, and I did, but not by much. Still, all things considered, it was a decent workout.

Around noon, I took a short break from work and worked my bis, tris, delts and chest. It only took 20 minutes, but I was feeling it.

I was invited to do a "spin" session at my bike shop that began at 6:30PM. I wasn't too sure it was a good idea to do it after having done a track workout, but whatever, it's all good training, right? Just see what I can do...

I loaded up a bottle with a can of Ultra Violence Voltage flavor cut with grape Gatorade, since I knew one way or the other, I'd need a boost to get through a hard bike workout in the evening (I rarely do evening workouts--I'm usually down for the count stretching about 6:00PM followed by general relaxation and vegetating).

I set up my bike and trainer next to the owner's bike, because I know him, and thought we could chat whenever our lungs weren't burning. Our instructor, Anthony, was facing us barking out gearing and effort levels. I was OK with most of the workout except for pretty extensive bouts of standing, where I took the opportunity to ride seated if I felt I needed to. I did the 3 isometric squats (a la Troy Jacobsen in Spinervals) just fine, and was kicking out good power for the duration. When it was over, either I was a slacker or I am just used to the hard workouts, I shouted, "Next time make it harder!" And well, I got my wish, as I have been asked to lead the next session in 2 weeks! I'm looking forward to putting something together that will be challenging, yet fun.

A few of us went out for beers and burgers afterwards, and when I got home, I was so tired I didn't even shower (I had towelled off at the shop) and just went straight to bed. I was a little pleased with myself that I was able to get through it, but knew it really wasn't a good idea for me to have done both a track workout and hard bike on the same day. Whatever, if I need to adjust after the fact, that's fine.

This morning all I had to do was a short (2200 yards) swim workout, and that went well, except for my throat being a little scratchy, which is just a sign that I had better watch it or I could get sick. I am still going to try and do the remainder of my strength work today which is LEGS!!!! My legs actually don't feel too bad right now, but I know from past experience that sometimes you feel your strongest and best just before you are about to go over the edge and get sick and need a day off. I'm already mentally prepared to take a sick day tomorrow if I at all feel less than 100%, and all I have planned is a swim which can go out the window, too.

I'm sure other people have to put up with a lot of other interferences to their training than I do--the only reason I write about this stuff is because sometimes I go back and read it and learn from it, and other times I find out just how strong I am and achieve a breakthrough by doing something that I thought might be a stupid idea!

Recovery

A friend asked me about consuming alcohol and its affect on recovery. I ended up stating that I believe that as long as you have a good diet and are getting sufficient sleep, that a few beers or glasses of wine shouldn't affect you too much. If you are really going for a Kona slot or you just want to see how you perform without any alcohol, go for it.

But then I got to thinking about the whole recovery thing, and there are so many factors that enter into it. What is recovery? I would define being recovered as:

the ability to train as hard as or harder than the most recent good, hard effort

where "hard effort" is a workout where you are able to do work at or above threshold/LT/FT pace, however you define it. If your most recent hard effort was a race, you are recovered when you can do a hard workout like the one before the race--nobody can just race and race and race! One reason that I am not an advocate of all long and easy "base" stuff in the "off season" is because it is too easy to slack on recovery like eating well, not putting on weight, sleeping well, etc., since you are not doing any hard efforts that truly test whether or not you are recovered!)

If I trained hard yesterday and all I do today is an easy (Z1/Z2) workout or two, then I can't say for sure whether I'm recovered. But the next time I try and do a pretty hard workout, I can sure tell.

Should we be striving for 100% recovery by the next day after a hard workout? If your job is to train, they I would say yes--otherwise, you need to get in touch with your own body so you know how many days you might need to recover from a hard or breakthrough effort.

For example, Sunday I did a 1-hour sprint race, and I also ran and biked easy afterwards. I did not expect to be fully recovered from that on Monday, and in fact, Monday all I had scheduled was a short, easy swim and an easy run. And I could tell I wasn't recovered. Yesterday, I had a hard interval bike workout to do, which I did after about 30 minutes of strength training. Did I execute well on the bike workout? I did OK, but I could tell I wasn't fully recovered from Sunday (sleeping less than 6 hours does that to me!). Still, I did the best I could, and knew that I it was critical that I focus on recovery last night. I got a massage, got to sleep early, and slept really well, and feel pretty good. But I won't really know until I do my track workout in a few minutes whether I am fully recovered.

If you don't know your own body well, you might start your next hard workout, notice that you aren't going to be able to hit the workout's objectives and bag it altogether or just turn it into an easy, aerobic workout. There are certainly times when this is the best thing to do. I know that for me, I am comfortable "doing the best I can" in the workout, and as long as I am close to the objectives, I am fine with it. I don't get down on myself for missing targets as long as it doesn't become habitual, and I keep pretty meticulous track of my workouts, so for example, on Thursday I am doing the same bike workout as Tuesday, and I should be able to perform it 100% to specs.

Now what about "recovery workouts?" I think this is highly individual. For some people, it's more of a mental thing to get back out there and do something, and our mental state affects our physical state so much, that if you think you will feel like a slacker if you do nothing but rest, then you are probably better off doing some sort of easy workout. But recovery is generally not doing, and for me that means sleep, massage, stretching, reading a book in bed, anything that gets me off my feet! Swimming can be recovery, too, but only if it's only about 1/2 hour or less and real easy.

All most age groupers can do to foster recovery is to pay attention to their bodies and to train at levels that can be recovered from. That is, I can train harder than some age groupers and not as hard as others. Plus, you need to take your goals into consideration. Generally speaking, my triathlon goals are to not suck in my races (MOP or better at any distance), do some really cool extreme shit, and have boatloads of fun while training hard a lot and still enjoying non-triathlon hobbies. Mostly I just like being highly fit! For other people, the goal might be general fitness, which allows for a lot of slack in how hard you train.

I think the key point is that recovery is relative to your goals. There's no need to worry too much about recovery if you aren't too concerned about being competitive, and if you aren't, then you are more likely to just bag a workout than try and execute it "as best you can." The more competitive you are, though, the more you need to pay attention to how your training plan plus recovery gets you there. A training plan is only as good as your ability to recover from it along the way. If you aren't recovering, you need to either scale back your goals (and your training) or bump up your recovery measures. There is no middle ground. And your ability to recover changes as you age, trust me I know!

A few other things post-track workout that I thought about...If you are feeling like you're not recovering, go through this list and see if any of them might be involved:

1. Sleeping long enough and restfully?
2. Executing good post-workout nutrition?
3. Taking in sufficient carbs to support your training load?
4. Eating a variety of foods, meeting your vitamin/mineral needs?
   
5. Minimizing life stress and performing rejuvenation techniques like stretching, massage, meditation?
6. Attending to lingering aches and pains before they turn into injuries?
   
7. Completing workouts at the appropriate intensity? In particular, are you going too hard when you don't need to?
8. Carrying an appropriate training load based on your history? I.e., if you trained 200 hours last year and this year's plan has you training 300 hours, it could be a recipe for disaster.
9. Reverse tapering (i.e., ramping back up after a race) appropriately?
   
10. Maintaining a healthy weight to minimize joint stress?

Those are some of the questions I ask myself or someone else if I/they are not feeling recovered.

I fucking love training hard, but I love my recovery, too!

Weekly Workout Totals 01/19-2009-01/25/2009 and First Race of 2009!

I'm pretty sure I won my age group handily yesterday, although official results haven't been posted yet. There was one woman in my AG who hadn't raced yet when I left, and I stalked her up and down the Intertubes and can't find any race results for her, so either she's a total ringer or I have nothing to worry about.

EDIT: Yeah, I won my AG and was 7th woman overall. I have some work to do on the bike next time to advance in the overall standings. Two of my men buds each got 2nd in their AG to very tough competition. I know fast people...

I had SO much fun yesterday--sure it's just a little sprint, but it's the middle of winter, and what else are you going to do? Plus, I got to reconnect with some tri friends, go really hard, get in additional working out on the day, and renew confidence in myself that maybe I am not slowing down yet.

Even though I wouldn't call myself superstitious, I do have a number of rituals and things I do before a race that "put me in the mood." On Saturday afternoon, I got a Brazilian wax, and while in process, my "girl" remarked that I didn't seem to wince much from it. I told her it was nothing compared to the pain I'd be in the next day!

Saturday night I fixed up 300 calories of Ultrafuel in my now lucky Hip Hype bottle that I got at Ironman Brazil in 2006. I don't know why it's become a special bottle to me, but it has, and it only gets used for Ultrafuel. I set the coffeepot, but didn't put it on auto, as I knew I'd wake up in plenty of time.

I ended up waking up around 3:30AM, but since I'd gone to sleep pretty early (bored; nothing on TV, full day, why not?), I'd have had enough sleep, but I stayed in bed just thinking happy thoughts for about a half hour. I began drinking coffee out of my 2004 Ironman Hawaii mug, which I like to use on race mornings or the morning of an important workout.

I hadn't chosen race clothes, so first thing was which swimsuit to wear? I have a large drawer full of them--about half are fitness bikinis and the rest are "look good hanging out at the beach" bikinis. I bought 4 new fitness suits at the end of last summer that I hadn't worn yet. I began trying things on, and was surprised that none of the bottoms were the least bit tight, but some of the tops were! This I attribute to my now steady diet of chinups. I settled on the red suit because the top wasn't too constricting.

Next, I began trying on bike shorts. It's been a tradition with me the last 4 years or so to wear my really low cut Desoto bike shorts to these races (I leave the swimsuit top on, take off the bottoms and put on the shorts before beginning the bike) because, well, they look good on me (I hope!) and again, it's the middle of winter, so why not see how low I can go? But I haven't felt particularly in shape, and my back injury has messed with my lower abs, so I wasn't sure how they'd feel or look. I put on the lowest cut black ones and just wasn't ready for them, although they didn't look bad. I settled on some gray ones made out of that Carrera fabric, which is kind of silky feeling.

I chose a pair of socks that I had worn at Triple T last year, so they felt lucky to me as well. For my street clothes, I had just finished sewing a pair of flannel pants that are white with small red lobsters on them, my black NOTHING t-shirt, a red sparkly thong that Shelley gave me a few years ago, and my striped pirate knee socks. To cap it all off, I decided to wear my silver Converse flats.

OK, so all of this stuff is making me feel ready to race and even a bit optimistic. In years past when I did these races, on the day before I'd do a hard long ride and brick run, but this time, I thought I'd move that run to Friday, because I was going to effectively do a brick on Sunday anyway. So Friday I ran sort of easy for 30' and then did 15' hard on the track, and Saturday I did a 2-hour trainer ride and kicked out some really good power.

My legs felt good, I stretched about 10', drank the Ultrafuel, went into a short insulin coma, mixed up my race nutrition--1 can of Ultra Violence and about 12 oz. of Gatorade Glacier Freeze, packed a cooler (since I'd be running after my race), and drove to the race venue (stopping on the way to gas up my car), which is about 3 miles from home. Sweet!

When I got there, I went to register, and the volunteer was getting the participant list ready when he said, "And you are?" My answer was, "AWESOME!" I was feeling pretty good and he got a laugh out of it, and I told him I thought I could do OK today.

I put my stuff in a locker and went to go check out the bikes. Turns out they had older model Precors which I hadn't been on in years, so I got on one, and it seemed easier than the newer models. That could be good or not. I only did 5' on it, which seemed enough for a 20' ride, eh? I never did do a run warmup, but for the next race, I think I'll at least jog for 5', then get on the bike.

I went and watched one wave swimming, still in my street clothes, and it was interesting to chat with some spectators and racers. Everyone is trying to figure out who is a newbie, who is experienced, and we all encourage one another. I have so much fun acting somewhat incognito, like I've never done triathlons before, just to see what people will say. It's tough to tell when I'm in loose street clothes what's going on underneath, although I was wearing my Ironman USA red fleece pullover, but it's got a subtle logo, and unless you're looking for the Ironman thing, you probably wouldn't notice. I had fun picking out who I thought would win that wave I watched, and I was right. I called him "Powerbar" because he wore a Powerbar swimcap, and he won handily.

Now it was my turn to suit up, so back to the locker room, and I put on my red bikini and sauntered onto the pool deck. Now people are looking at me because, well, a) I'm wearing a red bikini and b) I look pretty damn good in it (OMG am I narcissistic!!!). Sorry no pics, but let's just say I was a little noticeable. When I went to get bodymarked (yes, they do that for these little races--all part of the ritual, right?), the volunteers recognized me from years past, even though I skipped last winter because my Dad had just died.

I found my lane, and got in and the water felt really nice--cooler than my Y has been in months! So that would be a good thing. I haven't particularly been doing any intense swim training lately--I've been focusing on my bike and run--and wasn't worried about what I'd do in the pool since these races are won on the bike anyway. Several of us chatted about this and that, and I singled out a woman who looked like a swimmer, and I made that comment, and she looked at me and said I looked like "an all arounder." Whatever that means! I guess that is where my weight lifting pays off--while I'm pretty lean, I have some decent muscle, and thanks I like it that way!

The horn went off and I started swimming. All I cared about was that I swam with good form, stretching out my stroke and taking good pulls. I'd told my awesome volunteer, Stacy, to yell at me with 5' to go, as that was when I intended to try and pick up the pace a bit. I must have been lollygagging for the first 5', but those second 5' I was feeling it. I suppose I should just try and kick more, huh? Anyway, I did 550 yards in 10', which was fine.

Quick shower, strip off my swimsuit bottom, change into bike shorts, socks and running shoes, grab hat and iPod and off to the bikes. I put tunes on and so I guess I didn't hear the announcer dude say when to start pedaling so the volunteer could hit start, but my bike didn't fire up right away, and so I demanded I get 22 seconds after everyone else, and this guy is cool, and recognized me from years past, and he said, yeah, you get 22 seconds!

Well, even though I got a late start, I just fired up the legs and thought, "Let's see if I can make the first mile anyway." And I did. And I could just tell this was going to be a good ride, so I played around with different resistance levels, and even coasted when I took a sip out of my UV/Gatorade mix, and with 5' left, I knew I'd hit at least 6 miles, which is good stuff for these bikes for a female. To give you an idea, the overall female winner for several years running has been Lauren Jensen, a pro, and she does just around 7 miles.

I hit each new mile before anyone else did, and I think there may have been 1 other person in my wave that hit 6 miles, and I was over 6 at the 20' mark and then I had my 22 seconds, and I ended up at 6.65 miles, which is the most I've ever done at one of these races! Huh--guess my little fake taper thing was working!

But I got off the bike and had to lay on the floor for about a minute because I was pretty wiped out, and when I got up, my hamstrings didn't feel great because of the wide bike saddle, but as I began walking and shaking my legs, I felt OK.

Onto the track to run. The only man in my wave, a pretty young guy who must have gotten in by requesting an earlier wave than he was assigned, asked me how I did that on the bike, commenting that I was "really cruising." Of course, we didn't have much time (5') between bike and run, so I just smiled, thanked him, and lined up.

At this point, friends of mine were showing up to race in later waves, so I actually had a few people cheering for me, and then some girls that have worked on me at the massage school were next to the track, too, so in a way, it was good to know I was being watched.

I had told myself earlier in the day to really hold back for 2 laps (the track is 12 laps to the mile), but I guess I just threw that out the window and decided to see what I could do and how long I could hang on. I'm sure I slowed down the last 5 minutes, and I was off by about 1/2 lap from what I thought I could do. I did 22 laps, but I've done 23 before, so that's the objective for the next race.

At any rate, I really doubted anyone else would match my bike time, and that's what wins these races, so I felt pretty good. I cooled down a little bit, hung with some guy friends who were warming up for their race, and headed to the treadmill and ran for an hour. Now it was my turn to root for others, and I'd brought my camera, so I just snapped away while an elite wave of mostly guys was going off including friends of mine. The pool was like glass before they started, and then it was just boiling. Pics are here.

While they were biking, I got in another 15' on a bike before I began yelling at them for the last 5' of their ride, and then it was onto the track. It started out one guy wasn't wearing a shirt on the bike, and then three other guys removed theirs, and I was like NICE! And when they started running, all four shirtless guys were in a pack together, but it spread out a little, with the 2 fastest ones running neck and neck. One of them is a friend of mine, so I was really cheering hard for him, and knew he could take the other dude eventually, which he did.

After all this, we all went and grabbed some food and were just talking a mile a minute, and even though it was such a short little race, we were all talking about how we could do better at the next one! I said to someone, "I know what you need to do next time--GO FASTER!" I will be OK with the same swim and bike, but want to go a little further on the run. I might be able to do a bit more on the bike, too, which is cool, because the bike miles win. So I'm excited about the next race in 2 weeks!

After all that, I went home and tried to nap but mostly just laid there smiling and thinking how good it had felt to race and how auspiciously I am starting 2009 on a high note. Then I got up and read a little of the Sunday paper, made a meal of eggs and rainbow trout (YUM!), and relaxed and capped off the evening by splitting a bottle of champagne with a friend to celebrate our first race of the year!

Life is freaking good...and I'm tired today but I expected that and will be more than recovered by tomorrow--today is an easy day. Off to the pool!

Weekly Workout Totals	01/19/2009-01/25/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by racing and KICKING ASS
Swim:	7800 yards (4.43 miles) in 2.68 hours; 20% of weekly workout time; approx. 939 calories burned Canadian: 7132.32 meters
Bike:	Approx. 101.37 miles in 5.4 hours; 40% of weekly workout time; approx. 3034 calories burned; Total TSS=370 Canadian: 163.14 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 24.4 miles in 3.75 hours; 27% of weekly workout time; approx. 1698 calories burned Canadian: 39.27 kilometers
Strength:	1.83 hours; 13% of weekly workout time; approx. 458 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 130.2 miles in 13.66 hours; approx. 6129 calories burned Canadian: 1 kilometers
Sleep:	7.29 hours avg./night
Stretching:	2.8 hours. Massage: 1 hours

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!

Wednesday at the Track

I had to wait until 1:30PM to begin my track workout yesterday, as I'd had a few meetings stacked up that I couldn't move. Even though I was hungry, it would be suicidal to eat much before a track workout, but about an hour and a half before, I made a half sandwich of cashew butter and fig jam (yum!), and then while in the meeting just before I left, I drank some Ultra Violence, as I was feeling a little peaked from a few glasses of wine the night before.

When I started, my legs didn't feel bad--I just felt tired. I did the 10' warmup on the treadmill and then 10' of strides on the track, and then the fun began. There were up to 5 people walking on the track at any given time while I was there. Sometimes I just want to mow them down, especially when they are walking two abreast--but instead, I just had fun buzzing them, and I'm sure they could hear me breathing and feel a nice breeze as I whizzed by. At one point, a huge man was entering the track going the wrong way as I was about to round a corner, and I just yelled at him, "HEADS UP!!!" so he would look up and get out of my way.

After the warmup, I did the first little piece of the workout, which is 3x(1' @5K pace, 30" easy), and I hit my watch, and had no clue how fast I was running. Then I started in on the main set, which is 3x(6' @10K pace, 2' @5K pace, 2' walking recovery). Even though I was caffeined up, I still felt tired, so I purposely tried to hold myself back, and figured whatever I could do on the day was just fine.

On the first repeat (remember, I'm fucking slow here), I ran a mile in the 8' total (which is right around my 5K pace or at least I think it is), and that means I was probably going too fast on the 10K piece. So on the second repetition, I tried to slow myself down, and ended up running another full mile. I was like WTF how is that happening? On the third repetition, I came in just a hair under a mile.

It wasn't until this morning that I calculated how fast I was running on the initial 5K warmup and then the pace I was running for the 10K and 5K pieces of the main set. Looks like I'm back to where I was 2 years ago when I felt like I was in really excellent shape after having trained for and run Goofy Challenge, or maybe even a little faster .

Maybe there's hope for me after all...maybe my little forced break due to the back injury was a good thing...

At any rate, none of it means jack shit unless I can pull off something good this Sunday. But, I know that I will be going into the little race having knocked out a solid training week (unlike some of the participants), so this first one will just be a "let's see what happens." Not that I'm competitive or anything...I guess I had better go stalk the other women in my age group and see what I'm up against. That's always fun!

Happy Hump Day!

The week goes pretty well so far. It hasn't snowed much at all for several days, and it's not expected to snow again until next week. So getting a break from shoveling is good.

Monday was a nice day off--I did all three workouts (:30 swim, :45 run and 1:05 strength), took a short nap and got a haircut. Just before I left for my haircut, my new ottoman arrived. A friend had suggested that I needed one in the living room, and about a week ago, I sat quietly and thought if I could have anything I wanted, what would it be? And I thought silver leather. Lo and behold, the Internets have anything you want, and I found it and ordered it. I was happy when I opened up the box and discovered it doesn't weigh too much and I can carry it and move it around easily. So of course, the first thing I did was put it in the living room to see how it looks. Awesome! And next I tested out its strength--not so much for my feet, but it looked to be good for incorporating into my stretching routine. Actually, I can turn it on its side and lay on my back and get the best spine stretch you can imagine! Of course, I need to be careful not to slide off of it ;) Let's just say I also noticed the height of the thing might make it come in handy in "other" situations...sometimes a small platform can be useful, you know?

Yesterday, I executed my bike workout:

WU: 15' wup, 3' spinups
MS: 3 x 2' (1') @ 105%, 2' Easy,
4 x (6' @ FT then 1' @ 105-110%, 2' Easy), 1' Easy,
10 x 30/30'
CD: 3' Easy

pretty damn well. Funny how I have so much power when I haven't lifted right before riding and haven't shoveled snow in several days! But I can do better, and I get the opportunity again tomorrow to do the same workout, so I'll see if I can hit a higher TSS number.

I finished up the abs/core piece of my workout in the afternoon yesterday, and after work I got an awesome massage. I'd say my back/hips are at 99% now, as one of the things I was able to do yesterday is my twisting medicine ball/stability ball oblique exercise (that I made up and that is included in my abs/core routine on the sidebar) without feeling any restriction in my obliques! Yee-haw!

After my massage, I finished sewing a pair of tiger-striped flannel pants (I've got 3 more pairs almost finished--blue tiger-stripes, red, orange and yellow flaming skulls and tiny red lobsters on a white background), cleaned up a bit, ate some dinner and then spent some quality time with a friend to cap off 2 excellent days to begin my week.

Today, I've already swum 2500 yards, and I have a track workout to do in a few hours, and then I'm making dinner for a friend that I haven't seen in months...usually I go over to her house, but I'm having her here so she can see what's happened to my place, and we will talk and catch up and eat some good foods and drink some wine.

I am still working on shuffling workouts for the next 2 days because I want to be somewhat rested for the little indoor triathlon on Sunday. It should be interesting...I feel ready for a really hard effort, but I also dread it. Those short, hard things can be really rough, but it will also be fun and nice since this one is maybe 3 miles from home, and my wave goes off at 8:30AM. So I can get up, get it done, run for about 1:30 afterwards, and it will just be noon, and I can catch a nap and just lay around the rest of the day!

I love my new ottoman and decided to make a little art out of it today. Or is it art? Just some objects that I thought would look neat on it:

Weekly Workout Totals 01/12-2009-01/18/2009

I had a pretty good training week, but I was really worn out by Friday, from a combination of upping my lifting to 3 sets of 20 reps and shoveling snow. I have a snowblower, but sometimes I don't feel like waking my neighbors up at 5:30AM or I'm just clearing an inch or two, and so I'll just use a shovel. I didn't add this into my strength training totals, but I'm pretty sure I did at least 3 hours of it. This week, however, I am committed to not shoveling as I am racing this weekend and have a pretty busy schedule all week long, so I'm going to try and conserve energy wherever I can.

On Friday just before noon, I decided to make up for my shortened Wednesday swim, which would push the workout to 3400 yards. No big deal, right? Except that I had lifted bis, tris and chest in the morning, then shoveled a little snow beforehand (about 1.5"), and the workout included 2200 yards of pulling! My little stick arms were hurting during the workout, but that's OK. Still, it was just one of those days where I compulsively needed to ensure I got in all the swimming I was supposed to do for the week.

After I finished swimming, I made my little Fortress of Solitude (see previous post) in my front yard, and then went inside, ate a quick lunch and all of a sudden, felt pretty exhausted. I thought I would just do a short little lay down, but I fell asleep and napped for an hour! Even still, I fell asleep early in the evening.

For Saturday's brick workout, I decided to add some more calories while I was on the bike to see whether my treadmill brick run issues were really bonkiness or something else. My legs were a little sore while biking, but that's because my hips are just starting to come around and work properly since my back is healing up. I did pretty well with my bike workout, adding 15' to it because I cheesed out on Thursday because I was so tired.

When I got to the Y, I was pretty pigged out from the bike workout, and I got on the treadmill, and within maybe 5 minutes I was feeling a little light-headed. I figured out why, though--it's not a bonk--it's because my family room is about 60 degrees, which is awesome for trainer riding (I still have a fan pointed right at me), but my guess is the Y is kept nearer to 70, or something at least 5 degrees warmer than where I bike at home. I had had plenty of calories in me, so I knew I wasn't bonking--I was becoming hyperthermic! As usual, I chuckled a little at the things my body does and how sensitive it is to temperature and nutritional changes.

I went to run my last 5' on the indoor track, and since it was just 5', I fired up the afterburners and ended up running well below my 5K pace! It was fun, too, because I was woozy from having been overheated and now running in a cooler area. I walked one lap around the track when I was finished.

Yesterday, I started my long run (1:40) at 8:30AM, and my legs were pretty toasty from Saturday's workout (and a little more shoveling before I left, damn!), but getting on the treadmill right away does not cause me to become hyperthermic. I wanted to avoid additional caffeine besides my usual morning coffee, but because I had been pushing it this week, I took a can of Coke with me, and ended up drinking that during my first hour.

The run went really well, in fact, my running is coming along nicely. It now feels bad (i.e., too slow) to run in Zone 1 and Zone 2 on the treadmill. Zone 3 feels like a good pace, and Zone 4 is becoming not so hard. But, as always, we will test out the system this Sunday in the first indoor triathlon.

My back is still about 98%, and with the intensity I put in last week, especially the extra hard strength training (last week and this week are my most difficult strength weeks in a season), it didn't get too much better than at the beginning of the week, but what's interesting is that now I am feeling genuine pain in areas that tells me that the larger complex of all the back muscles is pretty well healed, leaving all the slacker muscles that haven't been working at full capacity to bitch and moan at me! And I love it! I'm feeling my piriformis and TFL really kicking in and getting angry, and instead of my QL's making the fascia over the tops of my glutes feel all gnarly, I am feeling them right up against my spine being the usual motherfuckers they are! See, sometimes pain is a sign of healing, and it sure is in my case right now!

Today I have a day off from work (YEAH!!!), and I've got a jam-packed day planned, including 3 workouts (swim, run, lift), some sewing, maybe a mini-odyssey (Target, fabric store and hardware store), maybe a nap, and a haircut (just a trim as it's growing out to where it was before the shaving incident in November).

I'm laughing because I'm letting my house get a little messy again, in terms of crap all over the place, but it's because I started on another mini-purge--I went through all my shoes (I have way too many) and am giving a bunch away that no longer fit since I bought them before I was running and my feet got a little bigger, and I lined up several more sewing projects, but it's all good.

Anyway, here's what happened:

Weekly Workout Totals	01/12/2009-01/18/2009 This week's totals are sponsored by racing, which I officially begin this week!
Swim:	8400 yards (4.77 miles) in 2.88 hours; 22% of weekly workout time; approx. 1009 calories burned Canadian: 7680.96 meters
Bike:	Approx. 83.55 miles in 4.58 hours; 35% of weekly workout time; approx. 2510 calories burned; Total TSS=279 Canadian: 134.46 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 25.6 miles in 3.96 hours; 30% of weekly workout time; approx. 1797 calories burned Canadian: 41.2 kilometers
Strength:	1.78 hours; 13% of weekly workout time; approx. 445 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 113.92 miles in 13.2 hours; approx. 5761 calories burned Canadian: 1 kilometers
Sleep:	7.14 hours avg./night
Stretching:	2.77 hours. Massage: 1 hours

TIKI HUT FORTRESS OF FUCKING...ER...SOLITUDE!!!

So it's really cold here. REALLY cold. And we've had a lot of snow. For the past week or so, whenever I look out my kitchen window at my neighbor's house, this is what I see:
That house has had no gutters on it for about 10 years, and while the new owner began replacing the roof 3 years ago, they never finished because they discovered the wall facing my house was rotted through. DUH!

Anyway, I've been looking at these awesome icicles, and since it warmed up to -5 today, when I got back from swimming, I decided I should harvest some of them and at least make a nice sculpture thingie in my yard, since the ice probably won't melt for at least a few days. So I began grabbing at them to get some really nice pointy ones, but I couldn't do anything with the one that has frozen all the way to the ground--it is just too strong! I didn't get really artistic or anything, but just made something that reminded me of Superman's ice palace, and this is what I came up with:


Not bad for a few minutes of work, eh? Just so you get an idea of how much ice I harvested, here's the neighbor's house after I pilfered:


But then I thought, hey, the Tiki Hut has never been outdoors in the snow...and you guessed it...

Here's the aerial view:

Here's the front view:

Here's the two horn dogs going at it, as usual:

And then I don't know how they got on top of that big hunk of ice, but they did!

Being Used to Pain

As soon as I woke up this morning, while still laying in bed, I could feel that my body was more healed than yesterday without even moving. So I twisted to one side and the next, arched up my back and then swung a leg over the edge of the bed. Still better than yesterday! Then I noticed that my gut wasn't feeling all jumbled up as it has for the past few weeks, which I've attributed to the muscular issues remaining from my back injury in November.

I got up and sauntered around like a cowboy with a swagger. I made coffee and then went to sit in front of the computer. Still feeling better.

Just last week, I said to my massage therapist that I thought I had about 2 more weeks until I'd be all healed up. One more week to go! This is the best my body has felt (in totality; I've been in a good mental place for well over a month now) since early November. Of course, some of my pain has been due to self-inflicted punishment--like my crazy birthday workout, effectively doing a HIM at IMFL and then another one just 2 weeks ago--but underneath has been the mess that I've been from my "accident" on 11/15.

While I've been able to move myself towards a healed state, it's been a slow process. This morning while testing myself out (I'd say I'm about 98% now), it occurred to me that I have become so accustomed to this discomfort, this pain. I'm not even sure what my pain threshold really is. If you asked me to rate how it's been on a scale from 1-10, I'd call it a 3--just something that's there that bugs the shit out of me. But maybe to someone else my pain would register more like an 8. All I know is that I've been able to continue swimming, biking, running, lifting and many other activities without too much restriction. But I've noticed a lack of full range of motion, and I am very flexible and normally my range of motion is well beyond any standards. Yet I'd become OK with limiting myself and being OK with things like not being able to raise a foot to my waist or higher (can't everyone do that?), bend over backwards just because I can--things like that.

And if you restrict yourself like that, eventually it becomes the norm. Even though I've continued pushing my own envelope, I've felt like I might do something at any time that would send me spiraling backwards in improvement. I can think of other times in my life where I've been OK with pain--psychic or physical--and have been just too complacent to try and move forward. Sometimes pain is a sign that we need to push our envelopes more to get through it or know it better so that we can move beyond it.

I'm very happy that as fucked up as I thought my back was that I knew it could have been much worse. It was entertaining to listen to others opine on how long it should take me to recover from what happened, but how could they know how bad it was unless they were there? I knew how bad it was when I was laying on the floor after about 80 pounds of wood had crashed down on my shins and quads after my glutes had already hit concrete and all my back muscles had gone into a protective tightening mode. I knew how bad it was a few minutes later when I was laying on an ice pack and my back muscles were spasming, I was sweating bullets, my pulse was going through the roof, and my body was trying to throw me into shock. I knew how bad it was a week and a half later when I went for my first post-injury run and my shins, quads, glutes and back were screaming at me to the point that I was crying while running--the tears streaming down my face and me wondering if it was a bad idea to try running at all.

So I laughed when one person said I should have recovered from this in 2 weeks! My massage therapist thought I'd be recovered sooner than now, too, but I told him you had to be there to know just how bad it was.

I am grateful that I have conditioned myself, sometimes in extreme ways, so that I was able to withstand the injury, and I'm coming back. I am done being OK with the pain and discomfort. I am done restricting myself. I am done saying I can't do certain things because it might cause me additional pain.

There was a time in my life when I would be OK being immersed in psychic or physical pain for months at a time. During the last 3 years, it's interesting that despite all the crap that has happened to me, my tolerance has shortened to about 8 weeks. 8 weeks is about all the time I will let myself be subject to crap--whether it be how someone else is treating me, how I am treating myself or going easy on myself because I perceive myself to be injured. I could enumerate all the examples of this and bore you, but I know how it's been.

I observe others and how they have built up this tolerance for pain to the point of staying in unhealthy situations for months or even years. What if everyone just decided to put limits on how long they would let themselves be in them? Part of the game is just making a conscious choice and setting a goal, and saying, "x weeks from now I am going to be in a much better place because I choose to take action NOW."

And now I can't wait to be 100%. My 100% is at least 150% of most normal people, I suppose, but I like it that way. Maybe now I should lower my tolerance to only 4 weeks!