It’s been busy! Even with a weekend of relaxing and a 3 day weekend, I’m just now getting here to talk about it.
So yeah, things and stuff.
Rosedale Ride: I was going to talk about it in more details, but let’s just sum it up with these bulletpoints
- Hardest race I’ve done in a while. Riding for 5 hours took a lot out of me. This needs to get better by the end of summer because I certainly don’t want to be taking anywhere near that long to ride the 56 miles for my half ironman, but happy to prove to myself that I can go the distance.
- I’m still terrified of my new shoes. Falling helped to get that freak out of my first crash out of the way, but the two times I fell down just stopped on the side of the road shifting my balance wrong, I think freak me out more even though they didn’t hurt at all – there is all manner of curb I’ll be riding on, and who knows if I have to stop near somewhere it will be tragic to fall over the wrong way.
- Regardless, I’ve got my big girl panties on about it and not changing my pedals back – everyone else seems to do fine with them so I’ll learn too. My heart rate may just stay a little high on rides and I may be chanting *please don’t make me stop, please don’t make me stop* when I get to intersections. 10 miles last weekend went ok though!
My runs have been very hit or miss lately. Some days I have just draaaagged asssss through the miles and it was all I could do to keep going (but also found that all I needed to do is slow down – 11 minute miles may be frustrating, but that’s all I have sometimes). Some days, I feel like a rockstar. I’ve been able to do some pretty fantastic 3-6 mile progression runs where after the warmup mile, I’m pretty easily running under 10 minute miles. For example this morning, I did 10:45, 9:55, 9:40, and 9 for the last quarter mile. I just have to have faith that even though the first half to full mile will suck, I usually perk up.
Swims, I’ve been maintaining about 1 per week, about 30 mins for 1500 yds. I need to get some open water lovin’ in here this month before Rookie in May, but I’m just not concerned. I did just snag a groupon to finally get Zliten his Christmas swimming lessons, so that’s exciting!
My eating has been fairly subpar (for me). As such, my weight and measurements really haven’t gone anywhere (I assume with the measurements, as I haven’t gotten the tape out in a few weeks). This week, I am trying something new: smoothies for lunch. Instead of spending my lunch break frantically preparing food, I’m trying out some new recipes. Today, I put in skim milk, chocolate protein powder, water, chocolate pb2, 2/3 banana, and a squish of chocolate syrup (just tasted not quite right without it). Tomorrow, I think I’ll try the strawberries/strawberry protein powder/banana/milk (trying to figure out a fat to put in there – c0conut oil maybe?). I’m having a small savory side with it (today, veggie quinoa pasta salad, tomorrow, maybe a greek salad). I couldn’t drink it all and saved the other half for a snack and felt really full today. Bonus!
Also, I think that what I really need to do is the “eat 500 calories less than Zliten” diet. He regularly burns about 500 more than me, and we mostly split our meals down the middle (so he’s losing weight, I’m not). That’s a lot though – that’s like a whole meal less! I’m trying to eliminate more snacks instead of a meal then, because I really hate eating 300 calorie meals, I’d rather just try to suck it up and feel like I’m eating a real meal unless my energy levels are super low and I’m feeling bad. And honestly, the way I’m feeling after my lunch smoothie, I don’t need no stinkin’ snax!
Working on the training program for us through the half ironman. Let me tell you, having 2 races a month and two vacations (one 4 days, one like 10 days) within a month and a half of race day (like, right during peak training time) is providing a CHALLENGE, but I think I have it conquered mostly. I’ve never followed anyone’s tri training program, just did my own by feel, and that’s what I’m doing this time (I’ve done a LOT of research and picked and chose what worked for me). I discussed with Zliten, and instead of a lot of long single sport training, we’re going to pile on the brickage. That is, instead of getting comfy with overdistances like wanting to bike 100 so that 56 feels like cake, we’re going to do more bike/runs that are closer to half iron distance. And, of course, we’ll train with the caveat that if our body needs a rest, we’ll back off (and planning in more rest weeks than I have ever before so that should help).
Fun Things I’ve Done Since Last Report:
- Went to a wedding with a candy bar and BBQ for dinner. I wished I could stay longer but it was Sunday night and work calls on Monday, so I had my sweets and danced my ass off for a bit and then headed home.
- Had a board game and pizza day at work as a fun day not last Friday but the Friday before. We played a bunch of D and D board game and DAMN IT’S HARD. Then we went home and drank absinth and played more.
- Spent March 30th without pants or workout gear on. The most strenuous thing I did was hang out at the neighbors for a while.
- Saw Hunger Games on April Fools Day. No foolin’, I enjoyed the movie a lot. They skipped some of the nuances, but they definitely did the books good and I’m just sad I couldn’t watch the next one yet!
- Made some EPIC chicken and bok choy in garlic sauce. I finally figured out awesome chinese food at home – it does just take a little chicken broth and flour to make it right. I used brown rice flour so it’s a little better, I suppose.
- Booked our trip to San Diego this summer. We plan on spending most of our time there with Zliten’s parents, but also are hoping to get in a nice long bike ride early AM Saturday and run America’s Finest Half Marathon on Sunday. Finally, a race in a different state!
- Went to Camp Gladiator boot camp. If I didn’t absolutely need to do traditional training for tris, I might blow off run/bike/swim for a month and do this. It’s super fun! We played freezetag!
- 10 mile ride and 6 mile run at Pflugerville. We plan on making good friends with the lake this year. Didn’t have time to swim, next time for sure!
- Played D and D (the actual role playing game) all day good Friday. It’s an amazing core workout, the guys make me laugh so hard! And, I fireballed FIVE trolls to death and ended the game early. Ha! Being a wizard is a good thing… here’s me triumphing over the fallen beasts…
- Did the Mighty Texas Dog Walk, with this cutie pie – he only has 3 legs but that totally doesn’t stop him at all! He was definitely in the first quarter of finishers, he just wanted to run run run run *sniff sniff pee* run run run run *sniff sniff peeeeee*. He definitely tired his owners out. However, he was definitely a sleepy dog after… apparently he barely complained when his parents left to go out later.
- Between this and the next entry, had brunch, a short nap, got groceries, swam, lifted weights, and got all gussied up. 5 hours definitely was productive!
- Had fancy birthday dinner with my good gal pal D in which we ingested: blue cheese with honey, pork cracklins, garlic bean sauce on toast, a pimms cup, spicy pickles, a cauliflower steak, buttermilk pie, and sticky toffee pudding (lots of tastes and sharing around the table). So yum!
- Then, we went to the Kung Fu saloon and I kicked ass at skeeball (I won almost EVERY game and they had it set up as a competition), drank grape vodka, watch people play an epic game of Jenga, played Jenga ourselves, and had a thoroughly fantabulous evening. Here we are watching an epic match of centipede.
- On Easter, we slept in (OMG 9:30 wheeeee), went to my parents house. We ate ham, played cards, played bocci ball, ate pound cake, played more cards, and then got home and had a little relaaaaaaaaax time. Not the most flattering pic but whatevs.
So, please forgive me for not blogging, but as you can see, iz been bizzy. This is ommitting the fact we’re still training 5-6 days a week and I’ve been working hard to meet a deadline at work (met today! woohoo!)
This week, hoping to just train and relax as much as possible, as Thursday is bike maintenance class, and this weekend is the 10/20 (10 mile run race) and Dad’s 79th b-day celebrations, so we’re booked.
Now, I’m off to log some more miles because I’m off work earlier than expected and get my crunchtime on!
Questions of the day: What’s the awesomest thing you’ve done in the last 2 weeks? Any suggestions on how to conquer my pedals on my bike better? How long do you need to warm up for on a run before you feel like you’re really IN THE ZONE? Any bets on how long it will take me to come back and blog? 
I have been a 
