Adjusted Reality

My training philosophy this year has been very different than last year.  2012 was about learning to operate on tired legs.  I just kept loading and loading and loading us up until we broke.  It was all about building the confidence that I could tackle 70.3 and then 26.2 miles no problem.  I didn’t do any races last year in which I felt anything but ready for the distance (maybe I was a little sketchy on the marathon, but only because I had trouble making the jump in my head from 20 to 26.2 and now realize it’s no issue).  I walked around in a haze for a few months, completely overloaded, exhausted.

This year, it’s completely different.  Every time I’ve thought “I’m tiiiiired”, it’s been like, “oh schweet, it’s rest week” and I’ve been rarin’ to go after.  The first half marathon I will run this year will be in Lubbock at my 70.3, and by that time, I’ll be able to count the double digit runs I will have done on one hand.  My bike miles have been decent, but mostly on the trainer, and I can count the 50+ rides on one hand as well.  My swimming kicks ass this year, and I have zero worries on that this year.  What I do have a handle on is my head.  Since I’m not spending so much time physically (and mentally) fatiguing myself, I can really concentrate on hurting when it’s time to hurt.

Last year, I built a HUGE tower, but it wasn’t very stable.  It got me to the end of each race, but there were a lot of bricks falling down each time I really tried to test myself, standing in the way of what I wanted and knew I could accomplish on those days.  And it was probably worth it, the first year of pushing my endurance limits so much further than they’ve ever been stretched, to toe those starting lines knowing I had done the distances before, that I was capable, that muscle memory could carry me through.

This year, it’s been about actually erasing some of that muscle memory.  I don’t need to try to practice race pace every day.  I don’t need to be 100% comfortable with race distances.  Frankly, that muscle memory might have been holding me back.  Slowly and carefully putting the blocks in the right places might not build as tall of a castle, and there may be gaps, but hopefully, the thoughtful mix of easy miles with a few strategically long and/or hard (that’s what she said?) workouts will be enough to plop me into race days a little hungry, a little unsure, and a little bit ready to prove things to myself.

Also, essentially missing May, which was supposed to involve a focused effort of more intensity and less sessions with longer distances, doesn’t help with the loads of volume strategy.  I need to BELIEVE I can do next month without proof.

But, at least I’m back.  I built the castle pretty well earlier this year, and while this knee thing has knocked a bit of it down, this week marked the first real week of picking those bricks up.  And I’m pretty happy with the progress.

Training:

Monday: Weights: Upper Body + Stretch 00:45, Swim: Quick Swim 600 m 00:12:00

Went to the doc, hoping for the best.  She looks at me and says, “So, are you just DYING to run?” and I did my best to say, “yes I would like to run please” rather than scream “HELL YES OMG LET ME AT THE ROADZZZZ”, I think it was somewhere in the middle.  I may have had my running clothes and shoes in the car.  She delivered some bad news, “Well, NOT TONIGHT…” and then some good news, “but starting tomorrow, you can.” Wheeeee!  Her instructions were to start with 1.5 miles and to expect stiffness.  If at any point it actually HURT I was to cut my run short.  She also said she’d prefer me running on the treadmill but wouldn’t require it, just asked I stick to even surfaces and not go all offroad trail-y.

So, I did a weights session and swam a very short speedy swim and went to bed dreaming about being able to get up and RUNNNNN!

Tuesday: Run: First Run in a Month 1.5 mi 00:18, Bike: Trainer + Music 6.4 mi 00:20, Bike: Trainer + Arrested Development 8.25 mi 00:30

Got up in the AM and ran outside – part of my normal loop, just up to the south school and back, which is just about exactly 1.5 miles.  I walked to warm up and then started ambling along very awkwardly at about 13 minute miles.  This was NOT the glorious return to running I envisioned.  It was tight and felt weird and I was a little mopey about it at first but then my knee started loosening up a little and went from 13s to 12s to 11s and then I had a little pain… in my freaking quad.  Yes, folks, my uber big and awesome quads were complaining about 1.5 wimpy little easy miles.  That was enough for the day.   I spent the rest of the morning on the trainer, and then got more miles after work.  I was actually sore on the second trainer, which was a bunch of SAD, but hey, first run!

Wednesday: Run: Treadmill Run 2 mi 00:22, Swim: Laps 1680 m 00:38

I skipped weights in favor of getting more run miles.  Still a little stiff and awkward, but felt better than the day before.  Happy that my endurance doesn’t seem to really be having issues, besides the leg muscle and tightness stuff, running isn’t taxing any other systems very much.  Swimming was decent, but I couldn’t get a good rhythm going for most of it, but was pretty happy with that pace being a crappy swim.

Thursday: Bike: Trainer + XxX 28 mi 01:31, Run: EZ Treadmill 2.5 mi 00:29

First 1+ hour trainer ride since the “iiiincident” and my knee had a few stiff moments, but held up pretty well.  I wasn’t sure I felt ready to run off the bike yet but hoped that a few hours rest would be sufficient.  Before lunch, I went on a quick walk around work campus to make sure I was ok, and I was – so I headed to the gym and knocked out 2.5 miles on the treadmill.  I tested out “race pace” at the end for about .1 (just a little sub-10) and it didn’t any more hurty, stiff, or awkward than easy pace.  Probably won’t try that again until race day, just to be safe.

Friday: off

While the body held out fine, I was definitely ready for a rest day Friday, although when I got home from work it was gorgeous and drizzly and cool and I really WANTED to run, but it felt irresponsible to run 5 times in a row on my comeback week when I usually don’t even do that healthy.

Saturday: Bike Trainer + Torchwood 50 mi 02:19, Run: Short Brick 1.7 mi 00:19

I woke up in a terrible mood, had to deal with work stuff early in the AM, and I tweaked my back getting off the toilet (?), and my lovely plan to ride and run out at Plugerville was ruined by thunderstorms.  The cat and I felt the same way about this morning (it was pitifully cute – she kept curling up in these awkward looking positions to nap, getting up after a few minutes, sighing, and sleeping again).  I almost started drinking at 8am instead, but Zliten convinced me to not and just TRY the trainer.  Oddly enough, aero felt WONDERFUL on my back and alternating sitting up stretched it out, so 10, 15, 20 miles ticked by.  I did 5 miles of tempo riding at 20-25, and then increased my easy pace to moderate and finished out 30, 40, and finally stopped at 50 miles as my knee was talking to me just a little bit.

I wasn’t sure how a run would feel but I was giving it a try.  The first quarter of a mile felt weird but then it just felt… good.  We set out on my 1.5 mile loop, figuring I could pull the cord early pretty easily if I felt bad, and I could run it twice if I felt great.  Well, it was a day for neither – at about 1.5 miles I got a little twinge, which went away as fast as it came, but to be safe I stopped at the house instead of going out again.  I had accomplished the effort for the day though – I did a solid, long effort on the bike, and I successfully ran off it feeling great.  If not for my knee and my back, I could have gone for many, many more miles at that pace happily.

Sunday: off

Knee was a little stiff, but defnitely not worse for wear.  Enjoyed a righteous day of doing nothing (Arrested Development marathon + played Rift).  It was glorious!

Summary:

Next weekend is the Olympic race, which I feel much better about after this week.  The week after, I’m hoping to get another brick in, but a shorter bike with a longer run.  Then, I think I’ll feel at least somewhat ready for the 70.3 (in the way you can feel confident about a test after slacking and then cramming for it).

While I’d hoped at closer to 10 hours this week – about 8 is pretty great considering the huge run limiter.  I was going to move some training to today, since it’s a holiday, however, volunteering at Cap Tex Tri for 5 hours wiped us out and my knee and back demanded rest, so I’ll hit it tomorrow. (That’s me, below, plotting which expensive bike to…erm… borrow… :D)

Food/Scale:

The good news: I have a new low of 176.0!!! Wheee!

The bad news: I just couldn’t get myself to eat the things I was supposed to for some reason.  Not that I shoved Mexican combo plates down my face (except on Saturday when I did, and it was amaaaaaazing and worth it), but I definitely put together some weird and sometimes somewhat less nutritional meals than I had planned.  Also, there were more random candy attacks due to stress than I would like, and the sad part is it wasn’t like “oh yum that looks good” it was the “i am grumpy and it’s there”.  I mean, not a significant part of my calories at all, I just hate the habit.

The ugly: 750 calories of vodka on a Thursday.  Yeah, it was a stressful week.

I’m happy with the progress of about another 3 lbs down this month.  I had hoped to hit 175 – and I still could, but 176 ain’t so far away.  If June continues with the trend, I’ll be in the low 170s by Buffalo Springs, and the lowest weight I’ve been since I got a real tri suit (and not my fake thrift store onesie – got about 12 lbs to go there…).  That could make me very happy!  I just have to eat the right things, and try to splurge mindfully, and not because my stress levels are at maximum (I can stress eat carrots like a champ, I just need to remember that).  I saw this and it was very appropriate to this week (even though my runs were nowhere near the lovely exhausting ones they mention here)…

By the day:

Monday: 31 DQ, 1490 calories
Tuesday: 23 DQ, 1730 calories
Wednesday: 20 DQ.1444 calories
Thursday: 10 DQ, 2002 calories
Friday: 23 DQ, 1568 calories
Saturday: 3 DQ, 2287 calories
Sunday: 14 DQ, 1507 calories

Average DQ (diet quality score): 17.7 (youch – I haven’t been below 20 in a while, wakeup call for next week!!!)

Average calories per day: 1718.  Not terrible, since I’m training again.

Weight: Low: 176.0.  High: 180.0 (0.4 down from last week).

Milestone: Over the last 10 weeks, I have lost over 5% of my bodyweight.  Yeah!!!

Other things:

Starting to think about what happens after Kerrville/Austin 70.3 because both my parents and friends like to plan vacations way in advanced (I’m officially booked up on PTO pretty much for 2014.  Maybe honeymoon in 2015? :D).  We’re talking about another cruise early in the year with the fam, and a friends’ vacation probably late summer 2014, renting a huge house somewhere fun.  We also have a Zliten and I week to plan in Nov/Dec somewhere warm.  We’re thinking about this (the half) and then a week in the Keys.  Not sure whether we’d be just fun-running it or racing it, but it looks fast and flat and fun!

So, that means, I need to predict the future for where I will be mentally and physically after tri season ends.  My current thoughts:

• I don’t think I want to try to run RnRSA again.  Probably not another marathon this year.  I don’t see my run training being there without artificially inflating it like I have the last few years at the end of tri season, and I’d really like to see what happens without that pressure.
• I DO think I want to try to take a crack and see how close I can get to smashing my 2:08 PR and who knows, maybe a sub-2 standalone half.  I also wouldn’t mind taking a crack at my 10k PR as well.
• I am NOT SURE whether I’ll want or need an offseason right away after my last 70.3.  Especially with this month long injury break and the smart training I’ve been doing this year, I feel remarkably fresh mid-cycle but I’ve still got June, July, August, and September to go.
• It might be fun to spend the fall doing lots of little races that I don’t care about (Dash for Dads 5k, Turkey Trot 5 miler, etc – Austin has at least 10 races each weekend in Oct and Nov) and just seeing what I can do with rested legs and a “let’s have fun” attitude.
• We MAY want to do a spring marathon.  And by WE I mean Zliten has brought up doing Austin as his first marathon (insert my requisite *I hate hills* pissing and moaning here).  I’m not sure if it will work timing-wise so we’ll think about it.  There are a lot of options in the area before things get too warm, but we need to consider it now so we’re not on vacation during or in too-close proximity.  It would work best to be right before a vacation week, but we’d need to figure that out NOW if we want to make it happen that way.
• That begs the question… what’s the goal for 2014 tri season?  Is it IM year (probably not but worth a consider)?  Which one?  What’s the first tri we want to do – Rookie?  One of the April tris?  The HITS tri in Feb? Is it the year we hit triple digits on a bike ride?

Lots to think about but I’m not going to stress.  I’ll see you on the other side of my season opener in (ulp) six days.  Be patient – it’s a Sunday Tri in the Dallas area (so ~4 hour drive away), so my priority after the race will be 1) In n Out 2) making it home safely 3) race day champagne and then 4) blogging.  I’m not sure I’ll get to #4 that day although hopefully I’ll be so compelled by a GIGANTIC PR that I want to share with the world quickly.  One can think positively, right?

Question of the week: If you and your friends could go rent a luxury house anywhere in the US for a week, where would you go and why?

Let’s dive in.

Training:

I’m sort of in that “middle of the season, digging in and keeping at it” place, so I’ll try not to repeat everything I’ve been saying the last few weeks

Weights – I’ve moved on to the point where I do strength maintenance 1-2x per week, and not on race weeks.  This week is a race week that I’ve decided is at least a B, so I’m going to skip it and resume next week.  I do the same sets (leg press or squats, rows, incline sit ups with twist, calf raises or hammie curls, and pulldowns) at 60/60/80% of my 1 rep max that I established last month.  For the rest of the year, this is about maintaining the pretty huge gains I made the first 3 months of the year, and the strength work will move into sport specific stuff (hill work, speedwork, force work, drag sets in the pool, etc).

Swim – I’m still kicking my ass in the pool on Wednesdays with speedwork, and feeling strong, but I’ve been finding that it’s hard to get there on the weekend after the increased hours on the bike/run and it’s just a little too early for lake swimming.  Again, I’m thrilled with the gains I’ve made in the first 3 months of this year, and I can take a little stalled progress here if needed.  And right now, it’s just that Sauron’s eye has turned a little more to the other two sports.  Once the lakes are in the 70s and it’s a billion degrees outside I’ll be back at it full force.

Bike – My trainer speeds are off the HOOK (I’m at 3/5 resistance and pulled a 30.5 mph avg at a lower HR than I did 28.9 miles at 2/5 resistance earlier this year).  My outdoor speeds suck.  But my outdoor rides this year have been a) after a 10 mile run w/2 mile tempo b) a metric century (61 miles) c) in traffic d) hilly as balls or e) first ride of the year, trying to remember how to not fall down.   My legs feel pretty strong this year, and my stupid hilly ride this weekend at the roller coaster called Pace Bend was not so, so bad (15.1 mph over 19 miles).  I just need to ride outside more, so we’re planning on doing one supported metric century per month as training.  The love is coming back to me with cycling this week, and that makes me happy.

Run – I feel like I’m just getting off training wheels here.  I spent 3 months running super slow.  I have done my requisite speed work and ran some hills and did some tempo work in the last few weeks, but I am racing 10 miles on Sunday, and I’m gunning for a PR (last year was 1:41-something).  I feel like I have it in me to sub-10 min/mile pace it, but I don’t have much experience at that pace since all my work minus the run tests have been in a lower zone than I plan to run.  I want to put the hurt on this race.  It’s my home turf, I know the elevations and what’s cool and what sucks about it.  It’s about convincing my mind that my body has more when it wants to quit.  That is most of what I want to do.  I want to hurt for about an hour and 40 minutes, give or take.

I hurt pretty bad running the mad hills at Pace Bend last weekend.  I stopped having fun at mile 4 but I finished out the 6 miles complain-y but strong.  I’m going to take the rest of my runs easy this week, and see what my legs have in them.

I’d say I’m loving all 3 sports right now, probably giving running or biking the edge depending on what day it is and what type of workout is planned – and I’m tired of weights but still doing them.

By the days:

Monday: Weights: SM Day 1 of the rest of the year 00:45, Swim: Easy Laps + Drills 1200 m 00:27
Tuesday: Run: Ruuuuuninng in the rain 4.15 mi 00:48, Bike: Trainer + End of Star Trek En… 19.07 mi 00:45
Wednesday: Weights: SM Day 2 00:45, Swim: 3x300m with some farteleks? 1800 m 00:45
Thursday: Bike: Cycling Test 17.78 mi 00:35, Run: Easy After Work Run 3.1 mi 00:37
Friday: rest, relaxing, setting up camp
Saturday: Run: Pace Bend Hill Run 6.03 mi 01:07 Bike: Pace Bend Hill Ride 18.66 mi 01:14 Run: Brick 1 mi 00:10:45
Sunday: rest, taking down camp, 20 mountains of laundry.

Food/Eating:

I’m even less motivated to talk about this, and it’s not because it’s going badly.  Actually, the opposite.  I’ve sustained a weight in the low 180s and my weight has been much more consistant, fluctuating more like 2-3 lbs than the 5-6 it has been.  I sustained TOM week with fairly minimal balloon belly, and if I keep on the straight and narrow, this week could be a decent loss week for me.

Now that I have found something that seems to work – having a few less calories than I think I should/deserve/etc, and not pigging out on weekends, and yes, sometimes having vodka for dinner, but more lately, drinking a little less vodka.  Not none, but less.

It’s just going to be a challenge to not kill all the progress I’ve made in the last 3.5 months while I’m gallivanting on vacation.  I’ll be extremely active, but we all know I can eat that back in the blink of an eye.  This week is a little odd because I didn’t get my batch cook on and am eating leftovers and old frozen meals and some my fit foods/snap kitchens, but it all should be rather healthy and I’ve pre-tracked my food so there’s that.

Here’s the deets, and lets move on:

Monday: 29 DQ, 1702 calories
Tuesday: 26 DQ, 1623 calories
Wednesday: 25 DQs, 1572 calories
Thursday: 23 DQ, 1782 calories
Friday: 26 DQ, 2112 calories
Saturday: 9 DQ, 2471 calories
Sunday: 19 DQ, 1539 calories

Average Diet Quality Score (not Dairy Queen Score – Yum Yucky :D): 22.4

Average Calories: In – 1828, Out (estimated) – 2400.  Deficit – ~600 (loss of just a little over 1 lb)

Weight Fluctuations: low 183.0-high 187.0 (TOM, so there was a reason and it went away super quick which made me happah).

Thoughts and stuff:

-My thought process is way different right now and I like it.  I saw some, shall we say, highly unflattering pictures from the weekend.  At some points in my life, that might send me into a tizzy and bad thought spiral, but it really just gave me a firm reminder to keep at it, because I’m not there yet.  Yeah, I may be feeling a bit more fly because my HR monitor is falling off and my sexy tri legs are coming back, but there is no way to not keep trying to work on the diet quality/food tracking/etc when someone could possibly see me from any angle looking like *THAT* in what I was wearing.  Fuel for the fire of accomplishing shit, not of self destruction and negative self talk.  Hard to be too negative when I pulled that same offending carcass up so many hills on the bike and run that morning, and totally motivating about how much FASTER I’ll be pulling that meatflesh up them thar hills if I keep at it and chip away at this extra poundage.

-We have had our Xterra for 3 weekends, and for all 3 weekends, we have made great use of it (bike transport to Rosedale Ride, hauling around scuba gear, and hauling camping gear this weekend).  Also, Pace Bend was a great place to train hills away from traffic, and since we own all the required equipment, we’ll consider coming out, camping overnight, and then training on those hills at least once or twice again this summer.

-I got to bring the Iguana to work last week, after her vet appointment.  She was only a little bit of a brat that afternoon – she didn’t like being shut in my office for an hour long meeting and pooped once, and she really, really wanted to go explore the rest of the offices, but I’m pretty sure letting a 5 foot long leezard out would have freaked some people out.  Also, she is doing just fine!  Yay!

-I don’t usually partake in April Fools, but we happened to have a company meeting that day, one of the ones where I get to talk on the microphone in front of the whole office, and let’s just say, I surprised some people with the “new direction” our latest update was taking, though I could only get a few sentences into it before I had to break the “April Fools”.   Fun stuff.

I think that about does it.  This week is going to be pretty crazy, so I’m gonna go dig in instead of more yakkity yak.

Question of the week: What is the best April Fool’s Prank you ever pulled?

Food:

This week I have learned that sacrifices must be made to make progress, and that I can’t have my cake and eat it too.

I partied pretty hard twice this week.  Both times, to justify the calories, for the most part, skipped dinner (I had small snacks both days, but not a meal).  While I don’t typically drink to that level very often, I did remember days of having to shelve half my dinner or more if I wanted to indulge when I was losing weight.

The good news is that remembering this made me stop bitching to twitter about poor little Quix who had to much to drink and is getting her dinner taken away and just enduring it.  I’m a big girl and I make those choices.

The bad news is that I will need to remember that when I do alcohol instead of the food I need to eat, rather than alcohol + the food I need to eat makes training days suck.  My gas tank felt like I was running on empty most of Saturday because my gas tank was full of crap, and I didn’t do much better by myself the rest of the weekend.  Today I feel sluggish, tired, I’ve been peeing all day getting rid of water, and really looking forward to NOT indulging in junk food for quite a while.

But, I remember there were sacrifices on the way down from 20000 billion lbs.  As much as I remember it with rosy colored glasses that it was just effortless once I got going, I went to bed hungry sometimes.  I had vodka for dinner because I chose those calories over good calories.  I went into workouts underfueled.  And y’know what?  This far away from season?  That’s ok.  I honestly believe 10 lbs down would help me much more than feeling awesome for each training session.  90% of my meals are awesome, healthy food.  I just need to remember that the 10% crap needs to be INSTEAD of the 10% healthy, or I’ll continue to end up with 110% me each year like I have been.

However, there are exceptions.  This weekend, I’m riding a metric century.  I expect that I’ll be burning about 2000 calories doing that alone, so probably eating 2500-3000 calories that day is not too out of the question (and luckily, I have a wedding to go to that evening, so I should have no problems with that).  There is underfueling and there’s stupid.  I aim to find that line and not cross it.

That being said, here’s the numbers:

Monday: 22 DQ, 1608 calories
Tuesday: 26 DQ, 1747 calories
Wednesday: 27 DQ, 1530 calories
Thursday: 2 DQ, 1977 calories (vodka for dinner)
Friday: 13 DQ, 2097 (ren faire catered meal + drink + desert)
Saturday: 3 DQ, 2696 calories (birthday fest)
Sunday: 13 DQ, 1403 calories

Average Calories In: 1865, estimated calories out 2285 (estimated deficit 420 per day or 2945 total, or about 3/4 lb)

Average Diet Quality Score: 15 (low low low)

Weight: low 183.2, high 188.8.

No wonder I’m getting frustrated, there’s no way to tell if I’m losing 3/4 lb when I fluctuate almost 6 lbs per week :P.

Oh well, onwards and upwards.  Hopefully, there will not be vodka for dinner this week.  My body would be thankful for that.

Training:

I shorted myself a little less than an hour, which sucks, but oh well.  It really wasn’t intentional.

Swim:  I cannot say enough good things about swimming.  My slow pace is pretty not slow, I’m enjoying the speedwork, and I have a wetsuit to play in when the lake is cold.  When my form is good, I feel like a spider crawling on top of the water, being pushed by the current.  Isn’t that weird?  I was bummed that I couldn’t get our first open water swim in this weekend (planned for 30 mins but only made it 10 mins breaststroking out and back to the first buoy) – but it was nice to know that when the lake isn’t like a wave pool, the wetsuit will work just fine even in 64 degree water.

Bike: Eh.  The wind made riding really unsafe, so we cut what should have an hour ride to 37 mins, and that was less than 9 miles due to WIIIIIIIIND.  My wheel kept singing me the song of it’s people, which was an eerie whistling sound I’ve never heard before so loud and so often that it was really just unsafe to ride.  The bike is my meh sport right now, but hopefully that will change once I get out and ride hills more and get my quad mojo back.

Run: This sport is definitely coming around for me though sometimes I just want to say SHUT UP HEART.  The great thing about recognizing zone 1/2 running is that I can knock a 10 mile run (when I haven’t even run CLOSE to double digits since the marathon) and my legs are like… did we just take a long walk?  Also, I did 2 amazing tempo miles in the middle – miles 7 and 8 – and the pace wasn’t that great (read: the wind), but I felt like I wanted to run that effort forever.  So if I’m doing that around 10:45s in the wind, at the end of a long run, and on a day where I kinda felt like crap, I certainly can get uncomfortable and sub 10 on race day, right?  Also, I did hill repeats and made the lunch run crew do them with me Tuesday – that will probably be a regular thing – they loved to hate it with me.

Weights: Increased weights on some stuff.  I can definitely tell I’m either where I’m supposed to be or at the top of my capacity right now.  I’ve had fun with heavy weights, but I’m ready to move onto strength maintenance, and starting the harder “force” workouts actually on the swim/bike/run to build more specific strength for sport.

Honestly, I’m a little terrified where I am at physically in relation to tri season on the bike, run, and body composition, but I’m also feeling super strong, and very confident in my swim and most importantly, my head game and strategy.  And, I have a month and a half until the first race I sorta really care about (Rookie Tri) so anything can happen.  Hell, a month and a half ago, I would have told you I was an awesome cyclist, mediocre swimmer, I had torn up my running card, and weights were the best thing ever so… yeah.  Things – they change.

By the days…

Monday: Weights: MS Phase – Day 5 45 mins, Easy Swim + Drills 1200 m/30 mins
Tuesday: Bike: Trainer + Futurama The Wild G… 26.02 mi/1h15m, Run: Lunch Run Hill Repeats 4.35 mi/50 mins
Wednesday: Run: Treadmill Run 1.76 mi/20mins, Weights:MS Day 6 + Stretching 45 mins, Swim: Speedwork Day 1800m/ 40 mins
Thursday: off
Friday:  Futurama + Trainer 13.05 mi/37 min
Saturday: Run: Lake Pfluger 3+ Laps 10.1 mi /2 hours, Bike: Lake Pfluger Out and Back 8.7 mi /37 min, Swim: Lake Pfluger Wetsuit Test 175 m/10 min
Sunday:  off

Total: 8h30 mins (supposed to be 9h30).  It was really due to missing out on about 25 mins of bike and 20 mins of swim on Saturday, but oh well.  Can’t control mother nature, and really really wanted a rest day Sunday.

This week is super build week (10.5 hours) for the Build 2 cycle so I just want to get through it alive.  4 hours of that, at least, is the Rosedale Ride.  I’m super pumped to ride another metric century and looking forward to getting lots of supported outdoor ride time.  Goal is sub 4 hours of time on bike (not counting rest stops).  Hopefully the weather cooperates.

Other stuff:

We had Brazillian Steakhouse for lunch on Thursday (Zliten’s birthday) and took a half day off work and enjoyed some time in the beautiful sunny day on our patio drinking frozen drinks.  I actually ate responsibly at an all you can eat salad bar/meat place, are y’all proud of me?  Then, I had vodka for dinner as I said, so don’t be too proud.

And for the last birthday celebration of the year, we headed to our favorite bar with about 20 of our friends and enjoyed an afternoon/evening of sipping cocktails and soaking in the sun.  And, apparently, we had a long rap concert going on inside, which made for some awesome people watching.  While again, I had vodka for dinner and looked longingly at all the greasy bar food that got ordered (I did snack on some fries though), I had a blast that day!

However, I’m definitely ready for things to go back to normal.  I’d like some solid time of good food, hydration, and normal human levels of alcohol consumption going on so I don’t feel like a lump of excrement.

Question: what was the biggest sacrifice you had to make to reach a goal?

I’m really glad I got my Sunday do-nothing day last week as this week launched into a new level of crazy.

Something blew up at work and I was there from 9am – 3am and then back in at 10am for a short day (left at 4pm).  I ducked out Monday evening to get in my weights, but I didn’t feel like I could be gone long enough to swim too, so I missed a swim Monday night and a trainer session Tuesday morning because, well, precious sleep.

I was on about 5 hours of sleep Tuesday, and thought of a billion different reasons why I shouldn’t go on my lunch run (tired, stressed, grumpy) and realized those were all reasons I NEEDED to go, and after some time in the warm sunshine, I felt amazing.  I was even able to make up my trainer ride that evening before I took a long long nap and slept 8 hours shortly after that.  I just had to bag the swim, which sucked but I think I’ve made peace with it.

The rest of the week went as planned, but was still very busy for various reasons.  We’re kinda hooked on Downton Abbey now, and we sat and watched a whole episode because we needed a damn moment to relax, but then we stayed up too late getting things done.  Relaxing for a 40 minute show was too much. 😛  That’s how life has been lately.

Later in the week, after Zliten was cleared for Scuba by his doc (because of his history with athsma, he needed a note), we signed up for classes this week.  Some couples do candy and flowers and fancy dinners, we learn how to dive…. romantical scuba!  I love it.  However, when they said there was a little homework to do before the class, we didn’t realize that meant a 300 page textbook, 5 quizzes, and 3 hours of DVDs.

Saturday was a slammed day as well – 8am wakeup to get a run in at Lake Pflugerville, bagged the bike since it was too windy and cold and gross, met my parents for lunch, played cards, swam laps in their pool, left, stuffed a veggie sandwich in my face, came home and trainered for not nearly as long as we wanted to and jumped off and changed straight away to try to not be too late to our friends’ house for games.  12 hours of gogogogogogo.

While Sunday was packed with studying, it’s sort of a relief to sit and focus on one thing (although there were short breaks to clean… and laundry… and internet… and nap…. ) and not leave the house.

Next week will be hectic too, but we do have a 3 day weekend at least to pack all the weekend stuff in, so we might actually get to relax a little.  Please? Maybe?

Workouts:

I may possibly have gone off the deep end with all the other crap going on if things weren’t going well in this area, but this week in training has actually been… pretty awesome!

Running: The magic is starting to happen with the zone 1/2 running.  It’s getting easier to stay in my zone and actually run instead of just sort of prancing and limping along.  I clocked two runs this week under 12 min/mile pace averages while staying around 150.  One of them even was a 10k run, which is the longest I’ve ran by far since the marathon, and it just felt fucking fantastic and I wanted to keep going.  Also, the shoes are working their magic.  My heel is not 100% better, but it’s been improving, and running doesn’t seem to really aggravate it, so I’m calling it a win.

I feel like I can actually show my runner card without feeling like a chump this week, finally.  I may not be anywhere close to where I was before, but the improving is certainly making me feel like I might actually be able to do something decent by the time I have to rock out with my tri suit on.  Running is making me happy again, which is comforting.

Biking: I’ve upped my resistances and my speeds are settling back down to what looks reasonable for me.  I’m going to continue doing my monthly test on the easy resistance just to gauge progress, but I need some more quad busting in my life.  Also, one leg drills are evil and hard, which means they are going to make me awesome come tri season.  Bummed we didn’t get a chance to ride outside this week, but hoping for next week.

Swimming: The fact that I missed one swim sucks, but Saturday’s swim made up for it.  Wednesday I swam ok – my (now) normal 1200m in 30, but I did spend some time helping Zliten with his stroke, so if I would have been focused I could have done some more, but it was totally worth it.  Saturday, we swam in a real 25m pool at my parents’ gym.  I started  with 250m (10 lengths) of fin drills and HOLY CRAP those really help you feel out the position you should be kicking in.  I took those off and did 52 more lengths (1300m) feeling faster and more efficent than I ever have.  I was digging my new music too.  I finished 1550m in 32 minutes, which is essentially magic gobbledy gook for me.  I’m going to be incorporating more fin drills because, well, damn.  I suppose I can give a little credit to the fact that I had a cup of decaf coffee and I was bouncy but… yeah… magic swim.

Weights: Lifting less reps heavier is just plain FUN!  For someone who really likes seeing numbers and progress, it was sure fun to pile 155 lbs on the squat bar, and 250 lbs on the leg press, 70 lbs on the pulldowns, and 90 on the row.  On the machines, I’m about halfway into the stacks, which is nice rather than being close to the top.  This week and next week transitions to the real heavy lifting, and I’m a little scared of some of the loads they want me to work towards, but I’ll give it a go to get there, but at least I have one more week before I think about that.

Overall, I feel finally like my body is getting back into shape and feel a little more like an athlete than someone who badly plays one on TV.

Next week will be a challenge to get in our training and do the dive classes and volunteer and cheer at the Austin Marathon, but we’ll get it done.

By the day:

Monday: Weights: 3×12… 250 lb leg press, 90 lb row, 120 lb calf raises, 70 lb pulldown. 3×25 situps w/twist w/10 lb plate. Swim: bagged due to a 17 hour workday.
Tuesday: Run: 3.1 miles, 37:45, HR not recorded (around 150 avg).  Bike: 15.53 in 45 mins (harder resistance setting). 3 miles w/u, 3×1 min one leg drills each side (lighter resistance) with a 1 mile rest interval concentrating on either pushing the downstroke, or pulling the upstroke, 2 miles, 5 mins heavy resistance, 5 mins cooldown.
Wednesday: Weights: 3×12… 155 lb squats (on smith machine), 90 lb rows, 70 lb pulldowns. 3×25… situps w/twist w/10 lb plate, hamstring curls w/55 lbs.  Swim: 1200m in 30 mins.  Helped Zliten with some drills and form.
Thursday: Bike: 9.5 miles in 30 mins…resistance up + 3×1 min 1 leg drills on each side + busted quads from squatting 155 lbs yesterday = slower (no HR data, but it was around 120 avg, 145 max).  Run: 3.1 miles in 36:15.  Never thought I’d be so happy to be running sub-12 minute miles. 152 AVG HR, 169 max
Friday: off!
Saturday: Run: 6.26 in 1:15, Avg HR 153, max 173.  Crazy good feeling.  Wanted to run forever. Swim: 1550m in 32 mins.  Magic swim was magic.  Bike: 15.04 in 45 mins, 136 HR avg/161 max.
Sunday: off

Food:

Planning and diet quality score really salvaged this week, because it could have gone to a bad, bad place.

I certainly could have justified some mad bad food after the work issues and probably been on a junk food spiral for a day or 2.  And then I could have forgotten to eat better, and then it would have been the weekend and I would have just started again on Monday.  However, having to keep accountable to that little count every bite of food really helped me.  Saturday involved cake and booze and poor planning and almost every moment not at home, but at least it wasn’t negative.

Monday: 30
Tuesday: 31
Wednesday: 30
Thursday: 18
Friday: 25
Saturday: 8
Sunday: 29

Average Diet Score: 24.4 – not as good as last week’s 27.4, but 24 is still a pretty awesome score.

The scale may not love me right now at a low weight of 185.0 and a high weight of 187.2 (it was also that time of the month), but my body fat went down another .7% and my muscle % went up too.  I am starting to see less wiggle too, so that’s good stuff.  I suppose slow and steady is the only way she goes.

No average calories.  I fell off this at the end of the week and am finding that a 28-31 day is generally about 1800-1900 calories, and I tend to eat the same things over and over, so it’s only really enlightening (read: depressing) when I have a day that’s abnormal due to social situations or whatnot.  I would imagine I’d be similar to last week.  This week, being mad crazypants, I’m going to just stick with the diet quality.  I’ll return to tracking calories soon (hold me to it), but diet score should stop me from tripping and falling onto pizza and cake.

Other Stuff:

This week was super game-y!  We played a board game with friends from work (I was TWO points off winning – curses!!!) on Thursday.  Then Saturday, we played cards with my parents as per usual, and then got some friends together later in the evening and we played Munchkin!  So incredibly fun.  Our game night resolution is working out well, it’s nice to gather for a reason other than just getting inebriated (booze was had, but it’s nice that it was not the focus).

Besides the crazy amount of studying before we didn’t expect, it was a lot of fun to learn.  Tomorrow, we do our first confined (pool) water dive.  I get about FOUR hours (30 min swim AM, 3h30m dive training) in the water tomorrow so I am a happy happy girl-fish.

It’s getting close-ish (within a few months) to the cruise, so I’m starting my planning for the ports.  Last time I made very rigid plans (run here, bike here, etc), this time, I’m trying to come up with a running route, bike rental shop, and how to get to the best beach for snorkeling in the cheapest and most efficient way, and noting anything else we should make sure to see or do for each port.  Then, try to play it by ear depending on what we feel like doing that day.  It’s not quite time to make a packing list, but I do love planning – it makes me more excited to go do!  Anyone have a “don’t miss” sight or activity for: Aruba, Bonaire, Grenada, Dominca, or St. Thomas?

Birthday season is coming up.  I’m not really sure what we’re going to do for Zliten’s and mine beyond eat lots of crab as per tradition, but for my good buddy D’s birthday we’re going camping!  Very much looking forward to it, the last trip was AWESOME!

That’s about it!  Question of the week: have you Scuba’d?  Would you want to?  What’s something you want to learn about?

I’m feeling a little mentally thin, y’all.

I’m sure I’ve got nothing on half the people in this world, and it’s a lot of GOOD THINGStm, but there’s been a lot to this January 2013.

• My stupid fucking cranky heel.  I think (hopehopehope) I’ve resolved this by getting new shoes (NOT Asics, after running in Asics just fine for 5 years) because apparently I pronate now (after not pronating for 5 years).  However, I cranked up the treaddy pretty fast to test them out on Friday, and running in a bunch of different shoes + that + some time in regular shoes (that were just fine 2 months ago :P) on Thursday = ouchy heel again.  I got out Saturday morning to test them out and they felt AWESOME, but I cut it at 1 mile walking and 1.5 miles running and my heel felt fine during, but obnoxious after.  FFS, I ran a marathon in November.  Now, I’m pegged at a mile and a half run at 12 minute miles.  Way to make me feel like a wuss, body.
• Work stuff.  Don’t really want to go into it, but it’s a factor.  I think part of it is now the way of signed, sealed, and delivered, but there is still a lot of uncertainty.  Stretching.  Being confident in the face of trying to be something more.  And realizing that it may not work out in any way shape or form.  This stuff is exciting, wonderful, stressful, and horrible for me.
• Goals.  Things beyond racing, staying healthy to race, and training.  Being well rounded is WAY more work than it’s cut out to be, when you are not, in fact, good at being well rounded.  When you are good at being mega-manical at what your passion is, it’s tough to focus elsewhere and realize it’s for good and not just a distraction and frivolity.
• Heart rate training.  Awesome for biking because it pushes me on the trainer, but holy crap, making me feel like a noob runner again.
• 3 bikes, 3 runs, 3 swims, 2 weights.  They may be short, but it does feel like a LOT of training.  My workout hamper is way fuller at the end of the week than my regular one, and it’s only prep month!
• Getting accustomed to another way of thinking of fueling.  Again, GOOD STUFF, but it’s taking a lot of pre-planning and different.  Different is stressful.  Also, different in a way that is not taking weight off quickly which I was hoping for in a very bad way.
• Between stress and allergies, I’m not sleeping well.  For someone who regularly passes out cold and wakes up 8-9 hours later, I’m not coping well with this.
• I would really really really really really really like the scale to cooperate a little more than it is even if I am making progress elsewhere. 185 is NOT AN OK SET POINT BODY.  I’m back to eating good things and training again, you can go ahead and start shedding the lbs now, thanks.

It’s not to say I haven’t been here before.  I could barely run 5 miles June of ’11, when I made my push to take back the summer.  I’ve taken weeks off running to heal an injury.  In August, I was forced to take a day off due to an emergency, and the thought of “OMG is so and so ok” was just barely above “OMG thank the dear fluffy lord I have an excuse to take a day off”.  I’ve changed up my diet before.  I’ve gone through work stress.

But fucked if this has not all quite happened at exactly the same fucking time.  While I’m also trying to achieve some balance in my life which is more stressful than one might think.

So, in creeps the doubt.  Is this it?  Can I top my accomplishments last year?  Can the dominos fall my way yet again?  Will I die of exhaustion?  Will my body fail me?

Each time, I find my way.  The endurance comes back.  My body relearns what it was to be awesome.  My mind wraps itself around the task at hand and goes forth to conquer.

But each time, before that, I feel so far away I just can’t fathom being back there.

Peaks and valleys.  Late summer and fall, I was standing on top of a big fucking mountain.  I couldn’t imagine lacking the endurance to bust out a 50 mile bike or a 15 mile run or a 4 hour brick.  I completed a half ironman and was back training in 2 days.  I ran a marathon and just wanted to run more.  That was just life.  I was fucking unstoppable.

Now, I’m fragile. I started feeling that way ever since I met my bicycle accident lawyer for the accident I was involved in, a couple of years back. No injuries last year, high (for me) volume.  Now, I have a failing heel and my running sucks and the only thing I can post PRs at is in the weight room (and believe me, that is one thing that is making me sane and sticking with it – lifting super heavy low reps is sorta fun) and the weight won’t come off and there is very little about right now that makes me feel like a bad ass.  At no point last year did I not feel like I could bust out a half marathon and today I would be lucky to run a 10k, and it certainly would be below marathon pace right now.

It makes me regret taking an offseason, but I think the promise of an offseason got me through the crazy of Aug-Nov.  I figured I’d be coming back stronger.  This sure doesn’t feel stronger.

I know it’s just about investing in the plan and plugging away.  There is no way eating good food and training consistently will not get me back there.   I was just hoping I’d feel a little less “herp derp I promise I am actually a runner for reals, and there are muscles under this, and I swear I don’t just eat cheeseburgers and chocolate shakes” sooner.  And I don’t.   And it sucks.

So, getting that rant out of the way, here’s the deets…

 Food:

Everyone, my diet quality scores were OFF THE HOOK this week.

Monday: 30
Tuesday: 31
Wednesday: 28
Thursday: 26
Friday: 28
Saturday: 21
Sunday: 28

This is the one of the worst things I ate last week, simply because it’s not “whole grain” but I do love me a kebap full of veggies, chicken, and yogurt sauce!

Average? 27.4.  Huge!  When I decide I’m going to eat all the right things and plan it out, I can do it.  And honestly, when you eat all the right things, there’s just not much drive or desire to eat many wrong things.  I splurged on a sweet on Friday and Sunday, and had a few drinks on Thursday and Saturday (and I may have had 1/3 of a cinnamon roll that I called an “ergogenic aid” since it was right before a bike ride, but still…).  I STILL didn’t have a day under 20.

This is exactly the way I need to keep eating to give this diet quality hotness a good test.

Average calories: 2035 (~75 less than last week).  It would have been more like 1900 except Saturday was a whole lot of calories (eating a few of the wrong things + the right things + lots of training fuel = ~2700)

Weight: lowest 183.2, highest 186.4

This week’s weight will be blown all to hell because of it being that happy special sucky time of the month, but I’m keeping up with the planning and diet quality maxing, and hoping for greatness.

Workouts:

Monday: Weights: 3×22… 200 lb* leg press, 50 lb pulldown, 115 lb squats, 20 lb dumbbell chest press, 65 lb* rows, 90 lb calf raises, and 3×25 situps w/10 lb plate w/twist.  Swim: 1200m in 30 mins.
Tuesday: Trainer: 11.78 miles in 30 mins.  Run: 3.1 miles in 37:45.
Wednesday: Weights: same as above but 3×25 of everything.  Swim: 1200m in 30 mins.
Thursday: Trainer: 11.05 miles in 30 mins (did some 1 leg drills that slowed me down a bit). Run: .8 miles of heel fail, then elliptical for 20 mins.
Friday: off
Saturday: Run: 1 mile walk, 1.5 mile run in 37 mins.  Swim: 990m in 22 mins. Outdoor bike: 12.17 miles in 46:45.
Sunday: off

Weights are fun guys!  Can’t you see the happy look on my face?

As you can see, all that speed on the trainer?  Translates almost nothing to outside.  Yet.  I think I’ve forgotten what it is to not just ride consistent speed/effort, so it will take a bit to bring up that number (though – when I was actually working on being fast, those loops were about 17 mph, so that’s something for the first ride of the year, especially when my bike has somehow gained about 10 lbs since tri season).  It’s now time to start working the resistance and speed and pushing some zone 3 HR on the trainer so I can remember what it feels like to hurt on the bike again.  Considering our first 70.3 is supposed to be super hilly and hard, it’s time to get back to the pain.

Let’s just not talk about running this week.  It just makes me sad.  At least I got those new shoes and my heel is feeling better and I think I may be able to run on it tomorrow.

Swimming has actually been my favorite lately.  Things keep clicking.  “Oh, fingers together and pushing the water!  Holy crap!” “Really extending my shoulders!  Shut up, that feels GREAT!”  And after I get my upper body in line and start thinking about my legs, they actually start doing the right thing as well.  I’m working on some breath work now (5 strokes to breathe, then 7) and that’s feeling awesome too.  Maybe I’ll just quit triathlon and work on becoming an awesome swimmer… kidding…

Weights have also been cool.  Accomplishments!  Wheee!  I am actually sad to see this phase end because I felt like I was making great strides with it, but now it’s time to transition to REALLY lift heavy.  Exciting stuff.

Next week we up the intensity just a little with some efforts allowed into zone 3, some gentle speedwork (very short sprints or strides), and some drill work on the trainer and with the runs.  Looking forward to it.  We add just a little time overall.  Prep time is over.  Time to begin the climb of the build.

Other Stuff I Have Done:

Not much actually.  I finally got some downtime and spent all day in bed just relaxing and it was everything I wanted out of a Sunday after hours of Run! Swim! Appointment!  Lunch! Bike! Cook!  Party! on Saturday.  I feel about halfway recharged.  Today’s 15 hour work day isn’t going to help things, but I really think of the bad state I could be in if I didn’t just lounge yesterday, and am happy I did it.

So yeah.  A little bit of the messy middle right here on display.  I’m sure I’ll look back and think how silly I was in a few months, but right now?  Yeah, right down in it.

Question of the week: What is NOT going right for you right now? Misery loves company.  What are you doing about it?