Things they don't tell you about IM training

1. Well, I kind of knew this one, but I'm putting it on here anyway...You have NO time. All you do is Workout, Eat, Sleep, Work. And I don't even work a full 40 hour week most of the time. When you do have a bit of time, you really just want to do NOTHING. I don't even want to blog...which is why you haven't heard from me! I knew that I would have no life going into this, but just in case you think "well, I can still have a life, it's just this girl..." WRONG. You will have no life.

2. Being on a bike for that many hours, does bad things to your nether regions! Seriously. And b/c all our workouts are in 90% humidity, its even BETTER! I could get into the gory details, but I'm sure most of you DON'T want to know. If you would like to know, just ask. But pretty much anything you can imagine happening when you spend LOTS of hours in sweat-soaked tight shorts, happens!

3. I had no idea that I could sweat THAT MUCH! Seriously, hubby has actually weighed himself before and after workouts...and has lost 5 POUNDS in sweat! WHAT?! I haven't done it, but I do not glisten, I sweat! A LOT! Its freakin' hot! Why did I sign up for a race in AUGUST?

4. You get SO BURNT OUT! I'm beat. I'm tired. I don't want to do any more long ass workouts...and I got three weeks of them left! I'm mostly counting the days until I can do something besides swim, bike, and run!

5. You are on a constant emotional, physical, and mental roller coaster. At least I am...and with 27 days, I'm really trying to figure out how to get in the right mindset for race day!

Any advice would be appreciated. Hopefully I can post a couple more times in the last few weeks! But, all in all, I'm feeling tired, but VERY fit. And READY and NOT READY at the exact same time!

OLD Post Finally Finished.

Well, its taken me almost 2 weeks to get this blog about the 70.3 out...why? Well, I'd like to say its entirely b/c I was just busy. I was busy, but I think the main reason was that its taken me two weeks to almost stop freaking out that this race was only HALF of what I'm supposed to accomplish in what is now 8 weeks! I guess I was hoping that this race would make me think "70.3 is easy, you are in a great position going into the full IM." I was wrong. I should have known better.

I like to say that I don't have high expectations of myself when I go into races, but I just don't tell people what they are. But, I always have numbers in the back of my head; and in this race I was a little off those numbers. I mean, overall, I am VERY happy. I was a 1/2 hour faster than my previous two half irons! So, I really can't complain...I guess in the back of my head I was hoping for a 6:00 (I got a 6:14), and I just wanted it to be easier. I've done WAY over the training needed for a half...but guess what? It's still hard! DUH!

So, to start out, one of the best news of the race was, that I wasn't that nervous. Often the night before the race, I cannot sleep at all, and that morning I have a VERY hard time eating breakfast. This race, I slept fairly well, and I ate breakfast no problem! I really didn't feel nervous until standing and waiting to get in the water. SO, that was AWESOME! I would LOVE for that to happen before IML...we'll have to see.

So, waiting for my swim wave, I really felt like I needed to go to the bathroom one more time, but I didn't feel like there was time. Usually when I start the swim it goes away anyway, so I just didn't go. Got in the water, and the water was gorgeous: crystal clear, nice and chilly, smooth as ice. Felt long and stretched the whole first half. Saw some girls really take off, but I was still pretty much in front of the girls. After the turn I felt great. Decided to pick it up a bit, and cruised on past most of the wave in front of me.

Out of the water, onto the bike, kept in mind to take it easy and let my HR settle in the first 15 minutes. Also had to remind myself that all those people FLYING past me were used to hills, so I just had to bide my time. Still felt like I needed to go potty, but passed the port-o-potty on the first loop. I thought well, I'll just get it the next go round. What that meant is for the next 40 miles I felt so Gassy! (sorry for being so frank). By the time I got to the potty, I felt nauseous...but I had kept my pace steady and even split the bike...so that was good.

Off the bike, I went back to the potty, and actually felt a BIT better for the run. Tried to keep it slow and easy pace. I also decided to just walk the aide stations. I've crashed my two previous runs at mile 6 and mile 8...So, I was just hoping to make it to mile 9. I should have convinced myself to make it to mile 13 beforehand, but I didn't, so I made it to mile 10 and then switched to a walk the hills, run the flats or downs. Ended up with a smile on my face and the race was lovely...

After the race, besides the being incredibly busy with swim meets, I went through the stages of grief...

1. Denial – I don't have a FULL Ironman in 8 weeks! There is NO WAY I can do this.

2. Anger – I can't believe I was DUMB enough to sign up for this! What the hell was I thinking?

3. Bargaining – Maybe I can get out of it somehow...or only get to the run and "break my ankle" to get out of the run! :)

4. Depression – How did I ever think I could be good enough to do this?

5. Acceptance – Ok...I'm in it now, and I just have to finish right? So, I can finish.

Problem is, I constantly rotate through these feelings from "I can do this" to "what the hell was I thinking." I just hope on race day, I am in the "I can do this" zone.

One week from 70.3

Well, we are less than a week away, actually, from competing in the Patriot's Half on Saturday with our best buddies Jess and James. I'm MOST excited about getting out of Miami for a long weekend. Its been RIDICULOUSLY HOT here...I mean its always hot here in the summer...but its been CRAZY hot. I'm ready for even a Hot Mass, b/c it can't be as bad as here! :)

I had a HORRIBLE long run yesterday, and though the heat was part of the reason, my head (as usual) was the most reason. I hope I can get my positive thinking skills and mental toughness skills back on track for Saturday. Mental toughness really is the bane in my existence...some days its just not there. And Sunday was one of those days. Wish me (and everyone else) luck for this Saturday...and if you are mentally tough and can keep a positive mindframe, please send me some of that mojo this way! :) I know my body is ready for this race...now its up to the mind.

Fork in the Road

Well, we are down to less than 90 days from IML. Its hard to believe, 3 months from now I will put my body through a new torture that it has never experienced before! I'm a nervous wreck already, but I am also constantly surprised by the next step my body (and any one else's body for that matter) will go to! Your body will pretty much do whatever you tell it. If you tell it to be lazy and enjoy laying around then it will, and it won't be too excited to get up and do something, and it will even try and fight with you. However, if you tell it, okay, this week we're going to push a little farther than last week, we're going to see if we can get more out of you! Guess what, it takes the punch and says "is that all you got? I'm tired, but I can keep going!"

As I'm going through this process, I'm just amazed by the shape I'm getting in. I think I've said it before, that when I did a previous 1/2 Iron, I felt like I was in the best shape of my life, but each new day in this process I need to learn to appreciate that I am NOW in the best shape of my life! :) And it just gets better...this is not saying this is easy. Its HARD! Its REALLY hard! Its really hot, and really time consuming, and you are really tired...but its also amazing! And now that I'm less than 90 days away, I'm really terrified, but also really excited. I can do this. I know my body can do it! I just have to mentally convince myself that I can do this! Its all a mind game now. Its been a mind game all along!

As I'm discovering my new limits, I'm seeing and reading about people who push so much further, so much more! I read about this guy who has completed EVERY Ironman since they started and is hoping to complete 100 by the time he is 50! And recently he hiked to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro in 2 days (when it usually takes people 8-9) then completed an IM the next week, then completed another one the week after that! WHAT?! Crazy! Right? But, how amazing that guy must be. I truly believe anyone can do this. Its just deciding if you want to accept the sacrifices you have to make to do it. As I tell my kids every day..."no, you don't have to swim. You have a choice to make, you always have a choice. The question is, do you want to accept the consequences that may arise from you not swimming?"

So, during my long run last week (which was 2 hours and 15 minutes), it was about 9 am, and I had about 3 miles to go. I was feeling pretty good, but it was hot and humid (duh, its Miami)...so I was running slightly aimlessly, and looking for new roads to run on. I came to a fork in the road...and I had to make a decision. How was my decision made? I chose the road...shadier. The one with more trees...for either way, I was going to be running, why not run in the shade? What does that say about me? :)

In terms of workouts over the past two weeks, we are ramping it up. Did a little over 18 hours last week, including an 82 mile ride (that had a 45 minute swim before and a 20 minute run after), and a 13 mile run (that had a hour and 15 minute ride before)...Its getting hard, its getting hot...and its only going to get HOTTER...but I think my body can do it! Now I just have to convince my brain! :)

Week 1- No Christian

Christian's gone for 2 weeks, this was week 1. Proud of myself for making it to Tuesday and Wednesday morning workouts. Slept in a bit more on Thursday. Then because I had a meet this weekend, I switched around my long Sunday workout with Friday, so I wouldn't have to stress so much on Sunday to get it done before going to see Spring Awakening at the Arscht Center!

Besides Christian being gone, nothing HUGELY interesting. Monday: 40 min swim, Tuesday: 2 hour bike, and 40 min run, Wednesday: hour swim and 1:15 track workout, Thursday: 2 hour ride, Friday: 4 hour ride, 30 minute brick run, Saturday: 1 hour ride, 1:50 brick run, Sunday: 45 min swim, 35 min easy run. Total 16:15.

Best workout of the week was Wednesday track. I wanted to ATTEMPT to run at that threshold speed I was told I could run at during the Lactate Test. The workout was 1.5 mile warm up with some speed-ups during it, then 4x800 (1:00ri), 4x600 (1:00ri), 4x400 (1:30ri), 800 cooldown. The 800s and 600s were supposed to be at threshold, and the 400s at :10 under threshold! Well, the bad news is that I didn't really descend the pace. The good news is that I didn't slow down either! And actually did get faster on the last 2 of the 400s! The even more amazing news is that I was actually holding around a 7:45 pace for most of it, and I didn't die! I was very proud of myself! And starting to gain a TINY bit of confidence in running! Which is nice...even got some coach compliments on a job well done! :) Of course then, I thought I would turn to that Sat. long run and be able to hold my HR in Zone 2 and run like 9:00/mile...WRONG. HR went up and up and I had to slow down and down. Ended up with a 10:30 average. I guess it doesn't all translate within a day or two! Imagine that!

Oh, also proud of myself for doing my 4 hour ride on Friday morning all by myself...and for getting 67 miles done! Go me! :) As for this week, its not really a "recovery" week, but a "rejuvenate" week? Only 13:00 hours scheduled...so that sounds nice. Then Coach says were ready to start bumping up the distance again! YIKES! We did about 4-6 weeks of 4 hour long ride, 2 hour long run...feeling comfortable there, but scared again at moving up! Wish us luck.

On a completely unrelated note, if "Spring Awakening" comes to your town, go see it! Its great!

Muddy Buddy and Clermont

Saturday was to be my 4th Muddy Buddy (Christian's Third). This was our second one in Orlando. I was last minute getting our costumes together and made, but I got it done. We dressed up as Ms. Piggy and Kermit the Frog...team name Muddy Muppets.

Did the costume contest, LOST AGAIN. And you know, at the time I was totally fine with it. Last year, I felt we got screwed, but this year there were some really great costumes. Most of the top ones had bought their costumes, but still cool. The top two were: He-Man and Skeletor (bought), but they had made their bike to look like the tiger and that was homemade, so cool. And The Ambiguously Gay Duo (this looked bought, but I'm not sure). Ace and Gary looked awesome and acted the part up on stage, so I cheered and voted for them. All's good...except...get done with the race and see that NEITHER TEAM had RACED IN THEIR COSTUME! What the hell? How is that fair/part of the race. That's the whole point...and if I ran the whole thing in a red dress and a pig's nose (admittedly, I didn't wear the wig), they should have to stay in costume too. UGH. Whatever...

Racewise, we were only a minute faster than last year. I was a bit disappointed in that, but I pretty much blame it all on my mountain biking ability and comfort. I was just not comfortable enough to whip my bike around people and with 2000 TEAMS this year, the course was CROWDED. I tried, but not hard enough on the bike. Overall, we finished 11th in our age group (out of about 140) and 133rd overall. And it was still fun.



Since we were in Orlando and Clermont is a 1/2 hour away from my best buddy's house, we got up EARLY on Sunday morning and headed over to Clermont to do the first loop of the Great Floridian Tri (60 miles for first loop), and to get an experience of hills that we can't get in Miami. We have heard the Louisville course is pretty hilly. So, what did I learn on this ride. #1 Clermont is BEAUTIFUL, wooded, open, nice roads, nice people...and if you have to live in Central Florida, this would be the place to be. You would think you were in Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia...it looks the same. I had NO IDEA that a place like that existed in Florida. #2 Clermont is REALLY hilly. They weren't kidding. It was TIRING. And after we climbed the mountain, for some reason I thought the rest of the hills wouldn't be that bad....wrong...lots more hills and big ones. #3 Sugarloaf Mountain is a BEAST for real. Apparently about a 1/2 mile at a 17% grade...turned that corner and my mouth fell open. It was hard the first time. But coach had us do it FOUR times. OUCH! I was pretty damn proud of myself after that fourth time though! All in all we did a few minutes over 4 hours, and covered 64 miles. I was exhausted and my legs were beat, but I loved the ride. It was SO much nicer to get the heck out of the one BORING-ASS ride we can do in Miami. Maybe we will hit it one or two more times before the big day!

And this was the end of our "Recovery Week." 11:30 hours training. 4:00 of those on Sunday, so a nice week!

Lactate Test

Got two/maybe three big things to report on from last week...so for now, I'll do a quick post about lactate testing! Then on the next post, I'll post about Muddy Buddy and biking in Clermont (Sugarloaf Mountain).

So, after being a bit screwed over by coach last week with our lactate testing it was rescheduled for this week on Friday. The good news is that it was a recovery week anyway, so there was no need to really change much of the training plan. We also were able to schedule on Friday, which was a day that Christian had already taken off for us to head to Orlando for Muddy Buddy. We took Thursday completely off from training! NICE! Then got up Friday morning and headed to this new apartment complex with a new gym inside where he does the testing.

Coach wanted to do one of us at a time, so I wanted to go first b/c I was nervous about being stabbed repeatedly in the finger. I have blazing memories from childhood about this gun implement that was used to prick my finger. I remember it hurting like HELL! and it sucking really bad...worse than needles. So I was not looking forward to it. Got on the treadmill at about 4.6 and walked for a bit to warm up. Then the deal was every 4 minutes he would crank the pace .4mph. He would then ask me to stop briefly, stick out my finger, he would prick it, and then get back on. After that, he would ask me to rate my exertion on a scale of 6-20. No problem. Still freaking out about the prick, I started the jog at 4.8 (SLOW JOG!), and stuck out my finger...bang! Hey! That wasn't that bad...even better, apparently I'm a "good bleeder." So he really only had to prick my finger like every other time! Towards the heavy breathing, hard running end of the workout, it hurt a bit, but still not horrible. Even better, it kept getting faster on the treadmill and I actually got to the fastest speed I've ever been on a treadmill (I hate treadmills-the whole fear of flying off thing, especially after watching the biggest Loser! And having to jump off and jump back on for the finger prick!!) But, I survived, and I made it up to 8.4mph (7:03ish pace!) WOW! YEA ME!

So, what did this test tell me? Well, it told me that my HR zones for my long runs are correct about 145-155. AND it told me that on my harder runs, my track workouts, I should be pushing to do pace holdings at 7:45! WHAT????!!!! Are you kidding me? In January, at the marathon, and before, was struggling to hold 11:30s! I was ecstatic to hold 9:15s at the last Oly Tri...7:45s, seriously. So hubby hears that, what does he say? "I told you!" OYE! So, apparently I CAN be a lot faster. At least physically my body is completely capable of holding a much faster pace...awesome...know what else that means? You guessed it...ITS ALL IN MY HEAD!

So, new goal. Throw out all notions of what speed I am for running. How to accomplish that? I have no idea. The mental part of this game is definitely the hardest part. But, from a blog I just read, I'm just going to "Zoom Out" to that pic of my crossing the finish line in Louisville and ATTEMPT not to think about much else, just "do it."

Oh, I almost forgot...I passed my Certified Personal Trainers exam! I'm officially qualified to be a personal trainer...now I just need a job to teach me what the hell that means! :)