Weekend Update

If you looked at my training log from last week, you might think I was tapering. Or recovering. Certainly not training.

Tuesday, I had a great four mile run averaging 8:30 minutes/mile. Wednesday, I actually swam - shocking- although my pace for a timed 1000 was a snail-like 1:085/50. I'm kind of hoping that I counted incorrectly but who knows. I definitely felt slow so it's probably right. I swam a lot of breastroke in my warm up and cool down because I may as well train the way I race. Thursday, I had a miserable run. Then Friday was a scheduled rest day.

Woo hoo! I'm going to rock the house in my next two events with that schedule, baby. Especially since the next one is all bike. Notice the preponderance of cycling in my week? Yeah, me neither.

Thank goodness Richard, Kathryn, and JRo dragged me out for a decent bike ride on Saturday - 35 miles at 16.6 mph average speed.

I learned a lot from last weekend's preparations and wisely repeated them by joining Liz, Rebekah, and Sharon for happy hour Friday night. I love those chiquitas! And clearly need to see them more often as our "happy hour" turned into over five hours of happy. Thank goodness the restaurant bar finally closed or we might still be there!

Liz made a compelling case for Bikram yoga, crediting it for her relaxed and happy outlook. After I promised to try it once my race season ends in October, she admitted that the first few classes are complete hell and that she doesn't want to be there when I start it. Apparently the room temperature is a balmy 105 degrees and the instructor locks you in the room for 90 minutes. Great. I'm picturing hurling my sweaty self against a locked door begging for release. But given her glowing reviews after months of doing it, I really am still interested. I want to take a break from triathlon training this winter and do other things I enjoy like weight training, yoga, and maybe even a step aerobics class for variety.

After far too little sleep, I met Kathryn and Richard bright and early at 7 a.m. to start our ride. We biked to West Creek where we met JRo and then we headed out on a loop from Patterson to Broad Street and back. I really liked the route - light traffic, good road conditions, and of course great company. As usual, I wished for my car to magically appear at West Creek but alas had to power myself home instead. I was grateful for our early start though because the day definitely heated up.

That was it for any athletic pursuits for the weekend, unless you count obsessively checking for Patriot Half and IM Wisconsin updates/results. Saturday night, I googled "Patriot Half" and poured over the results. I couldn't understand why I didn't see any TriGirl names in the results - until I finally realized that there is another half called Patriot... in Massachusetts. Whoops. Once I finally found the right link, I was totally impressed with all the TriGirls who participated and did great, especially our coach Grandison who just had a baby at the end of June. She's amazing!

(For those of you who read my blog for it's irreverent non-triathlon related wit, a half IronMan is a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and 13.1 mile run. An IronMan is double that. Crazy!)

Jennifer S. and I actually talked about swimming with Som Sunday night, but alas, it was cancelled since it was a race weekend for so many. Sigh. Yes we could have swum laps at the pool but we opted to sit on the side, chat, and watch the kids instead. I couldn't talk her into pina coladas even with valiant effort, so at least we didn't make it worse.

This week, I would train harder but I've got a metric century on Saturday followed by a 40 mile ride (maybe 25?) on Sunday at Heart of Va.

Guess I have to taper now.