Sunday, March 1, 2009

My Nemesis or Can we say tired?

My nemesis is:
W.I.N.D
I expect wind in Central Texas. It happens. It happened last year. This year it is happening on a COLOSSAL scale and, unfortunately, almost EVERY weekend. It's become so consistent and bad enough that it is starting to take a toll on my mental state. It's not just 10mph winds, that is typical and I can do that. We're talking regular wind advisories of 25-30mph sustained and gusts at 30+mph. Training is tough enough, and you need to train in some tough conditions because race day may have them....but doing it everytime becomes wearing, takes more time, causes you to work harder, and even causes things like windburn. It's just nuts, and I'm tired of it. But, it is what it is I guess. Yesterday's long run was in easily in 30-35mph winds. Today we rode the first 40 miles of an 80mph ride in 20mph winds (and cold, it was 35 when we started at 7:15 AM!). HOWEVER, the tail wind from that was nice. I did this ride with some of the triathletes from the Austin T3 Tri-Team. NO WAY I could've done it on my own. A big thanks to Celine, Blythe, and Jim for braving it out there with me in that craziness. Guess we can throw the sayings of "What doesn't kill us makes us stronger" and "builds character!" My face is wind burned, and I am tired. I will keep tackling this nemesis...but I don't like it.

Wow, what a week!! My goodness, between a lot of work events and training, I am TIRED but boy did I get a lot done. I won't go into the work stuff that much, as it kind of just gets to stay there. However, this week was, I think, the biggest week of training I have ever had. I'm in a weird spot where I'm training for both the Lonestar Half-Iron on 5 April and the Boston Marathon on 20 April. Maybe not the wisest of choices, but I wanted an early season triathlon to test my base, and I qualified for Boston my first time out on a marathon course, I had to give it a shot. So, that's the path I chose, and this week was a test of that training. Yes, I'm nuts. Yes, my life is pretty much: sleep, work, train, eat and then repeat. Don't look at me to repeat this year! :)

Monday: 6 mi run (51m 13sec)
Tuesday: 3.23 mile fartlek run (25m 30 sec) 1 hr bike (*indoor trainer) (18.3 miles)
Wednesday: 2600 meter swim (57m); 3.13 mile run (*unit; 28m 18sec); 1hr bike (*indoor trainer) (18.53 miles)
Thursday: 7 mile run (56m 29sec); 2hr bike (37.30; outside); 4.06 mile ruck march (1h 6m)
Friday: 2600m swim (55m) 8 mi run (1h 10m 5 sec)
Saturday: 16 mile run (2h 18m 53 sec); 2300 swim (46 min) WIND!!
Sunday: 80 mile bike (5 hours) WIND!!

Yeah, I'm a little tired. Monday's recovery day and I'm thrilled. If only I could sleep in....

3 comments:

laura said...

Wow! Congrats on such a hard week! I can't imagine how you rucked 4 miles and ran and biked in the same day; that is insane!

Enjoy your rest day!!

ShirleyPerly said...

Well, no wonder you're tired! Not only did you have that horrible wind to contend with on your long run and long bike, you didn't have a single rest day this week. Train hard and train smart, even if you're superwoman ;-)

Unknown said...

You are amazing! I don't think you're nuts for doing the half and the marathon - just an athlete through and through!

Looks like your training is going well. I hate wind too, although we haven't had that sort of windy lately. You did sign up for IMFL and I will be biking tha day so I can pretty much guarantee that it'll be windy! :) You're getting stronger!