All evidence to the contrary...

From our Sprint Tri -  but this pretty accurately represents how I'm feeling

So I know I have been radio silent on this blog the last few months but something had to give! I've been balancing school, an internship with an hour long commute multiple days a week, volunteering a few times a month and, of course, triathlon training which really ramped up.  So in case you have been wondering...I have still been training for the triathlon.

AND IT'S SUNDAY!

I'm kind of freaking out about it.  I wouldn't say I feel prepared for it at all...mentally, physically, or logistically (ie packed).

We did a "practice"/sprint triathlon a few weeks ago but it was 1/2 (and in the case of the bike, less than half) the distance of the real triathlon.  There were definitely moments during that race I thought I wasn't going to be able to finish. I expected to actually do fairly well in the swim portion but really struggled there. I am sort of blaming the wet suit which was wayyy to tight and choking me. So hopefully that will go better this time. But the 26 mile bike and 6.2 mile run really scare me.

Even though I haven't been posting on this thing it has definitely still served its original purpose to peer pressuring me through this thing. Frankly the public humiliation I expect will ensue if I can't finish is the 2nd biggest worry I have right now! (My largest concern is... how does one stay hydrated enough to race for 4.5 hours in 90 degree weather without access to a bathroom!?!?  TMI?)

If nothing else, after Sunday I will at least be done! I'm so proud of myself and my cousin for really dedicating to this and seeing it through but I am over it! I don't find biking enjoyable, swimming is hassle, and frankly it all just takes to long and has consumed more of my life than I would have liked. I also find that I really miss strength training.  So I'm really looking forward to single hour workouts (as opposed to multi-hour) and a balance in my life...well as much balance as I ever allow myself in my life...

Not my smartest decision

I went out for a 97 minute bike ride yesterday. The ride itself was not the dumb decision, although after a while, it felt like it was! But about 45 minutes into the ride and 9 miles away from my apartment I suddenly found a lot of comfort in the LiveTracking aspect of my running app I first found to be creepy.

Usually when I go for long rides like this, I'm going with my cousin. This time I set out by myself with no plan in mind, no idea how to fix my bike if something happened, and no cash. Yesterday was pretty miserable out here.  At one point I was cold, miserable, pretty sure I was about to get drenched, far from my apartment and, short of calling and begging someone to find me, with no alternative means of getting home (besides the bike). That wasn't necessarily a problem, I just turned around and headed back. But it did get me thinking, if something did happen, I would have been in a lot of trouble! Granted the routes I travel are pretty popular and I had a fully charged cellphone but not having any cash/cards/ID on me, not my smartest decision.

So I'm committed to being better prepared when I head out and bringing cash/ID with me. I'm also considering getting a running ID bracelet. My roommate may download the running app as well so if I head out for a long ride by myself and don't return within the allotted time, someone will at least know where to find me!

The ride itself was a struggle. In general I'm struggling with biking the most. If nothing else, I'm really just happy I completed it! I wasn't sure I would make the full 97 minutes but got back to my apartment at about 95 minutes so biked in circles in the parking lot of the school behind my building to hit the training plan target, even after ending the ride with a 1.6 mile hill. I also realized on this ride that I need to do a better job fueling on a workout of this length. When I first set out I had grand plans of running after this ride but I was feeling really wiped at the end.  I need to stock up on Gu or some similar product!

Does it count if...

I can swim across the entire length of the pool without taking a breath? only about 3 strokes? almost glide the entire way?

All evidence to the contrary I haven't abandoned the blog.  The last few weeks have been really busy! Last week was my Spring Break and I was working full time in Baltimore when mean 2+ hours in the car each day in addition to my hours in the office and this week I've been at a conference in Chicago.  I have still managed to get (some of) my training in...

Although I'm not sure if I can really count the 35 minutes I spent gliding back and forth in this pool today!

***
Training plan - 29 minute swim

My plan - no real plan

Actual - 5 minutes swim, 5 minutes kicking, 5 minutes swim, 5 minutes thumb-to-thigh drill, 5 minutes swim, 5 minutes catch-up drill, 5 minutes swim; 20 minutes elliptical

I think I'm bad at sleeping

A little more than a week ago I downloaded a sleep tracking app. I'm generally skeptical that my phone can tell if I'm sleeping or not but I was curious to see the results anyway. From what I can understand, it doesn't so much track sleep as movement. I turn the tracking on before I go to sleep and when I wake up in the morning it has a graph that indicates when I was in a "light" to"deep", total sleep information, a percent deep sleep, etc.

My graphs look something like this.  I'm currently averaging 67% "deep" sleep and across the 8 days I've been tracking so far, I've only hit the 80+% threshold once. On the other hand, I am averaging 7:48 hours of sleep which is pretty good considering it's midterms!

It also records noise if you hit a certain threshold. So far...nothing interesting. No snoring, no talking, etc. Although last night I decided, I might be able to use this to be "productive" in my sleep.  You know how you go through "to do" lists in your head before going to sleep? (no?  just me?) Well I think I can record them to follow through on the next day.  Now if I can just figure out how to be productive while in the car for 2 to 3 hours on the days I'm commuting to Baltimore!

***
Training plan - 29 minute swim

My plan - I'm kind of torn between swimming intervals and just swimming for 29 (or so) minutes to see if I can beat my last record of 52 laps in 26 minutes.

Actual - ?

I had such grand plans

So my original thought for today's post was to synthesize the comments and suggestions I received on my blog and detail the changes I plan to make as a result.  As one of my professor always says, you shouldn't ask for opinions if you're not going to do anything about them!

Unfortunately between today's two workouts and finance midterm, my 6am wake up tomorrow, 3 hours of commuting, 30 minute group presentation, and Thursday's 12 page paper to edit and Quality midterm to study for, I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and drained. As such, while I agree with my professor, I also don't want to make promises I'm not sure I can keep yet!

So until I can get a handle on my life, we'll all just have to make due with the addition of the training totals tab & this selfie, just for Steve (which is also a shout out to him, so I guess I'm not so bad at responding to feedback after all)!

Holly helping me stretch after Sunday's run

***
Training plan - 29 minute run, 48 minute swim

Ok so, the training plan didn't actually call for 2 workouts today but it was the only way I could get these in!

My plan - I sketched out a plan for intervals this morning and planned to push myself with the run.  The plan called for 3 minutes fast and 2 minutes slow with 1.5% incline on the slower sections.  For the swimming portion of today's training I planned to do drills and work on technique instead of killing myself for 2 workouts!

Actual Running - I actually pushed myself a bit harder than I thought I could/would! I bumped up the speeds from my original plan and the incline as well.

MPH                      Min/Mile         Incline                      # of Minutes      Cumulative Minutes

 5.0                        12:00             0%                            2:00                   2:00

 5.5                        11:00             0%                            1:00                   3:00

 6.0                        10:00             0%                            1:00                   4:00

 6.3                         9:30              0%                            1:00                   5:00

 6.7                         8:57              0%                            3:00                   8:00

 6.3                         9:30              1.5%                         2:00                   10:00

 7.1                         8:30              0%                            3:00                   13:00

 6.7                         8:57              1.5%                         2:00                   15:00

 7.5                         8:00              0%                            3:00                   18:00

 6.3                         9:30              2.0%                         2:00                   20:00

 7.1                         8:30              1%                            3:00                   23:00

 6.3                         9:30              2.0%                         2:00                   25:00

 6.7                         8:57              1%                            3:00                   28:00

 6.0                         10:00            2.0%                         2:00                   30:00

With the 3 minute cool down I ran 3.46 miles, average 9:31/mile and felt great!

Actual Swimming - By the time I got to the pool at 11 I was running a bit behind and beginning to feel drained. I powered through my drills it was a struggle.

WARM UP

·       200 SWIM

·       50 KICK

·       50 SWIM

DRILLS

·       6 x 50 : 25m Thumb-to-Thigh drill, 25m swim

1      100m swim

·       6 x 50 : 25m Touch-and-Go drill, 25 yards swim. 

2      200m swim

·       5 x 100 : 25 yds kick, 25 yds Thumb-to-Thigh, 25 yds Touch-and-Go, 25 Swim·

COOL DOWN:

·        200 SWIM (more if needed for time)

         76 lengths total

Just keep swimming

Before diving into (swimming...diving...get it?) today's post, let me start of by thanking everyone who provided feedback on my Monthly Checkup post! Really appreciate the thoughts, suggestions, and comments (ok, well only some of them, you know who you are)!

I've already implemented one of the suggestions with the addition of a new page, "Training Totals".  I'm now tracking the amount of time my training plan indicates we should spend on each of the disciplines and the amount of time I actually end up spending, plus the mileage that translates too.  Some of the numbers are a little rough (it's hard to track time when swimming) and I know the biking distance is wrong since I couldn't track distance on yesterday's workout (I used what I know to be my average mph on the bike and calculated a best guess for that one). I would like to get this info on the main page but was having some difficulty with formatting.  I'll keep trying though.

Unfortunately I can't devote the time I would like to this and other updates based on your feedback, although I plan to! More on that soon.  Currently I'm just trying to get through the week.

I can only make it show 7am to 7pm, you'll just have to take my word that my schedule both starts earlier and ends later 

And what a week it is.

Just keep swimming

Just keep swimming

Just keep swimming swimming swimming

What do we do we swim, swim, swim

(Finding Nemo)

So bear with me through this week folks!

***

Training plan - 58 minute bike

My plan - originally thought I would do this week's 48 minute swim (which would have worked much better for today's post) but I couldn't make the work with rest of my life. So now instead I'm going to work out twice tomorrow...

Actual - ??

Monthly Checkup

So it's been about a month since I resurrected the blog.  As anyone I've cooked for knows, I like constructive criticism.  I'm a big fan of feedback/data in general.

So, what's working? What's not? Anything you want to hear more about? Less?

Would love your thoughts!

This is the interactive part of the blog folks. Post publicly, anonymously, make a pseudonym, whatever works for you.

***
Friday's Training plan - 26 minute run

My plan - 2 minutes at 12:00, 2 minutes at 10:00, 2 minutes working up to at least 9:00; attempt 20 minutes at 9:00

Actual - That felt good!  Followed through on the plan above - 6 minute build up to an 8:57 minute mile, 20 minutes at 8:57 and then a 4 minute cool down (because I like even numbers).  I thought about adding in an ab workout but I don't have time (because I have just about every minute of my life planned out for the next week...it's midterms folks). This was also a relatively early workout for me (ran from 7:30 to 8) and it's nice to have my workout behind me for the day. Plus given my schedule and my internship(s) I might need to get used to working out even earlier!

***
Saturday's Training plan - 88 minute bike ride

My plan - I had such grand plans for this workout. It's been a while since I've done a long, outdoor, bike ride and I was especially looking forward to doing it at sea level!  I mapped out a 16.5 mile ride (and figured I could go further if I needed to for time) and planned to work in stops at my cousin's coffee shop and my other cousin's boyfriend's bike shop. But it's about 35 degrees here and pouring! So instead I thought I would go to a local gym, I even negotiated them down from $20 for a daily membership (because, really, that's ridiculous) to $10. But then I couldn't get my sister's car to start soo...

Actual - Most miserable 90 minutes on a stationary bike in the basement of my parent's house which is currently under construction and doesn't have heat, ever. I think the thing I found most frustrating about this workout experience is that not 2 hours earlier I had gone back and tracked all my times and distances for all my previous workouts, per my cousin's suggestion (PS - keep those coming), and the bike that I was on didn't track distance so... not really sure what I'm going to do about that one?  Ultimately, the workout happened (and it almost didn't) so, win!

***
Sunday's Training Plan - 44 minute run

My plan - Run through my town, along the beach in Spring Lake and turn around at Belmar gates, about a 5 mile run.  I had done this run twice while I was home over Winter Break and it's one of my favorites.

Actual - That was a good one folks! I do so love running at sea level.

12/21 Run Results

12/27 Run Results

Today's run!

The last few runs at this length averaged just over 10:00/mile but DC significantly more hilly than the Jersey Shore.  The elevation graph might be a bit misleading. The starting elevation was only 17ft and I maxed out at 47 feet.  All that is well and good but mostly I just wanted to point out the 8:23 mile, that's a record for me. And I shaved at least 20 seconds/mile off my last attempts at this run...and enjoy some scenery as I did so.

Also, apparently my cousin could track my progress through the mapmyrun.com app we both use.  Kind of creepy!  But since he's the only person I'm "friends" with on that site, I might leave that setting. A little extra accountability never hurt anyone...