Getting to September 27, 2009

A New Blog!

2009-09-30T10:39:00.003-04:00

Since I've reached the natural end of this blog by getting to September 27, 2009, I've decided to create a new blog that will be for my continued triathlon training.

The new blog is: http://amystriathlontraining.blogspot.com/

I've appreciated all the support and comments that I've gotten over the past several months and I hope that you'll follow me in my new blog!

Official Results

2009-09-30T09:33:00.004-04:00

Well, the official results are out and I did a pretty close job with my watch and unofficial timing of the race.

Swim: 38:01 (42:12 pace)
T1: 3:37
Bike: 1:47:23 (14 MPH pace)
T2: 2:11
Run: 1:06:16 (10:41 pace)

Total: 3:37:25

I was 31 out of 57 in my age group. Had I had faster transition times, I could have probably been 28th without any other real effort (45 seconds difference).
I'm really happy with the biking pace. I was hoping for 13 MPH under good weather conditions, so to be at 14 in the rain makes me really happy. On the flip side, I was hoping for a faster run, but I'm not disappointed with the final outcome.

I Got Here

2009-09-27T13:39:00.025-04:00

So, the short story is that I got to September 27, 2009 and I survived. Actually, I more than survived, I enjoyed myself. And now for the long version ...

When I talked to Laura on Saturday night, she told me about their TNT practice session at the race site and also told me that the race had run out of bike racks so people with numbers in the 1000s and above currently didn't have a place to rack their bike. That meant both of us were without bike racks. I knew there was nothing we could do to worry about it and we'd just have to see how things went in the morning.

I managed to fall asleep pretty early on Saturday night (sometime between 9:30 and 10). I was a little upset that Drew fell asleep before I did, but I wasn't up much later than he was. I managed to sleep soundly until about 1:30. After that it was a constant waking up and falling back to sleep. Around 2:30, I woke up and just had to look outside. It hadn't been raining when I went to bed originally and I was still hoping that the weather forecasters were wrong. At 2:30 it was raining pretty steadily. After I knew it was raining, it took me a while to fall back to sleep. I just laid there for a while and thought of all the things that could go wrong with the rain, which wasn't very productive.

Finally, my alarm went off at 4:10. By that point, I was ready to get up and just start moving around. I choked down my breakfast of cinnamon-raisin bread and peanut butter as best I could. I double checked my bag for everything I would need and then just like that, it was time to head over to the race site. Drew dropped me and my bike off and said he would just wait there so that I could sit in the car instead of having to stand in the rain. I took my bike over to the rack and found out that I actually had a rack, which was good news. I tried to start setting-up, but the rain was coming down pretty steadily and I wasn't certain that I wanted to start getting stuff out of my bag any sooner than I had to.

I sent Drew a text that told him that I thought he should just go back to the hotel. I knew I'd feel better if I could just hang out in transition and I felt bad that he was just waiting in the car. A couple minutes later, I saw the bus that I knew would hold Laura and the rest of her TNT buddies arrive. I went up to the front of transition and said hi to her. The transition space was really crowded. I'm guessing that they didn't really find more bike racks magically over night and just had to try to squeeze all of us into the same number of racks. Also, I understand why they put the transition in numerical order, but I guess what I thought was silly was everyone in my transition area was also in my swim wave. Which meant that we'd all be in transition at roughly the same time, which wouldn't help with the crowding.

Finally, I had laid everything out as best I could. My best solution for the rain was to make one plastic bag of biking gear and one plastic bag of running gear and to just hope that they would stay a little bit dry. It actually did briefly stop raining while we were still setting up transition for maybe 10-15 minutes before starting up again. I almost think it would have been better if it just stayed raining.

At 6:30, everyone started heading over to the beach. As I told Laura as we were leaving transition, I knew it would sound really ridiculous, but I just didn't feel like getting my hair wet yet. We had been out in the rain for over an hour at this point, but I had either been wearing a rain coat or a poncho, so I still had dry hair. In order to keep it dry as we left transition, I put my swim caps on. There was supposed to be an athlete's meeting at 6:35, but that didn't happen.

Laura and I got into the water and were accompanied by some of her Brooklyn TNTers. We all speculated about the swimming course since no one had explained it and there clearly wasn't going to be a race meeting. We actually ended up getting into the water a couple of times before the start. Especially for me in my sleeveless wetsuit, it was a lot warmer in the water than out of it.

Finally it was 7:00 and we watched the pros start the race. I kept scanning the crowd looking for Drew and his parents. I didn't know what time they'd be back or if I'd get to see them before the race. I told myself it didn't really matter. At about 7:15, Drew found us. I just gave him the biggest hug. At that second, it was as if all my fear about doing the race disappeared. I knew he was there and would be cheering me on regardless of how I finished with the time. I guess I just needed to know that he'd be there and watching out for me.

Finally, it was time to walk over into the corral for the start of the swim. Most everyone else in our wave got into the water one last time, but Laura and I just stood on the beach and watched (that's me on the right, hands on hips).
Right before we got into the water, the guy with the megaphone shouted out some instructions. "Keep the buoys on your left. When you get to the end, the last buoy will be green. Turn around and swim back." Turns out none of those instructions were all that helpful.

And then the horn sounded and we all started running into the water. At some point while we were running in, Laura just looked at me and said, "this is ridiculous". And it really was. And then we were deep enough and started swimming. I did almost exactly what I wanted to on the swim. I just kept myself slow and steady and didn't let my race-day adrenaline get the best of me. The swim course was mostly protected by two jetties, but at some point, we had to swim past the jetty and the water got a lot rougher. I could tell almost the instant I had passed the jetty and wasn't very happy about the thought of swimming even further.

Although I had practiced a lot for nutrition before the race, the one thing that I couldn't practice was drinking a gallon of salt water along with what I had eaten for breakfast. What I will say is that the two didn't mix and I got sick during the swim. Twice. I tried not to panic about it and knew that all I could do was keep swimming and get myself out of the water. When I got to the turn-around point, it was a little confusing because there was no green buoy. But everyone else was turning, so I did too. One guy next to me said, "Well, now what do I do?". Pretty much my thought.

Swimming back in was rough, but mostly because there was a girl next to me who wouldn't stop bumping into me. I tried to speed up, I tried to hang back a little bit, but it seemed like everything I did, she did too and just kept hitting me in the head. I was surprised that it would be that far into the swim and still so congested. Once we got back into the protected area of the swim, I really just tried to bring it home stronger than I had swum on the way out. I felt like I was practically rolling onto my back to get a breath without taking on water, but it seemed to be working. I also decided that in the future, I would try to avoid salt-water triathlons at all costs. With so many races out there, it just didn't seem worth it.

The other thing that the guy with the microphone at the start didn't describe was the fact that on the way in, you had to swim in between two buoys. I noticed a lot of people going really far to keep the outside buoy on the left, but that didn't make sense to me, so at least I didn't add onto the distance of the swim too much like I saw some other people doing. Once I got pretty close to shore, I kept swimming for as long as possible. I saw some people get up and start running really far out, but I knew that swimming further would be better.

As soon as I hit the bottom with my hand, I was up and running. I remembered how tired and defeated I had felt at Staten Island after the swim and I didn't feel that way at all today. I was feeling really strong and totally looking forward to the cup of water that I knew that they would have on the run into T1 (me, in the pink cap, running).

I knew that I was going to have long transitions because of the weather and because I wanted to put on more clothes than I had before. And I accept that as part of the race-day conditions. I almost forgot to take my swim cap off before putting my bike helmet on. With the rain, I'm not sure it really would have made any difference and might have actually helped. Drew and his parents were talking to me while I was in T1 and he asked how I was doing.
My answer, "sticky." It's really hard to put on a long-sleeved shirt while you're wet and it's raining. But, finally I got it on and ran my bike over to the mounting line. I jumped on and was off for 25 miles.

The first part of the bike was just fine. I recognized the part up until where Drew and I had gotten lost on our aborted training ride a couple of weeks ago. The roads were really wet and I tried to avoid the puddles and the storm drains and whatever bumps I could. Once I got past the part where Drew and I had ridden, I knew that I was then going to be in for the two big hills. On the first one, I saw a girl walking her bike up the hill. I was thinking that didn't look so good for her. I was also really glad that wasn't me. Once I got the first hill over with, I was just anticipating Claire's Climb.

It was still a few miles away, but it felt like it was there before I knew it. The race actually tracks your time up the hill, so I'm interested to know how fast I did it. I will say that I when I looked at my MPH, it was somewhere around 5.6 or 5.8, so it certainly wasn't a fast climb. But I stayed in the saddle and just kept pedaling. There was a bag piper playing on my climb up, so that was a nice distraction from the hill and the rain. Once I hit the top of the hill, I was ecstatic. The bike was more than half-way done, the hard part was over, and it would be (mostly) downhill from here. The ride down the hill was where I hit my highest speed and I'm sure I could have gone faster had the roads been dry and I wasn't worried about my brakes being too wet to stop!

On both bike bike hills, there were lots of inspirational signs provided by the race. As I was riding past, I was thinking that I would remember most of the sayings. Of course, I only remember one: "Pain is temporary. Quitting is permanent." Although a lot of the signs were corny, there is something about that sort of encouragement that just gets you going a little bit harder than you were before. And at least it distracts you slightly from the task at hand.

My stomach still wasn't very happy on the bike. I tried to take a couple of bites of my Clif bar and I managed to get two down, but that was all I could do. I tried to drink as much as I could, especially of the Gatorade that I had brought with me in order to keep my calorie count for the day up. I was worried about not having enough left in the tank for the run, but I also knew that if I ate too much and my stomach revolted even more that I'd be more miserable, so I might as well just try to do what I could and leave it alone a little bit.

The roads were really wet and the cops and volunteers were terrific. I tried to say "thank you" as often as possible. Especially when there was a long line of cars that the police officers were holding back from crossing into the course. A lot of the volunteers offered words of encouragement, which was nice. I felt pretty bad for them standing out in the rain, but none of them looked too unhappy.

So, I'm not 100% sure that I needed to put on my long-sleeved shirt for the bike ride, but I was never sorry that I had it on. Had it been any windier, I think it would have been a necessity. The one thing I really wasn't prepared for was how wet my shoes were. The rain just poured down my legs and collected in my shoes and every stroke of the pedals just felt like I was stepping into a pool of water. Needless to say, it wasn't the most comfortable feeling.

I got done with the bike faster that I would have thought I would even under dry conditions. In fact, I apparently was lucky to even see Drew on my way into T2. He told me after the race that they thought I would be coming in about 10-20 minutes later than I did and they had just gotten there to start watching for me. I actually saw them before they saw me, probably because they weren't expecting to look for me.

The second I unclipped my left foot and set it on the ground, there was nothing I could do but laugh. My legs were complete jelly. They haven't felt like that in a long time. I think because I have been doing bricks almost every week with Terrier, they're used to riding for about half that distance and then running, but doubling the bike ride and then running was a different story. But, somehow I managed to run the rest of the way into T2.

I had another long transition because I took off my bike vest and long-sleeved shirt. I also had dry socks that I wanted to change into for the run. Then I grabbed my race belt and hat and was off on my way out of T2. Right when I was leaving T2, I saw Laura right in front of me. I yelled for her and after yelling a second time, she turned around. I ran up to her and we started the run together.

We couldn't believe that we ended up there together. We figured out after the fact that she must have finished the bike just behind me and had a shorter T2 than I did to get out just ahead of me to the run. The official results aren't posted to the internet yet, so that's our best guess, but I guess we'll know more when we get those.

I think Laura was a life-saver in that first mile. My legs were feeling tired from the bike and I hadn't quite settled into the run yet. At one point, I told her that if she wanted to run ahead of me, she should. Unfortunately, that's not what happened. After about a mile, Laura stopped running. I turned back and she told me that I had to keep running and I shouldn't stop with her. I know that if the positions were reversed, I would have told her the same thing, but my heart sank. She's been training for so long this year and has just recently been having some leg pain and I knew that was getting the best of her. A big part of me wanted to stop and encourage her along and make sure that she finished okay, but the other part of me knew that we each wanted the other to have their best race possible, and that I needed to keep running in order to do that.

Oh, and also in the first mile of running there was also this monster puddle that took up most of the road we were running on. That was the end of my dry socks. That made me less enthused about the fact that I had changed them and also the rest of the run. On the plus side, I figured that since they were already soaking wet, I might as well splash myself through future puddles just to have some fun.

Somewhere between miles 1 & 2, I saw Drew again. It was at the first water/Gatorade station on the run, and I was ready for it. I actually took these two cups, drank them, turned back around and gave Drew a quick kiss before heading out for the rest of the run...definitely some good motivation!

I followed my running plan to a T. I wanted to walk through the aid stations and run otherwise, and that's exactly what I did. There was only one brief moment where I walked. I ran uphill only to turn left for another uphill (meanwhile the volunteer was saying "it's all downhill from here" -- complete lie) and that second uphill got about a 15 second walk out of me. At the aid stations, I tried to drink as much Gatorade as possible for the calories (plus, the water tasted funny), but the Gatorade was all lime. I think maybe I'll have to try drinking that in the future when I'm training, because it's really not that good and I don't understand why they can't get another flavor.

I was also able to pick up my running about 5 times. I think I only did it for about 20 or 30 seconds each time, but it was really helpful in just giving me an extra boost and not settling into my slower rhythm the whole time. I saw Laura again between miles 4 & 5 on an out-and-back part of the course. She was walking and said her leg wasn't good. I was so proud of her for not giving up and for continuing on.

By the time I got to mile 5, all I could think about was how good I was feeling and even though I knew I was tired, I wasn't dying. I couldn't believe all the training I had done to get me to be able to accomplish this and get to the finish running. This never would have even been possible a year ago and I never would have dreamed that I'd be doing triathlons and be wanting to do more. That was what else I was thinking about on the run ... next year's races. But that's another blog post. Let's finish this race first!

Once I saw the sign for mile marker 6, there was a sharp turn into a park for the finish and the last 0.2 miles. At that point, I just started sprinting. The run through the park was not on pavement, it was on grass, which at this point had turned to mud. I did my best to not lose my footing and just run as hard as I possibly could.
And just like that, it was over! Someone handed me a medal, a towel, a water bottle, took my chip off my ankle, and then I was hugging Drew and I was done!

Drew and his parents suggested that I should get something to eat. We walked over to the tent and I picked up a piece of pizza had one bite and knew that was a really bad idea. Instead I grabbed some plain bagel and tried to munch on that for a minute or two while I settled down. It was still raining at this point and I was getting really cold. I decided that we should just go get my stuff from transition and then head home. I felt horrible for not waiting and watching Laura finish, but even though I was happy to be done and I felt great about the race, standing in the rain and the cold for one more minute was just going to make me miserable.

So, we headed back to the city and I regaled everyone with stories of the race. By the time we got back home, it had stopped raining (quite typical!) and it turned out to be a nice evening.

I did learn a few things:
1. Bring a flashlight to transition. Some of the racks were in complete dark (not under street lights) and if I had one of those, I would have been sunk without a light. Not to mention using a port-a-potty in complete darkness is something I'd rather not repeat.
2. Use body glide. I don't really like it and I feel like it just makes sand stick to you, but the weird chafing I have on my neck, collar bone and arms thinks that I should have used it.

Other than that, I had a fantastic time and was more than prepared for the race. I'm sad it's over, but I'm looking forward to next year.

Unofficial Watch Time: 3:37:27
Calories: 2843
Maximum HR: 191
Average HR: 174

I'll post the official results when they're available. I also am planning a new blog for my continued training as this one seems to have almost reached its end, so I'll keep you updated on that as well.

Not According To Plan

2009-09-25T09:24:00.004-04:00

My plan for this morning was to get up and go for a quick run. Nothing too fast or serious, just one more stretch of the legs before the race. However, after having gotten up before 5 AM yesterday and staying up until about 1 AM last night, it just wasn't happening. I tried to get up. I snoozed once, twice, five times ... okay, I'll be honest, I snoozed for an hour and 15 minutes. At that point, Drew was poking me saying that I should get out of bed. But I just couldn't do it. I was still so exhausted that the thought of getting up was just excruciating. I have justified this to myself for the following reasons: (1) I have already spent enough hours working out this week according to my overall plan and (2) being well rested going into the race is the whole point of the taper week.

I won't have a chance to squeeze in a workout this evening and it's unlikely that I'll do anything tomorrow, so I guess now the only thing left to do is to lay out my race plan. At this point, the weather is looking pretty dismal. It's supposed to start raining Saturday evening and rain right on through Sunday morning until the late afternoon. Oh, and it will most likely only be in the mid-50s in the morning during the race. We just got an e-mail from the race this morning that said: "Sunday's weather forecast is calling for a chance of showers. In the event there is inclement weather and we do get rain, the race will go on. We will take into consideration your safety first and that of the volunteers. If the weather does get too severe, we have the right to modify the race. These changes, if any, will only be altered on race morning. We are looking forward to a safe and dry race for you all!"

I am trying to be a good sport about this. I want to say that it doesn't impact me at all. Except that I know that it does. I am hoping against hope that these weather predictors are getting it wrong this time and that it'll stop raining Saturday night and won't be raining Sunday morning. But, since I know it will be cold and most likely rainy, all I can do is try to alter my plan a little bit to fit the conditions.

I want to try to get to the race on the earlier side. Transition opens at 5 and I think I'd be happy arriving around that time. I would rather set everything up and try to get out my nervous jitters at the race site. I'm also hoping that by getting there early, I can sneak into the water before-hand to get acclimated to the water temperature. Clearly, nothing about the day will be warm, so maybe it won't be such a shock in the water!

For the swim, what I want to do is just settle into a relaxed rhythm. I know that it is likely to have a lot of elbows flying, but I'm hoping that I can not pay attention to that and just keep a nice easy pace on the swim. I want to make sure I don't let the adrenaline get the best of me from the start, so I think it's going to be really important to just take it easy.

In T1, I plan on putting on a long-sleeved shirt and my biking vest in order to cut down on some of the windchill on the bike in 56 degree weather. This will actually be useful as my biking vest has bigger pockets than my tri top and this way I can carry my stuff with me more easily (nutrition, sunglasses, etc.).

For the bike, I'm hoping I can remember to drink often and make sure I'm eating. It's going to be harder for me to remember to drink if it's not hot, so I'm really going to have to make a conscious effort to do so. I also need to remember to try to hold back a little bit as I need to save something in my legs for the run. I really felt like I was holding back on Thursday at the brick, so I'm hoping to remember that and carry over some of that.

In T2, I may or may not take off the biking vest and long-sleeved shirt depending on how I'm feeling temperature wise and what the weather is currently like. If it's raining, I think I'll definitely wear a running hat to try to keep some of the rain out of my eyes.

For the run, I'm going to just take it easy and remember that while this is a race, I'm just there to do my personal best. I know that at some point during the run, probably 2-3 miles in, I'll be exhausted from the effort of the day. But I think if I can run through that, I'll be able to finish the race running. I know that I will stop and walk through the aid stations, as I think at that point I'll really need the water and I'd prefer to make sure I'm actually drinking the water instead of spilling it down my shirt (which is what would happen if I ran). I am actually thinking of trying to incorporate some pick-ups into the run, because it seems to be easier for me to go further when I can keep myself busy with the speeding up and slowing down.

All in all, I think anything under 4 hours will make me extremely happy and proud of all that I've accomplished in the past seven months. It's still crazy to me to think that I've put in all this effort and now the day is almost here. I'm sure I'll be nervous and worried until that morning when they tell us that we can either do the full triathlon or the plans will be adjusted, but I'm going to just keep hoping that I can do the race that I've been training for.

Does It Sound Wet Or Flat?

2009-09-24T07:35:00.003-04:00

Yesterday after work I took my bike back to Toga to have them fix the bike computer. I was really glad that they were going to fix it because on the way over, nothing was working. Not the mileage, not the MPH, not the cadence ... nothing. Well, that's not true. It did still tell time accurately. I waited about a half an hour and they brought it back up and everything was in working order. Apparently one of the wires was too tight before and that's why it wasn't working. Once they re-wired and gave it some slack, it was A-OK. The only thing I'm not sure about is that they moved the location of the computer. It's fine, but I sort-of liked where it was before. I'm sure in a while I won't even really remember what it used to be like.

This morning I woke up at 2:30 to the sound of rain. I was secretly hopeful that it would keep on raining so that I could just get some more sleep. However, when my alarm went off at 4:45, it had stopped raining. I did debate whether or not to still go to the brick workout and if I had been by myself, I probably could have justified staying home, but Drew convinced me to go. I know that was the right decision, I just wasn't that excited about waking up before 5 AM.

I got to the meeting spot and it turned out that there were only 8 of us at the workout today. Not super surprising given the fact that the weather was a little bit iffy and it was also the last Terrier brick workout of the season. Even though it might have seemed like it could keep raining, the temperature was fantastic - really quite warm - which was a nice surprise.

The taper workout wasn't anything fancy - just 50 minutes on the bike spinning easy and then a 15-20 minute run. I started off on the bike riding and noticed right away that since there had been no car traffic in the park, the roads were really still pretty wet. It's not really that big of a deal to ride on a wet road, but I just hate that you get this thin layer of dirt all over you from the splashing up from the road. I also don't really like to give my bike a bath and that's usually a requirement after a day like today.

After I was 3/4 of the way done with my first loop in the park, I thought I heard a bit of an odd noise coming from my bike. I was worried that maybe I had a flat. I did think that it could just be the sound of the wet pavement that was leading me to hear all of these funny noises and not a flat, but being the worry-wort that I am (and also prone to flats!), I decided just to stop for a second and check it out. Of course, it was just my over-active imagination, but I did feel a lot better for the rest of the ride once I had stopped to see. Also, since the weather for Sunday is still looking pretty iffy, it made me feel better that I'll know what it'll sound like to ride on wet roads and I won't have to be as paranoid that every sound I hear is a flat tire.

My bike ride was 12.34 miles in 50:47 (14.58 MPH average). I really took it easy today. Every time I found myself pedaling harder up a hill, I reminded myself to ease off and not blow up my legs before the race. Which meant that I had no shame in using my granny gear to go up the Harlem Hill!

Running wasn't anything exciting. I started off a little bit slow because I really didn't want to push too hard this close to the race. I did the loop around Cherry Hill Fountain and then the lower loop of the Park. On the last quarter-mile or so of the run, I picked up the pace a little bit. I wanted to try to simulate the end of the run on Sunday and I'd like to have a little bit of gas left in the tank so that I can pick up the tempo at the end of the run and finish strong. My run was 1.86 miles in 18:01 (9:41 pace).

Bike:
Calories: 574
Maximum HR: 176
Average HR: 160

Run:
Calories: 238
Maximum HR: 183
Average HR: 174

I think my plan for this week is going really well so far. I'm hoping I can get to bed early tonight to try to stockpile my sleep. I'm just guessing that I won't sleep too well Saturday night, but I'm hoping if I get up early both Friday and Saturday mornings, I'll just be too tuckered out to stay awake worrying all night long. I just have one more workout planned for tomorrow and then that's it. I'm not going to gain any fitness in the next three days, so I just have to hope that everything I've done this far was enough.

It's A Prime Number!

2009-09-23T09:34:00.005-04:00

Yesterday afternoon the swim waves for Westchester came out. I found out that I'm in Wave 8 (out of 10 waves). I had been really nervous about the swim waves because I was worried that if I was in a later wave, I wouldn't have enough time to finish the bike course. Everyone, regardless of when you start, has to be off the bike course by 10:30. My wave should start around 7:24, which should be more than enough time to swim and bike by 10:30 (and even if I should get a flat tire, I think I'd still be okay).

Even though I was feeling better by the time I figured out that I should have more than enough time, I still got all panicky and sick-feeling in my tummy. I think a lot of it is the fact that I've been planning for this for over 7 months now and I cannot believe that it's almost here. I've decided that I should just embrace all these nervous jitters and hope that I can get a lot of them out of my system prior to Sunday morning. I know I'll still be nervous and anxious on that morning, but I'm hoping to be less so than I normally would have been.

Yesterday after work I went to pick up my race packet. I had found out when the swim waves were posted that I would be number 1093. Not such a bad number. It's a prime number, which I found to be quite comforting. Since my number is indivisible, it must mean that I am also indivisible and can't be too beat down by the end of the race. Turns out that 1093 is also a Wieferich prime number, and there are only two known Wieferich primes. Must mean that I'm pretty special since I really don't understand the rest of that math mumbo-jumbo.

When I was picking up my packet, they put this really awesome bracelet on all of the athletes:

It's so that we can all get into and out of transition and that non-athletes can't sneak in, but I will say that I'm not so keen on wearing this around for the next 4 days. It's hard to take myself seriously. Laura's take was more that it was a badge of honor and bragging rights, but I'm not sure I share that same sentiment.

Today I decided to take as a rest day. There was a brief period where I discussed swimming with Laura, but she decided not to trek to the city super early, which meant that I got to sleep in! I did awake with a start at 7:00 to be a little worried that it was already light outside and I wasn't already awake. I really felt like I was forgetting something this morning and then I couldn't fall back to sleep once I was up. I did, however, spend the next 45 minutes just lounging around in bed, because I figured if I wasn't going to sleep, I should at least keep resting.

My plan for the rest of the week is to do the Terrier brick tomorrow and go for a quick run on Friday and then just keep holding out hope that it doesn't rain on Sunday morning. It's looking like there is a good chance for rain, but I'm hoping that it will come in the afternoon instead of the morning.

If I Don't See Smiles, You're Not Racing

2009-09-22T07:19:00.004-04:00

This morning was my last Terrier run before the race. I can't believe it's only five days away! I got up and had a piece of toast with peanut butter before heading out. I walked about half of the way there and ran the last 0.50 miles in 5:07 (10:13 pace). When I got to the meeting spot, I hung out there for a while with the rest of the people who had shown up for practice. Spencer was about 5 minutes late, so we got a bit of a late start to the workout.

We headed over to do the strides as usual. I had thought about timing them this morning, but figured that I'd just do that next time instead. I have enough to think about right now as it is. We did all the normal strides, including skipping, high knees, butt kicks, and karaoke. Towards the end, Spencer said that we should all do the same drill as last week - the side lunges. I decided to sit that one out. Since my legs are still a little bit sore from last week, I figured that I'd be pressing my luck by doing it today also. Again, I'm not entirely sure of the time, but I'd say we did about 0.50 miles in 5 minutes.

Once we were done with the warm-up, we all ran over to the Start. For the very first time, I held my own with the group. I actually finished towards the front! Granted, I know that everyone else wasn't really pushing it, but I wasn't really either. It was maybe a little bit faster than I would have been 100% comfortable and I'm not sure how long I could have maintained that pace, but I ran the 1.25 miles in 10:04 (8:03 pace). I can't even begin to explain how excited I was not to be the last one there. I know that it doesn't really matter, but it was just a nice boost going into the race to know that I can run at a faster pace than I would on my own when there are people around.

Finally, I got my turn of doing the "easy" workout for the people who are racing this weekend instead of the regular Sprint/Olympic group workout. Spencer told us that we should really take it easy on the workout and that we should be smiling the whole time. He said that if he didn't see us smiling, we wouldn't be racing this weekend, so we better be sure to keep smiling!
The workout was 3 x 440 yards (1/4 mile) and 3 x 220 yards (1/8 mile). We would have 1:30 recovery after the 440s and 1:00 recovery after the 220s. I ended up doing the running portion of the workout (1.125 miles) in 8:33 (7:36 pace).

Today ended up being quite a speedy day for me. But, I did keep smiling the whole time. And I didn't leave feeling tired, so all in all, I think it was a good morning. Today is the first day that we can pick up our packets for the race, so I think I'll be going after work (if not at lunch) to pick it up. I'm really nervous about finding out what swim wave I'm in and I'm hoping that I'm towards the front of the race so that I don't have to worry about the bike cut-off time. I guess I'll find out later today!

Total Miles (including strides): 3.375 in 28:44 (8:30 pace)

Calories: 305
Maximum HR: 191
Average HR: 169

You Won't Fall Off

2009-09-21T10:35:00.004-04:00

This morning I met Nicole for pilates. Laura did what was probably the smart thing and took the day off from pilates. I'm not going to lie, when my alarm went off before 5:30, all I wanted to do was roll over and keep sleeping, but as usual with most exercising, once I got there, I was glad that I had gotten up and was doing the exercising.

We started out on the reformer and did a lot of the regular exercises. Nicole had me do some arm exercises on the reformer while keeping my legs in tabletop position. By the end of that, my tummy was exhausted. She told me that she has to come up with ways to make the beginner series more challenging. I told her that she had succeeded. It's a weird thing because the arm movements she was having me to aren't that challenging, but keeping my legs up certainly was.

While we were on the reformer, we got to do my favorite pilates exercise: side splits! Seriously, I think they're so much fun. I just really wanted to go down as far as I could, but I didn't think that my abs would be able to pick me back up. Unfortunately, that wasn't the only side exercise that I had to do today. Nicole also had me do side situps. As far as I can tell, the only reason to not complain too much about these situps is the fact you get to do two really good stretches when you're done with them. Although there is generally some grumbling involved no matter what.

Once we were done on the reformer, we moved over to the chair. Nicole had me lie down on the chair on my back. The chair itself is only about 2 feet long, so it's really just my back that was supported. She had me do the ab series on the chair. Normally, on the mat or the reformer, I always dread the words "curl your head, neck, and shoulders up", but on the chair it was even worse somehow. After that, she had me do a bit of a mini roll-up. I balanced on the chair on my tailbone and had to rock back about an inch and then forward to where I started. I was a little unsteady at first, but Nicole said, "Don't worry, you won't fall off." I was sure that was then the time where I actually would fall off, but she was right. She must know a thing or two about this teaching business.

Once we were done with the chair, we finished up on the Cadillac with some leg circles and some breathing exercises. It was quite a lot of things that we did today. I still really like pilates for the fact that even though we still do a lot of the same exercises, it can be switched up, like how it was today doing the ab series on the chair instead of the mat or the reformer. Sometimes, when I'm doing the exercises, I wonder how much I'm working my abs or if I'm cheating by not scooping them as much as I should be, but Drew says he can't believe how strong my abs are now, so I must be doing something right!

If I Could Reach

2009-09-20T18:05:00.004-04:00

Remember earlier today when I said that I should take it easy from now on? Yeah, well, that's going to be starting tomorrow, apparently. I decided to go to the Terrier swim practice this afternoon. I was actually worried that perhaps there wouldn't be a practice since I knew a lot of Terriers were going to be competing in the War at the Shore triathlon this morning. It ended up that the coach had competed this morning and got to swim practice about 5 minutes late and there were only six of us that showed up for practice, but that also made it sort of nice and laid back.

I ended up with my own lane, which was a nice treat!
This was the workout for today:

200 free warm-up
200 kick warm-up
3 x 50 descending (on the 1:00)
3 x 50 descending (on the 1:00)
50 easy
3 x 100 descending (on the 2:10)
3 x 100 descending (on the 2:10)
50 easy
100 reaching - 19 or 20 strokes
100 reaching - 17 or 18 strokes
100 easy

The descending sets were 50 (or 100) easy, 50 medium, and 50 fast. Especially on the 100s, we really had to make sure that we weren't over-swimming the first two. Otherwise, we wouldn't really improve on our times for the last set. On the second set of 100s, Sarah said that we should all finish under 1:30. I didn't quite make it. I'm not going to lie. My arms were tired today. Although I think it was good for them to get out there and just sort of not push too hard.

The 100s reaching were done really slowly. Sarah had us do 25s and count how many strokes we took. The first 100 we were just supposed to swim normally and count. I had either 19 or 20 strokes per 25 meters. Then after the first 100 she told us to really reach and see how many strokes we could shave off. Once we all reached the wall after swimming 25 and reaching more than we did before, she laughed and said that we all did exactly what she wanted us to do. We sped up. Instead of keeping our same easy pace, we sped up and shaved a couple of strokes off. I went down to either 17 or 18 strokes per 25 meters.

The whole purpose of this exercise is that we're more likely to swim and reach further like that while we're actually racing, so we should practice swimming like that in practice so that it feels more natural while we're actually racing instead of changing our strokes. For the 100 cool-down, I definitely tried to keep an easy pace and also keep my stroke count a little bit lower. Sarah said that we should have the same cadence regardless of how fast we're going. It should be a change in effort rather than how fast we're stroking our arms. Although this is definitely something I'm going to work on, I think I'm going to save it for after the triathlon!

Today's total: 1700 Meters (1.05 miles) in approximately 52 minutes.

Calories: 506
Maximum HR: 182
Average HR: 145

Wet Practice Ride

2009-09-20T09:49:00.007-04:00

This morning I made up for yesterday morning's laziness and got up and went for a bike ride. This wasn't really about going the distance, this was more of a test ride for Westchester and trying to figure out exactly what I'm going to wear and how it will work out for the ride. It's sort of silly to say this, but I actually got all ready for the bike ride and then I got into the shower and got wet wearing my tri gear that I plan on wearing under my wetsuit. I then put on a long sleeved shirt and my biking vest once I got out of the shower and then we headed out to the park.

My hope in doing this was to simulate the race conditions. When we left the house, the weather said it was 55 degrees outside. But, it was really sunny, which made it feel a bit warmer to me. The weather forecast for the day of the race is currently 68 degrees as a high temperature and it says "clouds and occasional sunshine." That does not sound ideal to me and in my (limited) experience, biking while wet is a little chilly.

On the ride from the apartment to the park, I thought that I had made the right decision by putting on the extra clothes. Especially any time that the wind blew. We got to the park and started on our way. My cadence monitor still isn't fixed, so I just had to go by feel and instead I kept an eye on the distance. I imagine that I'll keep it on the distance on race day even if the cadence is fixed, so I'm thinking that it's not a huge deal at the moment. It's still a bummer, but not a deal breaker.

On the first time up the Harlem Hill, I blew by Drew and beat him up the hill. I'm pretty sure that hasn't happened before - or if it has - it was maybe only one time. I still thought it was a fluke and that maybe he was just tired or he was just letting me do all the hard work today and he was just out for a joy ride. When we got back to 72nd Street, I decided that I thought that the park was getting a little too crowded for my liking and that we should cut off the very lower loop of the park that is always the worst part and just cut across 72nd and head back north.

I don't like my 2nd water bottle holder on my bike very much and I don't think I've ever actually used it while biking before. Sure, sometimes I bring two water bottles, but I generally tend to switch them while I'm stopped instead of using the second one actively while on the bike. Today I forced myself to practice with it while biking since I am fairly certain I'll be needing it at Westchester (since I certainly don't plan on stopping that day!). It actually went much better than I would have anticipated and I actually think it's harder to drop the bottle in and out when I'm standing next to it then when I'm actually on the bike. Who knew?

So, we got around to the Harlem Hill again and I beat Drew up the hill again! What in the world? I have no idea where my little legs got all their super powers today. To beat him twice in the same bike trip seemed like maybe it wasn't a fluke the first time. I don't really know what happened, but I was certainly quite proud of myself!

When we got back down to 72nd Street the second time, I asked Drew what he wanted to do. I sort of wanted to keep going, but I knew that we had a lot of stuff to get done today and that he also had to go to work. I didn't want him to be stuck at work forever, so I figured that we should just head home, which is what we did.

We reached the exit and checked our stats before hitting the real road to ride the rest of the way home. My distance said 10.99 in 43:43 (15.08 MPH average) and Drew's said 11.17 in 43:43 (15.13 MPH average). We've known for a while now that our distances never matched up. The funny thing is that I used to make fun of Drew for not riding in a straight line and for riding so much longer than I did. However, it turns out that it's my distance that isn't counting correctly. It seems like it's about 0.10 miles off for every 6 miles. Not a huge difference, but enough.

I think I'm going to be good with my outfit choice for race day. I was definitely still wet after the 11 miles today (shorts and shirt). I know that my tri top will be less likely to dry if I put these other clothes on top of it, but I'm hoping that will help keep me cool on the run. I was definitely never hot today, even with the sun shining down, so I think on race day it'll be the right choice. Of course, there is really only one way to find out.

Calories: 488
Maximum HR: 181
Average HR: 158

Oh, yeah, and my arms? Pretty tired from yesterday. I'm guessing it'll be worse tomorrow. The good news is that it'll be better by next Sunday. I just need to remember to take it easy this week!

Sweating Makes Me Cold

2009-09-19T16:15:00.005-04:00

My plan for this morning was to get up really early and go for a bike ride, but that didn't happen. Instead, Drew and I spent the morning and early afternoon running errands. We then headed off to the gym. I asked him if he was going to lift weights and he said yes. I didn't really think I wanted to do any leg lifting, but I'd do some arm lifts, so he said that he would do that too.

We got to the gym and did a quick 5 minutes on the treadmill. I went 0.57 miles (8:46 pace) in my 5:00. Then we headed over to the weights. I was thinking that I wouldn't do anything too crazy because this week is supposed to be rather restful, but Drew pushed me a little harder than I really wanted to be pushed. I know in the long run, that's how to grow big muscles is to increase the weight you're lifting, but that really wasn't my goal for today.

This is what I did:

Seated Row
12 reps @ 50 lbs
12 reps @ 60 lbs
8 reps @ 70 lbs

Lat Pull Down
12 reps @ 60 lbs
8 reps @ 70 lbs
8 reps @ 70 lbs

Dumbbell Rows
3 sets of 12 reps @ 15 lbs (3 sets right arm, 3 sets left arm)

Curls
3 sets of 10 reps @ 12.5 lbs (in each hand)

Shrugs
6 reps @ 25 lbs (in each hand)

Somewhere around the last set of curls, I realized that I had probably done enough, if not too much. When we started doing the shrugs, I realized that it would be a really bad idea for me to keep going. That's why I only did 6 of them. I actually really wanted to keep going, but I just don't need my arms to take 3 days to recover this week. I have big plans for weightlifting starting in October, but I need to get through this triathlon first!

After I gave up on the weight lifting, we agreed we would do a half an hour of cardio. Drew went over to the Arc trainer, which isn't really something I like at all. I decided to hit the treadmill instead. I did 25 minutes running and went 2.75 miles (9:05 pace). I then walked the last 5 minutes as a cool down because I was sweating all over the place. In the 30 minutes, I went 3.05 miles (9:50 pace). Really happy with that pacing. I want to be able to walk through the aid stations on the run during the race so that I can actually drink the water instead of just having it slop down my shirt. I'm glad to know that I can definitely walk for a while and still have good pacing.

In total, with the warm-up, I did 35 minutes on the treadmill and went 3.62 miles (9:40 pace).

I only used the HR monitor on the treadmill, not during the weight lifting, but here are stats:
Calories: 406
Maximum HR: 185
Average HR: 165

After we were done with the cardio, we headed over to the stretching area. It looked like I had sweat through my shirt even more than Drew had. I didn't know I was so sweaty all the time! We only wore our t-shirts and shorts to the gym, so walking home was really cold and a reminder that when you sweat, it definitely does its job of cooling you down. The only problem was that I was working out in a warm gym, not in the cool outdoor weather!

Not Quite The Distance

2009-09-18T09:29:00.003-04:00

This morning I got up and had two pieces of bread with peanut butter for breakfast. I knew that wasn't going to be enough for the day of the triathlon, but I was really trying to see how close I could eat that and go swimming as well as to see how long it would carry me through. I wore my full race day gear, including HR monitor, tri top and shorts, wetsuit, and two swim caps. I even wore my hair the same way that I plan on wearing it on race day, to make sure it all stays put when I take my swim caps off my head.

I had wanted to get in the pool earlier than Laura, so I got to the pool at about 6:50 and got all suited up. I was thinking that I'd try to swim the whole distance of the triathlon today and since I know that the swim course seems like the hardest to actually measure, I decided I'd swim 0.94 miles if possible. Of course, it didn't quite work out that way. Instead I did a quick 200 warm-up and then started just swimming laps back and forth. I had swum half of the distance that I was aiming for today (825 yards/0.47 miles) and I stopped for a second to check the time and to press my goggles on more securely. I also must have rubbed my eye, because I bumped my contact and had to actually get out of the pool to go look in the mirror to make sure everything was okay.

I got back in and started swimming again, did one lap, and then Laura appeared. We talked for a few minutes and then we both started swimming. By this point the pool was getting really quite crowded and I think I just wasn't in the mood anymore. I had sort-of lost my rhythm. I also was getting hungry, so I clearly need to eat a lot more calories before the actual race. I'm wondering if maybe I can try to drink some calories too in the form of one of those Odwalla Protein Drinks. I ended up swimming another 425 yards (.24 miles) and then saying that I was done with the pool.

In total, these are the stats for today:
200 yards / 3:34
825 yards / 17:07
425 yards / 7:01

Total swimming: 1450 yards (0.82 miles) in 27:43 (33:38 pace).

Calories: 304
Maximum HR: 172
Average HR: 156

Holy cow! What a heart rate. I knew I was just taking it slow and easy and not trying to rush, but was I even working out? Compared to some of my running heart rates, this looks like I was sitting on the couch watching TV, not swimming. Obviously, that's not really the case, and I'm sure the adrenaline of race day will increase this, but I really want to try and stay relaxed like I was today in the water. I think I'm a much better swimmer like this than I am when I'm really pushing it as I think my form tends to lose something in the quest to swim faster and faster.

The Usual, But Colder

2009-09-17T07:50:00.004-04:00

This morning was the usual Terrier brick. It was the second to last brick of the season, which makes me both happy and sad. Happy because I am ready for a little bit of a break, but sad because I really like the brick workouts.

However, I am glad that the bricks are coming to and end because it was quite chilly out there this morning. I had laid out my clothes last night and didn't really think about the weather at the time. When I got outside on my bike, I really wasn't that happy that I was only wearing short-sleeves. The fact that I was only wearing shorts was okay, but man-oh-man did my arms get cold!

Robert wasn't at practice this morning, but he had given one of my teammates the workout. It was actually the same cadence workout we had done on September 3. Since my cadence monitor doesn't work and I could barely see it last time anyway, I just decided I would do two loops in the park.

The vast majority of the first loop I was fairly unhappy. It wasn't even really the cold, although that didn't help matters any. It was more that I'm just really tired. My legs are tired, I'm tired, and I just wasn't having fun. I even took yesterday as a rest day and I'm still tired.

By the time I got around and was starting the second loop, I was feeling a lot better. I was warmer and I was more "in the groove" than I had been on the first loop. I ate a little bit of my Clif bar on the bike, mostly just to keep practicing eating on the bike. I noticed that because it was so much cooler, I didn't really drink much on the bike. I think if the race weather is like this morning, I'll have to remind myself that even though I don't feel very thirsty, I still need to keep drinking. My total bike for today was 12.36 miles in 51:30 (14.4 MPH average).

When I got done with the bike and was changing into my running shoes, I saw that Lisa was also changing her shoes and getting ready for the run. We ran the lower loop together, which was nice to have a running buddy. I finally warmed up all the way on the run, so I felt a lot better. We were supposed to run for 20 minutes, but when we got back to where we had (almost) started from, her watch made a beeping sound and I asked if that meant we could stop. She said that it was actually that it wasn't working so well, but we stopped anyway. I don't even feel bad about stopping a few minutes early as I'm going to justify it by saying that I'm supposed to be tapering. We ran 1.68 miles in 15:11 (9:02 pace).

You'll Be Done Faster

2009-09-15T07:28:00.006-04:00

This morning I tried out a new nutrition plan. I've been trying to figure out what to eat in a hotel room before Westchester that doesn't require a lot of extra stuff and I think I've scratched oatmeal off the list as a possibility. I normally have about a half of a Clif (or similar) bar before heading out for my workouts, but today I thought I'd try having some bread and peanut butter. I didn't make toast, as I won't have a toaster in the hotel room. I really wanted to see how it would go with running, since that seems like the most likely culprit to make my tummy a bit upset.

On my walk through the park to the Terrier group run, I was thinking that this was probably one of the last nice mornings for the run and that I really ought to start thinking about getting some warmer running gear. I noticed that there were a lot of acorns on the ground and that I'd have to remember that during the run so that I didn't slip on one and twist my ankle. That's the last thing I'd need right now.

I actually ended up jogging about the last 1/2 mile to the meeting spot. I didn't time it, but I'd guess that it was probably about 5 minutes as I was going slowly and just trying to warm up my muscles. I got to the meeting spot and there were a few people milling about. One girl came up and introduced herself and said that she was new and was trying it out for the day. She asked some questions about the club and said she felt intimidated by everyone there. I told her not to worry. They were all fast and then there was me who isn't! From what I understand, our group has a bit of a reputation of being hardcore, but I know that it's been really good for me to have a reason to get up in the morning, even if I'm not the fastest one there. And it's definitely helped me improve over the last several months, so I think it was a great investment for me personally.

Anyhow, we did our typical strides workout for about the first 15 minutes or so. We actually did a new one that involved side lunges in order to stretch out your inner thigh. I'm not sure I was so great at those and I noticed a lot of people not getting down as much as they probably should have. In total, the strides workout was about 0.6 miles. I thought after the fact that I should really time this one of these days. I know that we spend about 15 minutes doing the drills, but I'm guessing the time that I actually spend running is more like 5 minutes.

Then Spencer told us that we would be doing a harder workout today. In fact, it was one of the harder workouts of the season. My first thought was that didn't sound so good for the new girl, but they were doing some speed work with people who were racing this weekend, so I don't think she actually did the workout the rest of us did. The workout for the Sprint/Olympic group was a 4.0 mile tempo run, but with some speed work mixed in. Every 4th light post, we would have to pick up the effort until the next light post.

When we first started, I wasn't so happy because the fourth light post at the bottom of Cat Hill, which meant running even faster up the hill. That should have been a sign that from then on, most other sprints would be up hill. At first I thought that I would be likely to give up pretty quickly on the picking up the pace, but I actually found that it wasn't that bad. When someone complained when Spencer told us the workout, he simply replied, "You'll be done faster." Hard to argue with that logic.

Once I really started going, I couldn't figure out if I should count to five light posts and then start over, or if the fifth light post was actually also the first light post. I decided to go the second way, which meant that I'd have to pick up the pace more frequently. I will admit that I did cheat once. On the 102nd Street transverse, there are no light posts on the left side of the street. Since I had been using the posts on the left, it seemed like I shouldn't have to switch over and count the ones on the right, so I just ran regularly across the transverse.

So, even though I did enjoy the run this morning, I did stop twice to get a drink at a drinking fountain in the park. I wonder if the peanut butter made me a little bit thirstier than usual? Also, I went back to using the heart rate monitor today. It's a weird thing. I actually sort-of liked not wearing it for the past week or so because sometimes I get really nervous when I see that my heart is consistently beating at such a high rate. When I just go run on my own without it, I have no concept of how fast my heart is beating and I think I feel a lot better without the knowledge. However, I do really like knowing roughly how many calories I burned during the workout. Somehow that makes me feel better about eating more than one breakfast!

This morning when I looked down, it was consistently in the upper 180s and even a couple times up at 190. Then my right arm started to tingle a little bit and I thought maybe I was having a stroke. Of course, I wasn't. But I did stop and walk for a minute to get my heart rate back down and to make sure my arm was okay. It just makes me wonder if I didn't know that my heart was beating so fast, would I have been so worried?

I finished the 3.9 miles in 37:01 (9:29 pace).

I then kept running (without the pick-ups) as a bit of a cool-down to the bottom of the park. I finished 4.4 miles total in 42:16 (9:36 pace).

I think my total running, including the jog to the meeting spot and the strides was 5.50 miles in ~ 52:16 (9:30 pace).

Calories: 600
Maximum HR: 191
Average HR: 181

As a side note, the bread and peanut butter combo worked out great! Never felt icky in my tummy, but I never felt hungry either. I will be trying this out for the rest of the week with my workouts to make sure that it wasn't just a one-time deal.

You Missed The Turn

2009-09-13T11:47:00.011-04:00

Top 10 Things That Could Go Wrong On A Bike Ride:

1. You could get lost
2. You could fall off your bike
3. Your bike computer might not work
4. The weather could be bad
5. Your chain could come off
6. You could run out of nutrition
7. You could feel sick
8. You could get a flat
9. Your brakes could fail
10. You could get hit by a car

Well, this morning was the Westchester training ride. I was really looking forward to the ride before-hand as Laura had told me that it was really great to have ridden the course (she did the ride about 3 weeks ago). Also, all the Westchester info says that this is a ride, not a race, and no one will be left behind.

So, this morning Drew and I woke up early to catch the train to Westchester. On the ride from the apartment to Grand Central, I almost got run over by an SUV (see #10). We were stopped at a light and an SUV had stopped at the corner. Drew said to me that I should watch out because the guy was backing up. I moved back a few feet, the guy backed up a few feet, and I thought that was that. Then I turned the other direction to look at the oncoming traffic. However, about 15 seconds later, Drew is yelling, "Stop!" because the guy is still backing up. For anyone who has ever stopped a light and kept one foot clipped in, I think you can understand that it's not the easiest thing to back-up still half clipped in, even though I was trying. Luckily, the guy either heard us or stopped in time because he missed me. I don't understand how he didn't see me the first time, but that's New York drivers for you.

We bought our train tickets, boarded the train and were on our way. It was at about this point where I just started getting really nervous. I'm not sure that it was really the training ride that was making me nervous, I'm thinking that it's more the triathlon itself, but whatever the cause, all those nerves made my stomach pretty upset (see #7).

So, we get off the train at the Rye stop along with about 20 other people. I had brought directions from the train station to the meeting point for the ride. I tried to figure out where we were, but one guy started biking and a group of us followed. After following him for a couple of minutes, he then said we weren't supposed to follow him. That didn't help. I got out my map and looked at it to see where we needed to go, but one of the other girls was asking a local, so we started following those directions instead.

I'll admit we were a bit lost (see #1). Luckily, I happened to see a sign that was facing the opposite direction that indicated that we needed to turn left to get to Rye Playland (the meeting spot). So, we followed the sign and found our way to the meeting spot.

We got there about 15-20 minutes early, so at least when we were lost, we had plenty of time to figure it out! The leaders started explaining the ride and how since there was such a big turn out (at least 100 people) we would be broken into four groups: Fast, Medium 1, Medium 2 and Social. I was a little bit torn about whether or not to go in the Medium or Social group, but in the end I decided that we should go in the second Medium group.

I really wasn't too worried because there was supposed to be a leader at the front and at the back of each group, so even if I was going slower than everyone else, I figured there would still be someone at the back with me.

So, we started out. Right away I realized that my cadence wasn't working on my bike computer (see #3). Everything else was working on the computer, so I figured I'd just go off feel. I wasn't too worried about that, even though it was a bummer. The ride started out fine. I was slower than a lot of people, which was no surprise. For about a minute I was feeling really discouraged, but then I reminded myself that this is supposed to be fun. That was all I needed. Then I decided that I would just enjoy the ride and the scenery - there are some amazing houses out there and it was fun just to look.

What I didn't enjoy, however, were the roads. I realized when I was riding along that I'm really spoiled by riding in the park all the time. The road is 90% good in the park (I'm assuming mostly because the traffic there is pretty limited) and I'm not used to all the bumps and holes in a regular road. There are definitely a lot I'll have to keep my eyes out for on the actual race day.

We had been riding for right around 8 miles and we went up a fairly long and slow hill. Laura had told me that there was a hill right around that mile, but she had made it sound a bit worse than I thought this hill was. We kept going for about another mile before the 10 or so people in our group stopped off. Turns out we had missed our turn about 2 miles before.

We all turned around and headed back down the hill to continue on the right route. On the way down, Drew yelled out "Amy! My shoe fell off!" turns out what he actually said was "my chain fell off", but I did spend a good 30 seconds wondering how in the world he managed to have his shoe fall off (see #5). Drew and I stopped and he got his chain back on in record time. Of course, everyone who knew where we were going hadn't stopped, so our only choice was to pedal like mad and try and catch up. We had almost caught them to make our left turn, but of course we then had to wait for about 5 cars to pass before were able to turn.

Needless to say, by the time we got to the next intersection, everyone was gone and we were left wondering whether or not to turn right or left. At this point we thought we had gotten lucky because three bikers came up behind us. Drew asked if they knew where to go, but it turned out that they were just out for a ride, they weren't part of the Westchester training ride. We were now officially lost (see #1).

The three bikers turned right. I knew that was the direction we had come from and at that point the best we could hope for was to try to get back to somewhere we knew. So, we turned right too.

Now, I'd like to touch on the subject of how I didn't bring directions or a map of the course with me. I'm not going to lie, I definitely thought about it, and it was fairly uncharacteristic of me to have not taken them with me. However, I think the real reason why I didn't was simply because I knew that there were supposed to be people with us at all times and that no one would be left behind. It just didn't even seem like a possibility to get lost. It's a mistake I won't be repeating. Part of the problem was also the traffic lights. Drew stopped at a red light to wait for me to catch up while everyone else rode on ahead. By that point, the group leaders were several minutes ahead of us, and we just never caught up.

From that point, it was just the two of us out for a ride. Drew says that this was the point where he started having more fun since it never mattered to him where we rode our bikes. We definitely had a couple of good hills along our new route and I happened to see one off to the right, so we turned and went up and down that hill. I figure since I missed the dreaded Claire's climb, the least I could do was practice a few more hills.

While we were out riding, Drew saw this sign, which says, "RIDERS GO BACK - You Missed The Turn". Seemed like a pretty good summary of the day!

We asked a woman in a car where the nearest town was and she said Greenwich was about 3 miles down the road. We figured we'd ride there, figure out the train schedule, and go from there. We talked about getting a snack or the possibility of extending the ride, but it seemed like the best idea would be to just go and check things out. The trains only come once an hour on Sundays and it wouldn't have been fun to have just missed a train.

We were able to find Greenwich and when we stopped to see the train schedule, we watched just a minute or two of a Soapbox Derby that was going on in town. I figured out that the next train was in 12 minutes, so it seemed like we should just go and get on the train. We hopped back on our bikes and rode the few blocks down to the train station. As soon as I got on my bike, I could tell that something was a little off. I looked at my back tire and sure enough, it was flat (see #8).

Since we were now at the train station, the only option I really saw was to get on the train and worry about the flat when I got home. Our ride was 17.32 miles and we did that in 1:22:27 (12.6 MPH average). Not the 25 mile ride I was hoping for, but it ended up being quite an adventure and we managed to have 6 of the 10 things go wrong for us, 7 if you count the fact that we got lost twice.

Here's a link to the route we took.
And this is a link to the route we were supposed to take.
The funny thing is that there are a couple points where if we had either kept going straight or turned left instead of right where we actually could have found the group. Oh well.

So, this afternoon, I had been planning on going to the Terrier swim as sort-of a make-up for those extra 8 miles of biking that I lost out on. However, I ended up spending 2 hours at Toga having them give my bike a tune-up, look at the flat, and let me know what was wrong with my bike computer. Turns out that there was very little good news. The tire itself was fraying along the seam. I can only conclude that this was a result of the flat I got on August 1. At the time, I thought that the tube had been pinched in the tire and I was surprised that the tire didn't have any damage. I think that it probably did and that it just took a while to manifest itself. Turns out that although those Armadillo tires are strong, they're not strong enough to cope with that. At least it wasn't a puncture. Then I really would have been at my wits end!

Because I had actually bought two new tires, but just hadn't gotten around to putting a new one on the front wheel, I was able to use a tire I had already bought instead of having to buy a new one, which was a nice bonus. The other bad news is about the bike computer. The reason the cadence isn't working is because there is a frayed wire. So, they have to order a new part for that in order to get it working again. At least it's not anything super serious and I can still ride my bike even though it's not working.

All in all, today was quite the adventure. I'm just glad that we didn't get too lost and that we still managed to come home laughing about the whole experience. Believe me, I'm going to try to memorize every turn for the bike before the 27th!

Does This Pool Taste Funny?

2009-09-11T09:29:00.007-04:00

Because Laura and I hate ourselves (and each other) we agreed to meet at a pool this morning at 6:45 for an hour-long swim. Normally, this doesn't sound so bad, but the location wasn't desirable for either of us, meaning we both had to get up even earlier and travel pretty far. The only thing that was going to make the trip worthwhile was the fact that there is a hot tub there and we could sit in that for 15 minutes after our swim was over.

I took all of my swimming gear, including wetsuit with me, as I thought that Laura and I had talked about wearing our wetsuits today. While we did in fact talk about it, I apparently remembered wrong, because when she got there, she didn't have a wetsuit with her. I had brought a bathing suit with me too, so we just wore our regular suits for the swim.

Before this morning, I hadn't been swimming since I was on vacation. And I hadn't been in a pool in a month. I'm not sure that's the best way to be training for a triathlon. I was never really worried about it because I know I'm a good swimmer and with all the running and biking I've been doing, I haven't lost any cardio fitness. Still, it was a shock to have to get into a cold pool this morning. I still don't like that.

Luckily, the pool wasn't too cold and I warmed up almost right away. It was just the getting into the pool that was hard. My objective for today was just to get in and have a nice long swim. I decided that I wouldn't do a swimplan.com workout, but I also didn't want to be continuously swimming either, so I decided to break it up into alternating swimming and kicking. After the first few hundred, I asked Laura if the pool tasted funny to her. She said yes, which made me glad that it wasn't just that I forgot what swimming pools tasted like.

I looked up the pool on the internet to confirm that it was yards (and not meters) and found this interesting tidbit:

Our 25-yard pool is primarily used for recreational aquatics activities and is the first commercial indoor pool in New York State to be primarily disinfected by ozone. This system of purification was chosen to supplement chlorine because of ozone's extraordinary ability to effectively purify water without side effects. Ozone purifies water and air very quickly and efficiently. 3,000 times faster than chlorine. Just as nature uses ozone to protect the earth, we can use ozone to protect ourselves from microorganisms in the pool. The result is crystal clear, purified water.

So, maybe that's why the pool tasted different than a normal swimming pool?

Also, pool rule says, "Flotation devices not supplied by the Y are not permitted", which on the board at the pool included "float suits". Maybe it's good we ended up not wearing our wetsuits?

This was my workout today:
500 yards freestyle
200 yards kick
500 yards freestyle
200 yards kick
500 yards freestyle
200 yards kick
400 yards freestyle

2500 yards (1.42 miles) in 59:15

About half-way through at around the 30-minute mark, I realized that I was starving. Once I realize that I'm hungry, it's hard for me to concentrate on anything else. Laura and I had actually been talking about our plans for the day of the race and what and when we're going to eat. I obviously will need to be eating a lot more than a half of a Clif bar before hitting the water!

All in all, not too bad for my first pool swimming workout in quite some time! I keep having a little bit of doubt about my ability to actually complete an Olympic-distance triathlon in 16 days, but I also know that I've been working really hard for months now and I could do this right now if I had to. I definitely feel better about everything after having been swimming for an hour and realizing that although I'm tired from waking up so early, I'm not physically exhausted and I have a lot of stamina. I just have to keep reminding myself to go out and have fun!

Limiters

2009-09-10T07:12:00.006-04:00

This morning was the Terrier brick. Last week I couldn't believe how quickly they are coming to an end, but this morning and the cool weather, I could certainly understand why they are. Which leads me to something I'd never even thought of before - what if it's cold at Westchester? I never even considered the possibility that it might be in the 60s that day. This morning it was just about 60 for the workout and I was definitely a little cool, even while running. I was thinking that it wasn't so bad and that I wouldn't worry about Westchester other than the fact that I'll be wet on the bike & the run. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed for warmer weather.

Robert gave us a couple of options for workouts today. First there was the workout for people who are racing this weekend, so I didn't really pay attention to that workout. Then, he said that we'd be working on "limiters" ... or what we think is the weakest link of the triathlon. He asked who thought their weakest link was the bike and a few people raised their hands. He said that their bike workout would be two loops in the park, but that each loop would have 3 Harlem Hill repeats, so you'd do the hill a total of 6 times. And each time you went up the hill, you'd do it in the big chain ring. Your run workout would be 20 minutes. As soon as he said the words "big chain ring" I immediately knew that there was no way I was doing the bike workout.

Then he asked who thought that the run was their weakest link. I raised my hand along with some other people. He said that for us, we'd ride our bikes for 40 minutes and then we would go and do 6 running hill repeats on Cat Hill. I wasn't the only one who didn't like the sound of either workout. Someone else made a bit of a face and Robert asked what was wrong. I said that I was thinking about saying that swimming was my weakest link. He said I should feel free to leave my bike with the watch dog and hop on into the Central Park Boating Pond. I didn't think that was so funny.

We all headed off to do our various workouts for the day. Because the days are getting shorter, it's still completely dark by the time we start riding. This morning was horrible. There is a portion of the park where the street lights go off at 5:45 AM, which means that to ride there is in complete darkness. I think that if I had been riding with my eyes closed, it would have been just about the same. All I could think about was hitting a bump or a rock or something that would throw me off my bike and then I'd break all my teeth. I don't know why, but I think about falling off my bike and breaking my teeth more than I think about breaking anything else. Probably because I imagine myself flying forward, even though when you really start to think about it, that doesn't make any sense since I'd have to be hit with enough force to unclip both of my shoes to fly off the bike and land on my face. It's probably much more likely to end up with a big bruise. But I worry about my teeth nonetheless.

My total biking time today was 41:09 and I went 9.94 miles (14.5 MPH average).

I made it back on the bike safe and sound and switched shoes and headed off for my run. I drank my entire water bottle while I was on the bike (I didn't have time to drink anything before leaving the apartment today) and I was glad that I was doing these Cat Hill repeats because there is a drinking fountain at the bottom of the hill that I knew I could use if necessary. However, I think because the weather was so cool this morning, I never really got hot, so I never needed to stop for a drink. I did the six hill repeats without complaining. Honestly, other than sighing once or twice when turning around to run back up the hill, it really wasn't that bad. We were supposed to do a slow jog down the hill as our recovery, which I definitely took advantage of.

The run was a total of 3.55 miles in 33:14 (9:21 pace).

Looking back I'm wondering if maybe I should have done the bike workout instead, but I'm not sorry with my choice and even though I didn't leave the workout super sweaty (darn you cool weather!), I was definitely still sweating!

An Evening River Run

2009-09-09T21:13:00.003-04:00

This morning I opted again to sleep in, which meant an after-work workout was in my future. I should have probably stayed late at work today, but the workout meant that I had to hurry home (especially as I really wanted to workout outside if at all possible). Of course, once I actually left work, I dawdled a little bit walking home instead of my usual half-walk/half-jog pace. I decided while I was walking home that it was just about the perfect temperature for a run, so I got home, changed clothes and headed out.

I remembered that I've been wanting to run along the Westside path again for a while. The bike path isn't as nice there as the running path and I've been wanting to go again since I actually think it's nicer than running in the park. I just like being near the water and the change in scenery.

I was sort-of running against the sun tonight. I've never been a fan of fall. I actually think anyone who says that they like fall is fatally flawed. Why would you like something that signals the start of winter? I really don't like how much shorter the days are getting. I knew I'd have to be back to my house by 7:30 in order to be home by dark. Also, as much as I like running on this Westside path, the couple of blocks from my apartment to the path are pretty desolate and not exactly where I wanted to be at dark.

Because I was short on time, I knew that this wasn't going to be a really long run, but I knew that I needed to do something today and anything would be better than nothing. I started out running at a pretty slow pace. I just wanted to like running today. I wasn't out to beat any records, just to enjoy myself. I think that I really want to try to remember that all of this is supposed to be fun -- especially the race itself. I'd rather run a little bit slower and not hate the whole thing. Seems like a good trade off.

I just followed the paths and enjoyed watching people out on kayaks on the river. I also thought about swimming in the Hudson and I wondered what would happen if I just got in and started swimming? I mean, there are no posted signs saying that you can't swim there. I don't think I would do it unsupervised, mainly because of the boat traffic in the river, but it was just something interesting to think about.

I can't be 100% sure of the mileage for today because apparently some of the paths that I ran along are newer than the satellite maps on Google Pedometer! I think that a fair estimate is 3.5 miles, which I ran in 35:43 (10:12 pace). The run on the way there was slightly longer (1.9 miles) than the run on the way back (1.6 miles) because I took an extra pathway and I ran out onto a pier on the way there and skipped it on the way back. I made it home just in time for the sun to go down. I heard a teammate talking about Westchester the other day and she said that the sun is in your eyes a good portion of the race, so it sounds like I'll have the opposite problem then. I think I need to practice running/biking with my sunglasses on more than I have been recently.

You're Asleep Standing Up

2009-09-08T07:21:00.004-04:00

This morning I dragged myself out of bed to head off to the Terrier run. Normally I walk the entire way there as a bit of a warm-up, but this morning I literally needed to warm up myself, so I jogged the rest of the way there once I got into the park. Since I had allotted myself enough time to walk the whole way there, I was the first person to arrive and was ten minutes early. I did some stretching and people started showing up just about a minute later.

After doing some stretches, I was just standing leaning against the railing and the guy next to me looked at me and said, "You're asleep standing up." I couldn't really argue with him. I was wishing I was back in my nice warm bed and I also wasn't really paying attention to anything anyone else was saying at that point. However, his comment was enough to snap me out of it. Spencer then told us that we would have a really fun workout today (he used the word fun three times), but that we should head over to do the strides first.

We did our normal strides workout and then ran over to the Start. Spencer still didn't tell us before we left for the run over there what this so-called "fun" workout would be. A couple people commented that it probably wasn't going to be that fun since he wasn't saying anything. I had also checked the website before leaving and it wasn't posted there, so I really had no clue as to what we'd be doing.

Once we got to the start, he said that people in the Sprint/Olympic group would be running for 1:30 out and 1:30 back at 90% effort. We were supposed to make sure that we got back in the same amount of time that it took us to get there. The fun part was that because we would all be running for three minutes each time, we would all start together and all finish together, even though some people might go further distances in the three minutes. In between each interval, we would have a 2 minute rest period, where we were supposed to jog in place, but everyone pretty much walked around instead. We did 6 intervals, so it was a fairly short workout.

I certainly didn't start out as the slowest person in my group, but I ended up that way since the slower people quit at some point and didn't finish the workout. I'm glad to say that I stuck with it the whole time.

My stats for jogging to the meeting point and the run to the start is 1.9 miles in 18:10 (9:33 pace). The stats for the intervals is 2.4 miles in 18:00 (7:30 pace). Total running (not including strides): 4.3 miles in 36:10 minutes (8:24 pace). When I showed the stats to Drew, he commented that I was getting pretty fast. I told him that it's a lot easier to run faster for 3 minutes than it is for an hour or so, but I am going to say that I am pretty happy with today's effort and the results!

Super Fun Bike Ride

2009-09-07T21:24:00.005-04:00

Yesterday I knew I wanted to go for a longer bike ride since I haven't spent a whole lot of time on the bike. I figured that the best way to do that would be to head back to New Jersey and try it again. While I was getting ready to go, I told Drew that I would really like it if he would go with me as I thought that he would have a good time and I wasn't going too far and it should still be fun. I knew he was a bit reluctant, but I also knew that once we got going, he'd end up being glad that he came.

We started out riding up the Westside bike path until 95th Street and Drew asked me if I counted those miles in my MPH average, which he didn't think was completely fair since the path itself and Riverside Park were packed with people and we were going really slow. I wasn't too concerned about the speed, I just wanted to go out and sit on my bike for a long time and make sure my rear-end was ready for the triathlon and sitting on a bike for a longer period of time.

I had been planning on trying out River Road (which meant heading south once I was across the bridge) instead of heading north on 9W like I did last time. I didn't know exactly where a good turn around point would be or what the road would be like, but I figured we'd just get there and see how it looked/how we felt. It turned out that right when we got across the bridge, there was another biker there who was also turning left and asked us if we were going to Palisades Park. We said we didn't know where we were going, but we might just follow him if that was okay. He said sure and warned us that it was a pretty steep downhill and we were off.

Oh gosh. Going downhill, I was just thinking that there was no way that I would ever be able to make it back up the hill. I couldn't believe that I had turned left and gone down this hill, it just seemed to go on forever. And then we got to the entrance and it was closed. But there was a way to carry our bikes in over some rocks, so that's what we did. I'm not sure that was the best move because we then ended up going even more downhill all the way to the Hudson River.

This link is the route we ended up taking. It actually turned out to be a really fun bike ride. When we got to the bottom there were lots of families having picnics and there was also a small concession stand. We stopped for a few minutes, walked around the park area, took some pictures, and then enjoyed Coconut FrozFruit bars before heading home.

I'm not exactly sure why I was standing in front of a large plastic bag, why I didn't notice it at the time, and I'm definitely not sure why Drew included it in the picture!

Here we are together in our bike kits. Drew is awfully matchy-matchy with his red and white bike, red and white helmet and red and white Wisconsin bike jersey (Drew also has a red and white bike pump, just in case you were curious). I'd also like to point out that while it totally looks like I'm wearing pigtails, those are actually the straps of my helmet hanging down.

While we were relaxing for a few minutes and enjoying our popsicles, the sky started turning a bit too grey for our liking and it seemed like a good idea to start the trek back up the hills and head back home. The first hill in Palisades Park wasn't fun at all. I was in the lead and I asked Drew what he was doing back there and he just said that he was going to draft off me and make me do all the work. Nice, huh? The whole time up the first hill I was just dreading the second hill back to the bridge.

However, once we started up the second hill after leaving the Park and we got to the top of it, neither of us could believe how quick it was! It felt soooooooo long going down and going up was lickety split! That's not to say that it was super easy, but it wasn't nearly as challenging as I was expecting. The ride home was pretty uneventful and it actually didn't end up raining, so we lucked out there.

Our total ride was 20.97 miles in 2:03:58, which is a 10.15 MPH average. Not great. But I don't really care. I had my rear end in the saddle for two hours, I went almost 21 miles, and I know I can do the actual race course in a shorter time while going faster. Plus, it was just such a nice treat to have a bike companion on a longer ride that none of those stats really make much of a difference. This is supposed to be a fun thing.

Today, I ended up taking the day off from cardio as is my typical Monday routine. Because of the Labor Day holiday, there wasn't any pilates, but with the two workouts on Saturday, I think it all balances out.

Pilates, Hummus & Running

2009-09-05T19:30:00.006-04:00

This morning Nicole came over and we headed down to pilates together. It was my first solo pilates class in a while and it was fantastic. I really like that Laura also tends to go with me on Mondays, but this was just a nice treat to have all the attention on me (and it also meant that I didn't get to cheat at all). Nicole also did some of the exercises with me, so that was sort-of fun. We started out using one of those big exercise balls and did a whole set of exercises on that. Nicole said that she hasn't really taught those exercises before, so that was part of the class that she did with me to ensure that she was telling me to get into the right positions.

Then we did some exercises with the ball on the mat. All I can say is that the ab series with the ball is not easy! After I was done with all the ball exercises, Nicole decided that I should stay on the mat/tower instead of moving over to the reformer. We did a whole lot of exercises I'd never done before with the tower. One of them involved sitting facing away from the tower itself and pushing the bar down behind me while also stretching forward toward my toes. My back wasn't sure that it wanted to stretch like that and while it did hurt a little bit, it also was a really good stretch. I'm thinking that once all this triathlon stuff is done, I'm going to take a rest and just do lots and lots of yoga.

One of the last exercises that we did involved putting my feet up on the tower bar while in a push-up position and then doing 5 push-ups. Because the bar can move back and forth if you don't keep your core strong and your feet in place, that is not an easy thing to do!

After pilates, I spent the rest of the morning doing more stuff around the apartment with Drew. We moved the televisions around and got all of the electronics hooked up the way that we wanted them (which took a little bit longer than we thought). We then met our friend Eric for lunch (at 5:00) at Hummus Kitchen. We all had a really nice (and really filling) late lunch/early dinner. The three of us were also planning on going to see Inglourious Basterds at 8:30. Eric and Drew headed to the theater to make sure we could get tickets while I headed home to change and get ready for my run.

I will say that while my lunch was really yummy, I didn't have quite enough time between it and my run. I ran for about 1.5 miles before I started feeling pretty icky. I walked for a few minutes and then tried to keep running for as long as I could. I just kept that going for the whole run. My run plan was to go to the park and run north to the reservoir path. Then I would run almost the whole way around the path and exit on the West side and then head back down to the bottom of the park.

Although it wasn't my best personal effort, I did have a really good time. I haven't been in the park on a weekend for a workout in a really long time and I forgot how great it is for people watching. Some really interesting highlights included: a dad running with his kid in a jogging stroller while the kid was screaming bloody murder and the dad was listening to his iPod; a couple having a really intense fight; and a woman running with forearm crutches (which I found to be super inspiring, especially after the first two).

I know that I walked probably about 5 minutes of the whole time (although it wouldn't shock me if it was slightly more than that). I ended up going 4.3 miles in 42:17 (9:50 pace), which leads me to believe that while I was actually running, I was going pretty fast! I learned not to eat so close to running, although I actually knew that before, but I thought it was really important to make sure that I got a good run in this weekend. Even though it wasn't fantastic because of all the walking, the total time ended up being something that I am really happy with, so all in all, it worked out fine.

(And, as a complete aside, I totally recommend the movie! It was fantastic!!)

You Look Racey

2009-09-04T07:48:00.002-04:00

Last night I was up really late doing laundry (one of the dryers in the basement is broken, so it look twice as long as I thought it would to do 4 loads of laundry) and finishing the unpacking. I can't believe how great the apartment is looking now. I sort-of wish I had been wearing my heart rate monitor so that I could feel better about using this unpacking as alternative exercise!

This morning I was up early as usual. My dad and step-mom are nice enough to let me & Drew use some space in their basement for our stuff and they drove into the city this morning to pick up Drew's bed frame since we have decided to keep mine and to store his. They got to my apartment around 6:15 and the first thing my dad said to me was, "You look racey." I know, I know, it's misspelled. But that's really what he meant. I was all decked out in my biking gear as I knew I was going to head out for a quick ride after they left. For the record, Urban Dictionary defines "racey" as: Anything else that can get your heart going faster than normal. Fairly accurate, I think.

After we loaded up the bed frame into their car, I was off to the park. I will say that it was sort-of nice to be going to the park about an hour later than normal and to be able to ride in complete daylight. My plan for today wasn't speed. It was just to tackle the Harlem hill a few times in a row. I decided while I was biking up there that I wouldn't let myself use my granny gear at all - that I'd keep the bike in the middle chain ring (no sense in going into the big chain ring, that's just torture) the entire time and see how I did.

I didn't take my HR monitor as I'm still waiting on this weird chafing from Tuesday to go away before I wear it again, so I can't be positive that my HR was going faster than normal, but I think it's a fairly safe assumption considering the fact that on my first time up the hill I just was thinking to myself, "Why would you make yourself do this?". I don't think there is a rational answer to that question, but sometimes I think that there is something a tiny bit irrational about triathlons in general, and purposely riding your bicycle up hills is part of that irrationality.

I'm proud to say that I never once really considered going into the small chain ring. Once I had committed myself to staying in the middle, I was stuck there. I also did something that I've never done before. While riding down the hill (before the climb, near Lasker pool) I generally chicken out because I think I'm going too fast and I brake a little bit to make myself feel better. Mainly because at the bottom of that hill, you have to make a right turn and I'm always worried I'll be going too fast for the turn. Today, on my second and third trips down the hill, I didn't brake at all! The first time it happened, I didn't realize it until I was already past the point where I would normally brake. The second time, I had to really consciously think about not braking. After that, I just had to brake. It just feels natural and I'd rather loose a little speed than fall over.

Since I got a bit of a later start this morning, I only ended up riding for 54:52 and went 11.70 miles (12.8 MPH average). My weekend plans have now changed drastically (my friend is no longer coming to visit), so I'm hoping that means that I can get in a long bike ride to make up for the time I've spent out of the saddle recently.

It's Too Dark To See My Cadence Monitor

2009-09-03T07:08:00.004-04:00

OK, so my week-long workout plan did not go according to plan yesterday. I was supposed to meet Laura for a nice long swim, but when I woke up at 5:30 yesterday morning, I found an e-mail from her saying that she couldn't find the pass for the pool. We texted back and forth and it ended up that we wouldn't meet for a swim. I thought that I could just sleep for another half an hour and then get up to go for a bike ride. Except that I forgot to get up in a half hour and instead I just slept until I had to wake up for work.

I was telling myself all day yesterday that it was okay and that I could go biking after work. Except that when I got home from work, all I really wanted to do was keep unpacking and make this apartment more presentable. I actually accomplished a huge amount last night and now there are only 2.5 more boxes to unpack (well, one is to go to storage and 0.5 is stuff to sell on Ebay, so it's really more like 1 box to unpack). There are still a lot of things just lying around, but I'm hoping to finish up tonight so that this isn't a distraction any more!

This morning was the Terrier brick. They're quickly coming to an end (the last one is September 24), which I'm sad about. I'm not ready for it to be fall/winter again. I feel like I barely got a summer with all the rain we had here in NYC. I got to practice just in time this morning to hear Robert tell us the workout and then we all headed out.

The workout started with a 10:00 warm-up and then we were supposed to ride for an hour total, keeping our cadence above 95. It's so dark in the mornings now that it's almost impossible to see anything, let alone a small little number on a small little bike computer. I did the best I could and kept trying to see the cadence when I went under a streetlight. I spent a lot of time over 100, but the hills were almost murder on my legs. I normally try to keep it as high as I can, even on the hills, but I'd say I'm usually more like 85 on the hills instead of 95+. What a difference those extra 10 strokes make. This is probably also another reason why you should ride your bike more than once a week like I've been doing.

In total, I rode for 52:33 and went 12.54 miles (14.32 MPH average). I'm planning on going riding again tomorrow morning and I think I'm just going to focus on the hills. At least that's my plan for now. It's not set in stone.

The bike was to be followed by a 20 minute run. Every 4 minutes, we were supposed to do a 1 minute pick-up at our 5K race pace. Since I have no idea what my 5K race pace would be since I've never run a stand-alone 5K, I just ran faster than I was the rest of the time. I also spaced the intervals a little bit closer together than 4:00 minutes, since I did 5 of them in 16 minutes. It took me exactly 16:00 to run the lower loop in the park, which was 1.77 miles (9:02 pace). I decided that I wanted to run for all 20 minutes instead of stopping when I got back to where I had started from, so I ran around the Cherry Hill Fountain loop. In total, I ran for 20:03 and went 2.21 miles (9:04 pace).

I don't have any fancy HR data today. On Tuesday I got some sort of weird chafing from the strap. Although it doesn't really hurt to have anything against it, I didn't want to take any chances and make it worse. Additionally, Robert had told us to ignore our HR monitors if we had them on while we were biking because they were bound to spike with the high cadence on the hills. So, I didn't really need it anyway.

A Big Push

2009-09-01T07:28:00.005-04:00

This morning the alarm went off and all I wanted to do was stay in my warm bed and skip going out into the 58 degree morning for a Terrier run. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) I've got this great new roommate, who pushed me out of bed just in the nick of time so that I could make it to the run on time.

We did our normal strides workout, although I lost track of how many we did, but it definitely felt like more than usual. I think it probably was, because we are normally on our way to the real run by 6:15 and today we didn't get started until about 6:20, so I'm guessing that instead of the normal 0.5 or 0.6 miles, it was was most likely a little bit longer, maybe around 0.7?

Once we were done with the strides, the workout for the Olympic group was to do two loops of the lower loop of the park (1.7 miles per loop). I told myself starting out that I would just take my time and not be worried about everyone else just blowing by me. After I had been running for about 5 minutes, Robert caught up to me and asked how I was doing. I told him that slowing down a bit had made my legs really happy and I haven't had any more cramps, but that I was still a little nervous about Westchester. He said that I shouldn't worry and that I'll be fine.

I did my first loop in just about 16:23 (if I remember correctly what the watch said). I then continued on my way for the second loop. When I got to the "Start", there were 4 or 5 Terriers there with Robert, doing some of the speed workout. He called out to me and I said that I was still on my second loop and he said, "Yeah, well, you're only doing one" and so I stopped there. I had gone 2.3 miles in 22:23 (9:43 pace). Not too bad for someone who was taking their time.

Then Robert made me do some speed work. We were all supposed to do 4-6 sprints when we were done with the two loops in the park. I just got started on mine a little earlier than I expected. He had me run a 400 x 2 and then said that I should run the 200 in half the time minus 5. So, if I ran the 400 in 2:00, then the 200 should be in 0:55.
These were my times:

400 (1/4 mile) in 2:11 (8:43 pace)
200 (1/8 mile) in 1:01 (8:07 pace)
200 recovery jog

400 (1/4 mile) in 2:13 (8:52 pace)
200 (1/8 mile) in 1:00 (8:00 pace)
200 recovery jog

Not too bad. I'm sure I could have gone a little faster on the 200s, but I was really trying to make sure I didn't over-run in the beginning 400 so that I wouldn't miss my goal times in the 200s.

After that, I finished up with 4 x 200 sprints. I will say right now that I did not go all out, but I knew I was going just about as fast as I could if I was going to do more than one of these.
These are my times:

200 (1/8 mile) in 1:06 (8:48 pace)
200 recovery jog

200 (1/8 mile) in 1:01 (8:07 pace)
200 recovery jog

200 (1/8 mile) in 1:00 (8:00 pace)
200 recovery jog

200 (1/8 mile) in 1:02 (8:16 pace)

I'm estimating that I did the 200 recovery jogs in about 1:30 each time, although I really have no idea. It never once occurred to me to time them and I'm sure I would have been confused with all the numbers once I got home anyway! As it was with all those minute-long times, it was a lot of recording for one day. After doing those four 200s, I was ready to head home for the day. I was really, really glad that I got pushed out of bed and am so far sticking to my training schedule for the week. In related news, I'm actually going to switch Wednesday and Friday's workouts so that I can go swimming with Laura tomorrow morning. When I made my original plan, I thought she would be out of town on Wednesday, but turns out she'll be here, so we're going to go all out and have a pool wetsuit swim tomorrow. Maybe I'll also practice wearing my race gear underneath since it's always a little different with clothes versus a bathing suit on under a wetsuit.

Total mileage for the day: 5.0 (including strides)
Non-stride mileage: 4.3 in ~42:00 (9:48 pace)
Calories: 471
Max HR: 192
Average HR: ~188

Pinky Ball Pilates

2009-08-31T09:59:00.005-04:00

So, I had an extremely busy weekend that didn't include any "real" workouts, but I unpacked and moved around a lot of boxes, so I think it's just about the same. I mean, I definitely got sweaty and was on my feet most of the day, so I definitely wasn't off slacking. We're still not all the way done unpacking Drew's stuff, but I'm hoping by the end of the week we can be a lot closer to finished.

This morning I met Nicole for pilates. Laura sent us a text saying that she was having train trouble and shed be a few minutes late. I swear it's because she knew what Nicole was planning for the first 10 minutes of our session.

Nicole had told me about these pinky balls a while ago saying that she had wanted to try them out with me & Laura. Basically, it's a ball slightly smaller than a tennis ball that you let rest in your belly button and then you can't let it move while your doing the exercises. It doesn't sound too hard, but you absolutely cannot cheat and not squeeze your abdominal muscles if you want the ball to stay stationary. My stomach was exhausted pretty quickly.

We spent the whole class doing mat and tower exercises. I liked this class better than Friday's because it was easier for me to have Nicole just giving both me & Laura one set of directions. By the time we had almost reached the end of the class, my tummy was so tired I had to take a 30-second breather. I always feel bad when that happens, but sometimes after sucking in and up so much, I just need to let it out and breathe normally!

So, since I was not the best at cardio this past weekend, I am going to try to write down my workout plan for the week here so that I will hopefully feel more motivated and accountable as the week goes on to stick to it regardless of weather or other circumstances.

Monday: Pilates (done!)
Tuesday: Terrier Run (website says it should be about a 3.5 mile run)
Wednesday: Bike Ride (hopefully at least 18 miles)
Thursday: Terrier Brick (website says bike for an hour with cadence of 95+ / run for 20 minutes)
Friday: Swim (aiming for 2000+ yards)
Saturday: Run (hopefully with my friend Ann who will be visiting for the long weekend!)

Weird Pilates

2009-08-28T19:32:00.002-04:00

This morning I woke up to rain, which is never a good motivator. On top of that, Drew was really sleepy and wasn't motivated to get up and go to the gym, so we both slept in. I really wasn't looking forward to going to the gym after work either. Something about the rain just makes me want to stop working out.

When I got to work today, Nicole asked if I would be willing to come to pilates with her after work and be her "beginner body". For her next test, she has to teach the beginner and intermediate systems to two different people at the same time. She had another apprentice who was going to be the intermediate. I agreed as it would erase some of my guilt about sleeping in and it would be a workout for the day - perfect thing for a rainy day.

Of course I didn't have workout clothes at work, but it worked out that I just happened to be wearing leggings and Drew had a t-shirt in his office, so I was all set for pilates (good thing it doesn't require any special shoes or anything).

We got to the studio and changed clothes, Nicole introduced me to Mikhal (the other apprentice), and we got straight to work. We did the first few leg exercises together but from there on out, Mikhal and I did different exercises at different times. I'm so used to going with a second person when we both do the same exercises at the same time, that it was just really weird for Nicole to be giving each of us different instructions and to do totally different exercises.

I think Nicole did a really good job teaching the two of us, but it was just a little disconserting. She said our names a lot while she was teaching so that we would know who she was talking to, but there were just a couple of times where I wasn't 100% clear on who the instruction was for (although those were likely to be more general instructions and I always needs to keep my shoulders down).

I actually did the full beginner system today of reformer, mat and chair exercises while Mikhal did all the intermediate. What's really interesting to me is that there were actually one or two beginner exercises I don't ever remember doing before. I also was super jealous of Mikhal because she got to do side-splits and I thought that was by far one of the best exercises the one time I did the intermediate system.

When it was all over I asked Nicole if she really imagined teaching like that a lot in the future. She said that she didn't really think so for two reasons: (1) even if one person was more advanced than the other, she could still do a lot more intermediate exercises for both people at the same time and (2) other than the testing environment, she would never be required to teach the whole system in one setting. In fact, that's one thing I like about pilates. That although we may do some of the same exercises each time, we always mix it up and try something new or maybe do things in a different order. I understand why Nicole has to learn it the way she does, but it doesn't seem to have a complete practical application.

All in all I think it was a really good session and I'm so glad that I did something today because I really didn't feel like going to the gym. The bummer is that it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow too so I definitely will be logging some time at the gym this weekend whether I like it or not. I'm pretty bummed about that as I was really hoping to make it back to New Jersey for a ride this weekend, but since I can't control the weather, I'll just deal with it.

I Passed Robert?

2009-08-27T07:10:00.002-04:00

It's been two weeks since I've been on the bike and I was really worried that I'd be super slow and lose a lot of bike fitness. I might not have been the fastest person today, but a lot of that I'll attribute to the fact that my legs (quads, really) were exhausted after yesterday's weight lifting session. The next time that I think it's a good idea to left leg weights before a brick, I wish someone would remind me that it's not the best feeling in the world.

The workout today was one of the brick workouts that I really like. It's alternating short runs and bikes, so you get more transition practice. The first run we do with our bikes as practice running with our bikes. The first time I did this, I was horrible (because you're only allowed to use one hand on the saddle to push your bike). Turns out that the further away you hold your arm out from your side, the more control you have over the bike, which is a bit counter-intuitive. But, it seems as though I've gotten the hang of it as I was actually pretty good today. I went really slowly on the first run because I didn't want to take any chances since going slow has made my calves happy.

The whole workout was 4 runs with 3 bikes and each run should be faster than the last. The bike loops were supposed to be the 5-mile upper loop of the Park and we were supposed to ride in the big chain ring, but I knew pretty quickly after being on the bike that my quads weren't going to tolerate that big chain ring hill ride, so I cut a mile off the loops and went across the 102nd Street Transverse instead.

On the first bike loop, I caught up to Robert (our head coach). And then I passed him! It was unbelievable! OK, to be fair, I have to be honest, I passed him going downhill when he was coasting and I was pedaling. But, to my credit, he didn't then zoom by me later on. He stayed behind me for the rest of the loop. I couldn't believe it. I mean, I did think while biking today that I forgot how fun it is to go really fast, but I didn't think I was going that fast.

On the third bike loop, I did something that I know I should have been practicing for a while, but somehow didn't ever get around to it before. I ate while on the bike. Just a 1/2 of a Clif bar. I fully intend on eating at Westchester since I don't think that gu stuff agrees with me and I finally realized that I had better start practicing since it's a month from today! It really wasn't too bad or too hard. The wrapper was already open, so all I had to do was pull it out and then hold onto it while I ate. I put the wrapper back in my pocket right away so that I didn't lose/litter with it.

I'm planning on going to one of the training rides for the Westchester course before the actual race, so hopefully I can scope out a small section that isn't too technically challenging or where I don't have to shift a lot and I can eat there.

Here are today's stats. I always forget to use the HR monitor when biking. I think it's because I already have the bike computer and it just seems redundant, so it's not all the stats, but I did increase my running speed from lap to lap, so I'm really happy about that.

First run (with bike): ~6:00 (12:00 pace)

Second run: 5:08 (10:16 pace)
Calories: 62
Maximum HR: 174
Average HR: 170

Third run: 4:51 (9:41 pace)
Calories: 58
Maximum HR: 172
Average HR: 167

Fourth run: 4:30 (9:00 pace)
Calories: 56
Maximum HR: 174
Average HR: 170

Total Running: 2.0 miles in 20:29 (10:14 pace)
Total Biking: 12.72 miles in 49:35 (15.39 MPH average)

No Stopping

2009-08-26T09:29:00.014-04:00

So, I wrote out an entire blog post yesterday, but apparently the internet rejected it as it's nowhere to be found. I'll just give you a quick summary. Yesterday morning was the Terrier run. I was actually really excited to be back with the group and just to have the group dynamic again since I had just had a week of working out alone. We did our normal strides before heading out for the main workout.

The workout was that the Sprint/Olympic group would do 4 x 1200 meters (0.75 miles). Each 1200 meters would be broken down into 200 meter segments. The first 200 would be at 95% effort and the second 200 would be at 75% effort and then you would just alternate back and forth. Once you got to the 1200 meter mark, you would then rest for 2:30 before starting again. We ran over to the starting point and I noticed then that my calves were still giving me trouble. I thought I would just try doing the workout and see how far I could get.

I did the first 600 and then I just realized that it wasn't going well and that I should stop for a minute or two to stretch and see if that would make it better. I started running again and it was even worse. Then I decided that I would just give up since my legs clearly weren't happy and walk back to Drew's. Total run: 1.6 miles in 15:34 (9:44 pace).

I was pretty frustrated because all I wanted to do was to complete a workout without walking or stopping or giving up or having some other problem. When I started walking back, I ran into Robert who asked if I was okay and gave me a new stretch to try out to see if that would help. Shortly after that, I ran into Spencer, our running coach, and he also suggested that I start foam rolling my calves. He gave me another (different) stretch to try and also suggested that I should just try jogging very slowly and see how my legs were at a slower speed.

I walked for a few more minutes and then decided that I would just give it a shot and jogged about as slow as I could go and it was like a miracle cure! Granted, I wasn't anything great, but my calves weren't hurting and I was still jogging, so it seemed like it was better than nothing. I jogged back to Drew's without further incident, so I'm really hopeful that although it was really slow and I'm not very happy with the time, that I can do Westchester. I was really frustrated during the group run and was thinking about having to walk the 6 miles at Westchester, but now it seems like it's more realistic if I just remember to slow down. Total jog: 0.93 miles in 11:18 (12:11 pace).

********************

So, as promised, here's one of the photos my mom took while I was on vacation. This was on one of my runs after swimming. As you can (maybe) see, I ran barefoot on the sand, which I think might have been the cause of my current calf issues. Although I just finished reading this article in Time Out New York that says that running barefoot is supposedly better for you. But I'm not sure I consider them to be the foremost authority on running.

Yesterday proved to be quite a busy day with Drew's big move into my apartment! The movers were scheduled to come in the afternoon and in the morning when I was busy packing things up around the apartment, I managed to slice my finger open with a butter knife. It takes talent, I know. This cut that sounds quite silly meant that I had to cancel my swim this morning with Laura as the thought of bleeding into a public pool (because, yes, my cut still is bleeding from time to time) didn't really seem like a good idea.

Instead, that meant that I hit the gym this morning with my new "roommate" with a band-aid securely fastened around my cut. We did a quick warm-up on the treadmills. I decided to take what I learned yesterday and just take it slow. I ran for 5 minutes at speed 5 (12:00 pace) and went 0.40 miles. Then we hit the weight room.

These were our exercises:

Leg Press

Set 1: 10 reps @ 90 pounds

Set 2: 10 reps @ 115 pounds

Set 3: 10 @ 115 pounds

Squats

Set 1: 15 reps with bar + body weight

Set 2: 15 reps with bar + body weight + 30 pounds

Set 3: 15 reps with bar + body weight + 40 pounds

Hamstrings

3 sets of 10 reps @ 25 pounds

Drew also did calf raises, but I thought it might be a bad idea since I know that my calves are already bothering me to do some weight training. Although I guess the weight training could help strengthen them to prevent further annoyance while running, but I just didn't feel like taking the chance today. I also stretched between sets, which I think was a good thing to do.

He then headed off to the Arc Trainer (a machine that I'm not a huge fan of) and I went back to the treadmill. We had agreed to do a half hour of cardio before heading back home. I decided that I would just keep with the same premise as earlier and take it slow and see how my calves felt. I set the treadmill to level 5 (12:00 pace) and started jogging. I also told myself that it was going to be really important to not stop on this half-hour jog. I know it doesn't really matter in the scheme of things, but something about it mentally was really important to me to know I was capable of going for a half-hour with no breaks and no hurting parts.

And guess what? I did it. I didn't even hate it. I also never felt like I wanted to stop and rest. So, maybe my problem recently is that I've been running too fast - especially in the heat. I'm not going to lie. I definitely liked it more when I saw my minutes per mile going downward, but I'm not going to sweat it big time. I'd rather actually enjoy this than hate every second or feel like I'm getting all cramped up, so I'll be fine with the slowing down. In my 30:15 that I was on the treadmill, I went 2.5 miles.

Total for today: 2.9 miles in 35:15 (12:09 pace)

Running With A Bad Breakfast And A Bad Attitude

2009-08-23T22:08:00.004-04:00

Yesterday, I finished up my vacation with one more swim. The weather had cooled off (the high was only about 63 instead of in the 80s like it had been). That made the lake pretty freezing. I ended up conning my brother to go with me. Because I felt like I had a limited window on his agreeing to swim, I didn't bring any techie gear with me and therefore have no stats. I can tell you we didn't stay in very long before we were both turning blue. I would have liked to have gone for a longer swim, but it just wasn't happening. We lost feeling in our feet almost immediately and when I got back to the cottage and took a (hot) shower, I just stood there for quite a long time waiting for feeling to return.

Today we drove back to my mom's house and I did some laundry and took a nap. Then I got up and got my act together and drove over to my friend Ann's house. I had asked her if she wanted to go for a run with me and she agreed to a 5-mile run near her house. I had wanted to do a bit longer, but she's still recovering from a broken ankle and her knee is now bothering her, so she said 5 was her limit. I took what I could get since I wasn't so keen on running in the first place. At least having a friend would make it better.

Part of my problem today was that while we were driving back from the cottage, we were all hungry and stopped and had McDonald's for breakfast. I almost never eat fast food and it never really sits well with me, so I knew I might not feeling 100% later on for my run. I then made it worse by coming home and taking a nap and not drinking anything for most of the afternoon and when I woke up, I had popcorn as a pre-running snack. All of that made me feel sick while running and therefore gave me a bad attitude and made me want to quit running. Good to know what foods I should not eat pre-race!

In all today, we had an okay run. I made us walk a couple of times (due to sick feeling). Towards the ends my calves started to cramp and we walked the last 3/4 of a mile. The total run was almost exactly 5.0 miles, which we completed in 52:17 (10:27 pace). Seriously, if I could learn to run continuously, I think I might actually be running at a decent pace. I just don't like to do it. I'm getting a little worried again about Westchester, but I'm also trying to remind myself that the last couple runs where I actually felt okay were after biking, so I'm hoping for the best. And if I have to walk a little bit during the race, it will not be the end of the world!

Calories: 682
Maximum HR: 189
Average HR: 173

You're Too Fast

2009-08-21T17:30:00.002-04:00

Today I drove the running route I took yesterday in order to figure out the distance. Turns out it was 3.6 miles, which was actually longer than I would have thought, especially since I ended up doing quite a bit of walking. It averaged out to be a 10:47 mile pace, while that's not great I'm still okay with it.

I didn't end up swimming until this afternoon. The weather was sort-of on and off all day long and we got rained on while we were out on our family picnic and excursion to the Lumberman's Monument and the Foote Dam. Luckily, there was a picnic pavilion at the Monument, so at least we were able to be dry while we ate. When we got back to the cottage it cleared up for a while and I decided that it was pretty much then or never for a swim.

I got all my gear on and headed out. My mom came along and took some photos of me swimming. Some of them have turned out really well and when I'm back in civilization again, I'll try to post some of them.

My plan for today was just to practice getting into and out of the water. The beach here is really nice and sandy and you have to go out quite a ways to not be able to touch the bottom of the lake. My brother and some of his friends found a rope anchored down in the sand and tied an old jug to it, so I just swam straight out to the jug and came back into shore.

It was nothing exciting and each time I got out of the water I would wait for a minute and talk myself into going back again. After the first couple of times I had gone out, my mom said that I was "too fast" for the camera and some of the shots she was getting were a bit blurry, so she decided to try to take a movie with her camera.

I went out again and she took a movie. When I got out, she made me watch it with her. I'm quite glad I did because her idea of a good swimming movie and my idea of a good swimming movie are nothing alike. Her idea was to get a close up of my face, which makes for good viewing. My idea was to see if I was swimming in a straight line or not and for that you need a bit more perspective. So, she made a second movie.

I will say that I sort-of lost track of how many times I went out there and back. I did walk out to the jug when I was done and found out that it was 134 feet* one way / 268 feet there and back = 0.05 miles each time. I was out there for 45 minutes and each trip there and back was about 2 minutes. Of course, I didn't use a stop watch or a HR monitor, so I don't have a lot of data, but I do feel like I accomplished what I wanted to today and got a lot of good practice in. And the video showed that I swam mostly in a straight line, even with the waves, so I must be doing an okay job sighting. All good news.

*To clarify, 134 feet = 134 small Amy steps. It's not an exact measurement.

Cows and Calves

2009-08-20T15:31:00.001-04:00

Turns out that there are a lot more cows up here in Northern Michigan than I would have expected in what is essentially a beach community. My family has been playing a game in the car that if you see cows (or any animal) and they are on your side of the car, you get a point. The only problem with this game is that my aunt cheats every time, so unless you're sitting on her side of the car, you can't win.

This afternoon I decided to go for a run. I had looked at the map before leaving for Michigan and found a route that should have been about 6.5 miles. Our cabin is set right just a little ways back from the highway, but right on the water, so I wanted to try to avoid running too far along the highway. Luckily, just a little ways down the road is a sub-division of houses along the beach, so I figured I could run there and have less traffic to contend with.

Everything was going okay until I got to about the first mile (or what I'm assuming was the first mile since it had been 10 minutes). Then my calves just had essentially had enough. I don't know what happened and my left is worse than my right, but neither was happy. I stopped and stretched for a few minutes and kept going. I ran for another 15 minutes before stopping again to walk for a while.

It actually turned out that it was okay that my calves started acting up, because although the map shows that the road is a through street, it is actually a dead end. When I got to the end of the road, I turned around and headed back. That was also about the same time my legs pooped out on me.

I did run for a couple short intervals just to see how it felt and each time it still felt about the same (not too great). I did run from the sub-division back to the cottage since it seemed like I should minimize my time on the highway if at all possible. I did see a guy out walking his dog, so at least I wasn't the only person out there.

I have no clue at all the distance for today, but I will go back and fill in later. I tried and tried to get gmap pedometer to work on my phone (the only source of Internet I've got here) but I had zero luck. Part of the problem is that it still looks like the road should continue for longer than I know it does, so I really don't understand the map on the Internet at all.

But, here are today's stats without the distance:
Time: 38:51
Calories: 489
Maximum HR: 186
Average HR: 169

I'm thinking tomorrow will only be a swimming day. And I'm going less for distance and more for practicing getting into and out of the water, since Westchester is a beach start and I've got such a nice and sandy beach to practice on. I figure Saturday can be reserved for one long last swim.

A Family Hike

2009-08-19T19:56:00.001-04:00

This morning everyone was feeling pretty lazy and I just decided to go along with the group. Also, my calves were feeling pretty tired, which I think might be from running on the beach barefoot, but all I really needed was a reason to sleep in and now I had two.

Our vacation activity for today was a hike around Reid Lake. We all piled into the car and headed off with our water bottles and bug spray. We got to the trail head and sprayed ourselves pretty well with bug spray and headed off.

Almost immediately, I was getting attacked by bugs and I had to use my aunt's deet bug spray instead of my mom's family-friendly version, which didn't deter the bugs completely, but did make them think twice before landing on me. The path was really well-groomed, which made it nicer for my grandpa to walk along.

My brother, aunt, cousin and I started walking ahead of my mom and my grandpa. At some point, we got quite a ways ahead and my aunt went back to check on their progress. We waited for a while and then my mom appeared and said that my aunt had taken my grandpa back to the car.

My mom, brother, cousin and I continued on along the path and reached the lake and then hiked around the lake. I'm not really sure of the distance that we hiked in total, but we were out there for just about two hours.

It was a fun but tiring family afternoon. Everyone got back to the cottage and took a bit of a nap!

When Will I Warm Up?

2009-08-18T11:55:00.002-04:00

Yesterday we went to Super Wal-Mart to go grocery shopping, but I thought that maybe I should look for a brighter swim cap. In the sporting goods section, there was a very small selection, but what they did have was all Ironman brand. I ended up buying a new red cap with a grey M-dot for only a dollar, so I think those Wal-Mart roll backs were very helpful.

This morning I did pretty much the same workout as yesterday, except for a longer period of time. When I put my feet in the water, I immediately regretted my decision to swim. Even though putting on my wetsuit makes me work up a bit of a sweat, I certainly wasn't hot enough to justify the cold water temperature.

I walked out into the lake for a few minutes and my feet were numb. I was hoping that they would warm up once I started swimming. I kept walking and once the water started leaking in by the zipper, I was really unhappy. The water was like little daggers in my skin. I figured at that point it was time to put my head under. Wow! Was that ever cold!

I don't know what happened, but the water was much colder today than yesterday. My face was freezing. My arms were freezing. My toes were cold. Pretty much anything not covered by wetsuit was really cold.

I decided that I would swim for a longer period of time today. I planned on swimming for 30 minutes, so when I hit 15 minutes, I stopped for just a few seconds to make sure I knew exactly where I was and orient myself so I would be able to figure out the distance later on.

Then I turned around and headed back. I had swum north today instead of south like yesterday. That meant that the first part of the swim was with the current and the way back was against it. Although it wasn't much to look at, it turns out that any waves are something to fight against and I knew it would take me longer to swim back. I was actually happy to see that it wasn't a lot longer on the way back, just an extra minute and a half. I also knew I wasn't swimming very fast, but I just wanted to get in the cold water and have a nice relaxing swim.

I got out of the water and did a transition. I timed myself for the last couple stokes, jumped out of the water, goggles off, started running up the beach and unzipping my wetsuit. I got it completely off in 23 seconds. I thought that was fairly good, but I'm sure that people can do it much faster than me.

I then went for a run up the beach, the same direction I had been swimming. The best way I can figure out the distance I swam is to run there since I seem to have about an average 10 minute mile, I'm just using that as a guide. These distances clearly aren't that exact, but I think they are a rough estimate.

I reached the spot that I swam to in 4:20, so I believe that should translate to 0.42 miles each way for the swim. I exteded today's run to be 20 minutes long. I didn't even begin to feel warm in my arms and feet again until I had turned around and had been running for about 13 minutes. I was actually surprised it took that long.

I've heard that the water at Westchester is normally pretty warm, but with the cool summer we've had so far, I hope that it is still warm this year too. I'm thinking that tomorrow might be a pure running day, but we'll see how I feel in the morning. I do hate to give up the open water swimming practice.

Swimming:
0.84 miles in 31:27 minutes (36:00 pace)
Calories: 326
Maximum HR: 159
Average HR: 153

Running:
2.0 miles in 20 minutes (10 minute pace)
Calories: 261
Maximum HR: 179
Average HR: 174

Morning Brick

2009-08-17T09:45:00.003-04:00

Yesterday we drove up to the cottage and I didn't get a real workout in. I didn't get up early enough before leaving to go running. I was feeling a little bit bad about that, but I did carry a lot of stuff yesterday. And I went for a walk along the beach with my mom and my aunt, followed by a rousing game of Scrabble, so I definitely got my blood pumping even though I didn't really do cardio.

This morning I woke up early and donned my wetsuit. I had only gotten my feet wet yesterday and I knew that the water would be cold, but it was totally different to get all the way in. The lake is really pretty shallow for quite a ways out. The deepest I could get was chest-high, which is fine for swimming. I got in and walked out for a while and then swam back to shore to try to get acclimated to the water temperature.

Once I got back to shore, I ran back into the water, did some dolphins, and started my swim. The first two minutes were really rough. I think what happened was that I was swimming too fast. Once I realized what I was doing, I slowed down a bit and settled into a rhythm, and the swimming got much more enjoyable and I actually probably ended up swimming faster once I just relaxed.

I decided that I would swim for 10 minutes in one direction before turning around and swimming back. I wasn't really sure how long that would be distance-wise, but I figured it would be a good start. Sighting on the swim out was really easy. There were two trees on a little point that were extremely easy to see. Swimming back to the cottage was not as easy. It was surprising because I was swimming with the current, but there was nothing to sight off of. And I was breathing on the left so I could keep the shore in sight, so it wasn't as comfortable in general. Although I'm sure it's good practice.

When I got out of the water, I wanted to go for a quick run because after the swim at Staten Island I really didn't want to run to transition, so I thought that I should practice. I had thought that I would only run for 5 minutes, but I wasn't feeling too tired, so I kept going.

While I was running, I reached the spot where I think that I swam to at about 3:00 minutes, so in total, I think that I swam about 0.6 miles. I ended up running for 10 minutes, which I'm assuming was about a mile. I just ran barefoot along the beach. I might bring my shoes down to the beach another day this week, but I actually think the barefoot running was probably easier.

Swimming:
0.6 miles in 21:07 (35:00 pace)
Calories: 229
Max HR: 166
Average HR: 157

Running:
1.0 mile in 10:00 (putting the pace seems redundant)
Calories: 131
Max HR: 182
Average HR: 174

Some Serious Snoozin'

2009-08-15T18:06:00.003-04:00

I flew to Michigan last night and surprisingly, my flight was on time (early, in fact) and I even had my bag by the time the plane was actually supposed to land. I got to my mom's house and we talked for a bit and I had a snack and I didn't get to bed until around 12:15, which is quite late for me these days.

I set my alarm for 6:45 this morning, which actually is later than I normally get up to workout, but when the alarm went off, I realized that this was my first day of vacation and shouldn't I get to sleep in? So, that's what I did! I slept until about 10:30, so I got a full ten hours of sleep. I'm not really sure the last time that happened. I knew I might regret not getting up and running early, but I was also quite happy with the extra sleep.

I headed off to lunch with a friend and then ran a couple of errands. Then I came back to my mom's house and mapped out some running options, just so that I would have a rough idea of how far different points were from her house. It is really hot here today and I knew that running at 5:00 wasn't the ideal time, but I didn't really have a lot of other options other than skipping it all together, which I didn't even consider as an option.

So, I headed out on my run. Although it was really hot, I had chosen a route that was mostly in the shade on a nice wooded road. Or, at least, that's how the first half of it was. The second half was all out in the baking sun. It was not even close to being fun. It was hideous. All I could think about was wanting to have a drink of water. And the worst part was that the last mile of the run included a huge hill that I had to run up. Why on earth didn't I think this through before I went out running and do the run in reverse?

I think the only thing that kept me sane on this run was the fact that I had taken my iPod and I sang along to the songs. It's funny running in Michigan because you just pass a lot of cars (or a lot of cars pass you, depending on how you look at it). Even though the scenery itself might be nicer than New York, there definitely isn't as much to watch or look at as there is when I run at home. It definitely wasn't boring today because it was a different route, I just happened to notice that I only saw 3 bikers and no other runners. Quite a difference.

Here are today's stats:
4.3 miles in 44:05 (10:15 pace)
Calories: 604
Max HR: 187
Average HR: 178

Although the pacing was a lot slower than I was on Thursday, I think I'm okay with that. I had to stop at some stop lights (one of which was over a minute long) and that's factored into the time, since I only thought about stopping it after I had been waiting forever and by that point it seemed silly to stop the watch. I'm thinking that my runs on vacation (we leave tomorrow to head to the cottage) will have no stop lights, so hopefully I'll get some better (and earlier) runs in then!

Vacation Awaits!

2009-08-14T08:45:00.003-04:00

Yesterday after my brick workout, I thought about it all day that although I was tired, I felt really good after working out for an hour and a half. I think that was the first time where I really felt like I will be able to do Westchester. Even though I was tired, I felt like I could have kept going, and I think that was really what I needed mentally to carry me through the next month and a half.

This morning, I decided to sleep in and take a day off. Drew has been working like crazy and we haven't gotten to spend a lot of time together this week. He had to be at work early this morning, so instead of going out and working out, I decided to just hang out at his apartment while he got ready so we could spend some time together. Part of the reason that I made this decision is that I will be going on vacation starting tonight and I won't be back in New York until the 24th.

I am going on vacation with my family - we're going to a cottage in Northern Michigan on Lake Huron. I'm actually really looking forward to vacation. It should be really relaxing and since we're going to be right on the lake, I'm hoping to get in a lot of open water swimming practice and doing a lot of running. I won't have a bike and even though I'm a little worried I'll loose a little bike fitness, I think as long as I am swimming and running, I will be fine. I'm not sure how the internet access will be on vacation. I'm planning on writing out my blogs every day, but I'm not sure that I'll be able to post them until I get back. So, if there is radio silence for a while, I'll be back!

Dear Mr. NYC Parks Department Man,

2009-08-13T08:03:00.003-04:00

This morning I woke up early for the Terrier brick. I walked out the door of the apartment and luckily realized right away that I had forgotten my running shoes, so I had to go back and grab those. I was worried that I would be running late, but luckily I was there in plenty of time.

The workout was as follows:
10 minute bike warm-up followed by 6 x 6:00 minute intervals in the big ring. Each interval would be followed by a 2:00 easy spin recovery. Then we would do a 30 minute run.

I'm really glad that I got that light for the back of my bike. Riding to the park this morning, it was really dark out. I'm not a fan of the fact that the days are getting shorter again and it's definitely becoming evident in the mornings on my workouts. When I got to the park, the lights near the meeting spot went out, so it was even darker than normal. We started out on the bike ride heading north. I was going pretty slowly because I wasn't sure what the road condition would be like after yesterday's brain-jarring ride. Luckily, they had mostly paved what was torn up yesterday, leaving only about 15 feet unpaved. That seemed much more tolerable than the mile or so that was unpaved yesterday. A couple of people commented that they didn't understand why they didn't finish paving the road and I didn't either, but at least it was better than yesterday.

Because I was going so slowly at the beginning, I didn't quite make it to the top of the Harlem Hill in my 10 minute warm-up, but I left the bike in the middle ring the whole time (and didn't switch into the granny gear), so I think that still counts. As soon as I got to the top, I shifted into the big ring for the next 6 minutes. It was about 5:45 at this point and then the street lights in the park went out! I mean, it was still dark outside! I think the Parks Department needs to think about adjusting the timer on those lights. I'm all for turning off lights when they're not needed and trying to be green, but I definitely still needed the street lights for at least another 10-15 minutes. If I thought it would be effective, I would write a letter to the Parks Department to tell them, but I doubt one little e-mail would make them change the timing of the lights. Maybe I should get a headlight for my bike instead.

It's pretty interesting how after you have been riding in the big ring and then you shift into the middle ring for the 2:00 easy spin, how easy it feels on your legs. I found myself staying in a harder gear longer than I normally would have because it still felt easier than normal. I got really, really lucky on the timing today because on the second loop of the park, I was on a 2:00 easy spin for the Harlem Hill. When I got back to the 72nd Street transverse, I realized that I still had a few minutes to go on the workout, so I did another loop of the bottom of the park before heading in for the run.

I got off the bike, changed shoes, and headed off for the run. I headed north for the run instead of doing the lower loop like I had done the last couple of weeks. As soon as I did that, I was thinking that I didn't really want to run up Cat Hill again, but luckily, it wasn't too bad when you only have to do it once. I got back to 72nd Street a little too fast, so I headed down Dead Road and then back up the Mall so that I could add about another 0.5 miles onto the run and make it closer to a 30 minute run than a 20 minute run. I will say that the last couple times that I've run off the bike, I've felt really good. I've felt less like stopping than I do when I just go out running. I have no idea why that would be, as I would think that I'm more tired off the bike. Or, maybe it's that I'm more warmed up and that helps with the running.

All in all today, I went almost a sprint distance triathlon on the bike and run. I signed up for a duathlon the weekend after my Olympic triathlon (Drew and I are going to do it together). I know it might not have been the best idea, since I'm sure I'll still be tired, but today showed that the duathlon (run 2 miles, bike 12, run 2) is pretty similar to a workout and I should be more than capable of doing that as long as I just remember that I'm just going out to have fun! Today was really helpful in proving that doing the duathlon wouldn't be so dissimilar from a Thursday brick session.

Bike: 14.2 miles in 56:05/58:00 (15.19 MPH pace)
Calories: 628
Max HR: 176
Average HR: 160

Run: 2.75 miles in 26:22 (9:35 pace)
Calories: 341
Max HR: 181
Average HR: 173

More And More Hills

2009-08-12T07:12:00.010-04:00

This morning Drew and I got up early to go for a bike ride in the park. I was a little worried that part of the road would be torn up again. It seems that my fears were well founded, because shortly after we entered the park at 90th Street, we were back on the brain-jarring road. Ugh. I really, really hate it. Once we got back onto regular road again, I told Drew that I wasn't going to ride on that again and I'd rather do hill repeats than to have to ride on that horrible road. I guess that might be a sign of how bad the road actually is.

So, we ended up doing hill repeats on the Harlem Hill. Drew had to be home by 7 so he could be into work by 8, so we did 5 climbs up the hill. Nothing too special to report. Drew beat me up the hill every time. I still feel bad when we ride together that I'm holding him back. Today on the hills, I really tried to concentrate on my cadence and making sure that was high enough and I was less concerned with speed. The thing about training for a hilly triathlon is that you need to practice hills. I want to make sure that I'm training the right way with a high cadence so that in the triathlon I just do what feels normal and don't burn out my legs on the hills. Of course Drew was more concerned with his speed a couple times up the hill, which is probably why he beats me (well, and his stronger leg muscles).

The thing about doing hill repeats is that once you are done with those, you have to then go up the smaller hills on the West side, which I'm not really a fan of. I feel a little wimpy downshifting so much, but by that point my legs are just pretty tired!

When we got back to 90th Street and were waiting for the light to turn green, I peeked down at my bike computer and saw that I had gone 11.69 miles in 50:09 (14 MPH pace). Right after that, Drew said, "Did you see that we went almost exactly 12 miles?". I was a little confused about how that had happened because our times were almost identical, I think his was about 10 seconds longer than mine, but our mileage was about 0.30 off. I did use gmap pedometer when I got home, and that says that the route was 11.78 miles long. I don't know if maybe Drew doesn't ride in a straight line or if there is something a little off with my bike computer (or his), but I guess if you averaged our mileage together, you'd come out to be about right according to the internet. Either way, it's a little odd.

Much better heart rate today, even with the hill climbing on the bike! Although it's not surprising that running in general would give me a higher heart rate than biking would. Either way, I'm glad to see that it wasn't two days of extremely high effort. Kristin (fellow triathlete & blogger) was kind enough to send me this Joe Friel link about heart rates yesterday. I'm going to have to try out this 30 minute endurance test sometime soon, I think, just to see the results, so stay tuned for more on my maximum heart rate.

Calories: 507
Max HR: 174
Average HR: 158

Normally, I Consider Myself A Cat Person

2009-08-11T07:05:00.007-04:00

This morning I got up for the Terrier group run. When I woke up, I looked outside to see if it was raining. I couldn't quite tell from 11 stories up at Drew's apartment, but when I looked again, it definitely didn't look like rain. I never know if it's normal or not that even though I get really upset when it rains, I also sort-of wanted it to be raining so I could just go back to bed for a little while longer.

I walked over to the park and the meeting spot. Unlike the last time when I was at Drew's and went to the run, this time I didn't get lost in the park. Mostly because I walked down 5th Avenue the whole way until I got to 72nd Street. I didn't feel like chancing it and being late for the workout. Of course, when I got there, there was no coach! After we all waited around for about 5 minutes, we headed over to get started on the normal stride drills and warm-up. It was pretty surprising that there was no coach, but we managed to do a regular drill workout just fine on our own (0.6 miles, approximately).

Luckily, some people had checked out the Terrier website before coming to practice, so they knew we were supposed to do hill repeats. There was some discussion about which hill we'd use (Cat Hill or the grassy knoll by the Museum), but Cat Hill was the final verdict. One of the girls in the group said that the Sprint/Olympic group should do 30 minutes, the half-Ironman group should do 40 minutes and the Ironman group should do 45-50 minutes. So, we all jogged over to the base of the hill and started running.

On the first leg heading up, I was thinking that 2 minutes should equal 30 minutes because it was really not that much fun. And I really didn't feel like doing it again. Once we got to the top of the hill, we were supposed to jog back down and not cheat ourselves by walking down. Even though there were a few times that I probably would have really liked to walk, I did keep jogging. I will admit, however, that on my second or third time up the hill, I did stop and catch my breath while I counted to ten before jogging back down, but I don't think I cheated myself on that. Every time that I ran by that panther, I just thought to myself that I didn't really like cats that much, even though I own one!

Now that I'm able to look at the internet for myself, I see that we were supposed to do between 10 and 15 loops up the hill, depending on our training distance. I'm really glad I didn't know that at the time of the workout, because I ran up the hill 6 times in my 30 minutes. Well, technically, it was 29:22, but that was close enough for me! Including the jog over to the start, I went a total of 3 miles in 29:22 (9:46 pace). I actually feel really, really good about that pace because I definitely jogged rather slowly down the hills as an active recovery. Actually, it also makes me feel better about what turned out to be a slower pace on Sunday, because I knew that there was no way we were actually running that slowly and that it had to have been the stretching and walking that put us up to almost 11-minute miles.

Now, notice my max heart rate below. I was a little concerned when I saw that while I was walking home, since I thought my max heart rate should be 192 (220-28 [age]). However, I was just trying to research this a bit more on the internet, and it looks like women should do this estimate by taking 226 and subtracting their age. In that case, I'd get a max heart rate of 198, which makes me feel a little bit better. I'm still not sure that I'm getting all the benefits of training with a heart rate monitor and I'm fairly sure that I should do some more research on all of that, but perhaps next week I will have more time to do so.

Calories: 421
Max HR: 196
Average HR: 182

Pilates With My Eyes Closed

2009-08-10T13:57:00.005-04:00

This morning I met Nicole and Laura for our regular Monday morning pilates session. I'll be gone out of town on vacation with my family for the next two Mondays, so this was my last chance for a while to get in some really good core work.

Nicole had us start out on the mat and do a couple of warm-up breathing exercises. Then we got on the foam roller. She said she wasn't sure how it would go at 7:00 AM to do that first thing, but that we'd just try it out. I know I said this last week, but there is one that I just love with the foam roller, which is really more of a stretch. You put your hands into prayer position and then move them up over your head. Then you open your arms and let them fall down and around before coming back up into prayer position. Something about the fact that you are lying on that round tube just makes my chest and shoulders really get a good stretch and it really opens up your chest area (an area I tend to hunch over most of the day at my computer). I really would consider buying a foam roller myself just to do that stretch more often.

After doing some other foam roller exercises and then some exercises without the roller, including roll-ups and rolling like a ball (neither of which are my favorites), we moved over to the reformer. The sun rises right into one of the windows of the studio and right onto the reformer that I was using. During the first several exercises, I had to keep my eyes closed most of the time. Next time I'll try to remember to bring my sunglasses! It's actually a little bit surprising to me that the studio doesn't have a window shade that could be used to prevent this. I'm certainly not the first person to have noticed this. Of course, it's just one reformer that gets the sunlight, so maybe that one gets used less than the others.

When Nicole announced that we would be setting up to do the stomach massage set of exercises, I was just thinking that my stomach did not really want a massage today. I'm not sure why, but I just think all three of the stomach massage exercises are a little awkward. Probably because they are. Either way, my stomach did get a massage and now it's quite tired!

Megan Says, "Move Over"

2009-08-09T18:38:00.008-04:00

So, yesterday ended up being a rest day. I got up nice and early and headed out to JFK Airport to surprise Drew and take the cab ride back into the city with him and hear all about his African hunting adventure. We got back to his apartment and made breakfast and just hung out all day. Part of me thought at some point that maybe I should go and do some sort-of workout, but it seemed like much more of a priority to just spend some time with him. Totally think that I made the right call on that.

At the Terrier swim today I got into the middle lane (out of the five available lanes) and started doing the warm-up. I normally switch back and forth between the middle lane and the next fastest lane, but it really depends on who is at practice that day because the relative speed of each lane will change based on who is there. This was the workout:

300 Warm-Up
8 x 50 Backstroke down, Freestyle back on the 1:00 400
2 x 300 Pull 600
4 x 100 Freestyle on 1:45
50 Backstroke on 1:30
4 x 100 Freestyle on 1:40
50 Backstroke on 1:30
4 x 100 Freestyle on 1:35
50 Breaststroke (cool-down)

2650 meters = 1.65 miles in 56:10
Calories: 657
Max HR: 181
Average HR: 163

After the warm-up, Megan said we would be doing 8 x 50 on the 1:15 in the middle lane. We would do backstroke down and freestyle back. As a kid and even when swimming in high school, backstroke was always my favorite stroke. I know some people think it's really easy because your head is out of the water all the time, but I always really loved the motion your arm makes instead of the floating on your back part. So, I was really happy to be doing some backstroke. After the first 50, I was at the wall and Megan said I needed to move over into the faster lane. I wasn't sure I was up for it today, but I also wasn't going to question her judgment. Of course, moving over a lane also meant that I had to do the 50s on the 1:00 instead of the 1:15.

There were not a ton of people at practice today, so there were only two other people in my lane besides me, which was nice. We finished up the 50s and then Megan passed out the pull buoys. I was thinking that so far the workout wasn't too bad and that I sort-of was glad for that. Then she told us that we'd be doing 3 x 200 pull. The catch? The first 200 we'd breathe every third stroke (easy). The second 200 we'd breathe every fifth stroke (not too bad). The third 200 we'd breathe every seventh stroke (was she kidding about that?). I was wishing that we could do it in the opposite order so that it would get easier instead of harder as time went on. I normally breathe every second stroke and I sort-of wanted to give up during the last 200. I did take a breath on the fifth stroke twice in that set, but for the most part I did the workout as instructed.

The main set was 1200 broken down into 4 x 100. Each set of 400 would be 5 seconds faster than the last. I knew by the time we got to the last set on the 1:35, I would essentially be swimming a 400 as there wouldn't be any time to rest at the wall. The 50 meter backstroke was supposed to be a slow, active recovery rather than just resting at the wall for a minute. I wasn't sure I was 100% in favor of that, but who am I to say what's best? Also, on the second 50 recovery, I got water straight up my nose at the turn and couldn't stop coughing before starting the last 4 x 100. I'm sure that didn't help my time any.

All in all, this ended up being a really good workout. I was so surprised to get home and to see how far and frankly, how fast I swam today, even though I didn't ever feel like I was going that fast or that hard. I always just felt like I was swimming at my regular pace. Perhaps I'm just getting faster in general.

Last week, Laura had told me that she was planning on going running in Central Park tonight as a taper run for her half-marathon. When I got home from swimming, I asked Drew if he'd want to go along, so we both met her and two other people, Bill & Sue. I was a little nervous that I would be too slow for the group and I knew that I wouldn't want (or be able) to do the entire 7.6 mile run that Laura had planned. I was hoping to do about a 3.7 mile run instead, which meant that Drew and I would cross the 72nd Street transverse and head back East, while Laura, Bill & Sue would keep going North to do the entire 6.0 mile loop.

Sue and Laura talked most of the time we were running together, which actually helped me concentrate on their conversation rather than worrying about the actual running. It was also nice because I thought we were running at a pretty comfortable pace for me, so I didn't feel like I was holding anyone back. When we got to the transverse and turned off to head back to Drew's, he said that his calf was acting up again. I asked him if he wanted to start walking, because I would feel horrible if he got hurt on my account, and he said yes. We also stopped for a minute for him to try to stretch out his calf. When we had walked to the end of the transverse and started to head back North, Drew said we should run again. We ran for about 15 seconds before he said that his leg wouldn't let him. So, instead, we just walked the rest of the way home.

I know from my hamstring incident last week that it is much better to just stop as soon as you feel pain instead of trying to push through like I had with my heel pain, so I'm glad for his sake that we stopped when we did. In total, we went 2.5 miles in 27:15 (10:54 pace). Some of that time includes when we were walking and Drew was stretching, so I don't think that pace is actually accurate. I'm fairly certain we were more on a 10:00 mile pace while we were actually running. Either way, I'm still really glad that I got out and went for the run, even if it was cut short. Even though I think it was silly to swim, shower, and then run, I still think it was a really good workout day.

Running Stats:
Calories: 367
Max HR: 189
Average HR: 176

The World Went By In A Blur

2009-08-07T08:07:00.001-04:00

Last night I set my alarm for 6 AM so that I could get up early and go for a nice long run. When my alarm went off, I just kept pressing snooze for the next 43 minutes. I will say that it's much harder to get myself out of bed when I don't have a planned group activity or I'm not meeting someone at a certain time. Even when I was pressing snooze, I was thinking that maybe I really didn't have to go running, even though I knew that was wrong.

Finally, I got myself up and dressed. It was quite sunny out this morning, so I grabbed my sunglasses. When I put them on, I realized that I wasn't wearing my contacts and I wouldn't be able to see anything. I figured that was probably okay. I didn't want to waste the extra time to put them in and my eyes were too tired to deal with it. There isn't too much to see in the park that I haven't seen before. So, the run was a bit of a blur.

I walked over to the park and saw right away that the part of the park drive that was torn up yesterday was newly paved today. Why couldn't the brick have been this morning instead of yesterday? Oh well.

So, right when I started running, another girl started running too. At the exact same pace. I cannot begin to explain how awkward this was for me. We were running right next to each other, but not acknowledging one another. It really felt like I was running with a friend, except she was wearing an iPod and we weren't talking to one another. At some point, I decided that I couldn't take it any more and that maybe I should fall back a little bit, so I ran right behind her. That also felt really weird and when we got to the 102nd Street transverse and turned there, I really felt like I was following her (even though that really was my planned route). I couldn't take it any more. I felt like it was all too weird, so I took a walking break for about a minute to let her go ahead.

When I started running again, I felt like I couldn't get a good breath. I just couldn't inhale all the way. I looked down at the heart rate monitor and saw that my heart rate was 188! That seemed quite high, so I decided to just walk again for a minute to get it back down into some sort of normal range and catch my breath. That definitely helped and I was able to go on with the rest of my run. I'm not really sure what happened, but I do wonder if once I knew that my heart rate was so high that I then got more nervous than I would have been otherwise.

When I reached the bottom of the reservoir, I really thought about just cutting my run short and heading back, but I realized that wasn't going to help me any on race day and that I might as well just keep going. I told myself that I would run from where I was until I got to 72nd Street and then I could take a little walking break. The funny thing is that it seemed like I had so far to run when I made that deal with myself, but I was at 72nd Street before I knew it. I did take a little break and walked for another minute and then I finished my run strong and running the whole rest of the way. I felt really good at the end of the run, like I could have kept running, which I think is a good feeling to have.

I guess now I should mention that I am a mosquito magnet. I don't think regular people would even think that there are mosquitos in New York City, but there are. Regular people just don't know that they're here because they're all biting me! Anyway, I have bites all over my arms, legs, hands ... and one very bad one on the bottom of my right foot. The entire time I was running all I wanted to do was scratch my foot. Or punch someone in the face. It was really uncomfortable running. The bite is pretty much right in the middle of my foot and every step I took, it rubbed against my sock and made me want to scratch. I'm not really sure how to prevent this from happening in the future since I think that they mostly bite me in the middle of the night.

In total today, I ran 4.10 miles in 41:48 (10:11 pace). I'm really happy with that pace since I did take a few walking breaks. I told myself today that it's okay to take those walking breaks sometimes since during the race I'll want to walk through the aid stations on the run so that I can actually drink water instead of spill it down my shirt and this would be a good way to see my race pace. I don't know if that's a good way to think about it or not, but it helped me to run further by taking those breaks today and I think that's the most important thing.

Calories: 550
Max HR: 189
Average HR: 174

Hill Attack

2009-08-06T07:08:00.003-04:00

You know, I forgot to mention yesterday that I was actually pretty impressed with my HR stats for my own swim workout versus the Terrier swim workout. I know that it helped that I a swimplan workout to do, so I wasn't fending for myself in the pool, but I'm also glad that I am getting a good workout in on my own.

This morning I woke up at 4:27 on my own. Apparently it was time to get up for the Terrier brick. I did think that was a little early, so I laid in bed for a few more minutes of rest before getting all ready for the brick. Riding to the park this morning I was thinking that if I got another flat today, I would just act a bit like Normann Stadler, because I'm quite paranoid about the whole thing now.

We got there and the coach told us that the workout would be attacking the six hills in Central Park. We were supposed to do one warm-up loop of the park and then two where we really attacked the hills. This would be another workout for anaerobic training and working on VO2 max. Really, why can't this stuff be in English? I guess maybe I should know what they're talking about, but even when I read the descriptions on the internet, I'm still a little confused about all of these equations. The bike would be followed by a 20 minute run.

We started out on the bike. Now, they had mentioned that the road was torn up from 90th Street to about 100th Street, but I didn't really know what that meant. I quickly found out that it meant a brain-jarring ride along the road. Seriously, I hated that. Everyone else just zipped right past me and I was happy to go along at 10 miles an hour. I felt like if I went any faster I'd get that shaken baby syndrome. I tried to figure out what I could do to avoid going along the Upper East Side again. I decided that since we were supposed to be doing hills, I might as well do Harlem Hill repeats instead of doing the whole park loop. It was probably comparable and that way I could avoid the rough road.

I ended up doing 4 loops on the Harlem hill. Then I rode back down and through the lower loop of the park twice. I spent a lot of time at the ends of the park today and not very much time in the middle. I ended up riding for 12.29 miles in 51:02 (14.45 MPH average). I feel okay with that average, especially since I was only going about 8 or 9 MPH on the hill. I was definitely working hard on the hill. On my last Harlem hill repeat, I saw that my HR was at 180, which seemed like a lot of work for my heart, not to mention my legs!

When I got back to the transition area, I stretched out my hamstrings as best I could for a minute or so. I told myself that I would just start running and see how it went. At worst, I could just walk the lower loop of the park and at best I could run, but I wouldn't keep running if it hurt at all and I wasn't going to be in a hurry, I'd just take my time. Well, that strategy proved to be a really good one. I felt better running today than I have in a long time. I really wasn't in a rush and I ran the 1.75 miles in 17:36 (10:03 pace). My leg never hurt at all. It still feels really tight when I stretch it, but I'm not in any pain, so I'm even happier that I didn't keep running on Tuesday as I think it could have been a lot worse. I'm hoping to be able to get in a nice long run tomorrow, so hopefully this just continues to get better.

Calories: 799
Max HR: 180
Average HR: 159

I Spy With My Little Eye

2009-08-05T10:10:00.005-04:00

This morning I met Laura for a swim at Manhattan Plaza Health Club. Last time we went there, I wasn't overly impressed with the facilities or the clientele, but I was trying to have a more open mind this time. Laura sent me a text that she was running late, so I told her that I would just meet her in the pool. That way, I could get in a longer workout. I printed out a swimplan.com workout so that I wouldn't be struggling for things to do in the water and I could hopefully push myself a bit more than I had been the last couple times I swam on my own.

This was the workout:

Warm-Up:
4 x 50 Any Stroke (even pace), rest 0:15/50 yd
Build Up:
4 x 100 Freestyle Swim (kick every 4th 25 yd), rest 0:20/100 yd
Core:
2 x 200 Freestyle Swim, leave on 3:40/200 yd
2 x 100 Freestyle Swim, leave on 1:55/100 yd
2 x 200 Freestyle Swim, leave on 3:40/200 yd
4 x 50 Freestyle Swim, leave on 1:02/50 yd
Warm Down:
1 x 100 Freestyle Push & Glide, rest 0:20/100 yd
1 x 100 Freestyle Easy, rest 0:20/100 yd

If someone could please explain the build-up part to me, I'd really appreciate it. At first, I was thinking that I would just use a kick board for every 4th 25. Then I realized that I would need to have 4 kick boards at the far end of the pool for that to work and that didn't seem right. Then I thought maybe what I was supposed to do was use a pull buoy for the first 75 and swim regularly on the last 25. That still didn't make sense because the pull buoy would have always ended up at the far end of the pool as well. So, what I did was to swim 300 regularly and then I did 100 with a kick board. That was really all I could do to make sense of those directions!

Because it wasn't raining yesterday like it had been at our first visit to MPHC, they had the retractable roof open all the way. The retractable part was really only over the shallow end, but it was actually pretty nice to have it open to the sky. Laura got there when I was about half-way through the core portion of the workout. Shortly after she got there, I spied something pretty exciting. I saw someone walk up some stairs and I just had a feeling that perhaps that they were going to a hot tub. The guy in the lane next to me was resting for a few seconds, so I asked him if I was correct and he said that there were two hot tubs! I can't believe we didn't see them the first time we were there! What a bummer! I told Laura and we both agreed to keep swimming for a while before hitting the hot tub.

I finished my workout, but Laura wasn't done with hers yet. She said she wanted to swim for another 10 minutes or so. I told her that was fine with me and I decided that since I was already a bit cooled-down, I would just keep working on my new kick from the hips. I did 500 kick while she was finishing up. These are my totals for the day:

Distance: 2500 yards = 1.42 miles
Time: 1:02:21
Calories: 618
Max HR: 179
Average HR: 148

After getting out of the pool, we spent a very relaxing 15 minutes in the hot tub before hitting the showers. I will say, if a hot tub was involved at the end of every workout, I'd be much happier to get up in the mornings! Although it is disturbingly getting easier and easier to wake up these days. My hamstring still seems to be feeling tight and it's definitely still noticeable when I'm walking around, but it seems better than yesterday. I think this was just a minor thing, but I'm really glad that I didn't push myself too hard yesterday and do something serious.

Hello Hamstring!

2009-08-04T11:48:00.005-04:00

This morning I got up and headed over to the Terrier run. I slept in a few minutes more than I should have, so I was running a little bit late. I started walking there, but once I got to the park, I realized that I would probably have to pick up the pace and jog a little bit in order to get there on time. Almost as soon as I started jogging, I noticed a pain in my right hamstring. I got to the meeting spot and tried to stretch it as much as I could while we waited for practice to start. It definitely felt really tight when I was trying to stretch, but I thought I would just keep going and see how things progressed.

We did the usual stride drills with skipping, high knees, regular strides, etc. Then Spencer gave us our workout. The Sprint/Olympic group was supposed to do the following: 2 loops of the lower park loop (from 72nd Street to the bottom of the park and back). The first loop at 80% and the second loop at 85%. Then we were supposed to do 6 x 200s fast at 95% effort. The recovery would be a jog back to the start. Spencer said that he didn't care how slowly we were jogging as long as we didn't walk. If we walked, we'd have to do an extra one.

However, we all started out on the two-loop run and I knew almost immediately that my hamstring wasn't feeling any better. I decided that instead of pressing my luck, I should head home and put some ice on it and hope that would make it better instead of worse. Since it hurt the entire walk home, I think I made the right decision. I went home and put some ice on it for a while, hoping that would be a magic cure. Of course, it wasn't. It's still not feeling that great. I'm hoping that doing my yoga DVD tonight and a nice swim tomorrow will do the trick. Otherwise, I might start to get worried about the run portion of Westchester (as if I wasn't already!).

Foam Roller Pilates

2009-08-03T09:44:00.002-04:00

This morning I met Nicole and Laura for a pilates session. We started on the reformer and did a lot of the regular stuff. After getting warmed up, Nicole had us move over to the mats and gave us each a foam roller. We laid down on the rollers from our heads to our tailbones with our feet flat on the floor (knees bent). Then we went through a series of exercises on the rollers. By far the best one was really more of a stretch. Nicole said that it was also her favorite. Basically it stretched your shoulders/neck/upper arms and felt awesome. I wished that we could do that all day long.

Of course, Nicole had other ideas for us. Instead of just doing stretches all day long, she made us do the entire ab series on the foam rollers. Ugh! That was really hard, but I'm sure also very good for me. Nicole had told me that she had learned these new foam roller exercises when I went two weeks ago and at the time I was thinking that it'd be really fun to try them out. I'll admit it sounded more fun to hear about it than it actually was to do it, mostly because keeping your balance and trying to do exercises turns out to not be that easy.

For fun, I decided that I would wear my HR monitor and just see what the HR/calories looked like from doing pilates. These are today's stats:

Calories: 216
Max HR: 126
Average HR: 100

Clearly, not the same type of workout as doing cardio. But, I'm still glad I wore it just for the sake of comparison. I was thinking that I might be able to get in some cardio tonight, but now that I realize that I have a lot of other things that need to get done this week, I might skip it and make sure I get a good night's sleep before tomorrow's Terrier run.

It's All About The Breathing

2009-08-02T18:16:00.006-04:00

This morning I went to Toga to go buy a replacement bike tube for Caroline and to have my bike get a tune-up and check on the brakes. I've also noticed the last couple times while riding that the MPH sensor might have been on the fritz (just temporarily both times, but it seemed like I should just ask while I was there). I was expecting that it would be about a $50 expense for the tune-up, since that's what the sign says at the shop. I only had to wait about 20 minutes for them to check out the bike. When they brought it back upstairs, the girl rang me up and my total was only $12 (for the two tubes I purchased). I asked about the cost of the tune-up and she told me that since I had bought my bike there, all basic tune-ups for the life of the bike are free! What a nice start to the day!

I then spent the afternoon hanging out at home since it was pouring rain (no surprise there!). Luckily, when I headed out to swim practice, there was a break in the rain. Sarah was coaching today. She said that we would be doing some longer sets today. This was the workout:

400 Warm-Up
300 Drill (one arm / thumb drag)
200 Kick
100 Build
2 x 500 (broken into 100's - 0:05 Rest) 1:00 RI
Flip turns
100 Cool-Down

Total: 2100 meters = 1.30 miles
Time: 1:00:49
Calories: 628
Max HR: 185
Average HR: 151

The drill portion I did 200 using just one arm and the other 100 I did doing the thumb drag drill (where you drag your thumb up the side of your body in order to get your elbows up). The 2 x 500s were broken into 100s, but there was only 0:05 rest between each 100, so it was mostly like swimming a 500. The first 500 we were supposed to keep at an even pace for each 100. The second 500 was supposed to increase in speed for each 100. I'm not sure that I really did that as I just get so tired by the end. One of the other girls in my lane said she doesn't think that it's fair that we're working so hard on the last 100 and going slower than the first 100. I tend to agree.

After the first 500, Sarah asked all of us who could do a flip turn. She said that those of us who raised our hands should try to do them on the second 500. I told her my ear problem and how I feel like my whole head gets clogged with water and she said that it was all about the breathing and she'd help me after the second 500. So, once we were done with the swimming, she broke us up into groups and had us practice flipping. I asked her and she said that as long as I blow out of my nose the entire time I'm flipping, I shouldn't have any ear problems. I did it a few times and she was right! I must have been holding my breath a couple of weeks ago when I was doing it and that was the problem.

For the last 100 cool-down, I practiced flip turning while swimming and breathing out and I didn't have any trouble at all. I guess now that I know the trick, I'll have to try to incorporate this into practice more often. Sarah said that if we work on this over the winter (off season), we'll definitely see results next year in our swimming. Even though there are no flip turns in races and a lot of triathletes say that they don't see the point, the extra second of rest that we're giving ourselves at the wall when we turn without flipping does add up and does give us that extra rest that we wouldn't have in a race. I can see both sides of the argument, but I would like to try it more often going forward and see how it goes.

Also, I know that I was mostly worried about not pushing myself hard enough while swimming and that was the reason for the HR monitor. Obviously, I wasn't too worried about that at Terrier practice as the workouts are usually pretty hard. It was more on my own that I'm concerned. I really wanted to wear the monitor today so that I could have a good comparison for when I'm swimming by myself to see how I'm doing then. I'm hoping to swim with Laura on Wednesday morning, so we'll see how that goes.

Only Cross At Greens & Not In Between

2009-08-01T12:16:00.005-04:00

I guess I have to start on Thursday since I've been a bit lax in the blogging department. Thursday after work I headed over to Toga and bought myself some new bike tires. I decided to get Armadillos because I am sick and tired of changing flats and this seemed like a way to avoid them. Friday morning I woke up to rain and decided that I would just sleep in and give myself a rest day. I know that this hasn't been my hardest workout week, but I knew I needed the extra sleep.

Friday after work, I headed to Drew's apartment to put on my new tire and then take my bike home. I got the tire on without too much frustration. I will say that these armadillos are a little bit tougher to manipulate than regular tires, but I'm guessing that's part of the point of them. The only bad thing about going home was that I rode the subway because it was pouring out! I did get a few dirty looks on the trains home, which made me want to shout out "bikes are allowed on the subways 24/7!" but I didn't. I just tried to make myself as small as possible. Which is impossible with a bicycle.

This morning I got up early and headed out for my very first ride into New Jersey and across the George Washington Bridge. I double checked all the directions that Matt had given me and thought I had a pretty good idea of where I was going (but just in case I wrote them down on a post-it and stuck them in my pocket). I took along a Clif bar and a bottle of Gatorade and a bottle of water. I took my patch kit but left my extra tube at home. I figured with my armadillos, why would I need an extra tube?

I headed over to the Westside bike path and on my way, I was stopped at the light at 51st and 11th Avenue when a pedestrian crossing said, "Only cross at greens and not in between!". It seemed like good advice. I definitely try to do that, although with so many one-way streets here in the city, a lot of times it easy to go against the red (although I do always try to yield for pedestrians).

The ride got off to a good start. I headed up the Westside and exited Riverside Park at 95th Street to continue my ride on Riverside Drive. (Here is a link to the approximate route I took). From there I headed up to 165th Street. I thought I knew where I was going, as when you get to 165th Street, the hospital is there and I knew I had to veer right. Well, actually, you are supposed to turn onto 165th Street and go up a steep hill. Instead, I followed the signs for the GWB (for cars) and started to get onto the highway. I quickly realized when I got to the merging point that I was in the wrong place and turned around and headed back to 165th Street. It wasn't a total loss as I did get to see two dead rats on the freeway entrance ramp. Who can say that they see that every day?

When I got back to the corner of 165th Street and Riverside, I stood there for a minute and watched all of the other bikers turning onto 165th and knew that if I followed them I would be able to find the bridge entrance. It was up a pretty steep hill and since I was stopped and didn't quite have the momentum I thought I might need (especially while also clipping in), I decided not to chance it and to just walk my bike up the hill.

I almost got lost again when trying to find the pedestrian walkway to the bridge. I was going to turn right, but that also looked like I'd be getting on the freeway, so instead there happened to be a guy there and I asked him if he knew where I should go and he pointed behind him to the left and then I saw the ramp. Matt had told me that it was really narrow and steep and my first time I should probably walk. I definitely took his advice and walked up the ramp.

When I got onto the bridge itself I actually said "Wow!" because the views were so nice. And I was amazed that I had gotten as far as I did. I made it across the bridge just fine. When exiting, I turned left and tried to find my way to Route 9W. The street I was on was called Huson Terrace and I knew I wasn't really in the right spot, but I also wasn't 100% sure how to get to where I needed to go. I pulled into an empty parking lot and pulled out my handy phone to look at the map. Hudson Terrace run parallel to 9W and I could take pretty much any street to cut over. I took the next one and then realized that maybe I should have stuck with Hudson Terrace a while longer. 9W (where I got on) goes from having a very small shoulder, which is filled with storm drains, to no shoulder at all. After a couple of miles like that, the road narrows and the shoulder becomes about one lane wide, which is much nicer. Next time I might try sticking with Hudson Terrace until it ends at Palisade Avenue.

It had rained a lot on Friday, so there were a lot of tree branches and debris in the shoulder, but at least I had quite a lot of room to maneuver around all that stuff. I didn't go that far on 9W. I had just planned a 30-mile trip to prove to myself that I could ride the Olympic distance and also just to get over to NJ and back. I figure next time I can go further since I'll be faster at getting to the bridge itself.

After 15 miles on the way out, I turned around and headed back. I had already been riding for quite a while, so on my way back, I pulled into a bus stop and ate my Clif bar I had brought along. Then I kept heading back to the bridge. Pretty much when I go to the base of the bridge I heard the tell-tale sign of a flat followed by a pop! I wasn't even surprised at that point. Why would my new no-flat tire do as it said? I also was really mad at myself in that moment for only having $20 and not my credit card. I know that there is a bike shop nearby and I could have gone and had them fix it, but since I was so close to the bridge, I decided just to walk my bike across the bridge and take the subway home. I was also really worried that I had gotten another blown-out tire and $20 wasn't going to cover the cost of a new tire and tube. I, of course, had left my extra tube at home because I figured if something happened, I would be able to patch it, and really, what were the odds of getting another flat this week?

I started my walk across the bridge, which wasn't too bad. I got to watch all the boats and kayaks in the water and of all the places to have to walk it wasn't the worst. When I was about half-way across, I ran into Will from Toga. He stopped and asked what happened. I told him my predicament with no tube and he offered to fix it for me. He with with a girl named Caroline (fellow Terrier) and she lent me a tube since Will's extra tube had a valve that was too long for my bike (he's got very fancy wheels). Will had that thing fixed in about 5 minutes flat. While he was doing it, he asked if I knew how to change a tire. I said yes, but what I was really thinking was "yes, but I'd never get it done faster than it would take me to walk to the subway like you're doing right now". As he was putting the wheel back on my bike, he said that something looked wrong with my back brake and that I should bring my bike in for a tune-up.

I thanked both of them for their generosity and time. I got back on my bike and headed home. The whole time I was riding, all I could do was think about my back brake failing, so I kept my hand on my front brake more than I normally do just in case. However, I made it home A-OK with no further incidents. These are the stats:

Mileage: 29.08
Time: 2:54:08 (from HR monitor)
Average Speed: 10.01 MPH (not too bad considering the walking part across the bridge)
Calories: 1719
Max HR: 173
Average HR: 146

In short, I'm actually really looking forward to tackling this route again. Now that I have more of an idea of where to go and what the route is like I think I'll be much more confident next time. Next time I'll also be sure to take everything that might be needed. I'm extremely grateful to know some really nice triathletes and be a part of team that is willing to help out. I also happened to notice that it looks like most riders get a bit of a later start than I did. There were lots and lots of people heading out to NJ when I was heading in, which makes me think that going early is a good idea to have more of the road to myself!

There Is A Buzz At The Gym

2009-07-30T08:47:00.003-04:00

Last night I was all ready to fix my popped tube, so I got the tire and tube off the bike, looked at the rip in the tube (quite impressive - over two inches long!). I also noticed that part of the tire looked a little bit questionable. The wire edge of the tire was exposed meaning that the rubber had sort-of blown off around the edge of the tire. I wasn't quite sure what that would mean. So, I put a new tube on and put the tire back on the wheel. I pumped up the tube and Drew happened to notice that there was a bulge on the tire. I googled this problem and saw that it can sometimes be fixed by deflating the tube and sort of trying to move everything around. When I was doing that, I realized that the tire damage was worse than I initially thought and that a new tire would be required. At least, that's what I think in my very limited opinion. I've brought my tire to work with me today so that after work I can head over to Toga to see what they think (I'm not sure if there is a way to repair this or if it's just time for a new tire). I really can't believe my luck!

Although, I guess I don't have the worst luck in the world ... yesterday while I was swimming I was sort-of wishing that I had a heart rate monitor so that I could see how hard I was working since sometimes when I'm swimming on my own I know that I don't push myself as hard as I could. I mentioned that to Drew and he said that he had never returned the heart rate monitor he had bought for himself on E-Bay (it turned out that it was a women's instead of a men's) and that if I wanted to try it out, I certainly could. So, last night, I tried out this Polar F6 heart rate monitor and worked on setting it all up. Drew made us do 10 push-ups as a test to see if it was working or not. It definitely was. My heart rate went from 80 to 100+.

Because of my busted bike tire, I was unable to go to the Terrier brick this morning. I had thought it would be raining so it wouldn't be too much of a loss, but of course, the morning was just fine. Drew woke up really early this morning and left for the gym before 6 AM. I had set my alarm for 6, but didn't get up until about 6:20. I really didn't want to get out of bed, but then I remembered that I could test out this heart rate monitor some more, so off to the gym I went. Of course, I had been planning on doing a brick, so I had my tri shorts and Terrier tri top with me, which was a little bit of a funny outfit for the gym, but there wasn't too much I could do about that.

I met Drew at the gym and did some strength stuff in the "boy area" with him. Right after I got there, we bumped into Drew's trainer, Billy. Billy was training another girl this morning and the four of us chatted for a minute. The girl said told me congratulations on training for an Ironman and I told her that I was pretty sure that congratulations weren't in order quite yet as I haven't decided one way or another yet. She then told me that there is a buzz going around the gym about me and the Ironman training. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but I'm going to take it as a good thing.

This was the workout I did with Drew:

Bench Press:
10 reps at 45 pounds
8 reps at 55 pounds
7 reps at 55 pounds

Incline Bench Press:
8 reps at 45 pounds
8 reps at 55 pounds
8 reps at 55 pounds (but Drew helped me with the last two)

Chest Flys:
12 reps at 40 pounds
2 sets of 12 reps at 50 pounds

Skull Crushers:
3 sets of 10 reps at 35 pounds

When we were done with those exercises, Drew was ready to head home and I said that I'd just go with him. Because he was leaving for Africa this morning and won't be back until August 8th, it seemed more important to hang out with him for a little while longer than it did to do cardio. I'm pretty sure I've got my priorities straight on that one.

Just for the record, these are today's stats: 127 calories burned, Max HR 130, Average HR 99, duration: 35:53. Nothing too remarkable there, but a little interesting nonetheless. I'm much more interested in having this for cardio. I'm hoping to make it to the gym tonight, but I'm not sure how much time I'll have after getting the tire situation taken care of. We shall see.

Pools & Whirlpools

2009-07-29T08:33:00.003-04:00

This morning I met Laura at the 92nd Street Y for a swim. We were able to use our passes with no hassle at all. We walked into the locker room, which was much nicer than the locker room at the Westside Y (although not nearly as big!). The showers also looked promising. We walked out into the pool area, which looked nice as well.

We hopped into the water and started swimming. The one weird thing I noticed right away about the pool was that the walls of the pool were really high. Most pools have somewhere that you can hang onto the edge in the deep end (more of a ledge), but this pool just had a tile wall all the way around. It sort-of made it harder to turn around at the end of the pool. Probably an argument to do flip-turns could be made here, but they just really make my ears hurt. As an aside, I did get some ear plugs at the NYC Triathlon Expo, so maybe I should try those out with flip-turns sometime soon.

Again, I didn't really have a set swimming plan in mind. I did think that I wanted to keep working on this more straight-leg kick to see if it can help me with my times, so I thought should do a lot of kicking today. This was what I ended up doing:

200 Free (warm-up)
300 Kick
200 Free
300 Pull
200 Free
300 Kick
200 Free
250 Pull

1950 Yards = 1.1 miles in 42:05

I thought that the alternating between swimming, kicking and pulling was actually really helpful. It let me concentrate on either kicking or pulling and then I would try to put it all together when swimming.

I had asked Laura at about 7:45 if she would want to get out 5 minutes early from our swim so that we could go check out the whirlpools that were next to the pool. She hesitated for only a second before saying yes. We got out of the pool at 7:55 (I had to cut my workout a little short) and headed over to the whirlpools. Stepping in was so nice! It was warm and had jets. I could have stayed there all day long, I think. Of course, we only stayed in for about 5 minutes before heading to the showers. Next time we go there, however, I'm definitely going to plan on staying in those whirlpools for a longer time and will have to schedule my swim around my whirlpool time!

Worried

2009-07-28T07:38:00.003-04:00

This morning I got up for the Terrier run. When I looked at the weather, it said it was 72 out, which seemed okay. The part I didn't see was that it was ridiculously humid out. I decided just to walk to the meeting spot since I was so exhausted I felt like I was sleep-walking. I actually felt like I shouldn't be operating any heavy machinery (luckily that wasn't an option), but I was so tired that I was a little nervous about my results today.

We had a bit of a smaller group today because so many people were most likely recovering from the NYC Triathlon this past weekend. We did our normal strides workout to start. We did 16 strides total (12 long and 4 short), which is a total of about 0.56 miles. It didn't take long before I was sweating up a storm. I literally felt like we were swimming through the air it was so humid. We finished up the strides and headed over to the starting place ("S"), which is 1.2 miles.

The run over there was when I started to realize that I might not be cut out for all of this humidity stuff and if it's like that at Westchester, then I'm going to be really worried for myself. I know it takes time to get used to it, but I was not very comfortable running today. Once we got to the starting spot, we were broken up into groups based on what sort of race we are training for. The Olympic group was supposed to do 3 x 880, recover for 2 minutes, jog back half-way and then finish running for the last 440 (total 3 miles).

I hated the running today. I did the first one there and back okay. One thing that is hard for me is that there isn't much difference (if any) between my jogging and running pace, so I just plod along at my regular pace the entire time. Once I got half-way through the second set and was doing the 2:00 recovery, I was thinking that I could just do this one and go home. I was really ready to quit and give up. Drew has been asking me recently to rate myself on a scale of 1 to 100 on where I am about signing up for the Ironman Switzerland. I've been hovering somewhere just above 50 for the past few days. Today, while running, I was at a 15. I was thinking that if I can't do these short runs in humid weather, I'm not sure why I would ever think that I'm cut out to run a marathon in August after doing the other two legs of the triathlon.

I did do a little bit of walking today, just to try to cool down a little bit and prevent myself from overheating, but I finished the workout running and I was so incredibly proud that I didn't give up on the workout or myself. (And it also made me think that maybe I'm not too crazy for thinking about the Ironman since I didn't give up).

In total, the running (not including strides) was 4.2 miles today, which I did in 39:39 (9:26 pace). I'm really happy with that pace considering the fact that I was tired, sweaty, and mostly miserable while running and I even took a few walking breaks in there.

I walked home and made myself a smoothie right away. Drew was at the gym and I tried to hold out and wait for him to get home, but I couldn't do it. I would have made him a smoothie and saved it for him, but I really only know how to make one size and then there wouldn't have been enough for either of us to be full. He seemed a little miffed when he got home that I had already had my smoothie, but he got over it pretty quickly, I think!

Back At The NYSC

2009-07-27T20:30:00.004-04:00

After this morning's workout didn't happen the way or I planned (or at all!) I knew I was going to have to rearrange my schedule for the week and try to get in a swim this evening at NYSC. Now, this pool isn't so great in the evenings. It's usually packed with people and no one circle swims, etc. So, I didn't have high hopes for this swim workout, but as always, something is better than nothing.

I got there around 7:30 and as expected, the pool was quite crowded. Someone with a reservation at 7:30 didn't show up, so the lifeguard let me go in the reservation spot. He did tell me that it was someone else's reservation, but didn't really specify what that meant for me. I got into the pool at 7:38 so I thought I would have until 8:08 to swim. I didn't really have much of a swimming plan, so this is what I ended up doing:

360 freestyle
180 kick
180 pull
360 freestyle
180 kick
180 pull

1440 yards (0.81 miles) in 28 minutes

The distances are funny because the pool there is 18 yards long, so the freestyle sets were 20 lengths and the pull and kick sets were each 10 lengths of the pool. After my last kick set, at 8:03, the lifeguard said I had to get out in order for the people who had reservations at 8:00 to be able to swim. I got out but mentioned that he hadn't specified that I would have to get out before my 30 minutes were up. I was able to sneak into the lane next to me because two girls were sort-of splashing around and I asked if I could just finish up and they didn't mind at all, which was awesome of them.

In the end, I'm glad I got a workout in today and didn't give up and have an extra rest day. It's not what I was planning for, but life doesn't normally go according to plan, so you just have to adjust accordingly!

Character Building

2009-07-27T07:55:00.002-04:00

This morning I woke up early in order to get in a longer bike ride (my plan was to ride for an hour and a half). Drew was even kind enough to get up early too and come with me. We also were going to try out our new bike and tri shorts that we got over the weekend and see how they felt on the bike. Of course, the best laid plans never really work out. I had gotten dressed, eaten half my Clif bar, put on my shoes and walked over to pump up my tires only to discover that my back tire was flat. Ugh!

I took a look at the tire to see if I could figure out what had happened. I found a tiny piece of glass in the tire, but after I got the tire and tube off the rim, I couldn't find a puncture in the tube. However, something seemed to be malfunctioning with the valve. I decided my best option would be to just get ride of that tube and start with a new one. I put the new tube and tire onto the rim (why on earth does it take so long to get the tire back onto the rim!?!) and pumped up and was finally ready to go 45 minutes later. Clearly, I'm not the fastest tube changer, but I figure I'll only get faster as time goes on.

So, Drew and I head out for a shorter version of our original bike ride. We ride to the park and then are riding for less than a minute before I hear the sound of another flat tire! And then about 10 seconds later POP! My tube popped! I didn't really know why that happened or what had gone wrong, but after a quick Google search when I got home, it looks like it was most likely my own fault and that the tube was pinched between the tire and rim. After the popped tube, I picked up my bike and walked home with Drew. He offered to carry my bike for me, but I said that it would build character and I'd just do it myself. I got back to his apartment and took a really long shower to clean off all the bike grease that I had gotten all over my hands, legs and arms.

I'm hoping to make it to the pool at the gym later tonight. I'm just bummed that I got up early and had to miss a workout.

New York City

2009-07-26T14:28:00.004-04:00

This morning Drew and I woke up at 4:20 to a downpour of rain. That put a bit of a damper on the idea of getting up early and watching the Pros and Elites compete in the New York City Triathlon today. However, after waiting it out for about an hour, it was no longer raining and I decided that we should just get up and chance it. If it started raining again, we could always go home. Luckily, the race ended up being delayed about 20 minutes, so we didn't miss anything.

We staked out a pretty good spot, just south of the swim exit. We were able to cheer on the athletes as they were running to transition and then also cheer them on as they were coming out of transition on the bikes. I had made a sign to cheer on my fellow Terriers that were competing today. I had a fantastic time just cheering everyone on. I can't even begin to describe how exciting it was to be cheer people on and have them smile or laugh. It also was pretty amazing to be able to cheer people on and have them pick up their pace a little bit. I felt like hopefully I was helping them reach their goals just a little bit faster when that happened. I know when I got out of the water at Staten Island, the last thing I felt like doing was running, and my transition area wasn't a mile away from the swim exit either!

I will say that the most inspiring group of athletes were those who were racing with disabilities. To see people so committed and determined that they were not going to let anything stand in their way of the finish line was pretty awe-inspiring. After watching all of the women and most of the men do the swim and head out on the bikes, we decided that we would head over to Central Park to watch the run.

We lined up along the Cherry Hill fountain area and were able to cheer the runners on for their last quarter-mile into the finish. When one of the disabled (blind) athletes ran by us, he held out his hand for high-fives, which we gave to him. Aaron Scheidies finished the race in 2:02:15. That is an amazing effort, especially considering the man who won the entire race finished in 1:45:50!

Next year's NYC tri is on July 18. If I don't sign up for this Ironman, this race is definitely on my list for next year. I think that it would be pretty awesome to race in my own city and there are just so many spectators cheering you on that it would make the race that much more fun as well as keeping you motivated.

An Explorer, I Am Not

2009-07-25T16:16:00.001-04:00

This morning I slept in until the very late hour of 8. Even though it's not that late, it still felt like a bit of a treat. I got up and putzed around for a little while to get ready for my bike ride. I had asked Drew if he would want to come, but since his calf still isn't feeling so great, he opted to skip the ride. Instead he decided that he would go to the gym. He was going to check out the other one that is close to my apartment that neither of us had been to yet. He did say that he was thinking of just going to the regular one since he wasn't sure if he wanted to go out of his comfort zone, but in the end he did go to the other one.

I decided tht I would go for a ride up the West Side. I'm not sure that the ride helps me with my speed a lot, but it is just a really beautiful ride and after doing mostly loops in the park, it's nice to have a change.

Laura and I were talking yesterday about going over the George Washington Bridge and riding in New Jersey, but I think we are both a bit intimidated by the bridge itself and getting over and back safely. From what I've heard you are able to pretty much follow everyone else, but it still makes me nervous to think about getting lost.

So, I headed out up the West Side on my ride. On my way North, I noticed the swim start for the New York City Triathlon tomorrow. They were also setting up the transition areas and getting ready for the race. I think that it would be such a fun race to do in my own city, so we'll have to see how next year goes.

When I got to the base of the GWB, I wasn't sure if I wanted to keep going and ride up the very steep hills. I stopped for just a minute at the bottom of the first hill, had a squirt of Gatorade and decided that there is only one way to get ready for this Westchester triathlon. And that is to practice hills when possible and spend more time in the saddle itself. So, up I went. I'm not going to lie. When I got to the last (extremely steep) hill and I rode past someone who was walking their bike up the hill, I felt a lot better about myself.

At the top of all these hills is a pedestrian walkway that heads to the entrance to the GWB. I thought about going up there to see what it was like and how confusing it might be, but instead I just kept riding. I got to the end of the pathway and turned around to head home. Again, I passed the pedestrian walkway heading to the bridge. I really wanted to go up and see what it was like, especially since I was already there, but I just couldn't push myself that far out of my comfort zone today. All I can say is maybe next time.

It was really interesting to me that all along the river, people were already staking a claim to the picnic tables available. All before 10 AM! I guess that there must be a lot of competition for them and families must have big BBQ spreads. I'm sure it's a fun way to spend the day, but I'm not sure I'd want to get up quite so early to have a BBQ!

All in all, my ride was 17.07 miles, which I did in 1:18:58 (12.97 MPH average).

I got home from the ride and Drew reported back that the other gym had a very small cardio area, but a bigger weight room. We quickly took showers and then headed out to the NYC Triathlon Expo. I've never been to one before, so I didn't know quite what to expect, although I was hoping for some free samples.

The Expo was held in a hotel ballroom. We walked in and just started filling out little sweepstakes forms. For the record, I fully intend on winning a computrainer as well as a trip to Jamaica! We got some free stuff too: race belts, Muscle Milk, Cytomax recovery drink, and t-shirts. Definitely a fun time. Toga (LBS) had a booth at the Expo and Will (the guy who sold me my bike) was working there. When we walked by the first time, he was really busy, so I just waved Hi. The second time, when we were heading out, we were able to stop and chat with him for a bit. He said that the Westchester course is really tough (which made me extremely glad that I did those hills today). I also asked him what he thought about my bike and doing IM Switzerland. He said that my current bike could have aero bars put on and it would be okay to get started, but once I really start to increase my mileage, my bike just isn't designed for all that wear and tear. He said that I should also really consider doing a half Ironman before jumping into the full thing. While I'm glad to have his thoughts, especially on the bike, I feel that this is mostly a personal decision that I need to come to on my own first about putting in the time for the training. Drew suggested today that I should look at some sample Ironman plans and see what the workouts look like. Pretty smart idea, I think.

After the Expo, we dropped our loot off at my apartment and headed down to Union Square for a brunch made from goodies we got at the Farmers Market. After that we headed over to Paragon in order to check out all the bike/tri gear for Drew's upcoming duathlon! We got lucky because all of the bike and tri clothing was 20% off! He got a new pair of Pearl Izumi bike shorts, I got myself a pair of Pearl Izumi tri shorts, and best of all, I got a blinking red light for my bicycle! It's actually really cool because it can clip onto the bike or I can slide it onto a clip that I could attach to my shorts in case I needed it while running or not on the bike. I feel a lot better about riding in the early morning hours with this little light! A very triathlon filled day. I'm really looking forward to tomorrow and going to cheer on my Terrier teammates in the NYC tri. I'm also hoping to see some of the pros and elites compete and dream about being on their level.

The Third Time Is Not The Charm

2009-07-24T09:57:00.002-04:00

This morning Drew and I woke up early in order to head out for a run in Central Park. We were planning on doing the 4-mile loop from the 102nd Street Transverse to the 72nd Street Transverse. I poked around in Drew's cupboards and found no granola bars, so I just had a half of a glass of water before setting out. I wasn't sure how that would go for me since I was already feeling a little bit hungry before we started.

Drew had said that the last two times that we had gone running together he hadn't done so well, but that this time would be different and he would be better. To set the record straight, the last time we went running, I felt really bad for him as he was sick and I felt like I was dragging him out to go running when he should probably be sleeping.

We walked over to the park and started our watches and headed north. I'm not sure that we needed both of our watches, but it is just fun to be the one pressing the button. We weren't even a minute into the running before I noticed that there was something seriously wrong with my sock. I stopped my watch and bent down to fix it. I think that's fair to stop the watch when you aren't even moving. Somehow I must not have pulled it on all the way, since when I got my foot out of my shoe, my sock wasn't even close to being near my heel. I pulled it up all the way and then we were back on our way.

Right after we got across the 102nd Street Transverse, I felt like I wanted to give up. My head started to get that feeling of a running headache coming on and I was 100% sure that it was all due to the fact that I hadn't had anything to eat before working out. I told Drew that I needed to walk for a minute. I felt like I was wimping out, but I also knew that I would feel a lot worse later on if I didn't take a little bit of a break. We walked for about a minute (and I kept my watch counting while we were walking). Then we started back up.

Shortly after that, Drew mentioned that his right calf was feeling like it had a cramp. We stopped for a few seconds so that he could lean against a light post and try to stretch it out. After that, we kept going on our way. It quickly became clear that Drew was not very comfortable running because his leg was really bothering him. We stopped again for him to try to stretch, but still without any real success. I realized that we should stop running and just head home. It clearly wasn't our day to be out there and doing all this exercise with nothing in our bellies.

Our total time running was 20:09 and we went exactly 2.0 miles (10:04 pace). Not too bad considering one of us was crippled and the other one wanted to walk for a while. I know that this was not my best effort today, but I have to think that at least I got out there and did something and I'll just work a little bit harder tomorrow. I really think that Drew is never going to want to come running with me again since now on his third recent attempt, things went awry again. I just hope that he has a speedy recovery since next week at this time he'll be hunting in Africa and it seems like it'd be really quite bad to have a sore calf for that.

My Best Teammate

2009-07-23T07:12:00.007-04:00

Yesterday afternoon I got an e-mail from Terrier saying that we should all make sure to wear our Terrier gear for this morning's brick workout because Fox 5 News would be there in the morning talking to our team. I will say that the last time I was interviewed for the news, I made a complete fool of myself, but it was definitely good for a laugh or two. I wasn't 100% sure that anyone wanted me to say anything on TV ever again, especially when representing our triathlon club.

Last night, after work, I headed home and took a little bit of a nap. I then woke up, made dinner and then Drew came over and we watched some TV. I probably stayed up a bit later than I should have, even with the nap, because I have to get up so early on Thursdays for the workout. This morning I woke up to Drew asking me "What is that beeping noise?". I guess my reply of "It's that thing" wasn't very descriptive because he just kept asking me what was going on. It was all I could do in my haze of sleepiness to form a complete sentence. Asking for it to be a good one was really a lot. Anyway, the problem was that the carbon monoxide detector was losing it's battery power and wanted to be plugged in. In the midst of all of this, I glanced at the clock to realize that it was already 5:20 and practice starts at 5:30! To set the record straight, I had actually set the alarm on my phone, which did go off at the right time. However, I had left my phone downstairs and I guess I couldn't hear it go off over the air conditioner. Lesson learned.

I started to get myself ready and realized that there was no way that I could possibly get myself there in under 10 minutes. I had to eat something, pump up my tires, fill up my water bottle, get dressed, pack up my bag with my running stuff, the list seemed endless in that moment. Drew then asked what I needed help with because we're a team and he'd just be a really good teammate. I told him that he could pump the tires and fill up the water bottle, both of which he did, which was a huge time saver. I ate half of a Clif bar, brushed my teeth, threw on some clothes, tried to wake up a bit more, and headed out. Of course, by that time, I was already late. I didn't even get into the park until 5:50. But, it would have been even later if Drew hadn't helped me out.

I realized at some point that I would miss out on the TV portion of the day. I just decided that I would skip the brick and just go for a nice bike ride instead. I knew that by the time I got to the meeting spot and set everything up, I'd really be pressed for time to get in a good workout and I thought that I could do a longer harder workout on my own if I just skipped the running and only did the biking.

It was actually a really nice morning in the park. There were lots of Terriers out so I got to encourage some of my teammates and got some encouragement back. On the beginning of the third loop, a (non-Terrier) guy rode up next to me and asked if I was racing this weekend in the New York City Triathlon. I told him I'm not, but I am planning to go cheer on my teammates. We chatted for a while about triathlons and bikes. I normally might have been a little weirded out by the whole thing, but I've definitely seen that guy in the park before riding, so it just seemed less intimidating. He told me that he used to do triathlons but now does Adventure Racing. I think it sounds pretty cool, but also a little crazy, so it probably goes well with triathlons!

All in all, I did three loops of the park today: 18.19 miles in 1:12:30 (15.05 MPH pace). I'm extremely happy with that time. I checked after two loops and my pace was 15.2, so I slowed down a little bit for the third loop, but not a huge drop off, so I'm also very pleased with the fact that I was giving a pretty consistent effort, even though I definitely felt a bit more tired on the third loop. I will say that my legs in general felt pretty good today. I wonder if climbing all those stairs on Tuesday helped with the biking today?

Russian Bathhouse

2009-07-22T09:37:00.003-04:00

This morning I met Laura at the Westside YMCA for a swim. I checked in using my guest pass with no problems. While I was waiting for Laura, I noticed that this wasn't just a gym, it was also the kind of Y where you can stay the night. It seems like you really don't see those kind of old school Y's anymore.

We walked into the locker room, which was possibly the largest one that I've seen in quite some time. It just kept going on and on and on forever. We picked out two lockers, with an empty one in between us. It seemed like the perfect location - near the stairs to the pool, the showers and that aisle of lockers had two stools - one for each of us.

We headed to the pool and walking in, I immediately thought that we were walking into some sort of Russian bathhouse. Not that I've ever been to one, it just was similar to what it would be like in my imagination. There was really detailed tile work, which I think was the main thing that made it feel like a bathhouse to me. There was also a balcony/catwalk around the entire pool, which made it feel very old fashioned, but also pretty cool.

We hung up our towels, took off our flip flops and got into the water. Freezing cold. In those situations there is only one option - to start swimming. That's the only way I know how to warm up. And I really did warm up very quickly. After swimming a 300, I realized that I hadn't started my watch, so I was at a bit of a loss for exactly how long I had been in the water already. I figured it didn't really matter in the scheme of things if I didn't know the precise amount of time that I had been swimming.

Because I hadn't known what kind of pool this would be and what to expect exactly, I didn't print out a workout. I figured I would just go and do a long swim. Although I really love the Terrier swim practices with all the drills, I did just want to get in a long continuous swim. I decided that I would time myself swimming a 500 to see how it compared to Sunday's crazy-fast 500 time of 7:37. Swimming at my normal leisurly pace, I swam a 500 in 9:21 (1:52/100 pace). That was pretty much what I thought my 100 pace was, so I'm not too surprised by that. It is just crazy to think that I went almost two whole minutes faster on Sunday though!

While I was swimming, there was a guy and a girl in my lane chatting about Ironman triathlons. The guy is doing Lake Placid this weekend and he was explaining everything to the girl and was encouraging her to try out triathlons as well. I sort-of feel like I can't escape Ironman talk. I still haven't come to a decision about Ironman Switzerland next year. Yesterday I watched these incredible videos on YouTube about the Kona Ironman in 2006. (As a side note, if you have time, you should watch all 9 of them too as they're ridiculously inspiring!). I am still trying to figure out if I have the dedication and determination needed to finish the Ironman myself. I'll keep you posted on what happens with my decision making.

At some point this morning, the guy next to me got out of his lane and said if I wanted to move over and have a lane to myself I was welcome to. So, I thought that sounded like a nice idea and I did. Of course, I had been swimming in the far left lane and swimming against the wall half of the time and the lane line the rest of the time. In this other lane I had to swim against the lane line on both sides. Apparently I'm not very good at that because when I got out of the pool, I had another bruise developing on my right elbow from hitting the lane line. What is my problem? At this point it's getting to be a little embarassing that I can't swim properly.

Speaking of swimming properly, I really concentrated today on keeping my knees straight and kicking from the hips more than I have been. It still feels really weird (and slow) to me, but I do believe that it probably makes me more streamlined and therefore faster in the water in the long run. In total today, I swam 2300 yards (1.3 Miles). I had guessed that I was in the water for about 50 minutes, but Laura told me later that it was actually 53, so I wasn't too far off. I still think it's fair to say that I probably wasn't swimming all 53 minutes, although I didn't rest too much, so my 50 minute guess was probably just about right on.

Getting out of the pool and heading back into the locker room, we get to our lockers and there is an entire cosmetics counter laid out on one of the stools and that stool is in conjunction with the locker right in between the lockers that Laura and I selected. I mean, really? There were 6 lockers on either side of us that were empty and had no locks on them. Not to mention the rows upon rows of other lockers. Why would you need to use the one right in between us? I made up for it by using some of the lotion that was so nicely placed on the stool for me. For the record, normally I'm not really like that, I just couldn't find my lotion and it seemed like a fair payback.

Where Is The Wind?

2009-07-21T19:18:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I had my regular pilates session with Nicole at 7:00. Her friend Cara came as well, since Laura had to miss the session. We did a couple of new moves on the tower, including one I really liked. I have no idea what the name of it is, but you sit facing the tower portion with your feet on the silver bars. You grab the wooden bar lift up and then pull down and push through toward the wall (I'm doing a horrible job describing this, I know). The short story is that you get this really great stretch at the end.

This morning I woke up to rain. No big surprise there, I know. And, of course, there is rain in the forecast every day for the next 10 days. I find this to be rather typical since I just cleaned up my terrace and my patio furniture and was hoping to spend more time out there ... and now there is nothing but rain in the forecast. Ugh.

I still consider myself to be a bit of a fair-weather triathlete, so I didn't want to brave the rain for the Terrier run this morning, so I slept in. Walking home from work today, it wasn't raining right when I left, so I was super optimistic that I might be able to get in a real run outside. Of course, about 5 minutes into my walk, it started raining again, so that idea was out the window. So, I came home, changed clothes and headed to the gym.

I haven't been to the gym in quite some time and my last time there wasn't my favorite. I really wasn't looking forward to running on the treadmill, but I knew it didn't matter and that I could hopefully get 5 miles in. However, when I got there, the gym was filled with meat-heads and every single (working) treadmill was taken. As was every single elliptical machine. So, that meant that I would be using the one available stair master.

I chose to do speed intervals. I thought I would start on level 10 (out of 20) and see how that went. After doing one slow and one fast, I figured I could bump it up to level 12. I had programmed that I would do 45 minutes and since I had no idea of what sort of distance I would get with that, I was hoping that it'd be somewhere in the same range as running for 45 minutes would be.

I forgot how sweaty the stair master is. It didn't take me long until I was just dripping with sweat, which I'm sure was not a pretty sight to see. It also didn't take very long for me to miss being outside. Even when it's hot out and I'm running, just the running itself creates a bit of a breeze to help cool down. That breeze does not exist on a stair master at the gym. Turns out I really missed that today.

I had taken my iPod with me to the gym as a bit of a treat, since with all my outdoor workouts I don't listen to music much anymore. It turned out to be a good thing since it really helped with my motivation. Around the 30 minute mark, I was definitely ready to get off the stair master. I tried talking myself off of the machine by saying that if I wrote my blog and said that I did it for 30 minutes, no one would know that I had planned for 45 if I didn't write it down. Then I realized that was a pretty bad attitude and I should keep going and be honest with my readers and myself.

The screen of the machine kept flashing all these statistics at me. The usual suspects: calories, distance, heartrate, flights climbed ... but then it also flashed statistics for METs and Watts. I had no real idea what a MET was and after reading that link, I'm still not really sure, but what I do know is that the lower level workouts were 7.6 METs and the higher level was 11.2 METs. Whatever that means.

In total, I went for 45 minutes and climbed a total of 233 floors and went an equivalent of 4.64 miles (which, if I had been running would have been a 9:41 mile pace). The stair master wasn't what I had planned, but I felt really good after finishing the workout that I had programmed for myself. I finished up with some stretching, which I haven't been doing enough of recently and it felt really nice to just give my muscles some love.

Whoopin' & Hollerin'

2009-07-19T17:20:00.006-04:00

This afternoon I went to the Terrier swim. Last week at practice, coach Megan had told us that because the 4:30 practice was so crowded, we were welcome to come to the 3:30 race-specific practice instead. I'm not sure if this is the last week of the 3:30 practice since the New York triathlon is next weekend, but I figured I would take advantage of the smaller practice group.

When I got there, the new swim coach, Jamie Barone, was teaching a flip-turn clinic. I know how to do flip-turns, but I just cannot do them on a regular basis because they really hurt my ears. I know that sounds weird, but I have had a lot ear problems ever since I was a kid and something about going too deep in the water (even a couple of feet) really gives me a hard time. I know that if I did them on a regular basis, it would make my pool swimming faster, but I figure that in triathlons you don't really do flip-turns, so I'm probably okay on that.

Jamie told us that he's a fan of doing short, fast sets in practices. He feels like longer, slower sets teach you how to swim slowly and doing faster sets helps you learn how to swim more quickly. We also all lucked out because it ended up that there were only 4 of us who were at the 3:30 practice, so we all had pretty individual attention. This was the workout:

300 Warm-Up
350 Kick
10 x 100 Hard/Easy split
10 x 50 Hard/Easy split
50 Warm-Down

Total distance: 2200 meters (1.36 miles) in approximately 1:05:00

The kick was done in sets. It was 25 hard followed by 25 easy. Then 50 hard followed by 25 easy. And then 75 hard followed by 25 easy. Finally 100 hard with 25 easy. Jamie was walking up and down the side of the pool with us while we were kicking. I was in the far left lane, closest to the wall, so he was mostly walking up and down next to me while we were swimming. He asked me if I had done a lot of swimming as a kid. When I said yes, he said it showed a lot in my kick. He said that I kick a lot from the knee instead of from the hip, which will make my stroke a lot faster and so I worked on that for the rest of the kicking drills. He said he could instantly tell I was kicking faster his way and I did feel a little bit smoother in the water, but it still doesn't feel 100% natural.

After that we did 10 x 100. It was broken up into five 200s that the first one was done fast and the second was done easy. Jamie had a stop watch, so he timed all of us doing our fast 100s. My first 100 was in 1:28, if I'm remembering correctly. I did increase my time from there, I think my third one was 1:33. Then Jamie gave me a different swim cap to wear. I wear a lycra one because I think all of the other kinds hurt my hair, so he told me to put on a silicone one over my lycra one. He said that my original cap carries a lot of water and is giving me too much drag. The funny thing was that after he told me that I was wearing the fast cap, I went down to 1:29 on my fourth hard 100. So, I guess he did know what he was talking about. It probably is worth wearing a second cap, although I would still want to wear the lycra one underneath because those other ones just pull on my hair too much. Or I should just toughen up. But I think I'll choose the second swim cap.

While were doing the fast 100s, Jamie would walk up and down the side of the pool and whistle and yell at us to encourage us. It actually was really pretty awesome and nice. It was definitely the encouragement that I needed to keep going, mostly on the last 25! He told us at one point that if we heard him "whoopin' and hollerin'" that we should just keep swimming - and swimming fast! The recovery 100s were done amazingly slow. I have no idea what the timing was on those, but it was really nice to just take it slow and easy. I did the fast 500 in 7:37 total (about 1:31/100), which was pretty good for me, considering that my normal 100 pace is about 1:50. I'm sure I couldn't have maintained that 7:37 pace if the 500 had been continuous, but still an excellent time. After our last fast 100, Jamie had us take our heart rates. Mine was 180. According to the formula, my max heart rate could be 192. He also had us take our heart rate after the recovery 100 and mine dropped down to 126. He said that ideally it would be about 60 beats slower from one to the other.

We then did the exact same thing with the 10 x 50. We did 5 fast and 5 as recovery. Jamie told us that we wanted our five fast 50s to be less than half of the time that it took us to do the five fast 100s. I came in at 3:30 total, which was definitely less than half of the time, so I felt good about that. The average for each 50 was 0:42. Jamie still walked up and down the pool while we were doing the 50s. He kept reminding me that I should kick from the hips instead of the knees (and yes, he did that while I was swimming by using arm motions). I tried to do it as best I could, but I think it's extremely hard to change your stroke while also trying to swim as fast as we could. We took our heart rates again on the last fast 50 (168 beats/minute) and after the last slow 50 (108 beats/minute). I guess that extra hard 50 really made my heart increase.

So, I'm not sure how often Jamie will be running regular practices. There are additional practices that I know he'll be doing on Thursday nights, but those are for an additional fee, so I'm not sure that I'm quite ready to do that, especially since swimming is not my weakest sport. I do hope that he runs some of the regular Sunday practices as well. I like that there are so many coaches because it really helps shake up the variety of the workouts. Next Sunday there is no swim practice because so many people are doing the New York City triathlon. I'm going to go and cheer on my fellow teammates - I think that counts as a workout, right?

Wash, Rinse, Repeat

2009-07-18T09:21:00.004-04:00

Yesterday was an unplanned rest day. Drew and I had a date planned for Thursday night. He ended up working late, so we got a late start going out. We ended up staying out way too late. As a result, I couldn't drag myself out of bed in time to get a workout in and then after work I was beat.

This morning I had set my alarm for 6 so that I could get a good bike ride in before my mom came to visit for the next few days. Of course, I did not get up at 6:00. Drew was too cuddly for me to get out of bed. Finally, around 7 he said that he would stop snuggling and I had to get up. It had rained pretty hard overnight, so the roads were still all wet, especially in the park where there isn't any traffic.

I had considered a couple of options for workouts today. I had thought that maybe I would do the short loops in the park, but before I left I realized that I need to get ready for Claire's climb and there is only one way to do that. Hill repeats. This was my first time with these things. I'm not really sure how many you have to do for it to qualify as a hill repeat session. At first I thought that maybe four was a good number, but that seemed like it wasn't a whole lot, so I decided that five sounded like better number.

The first one wasn't too bad. Even the second, third, and fourth ones didn't make me want to poke my eyes out. On the fifth one I was questioning why I had decided that five was a good number. My quads were definitely ready to head home by the time I got to the top of the hill the fifth time. And they weren't too happy about the extra couple of hills I had to climb on the way home.

I ended up riding for a total of 1:01:01 and went 13.17 miles (12.95 MPH average). I'm super impressed with that MPH average (although it doesn't look like much) considering the fact that it includes time to and from the park as well as a hill workout! Not too shabby, I think.

Coming home, both my bike and I needed a shower - although my bike had to settle for a wipe down. I wish that there was a way to snap my fingers and get my bike clean, but I haven't figured that one out yet.

I Think I'm Growing Leg Muscles

2009-07-16T06:44:00.003-04:00

The thing about sleeping in (like yesterday morning) is that your body gets tricked into thinking that it can stay up later at night. I tried to get to bed at a decent time last night, but I still think it was after 11:30 by the time I fell asleep. Of course, waking up this morning at 4:55 wasn't any picnic. But, I got up, ate my Clif bar and headed out for the Terrier brick.

When we got there, Robert explained the workout. The run portion would be the last part of the NYC triathlon route so that those people who were doing the race would know the route and be familiar with it. The bike was from the 72nd Street transverse to the 102nd Street transverse. We were supposed to bike all out from transverse to transverse and then recover across them. The workout was supposed to be about 90 minutes in total and however many runs and bikes you could fit into that amount of time was where you would end up.

We all did the run portion as a group first so that we would know the route to take. Robert said that it was about a half mile, but since it took me about 8 minutes to do the first loop, I knew that his math had to be a little bit off. Turns out each loop was 0.85 miles. By the time we got done with that first running loop, I was already pooped and ready to go home. My legs were tired, I was tired, but I knew I just had to get on my bike and do the best I could.

These are my stats for the day:

Park riding: 8.18 miles in 33:55 minutes (14.47 MPH average)
Bike to park and home: 3.50 miles in 24:00 minutes (8.75 MPH average)
Total biking: 11.68 miles in 57:55 minutes

One running loop was 0.85 miles. Did two loops total (1.70 miles) in 15:28 (9:05 pace)

My legs were not very happy about that second biking loop, but I knew I had to suck it up and keep going. I like to think that when they get so tired like that it's because they're working really hard to grow bigger muscles and even though they're tired now it'll be better in the long run (no pun intended).

Out For A Joy Ride With Marilyn

2009-07-15T19:45:00.004-04:00

This morning I woke up on my own at 5:17. When I realized that I didn't have to be awake then, I rolled over and slept happily until almost 8:00. It was quite a treat to have a morning to sleep in and not be up early! Even though that meant that I would have to workout after work, it was totally worth it.

Today at work I noticed that my quads were a little tired and sore. Nothing major, just something I noticed. It seemed a little strange to me that running would have made my quads tired, but I'm guessing that's mostly because in the past I've mostly had shin and heel pain, so it have it somewhere new was a surprise.

While at work today, I got an e-mail from Terrier saying that if we were interested in Ironman Switzerland, we should sign up soon because they are going to race it as a team and training will start after the first of the year. As crazy as it is to say, I actually didn't just delete the e-mail. I'm actually going to give this some thought before just automatically deciding that it is a crazy idea (which, let's face it, you have to be crazy to do one). The race is in August of 2010, so I'd have a year to get ready for it. I have no idea if it's a horrible idea or not, but I'm going to keep thinking about it and weighing my options. I know it would take a lot of time and dedication to get to the finish line, but I also think it would be an amazing and rewarding experience.

After finishing work today, I walked home (and happened to catch Paul McCartney playing live outside at The Late Show, which was pretty awesome!) and got ready for my bike ride. I had been thinking that I didn't want to do anything too hard because obviously my quads were tired already and I have the Terrier brick in the morning. I thought that I would go for a ride up the Westside path since I will be riding in the park in the morning.

When I was getting ready, I decided that I would try out some of the new socks that Drew's mom and dad sent to me. They are actually really nice socks, I think. They're Ironman brand (coincidence?), but the funny thing about them is that at the top of the socks, they have Marilyn Monroe's head. I'm not really sure what the appeal to triathletes would be to have Marilyn on your socks, but I thought they were pretty comfy, so I'm always glad to have more socks (makes the time between loads of laundry longer!).

Setting out, it quickly became apparent that this would not be a serious biking day and would be more of a relaxed ride. The path was packed. I was thinking that when I got further north there would be less traffic. Wrong. There were tons of families out having B-B-Q's (which smelled delicious) and lots of kids running around. I only had to slam on my brakes 5 separate times to narrowly avoid collisions with kids! But, luckily, everything was fine.

I had a really nice ride up to the base of the George Washington Bridge. I didn't think that my legs would be very happy with me going up the three hills, so I decided to just turn around and head back home when I got to that point. If anything, it was busier on the path on the way home, so I didn't sweat it when I got home to see these results on the bike computer:

Total Time: 1:08:56
Total Distance: 14.24
Average: 12.39 MPH

"Real" riding (time not spent traveling to/from the path): 58:56
Distance: 13.04
Average: 13.28 MPH

Ramblin' In The Ramble

2009-07-14T07:42:00.004-04:00

Last night I spent the night at Drew's apartment, which meant that this morning when the alarm went off, I had someone to help push me out of bed and out for my Terrier run. I was actually looking forward to the run this morning, since we were going to be doing the NYC Triathlon course (or at least the park portion of the course). I left Drew's apartment at 5:40, which should have been plenty of time to walk the 1.4 miles from his apartment to the meeting spot and get there at 6:00. I had been planning on just walking down 5th Avenue and turning into the park at 72nd Street, because I wasn't sure that I trusted myself to be able to find my way on the park paths. Turns out I should have listened to my instinct.

Instead, I saw a couple of people turning into the park at 85th Street and I thought to myself that I was pretty sure I could find my way, as long as I kept the road in sight. I was doing pretty well until about 79th Street. Then I entered the Ramble and completely lost my way. The funny thing was that as I was walking through, I heard two runners coming up behind me and thought that they might be fellow Terriers. And they were. I was thinking that I could hopefully just see where they went, but since they were running and I was walking, I quickly lost sight of them. When I emerged from the Ramble, I was standing at the edge of the boating pond, and I could see the fountain, which was where I should have been, but I would have had to swim to get there from where I was. Which meant that I had to turn around and find the road again and just jog on the road to the meeting spot. And I think I added on an extra 1/2 mile in my ramblings.

I ended up being 5 minutes late (so not too bad). I got there in time to do 4 quick stride drills and then it was time to start the workout. Robert had us run around the finish of the NYC tri, so that those who were doing the race would know where the finish was. Then we ran over to the corner of the Park Drive and the 72nd Street transverse (0.55 miles / ~5:00 minutes). From there, our task was to run north around the Park Drive and back to the finish line. We were supposed to run for 3 minutes and then rest/recover for 2. The recovery was technically supposed to be done running in place for 2 minutes, but the slow group that I was a part of walked through the recovery portions.

Running the park backwards - meaning the opposite direction that we normally bike or run - is really interesting. Especially the Harlem hill. It's not nearly as bad going from West to East as it is the other way. Although when I got to the end of the hill on the East side, I was wiped out and took my walking break about 30 seconds early. I didn't feel too bad about it because there were several times where I ran for more than 3 minutes in a stretch, so I think it all evened out.

The total running distance was 5.1 miles, which I finished in 53:38 (10:30 pace). I'm super happy with that time given all of the walking breaks that I took! I then walked the 1.4 miles back to Drew's apartment on the actual roads (I had enough of the park for one morning!).

Total running today: 5.6 miles / 58:38
Total walking today: 3.3 miles / 45:00

It's No Fun With A Dancer

2009-07-13T09:35:00.002-04:00

This morning I met Nicole for a pilates lesson. Unfortunately, Laura is ill after our excursion to Coney Island so she couldn't be there this morning. I'm actually a little nervous about the fact that she got sick and I'm hoping that I'm A-OK and didn't swallow some yucky stuff myself. Because Laura wasn't able to join us, Nicole's friend Cara came instead.

We started out the lesson on the reformer doing some of the beginner basics. When we got to the Tree exercise, I looked over and just had to laugh. Tree requires you to lift up one leg, while the other leg is hooked into a strap. You then tuck your pelvis and lean backwards a bit. And then you crawl your arms down and up the tree (made by the leg that is lifted in the air) by using your ab muscles to pull you back up. Cara, like Nicole, is a dancer, which means that she's got crazy flexibility. When I do tree, my leg is out at least at a 45 degree angle. Cara's leg, on the other hand, was straight up and down in the air. When Cara crawled down the tree, she was so far down, she was in the well behind the reformer carriage. I just looked over and said, "It's no fun to do this with a dancer." There were definitely a few other times where her flexibility was extremely noticeable and made me sad for my own pathetic flexibility.

I will say that I was a little bit happy when Cara yelled out, "I hate you" to Nicole, which made me feel like it wasn't all fun and games for her either. I've actually missed doing pilates the last couple weeks. I'm glad that it'll finally work out that I'll be able to do it for two weeks in a row.

Pool, Glorious Pool

2009-07-12T18:06:00.002-04:00

Today I spent the morning sleeping in. Then I took an afternoon nap. I will say that I was a little bit bummed to be wasting such a nice day staying inside so much, but the sleep was so nice (and needed) that I'm really okay with that. Today was also the Terrier group swim, which meant more time spent indoors. Oh well. Hopefully summer is finally here and that will mean lots more nice weekends to spend outside.

Getting into the pool was so nice compared to getting into the ocean yesterday. While the pool is always a little bit cool, it's nothing like the ocean temperature and it's so nice to be able to see the bottom of the pool and know you're swimming in a straight line. I also never worried about drinking too much water and was actually glad to taste the chlorinated water instead of salt water. Megan was the coach today and she said that we would be doing a lot of speed work.

This was the workout:
300 Warm-Up
10 x 50 - on the 1:00
6 x 75 Pull
12 x 100 - on the 2:10
25 Sprint
75 Cool Down

Total distance = 2550 meters

The 300 warm-up was mostly a warm-up, but every 3rd length was supposed to be an easy to fast build. We should have all known right then that this wasn't going to be an easy workout and that it would pretty much kick our butts. The 10 x 50 were all easy down and fast back and we had a minute to complete each one. I'd say that I finished all of them in less than 0:50 and some were in 0:45, mostly depending on how fast the last 25 was.

The pulling was supposed to be easy-fast-easy. It's just still so interesting to me that people who are not great swimmers can be amazing pullers. I know it's because they obviously don't kick much when they're swimming regularly, but the difference between one and the other is really amazing to watch.

The 12 x 100 were broken down into three groups of 400. The first 100 would be easy, the second 100 would be slightly faster, the third 100 should be at race pace and the fourth 100 should be an all out sprint. Repeated three times and all of the 100s would be on the 2:10, so depending on how fast you swam, you'd have more recovery time. The first set of 400 was definitely the hardest one. Mainly the last 100 sprint. Megan said that she wanted to see us kicking really hard and I don't know why it is, but kicking really hard just takes a lot out of me. By the time we got to the second set of 400, I thought I was about to pee my pants (or bathing suit, as the case may be). I had to get out and go use the restroom, but I only missed a 50 of easy, so I don't think it was a huge deal in terms of the workout.

When we were starting the last sprint 100, I was just thinking how excited I was that once that was done we would get to do a cool-down and be done. Megan had different ideas, though. We had to do one more 25 sprint. She shuffled all of us around so that one person from each lane would have a race against each other. So, all of the really fast people from the far lane would race against each other, etc. When I was standing there, I was thinking that I wasn't sure I had it in me, but I was also thinking that it was only a 25 and I could do it. It actually was much more fun than I had expected - although I'm sure part of that was the competition aspect of it. I'm fairly sure I came in second, but it was pretty close with the girl in the lane next to me.

Finally we got to do the cool-down! I was definitely ready for that. My total distance today was 2500 meters (1.55 miles). I didn't use my stop watch, but I think the total time in the pool was about 1:03, just based on looking at my watch when we got in and out. Obviously not all that time was spent actually swimming as some of it was resting, but it still was a great workout and a good way to start the week.

We Are Like '80s Triathletes

2009-07-11T17:37:00.003-04:00

This morning I met Laura and Jen so that the three of us could head to Coney Island for an open water swim. Because we wouldn't have anyone to watch our stuff, I really took the bare bones and toted all my stuff around in a brown paper bag from Whole Foods (just in case anything was stolen, I wouldn't lose a lot).

The three of us met at Laura's before heading out there. She had suggested that we should all wear brightly-colored swim caps so we would be easy to spot in the water. Since I own a black swim cap and I threw away the white one I used at Staten Island, I needed to borrow one from Laura. She had a neon pink one for me to wear, which definitely fulfilled the brightly-colored requirement.

We got on the train and headed out to the end of Brooklyn. Once we got there, we headed toward the water and set all of our stuff down on the beach and started to get suited up. I had applied Body Glide before leaving my apartment and I'm sure that some of it came off along the way, but I really didn't have any problems getting my wetsuit on. Jen had brought a neon yellow swim cap and Laura had a neon green one. The three of us together reminded me of some sort of bad '80s exercise video with the neon swim caps.

Once we were all suited and capped up, we headed into the water. It was definitely not as cold as I had remembered it being, but the waves were really significant. The last time I was there it was pretty much like swimming in a (very cold) lake. Today, not so much.

We headed out further into the water,about half-way down the jetty. We all just stayed there treading water for a few minutes saying, "OK" but didn't do anything. Finally I said I would countdown from 5 to get us going. And on 1, we all went. It never ceases to surprise me when that actually works. It always still feels a bit to me like we're kids and it's all a trick.

The distance between the jettys is .10 miles. Laura was in disbelief about the distance when we were at one end looking at how far we had to swim, but after swimming there and seeing the time on her watch, she believed me. I don't think that gmap pedometer has lied to me yet, and I guess this proved the point.

We all swam there and back (0.2 miles). Swimming there wasn't too bad because the waves were coming from the left, so it was easy to breathe on the right. Swimming back was another story. Although it was really good practice for breathing on the left. Otherwise the result was a mouthful of water. After the first 0.2 miles, Laura said that she had a sidestitch and was going to rest while Jen and I kept swimming.

Jen and I did another 0.2 miles. On the way there, I started having some goggle issues. Mostly that the right goggle was leaking just a tiny bit. I know that some people actually keep a little bit of water in their goggles to prevent fogging, but I am not one of those people. I think that part of the goggle problem was due to the fact that the waves kept hitting my face and jostling them out of position. I stopped, tried to suction them back into my eye socket as best as I could and kept swimming.

After Jen and I finished that leg, Laura came back and joined us for another 0.2 miles. Half-way through that leg, I realized that I wasn't feeling 100% because of all the salt water that I had swallowed and all I wanted to do was get out and have drink of fresh water. When we finished that part up, I told the girls that I needed to get a drink and that they should keep swimming. I think we had all reached our limits, however. We all ended up getting out of the water and getting something to drink. Once we were out of the water, we realized that we had had enough for one day.

I ended up swimming 0.6 miles in 26:04. Slower than my normal (pool) mile pace, but still fairly good, I thought, considering it was open water with waves! We celebrated our triumph over the waves with Nathan's hot dogs. After all, what's a trip to Coney Island without a hot dog?

The Friendly Park

2009-07-10T07:34:00.005-04:00

This morning Drew and I got up early to head over to Central Park for a run. He is still fighting off this cold, so I did feel a little bit bad dragging him along with me. We walked to the park as a warm-up and as we were walking there Drew said, "The park looks so friendly since it's so green." I started thinking about how great it is to be in such an urban area and still have a great park. Thank you Frederick Law Olmstead!

We started out on our run heading north. I was a little bit pressed for time so I wasn't sure how far I could go before having to head back. I knew that Drew's cold would probably keep him from doing the whole run with me, but it was nice to have company part of the time. He ran with me until about 86th Street, where you can cut through on the path to head back downtown. We ran that 1.6 miles in 15:58 (9:58 pace). He then let me go on with the rest of my run and he started walking home.

I ended up going 3.3 miles in 33:09 (10:02 pace). I felt really good while running and I definitely felt like I could have kept running, except that I really had to rush home and get ready for the day because I had to be at an early meeting.

I am feeling a lot better about Westchester now. I went through a bit of a funk after Staten Island but I definitely feel like I'm back in the groove now. I can't really say that I'm looking forward to actually doing this next triathlon, but I am looking forward to saying that I'm an Olympic-distance triathlete, so I think that will help me mentally prepare.

An Aerobic What?

2009-07-09T07:14:00.004-04:00

This morning I woke up and I couldn't believe it! No rain!! That meant that I could actually get up and go to the Terrier brick. Even more surprising, when I was getting ready and listening to the radio, the weatherman said that there wasn't any rain in the forecast for the entire day. That just seems like crazy talk, but I'm really glad.

I headed over to the park. When I was riding at 5:15, I was thinking about how the back reflector on my bike seems to have fallen off somewhere along the way and that it really wasn't that light out yet and I was wearing mostly black. Of course, there isn't a lot of traffic, so I wasn't that concerned, but it seems like it might be worth it to get one of those blinking lights that clips on me for riding in those situations.

I was one of the first people who got to the meeting spot. I took out my running shoes and hat to get set-up for the transition. While I was doing that, two girls came up to a couple of the guys who were also there and asked them for directions to Shakespeare in the Park. The girls were clearly intoxicated. I mentioned to someone else that they were pretty much the opposite of everyone else there - we were all about to workout and they were drunk at 5:30 in the morning. Now, I'm not sure precisely what happened, but the girls either got bad directions or didn't really hear the directions they were given (I couldn't hear what they were told), but they took off walking in the wrong direction.

By this time, it was 5:30 and time to get our workout for the day. Robert said that we were supposed to basically do an hour on the bike - 10 minute warm-up, 10 minute build (in the big chain ring), 5 minute spin, 10 minute build, 5 minute spin, 10 minutes at race pace, 5 minute easy spin. This would be followed by a 20 minute run. He explained that the builds were supposed to be in our big ring at a lower cadence than normal. Then this was the part where I lost him. He started talking about anaerobic exercise and working our muscles this way and that way and while I understand that all of that stuff (aerobic/anaerobic/lactic acid) is supposed to be important to triathletes, I just don't really understand. I think at this point, I need to be worried about the basics and spending more time working out than I do about all this science stuff.

I figured I would do one loop of the park and then see how I was feeling and what the timing was. I did the first loop as I would normally do it (in the medium chain ring), with one exception. Instead of switching to my "granny gear" to go up the Harlem hill, I left it in the medium ring and made it up the hill just fine. I'm not sure I went any faster or slower than I had before, but I felt pretty proud that I could do it without making it any easier. The second loop, I decided that I would ride in my big ring until the hill again. It actually wasn't as bad as I had imagined it would be. I think my cadence was averaging around 75 instead of 90+, so I didn't think that was horrible either. On the hill, I again put it back to the middle ring for the climb up. I did put it back to the big ring for a couple of minutes, but around 90th Street, I switched back to the middle ring for the rest of the ride. I think I did the bike (~12 miles) in about 50 minutes (14.5 MPH average). [Total bike mileage with rides to/from park: 15.81 in 1:09:24 (13.7 MPH average)]

When I got back to the benches, there were a couple of guys standing around, but I didn't really think anything of it. I knew they were Terriers. When I was putting on my running shoes and throwing on my hat, I heard one of them say, "Do you want to try to get cleaned up?". I started running away and noticed that one of the guys had blood on his shirt. I figured he had fallen off his bike, but he appeared to be okay, so I just kept going.

I wasn't entirely sure where I should run (north or south) to get a 20 minute run in. I figured I would start running south and see what happened from there. If it looked like it was going to be too long, I could always cut back up the Mall back to the bandshell. It turns out that the loop that I did was 1.72 miles and I ran for 16:18 (9:30 pace). When I was running, I felt like my calves were getting a little bit cramped up, but nothing that I couldn't run through and it actually felt better the longer that I ran. However, I figured 16 minutes was close enough to 20. Plus, when I got back to the 72nd Street transverse, I noticed that there was a cop car there and I thought maybe they were there to talk about what I had assumed was a bike accident.

Boy, was I wrong about that. Turns out that while everyone was out bike riding, the drunk girls had come back. We do have a "watch dog" that keeps an eye on our stuff for us. The girls had sat down on one of the benches and started messing with some of the stuff. From what I understand, the watch dog asked them to stop and to please leave and it escalated from there. The girls started hitting the watch dog with shoes that they had picked up and then tried to run off with some of our stuff. The blood that I had seen on his shirt earlier was really a result of a pretty serious cut that he had gotten on his arm. I think the crazier part of all of this was that this poor guy was a fill-in for the person who was actually supposed to be the watch dog today and I had considered filling in myself, but I knew that I really needed to get a good workout in.

As I was leaving, more cops were arriving as well as an ambulance so it looked like everything was under control. And all of my stuff was there and untouched so I packed up and headed home. I know it's not something that I normally think about, but apparently being a watch dog is a dangerous job!

** As an update, the story gets worse and better: I found out that the cut on his arm was actually from one of the girls biting him! How crazy is that? The good news is that the girls were arrested, so at least they're not out there on the streets right now continuing on with their bad drunken behavior. **

Our Own Private Pool

2009-07-08T09:20:00.002-04:00

This morning I met Laura for a swim. We had to change pools at the last minute and ended up going to the Atlantis Health Club / Marriott Hotel swimming pool. When we walked into the pool area, I wasn't so sure about it. It was only a 50-foot pool (16.66 yards), so really short. The shallow end was also extremely shallow (only 3 feet deep!).

Once I got in, however, I felt a lot better about the pool. The nicest part was that Laura and I were the only people in the pool for most of the time we were there. At some point a couple came and swam for a while, but that still meant that Laura and I had half of the pool to ourselves. I don't think Laura was ever really as excited as I was about the pool, but I loved that no one else was there and that we didn't have to worry about crazy swimmers messing up our swimming time.

The three-foot deep shallow end was a little weird. At some point I realized that it would be a good way to practice dolphins as if I was doing a beach start for a triathlon. It actually was pretty good practice and I am really hoping that Westchester is a beach start instead of a deep water start.

All in all, I swam for 23:46 and went 3500 feet (0.66 miles). I know that I'm going to have to start doing longer workouts and I am now feeling like I can get back into the groove of working out every day. I was just going through a bit of a rut after Staten Island and with the holiday weekend, but I am feeling a lot better about this now. All I need now is for the weather to cooperate!

I'm Going 5 Miles An Hour And I'm Wearing A Helmet

2009-07-04T14:50:00.005-04:00

This morning, we all got up and headed over to the gun range for some shooting. Drew needed to practice for his big trip to Africa at the end of the month. We shot handguns and rifles. The biggest rifle I shot was a .308, which definitely had some kick! It was a fun way to spend the morning.

We got back to Drew's parents' house and I changed into my running gear. Drew had caught a bit of a cold, so he couldn't run with me. So, we did something really silly instead. Drew rode along beside me on his mom's scooter. I'm pretty sure he felt ridiculous riding around going 5 or 6 mile per hour and wearing a helmet.

The run was basically a big rectangle. The original ru n that Drew had mapped out was 4.5 miles, but I only ended up running 4.0 miles. I ran that distance in 43 minutes (10:43 pace). The last road on the rectangle was a more major road (instead of the more country roads we had been on earlier). Drew said he wouldn't be able to go so slowly on that road, so he drove off toward home. About 3 minutes later, I heard a very familiar sound and Drew was there behind me. He had done a circle as a surprise. I was really glad I was still running and wasn't cheating and walking.

I've been getting a lot of headaches while running in the heat recently. Today was no exception. I'm hoping I can get to the bottom of this because I think I'd be able to keep going (although at my slow pace) if my head wasn't pounding.

Fair-Weather Triathlete

2009-07-02T17:29:00.003-04:00

This morning I woke up to rain and didn't go to the Terrier brick (although I'm not 100% sure that there actually was a Terrier brick). I figured when it was still raining at 5:15 that I wouldn't be happy out there in the rain. Then, I went to work early in the hopes that it wouldn't be raining when I got out of work early. Nope. Torrential downpour on my way home. I'm now declaring myself to be a fair-weather triathlete. I'm also headed to Wisconsin for the weekend with Drew and some other friends. I'm planning on running at least twice while I'm there, so hopefully that will be enough to offset my milking of the excuse "I just did a triathlon."

Next week I will start training for Westchester, I promise.

There Was Some Trickery Involved

2009-07-01T08:08:00.002-04:00

When I woke up this morning it looked like it was just foggy outside and I was thinking that would be just fine for going for a bike ride. I laid in bed for a few more minutes and then I noticed that the terrace was a bit wet in patches where it hadn't been a few minutes before. I then cursed Mother Nature and the rain. However, after getting out of bed and going outside, I realized that it wasn't actually raining. I got dressed and looked outside again. And then there it was raining again! I decided I would have to give up on the bike riding idea and go to the gym.

Of course, when I got outside to start walking to the gym, it wasn't raining at all and it was just rather muggy outside. I will say that right then and there I wasn't very happy with the trick that was being played on me, especially since the last thing I wanted to do was go to the gym. But, I went anyway. I got on the treadmill and just did a quick two miles (at a 9:42 pace). I wanted to make sure that I had plenty of time after getting off the treadmill to get in a lot of good stretching. Boy oh boy, is the treadmill boring! I even was listening to my iPod and watching Sports Center with subtitles, but it's just not the same as running outside. I wish that all this rain would just go away. I had had enough of it a month ago. And now it's July and we're supposed to be dying with heat and it's barely 70 degrees outside right now. This global warming thing sure is an odd beast.

My Own Personal Trainer

2009-06-30T20:48:00.005-04:00

This morning I just couldn't get up and out of bed. I think it was residual sleepiness from Saturday. Really makes me wonder how sleepy I'll be after the Olympic triathlon. Of course, by not doing my workout this morning, that meant that when I left work it was pouring. I came home to change clothes and realized that I just did not want to go to the gym and run on the treadmill. All I really wanted to do was go outside, but not in the pouring rain. I was IMing with Drew and told him my predicament and he suggested that I should do something in my apartment. He even offered to give me a workout. He said that he wouldn't be easy on me. So, I turned the air conditioning up, laid out my yoga mat and waited for instructions.

Set #1 (repeated three times):
25 jumping jacks, 5 real push-ups, 10 push-ups on my knees, 30 second wall sit

I laughed out loud during the very first jumping jacks. Mostly because I couldn't believe that I was doing this and I was also thinking of Drew imagining me doing jumping jacks while he was sitting in his office. I found the wall sit to be a lot easier than in the past (and I didn't even cheat!). I'm guessing that my legs are stronger now from biking.

Set #2 (repeated three times):
20 crunches, 30 second plank (on forearms), 20 squats

The crunches were really hard for me. I have been having a lot of pain in my right shoulder blade recently. This all started right after I fell off my bike, so I do wonder if it's related. It was finally feeling a tiny bit better this morning, so I only did 2 sets of the crunches because they were so painful in my shoulder. I figured that it was probably okay as I really don't want to aggravate it even more.

Set #3 (repeated three times):
Leg raises for 30 seconds (legs about 8" off the ground), 20 knee highs, 20 butt kickers, 10 things where you jump up and then go flat on the ground

Drew said that if I was really tough, I could drum my fists on my abs like he did when he was in football during the leg raises. I actually was wondering when Drew even played football (in middle school is my guess) and I'm thinking that holding your legs up in the air and pounding on your abs was a lot easier then. At least I didn't find that part to be very easy. And I was only tough enough to pound on my abs one time. And as far as these things where you are standing up, go down into plank, do a push-up, jump your feet forward, then jump all the way off the ground ... really, really sweaty. I pretty much hated those by the end. And I was dripping with sweat. I think this was about the time that I had to go turn the air conditioning down even further.

Set #4 (repeated three times):
10 stand ups (sat on edge of coffee table, hands out at side, and use only thigh muscles to stand up), 15 jump lunges (lunge and jump while scissoring legs to reverse the lunge), 10 tricep dips (held onto edge of coffee table, legs extended and lowered down)

I was not particularly good at the jump lunges. I was a little bit wobbly, so I had to slow down and try to them better. My arms were also burning at this point during the tricep dips. Do I not work my arms when training for a triathlon? How did they get so tired so easily?

Set #5 (repeated three times):
30 jumping jacks, squat in front of the couch and punch the back 20 times each arm, 5 real push-ups, 10 knee push-ups, 2 real push-ups.

The squats were a little bit funny. I was worried at first when I read the exercise that I wouldn't be able to reach the back of my couch to punch it, but it worked just fine. Drew had to remind me, of course, to keep my thumbs out of my fist while punching. I only recently learned that if you keep your thumbs in, you can break them if you're throwing a real punch. I felt really silly punching the back of my couch, but it didn't seem to mind. The push-ups were killer. I thought the last two real push-ups were cruel and unusual punishment. I actually whined to Drew during this set about the push-ups. I had had enough!

Set #6:
30 second wall sit, 30 second leg raise, 30 second calf raises (balanced on one leg), 30 second plank, 30 second standing on one leg, other leg behind with arms out at sides

This time the wall sit wasn't so easy. I was definitely counting down the seconds until I could get up. The calf raises were pretty hard. I was surprisingly better at balancing on my left leg than my right leg. I'm still not really sure I understand why that was.

Set #7:
40 ankle lunges (leg at 45 degree angle instead of out in front), 20 jumping jacks, 20 couch punches (each fist), 20 tricep dips

I sort-of lost count when doing the jumping jacks and ended up doing 31 because I forgot that I only had to do 20. I will say that the jumping jacks were the most fun (and the easiest exercise). I'm not really sure I understand the benefit of jumping jacks, but I also think I'd like to do them more often. After the lunges, the last think I wanted to do was squat in front of my couch. And of course, my arms were oh-so-happy about the tricep dips.

All in all, the workout was an hour long. Much longer than I would have imagined. It was also a lot sweatier than I would have thought it could be. I was pretty impressed that Drew came up with all those exercises. I'm also really glad that I have this written down because the next time that I'm just not interested in going out in the rain, this is going to be my fall-back workout. I will say that after doing this workout, I wouldn't recommend going to the pet store and carrying home 28 pounds of kitty litter and 8.5 pounds of cat food. That's probably an unofficial Set #8.

Drew wanted me to rate him on the following (using a 4 star scale):
Intensity: ***
Interestingness: ****
Sweatiness: ***
You-Hate-Me-Ness: Varied between * and **** depending on the exercise
You'd-Do-It-Again Ness: ****

The only comment (that wasn't really his fault) is that there was a minute or two of down time between sets while I waited for him to type. Towards the end he got better at just being able to send me the next set right away. I think that was slightly more effective for keeping my heart-rate up. All in all, I thought this was a great workout. I don't think I'll be able to lift my arms tomorrow, but who would need to do that?

The Sleepiest Triathlete

2009-06-29T19:58:00.002-04:00

Saturday after getting home from the race, eating lunch, and showering it was time for a nap. Drew and I took a three hour nap before heading out to Brooklyn for dinner at a friend's house. I will say that having someone make dinner for you the night after a triathlon is pretty fantastic. By about 10 that night I was exhausted again an we headed back to the city.

Sunday morning I woke up around 9 and walked Drew to work. I walked home and did some stuff around the apartment. I was planning on heading to the Terrier swim, but I fell asleep around 1:30 and woke up at 4:27. Since practice starts at 4:30, there wasn't really any way that I could get there in time. I took that as a sign that my body needed a little bit more rest.

This morning I woke up early to meet Laura and have a pilates session with Nicole at 7:00. I haven't been to pilates in a while because Nicole was out of town last week. Boy oh boy, was my stomach tired today. I felt like my abdominal muscles had lost a good deal of fitness. It sort-of felt like it would be comparable to not doing any cardio for two weeks and then trying to go for a long run.

I had a really good workout, even though I felt like I was struggling a bit throughout the workout. The good thing was that when I told Nicole how I was feeling about how hard I thought today workout was, she said that I was looking really good at the lesson. That made me feel better. However, because of the holiday next week, I'll be in the same situation again in two weeks. I probably better do some crunches on my own in the meantime!

My First Tri

2009-06-27T14:55:00.004-04:00

Well, I did it. My first triathlon. I woke up in plenty of time. Drew made a nice breakfast for us and I double-checked the list and we headed to Staten Island. The exit from the highway that we were supposed to use was closed, so I was momentarily worried that we'd get lost, but once the cab driver looked at the map, we turned around and found the location very easily.

I noticed the Terrier bike trailer was there, so I went to collect my bike right away. I had brought my bike pump because I was too nervous without it. It actually turned out to have been a good thing to bring, since the Terrier pump was broken and I think about half of the team (and Laura) ended up using the pump. As soon as I had my bike all set, I headed over to the transition area. I racked my bike and started setting up my area. I cheated a little bit to see what the people around me were doing and to make sure I laid everything that I would need out. I had brought three water bottles - two for drinking and one to use to rinse my feet off in T1. My plan was to drink one whole water bottle before the race and then fill that one up with Gatorade. I took my water bottle and went to find Drew and to say hi to my dad and step-mom.

I had wanted to get in a short run before the race, but that didn't work out. I think I could have done it, but I'm sort-of glad I didn't because they closed the transition area at 7:15 and I think if I had gone for the short run, I would have felt too rushed. I felt a tiny bit rushed as it was. After they closed the transition area, we had our mandatory pre-race meeting. Then everyone headed over to the beach and we were able to get in the water before the race. When I was walking to the beach, I ran into Robert and a couple of other Terriers and we all got into the water together.

Not surprisingly, the water was pretty cool. I'm really glad that I got into to acclimate myself to the temperature, and when I saw how many people were standing on the beach and not getting into the water, I couldn't believe it! It seemed crazy to me that everyone wouldn't get in, but I guess that everyone has their own pre-race strategy.

I was in the water for 15-20 minutes and then got out and walked back along the beach to the starting area. Before I knew it, they were blowing the whistle for the first wave and it was time for me to get into the water. When they blew the whistle for my wave, I pressed start on my watch and started swimming. I did not have a very good swim. I'm not entirely sure what went wrong. I didn't feel panicked or worried about drowning. I could clearly sight the buoys and used the Verrazano as well for sighting. I think that part (or most of my problem was mental). I realized half-way there on the swim that I couldn't believe that I had signed up to do a triathlon. And even more than that, I couldn't believe I was doing one at that very moment. And I was just thinking that I sort-of had to pee and I had a long way to go before I could use a bathroom. So, I did a couple of stokes of breast-stroke, tried to get my head together, and just keep swimming. I felt like I never really got into a rhythm when I was swimming, which was part of my problem as well. As I was getting out of the water, I was thinking that this whole triathlon thing was crazy and I didn't want to keep running up to the transition area. Then as I was starting to unzip my wetsuit, I saw Drew, who was cheering me on, holding a big encouraging sign (that said "Wow! You're fast!") and taking photos. That made me realize that I had better HTFU and keep going. Although I started running out of the water and towards the transition area, I definitely slowed down to a walk for most of the run in from the beach.

T1 went really well for me. I yanked my wetsuit down and got it off really quickly. Then I poured water on my feet to get the sand off my feet. I didn't really dry my feet off since it seemed like too much work. I pulled on my right sock with no trouble, but I put the left sock on upside-down. That meant I had to take it off and try again. I clipped my race belt on, threw my helmet on and clipped it, and grabbed 1/2 of a Clif bar. I had thought to open the wrapper before the race, so all I had to do was break off a piece. I shoved most of that in my mouth in about three bites while running out of the transition area and heading to the bike mount area.

I got clipped into my bike with no trouble, which I was really glad about. Then I was off. The road that the course was on was pretty bad. There were several holes in the road marked with orange spray paint, but the entire road was really bumpy. The bike course was 3 loops on a 4 mile course (although looking at my bike computer, it might have been just a bit shorter than that). The turn around points were pretty sharp U-turns, so I made sure to really slow down on those. On my way back on the first loop, I looked at my watch and thought that I could possibly see Laura sometime soon. And then, just after having that thought, she was there! I yelled to her, which was fun. I ended up seeing her a few more times on the bike, so it was nice to have something to do. I did think that the bike was pretty boring. I'm guessing that part of that was that it was a loop course. I also think part of it was just that I was trying to race instead of just practice in the park. I don't know if all those crazy pedestrians and bike riders that I complain about so much make bike riding better, but they certainly make it more interesting.

On my second loop at the turn around to head back, the guy in front of me must have been taking the turn too fast because he wiped out. I stopped (remembering to unclip first) and asked if he was okay. It looked like he would be fine - probably just some scrapes and bruises. I clipped back in and yelled to a police officer and was back on my way. I really felt bad riding away, but he was sitting up and wasn't visibly bleeding and I knew assistance was coming, so I felt better about that. I'm not 100% sure what the right protocol is on that. Hopefully I didn't do the wrong thing. I remembered to drink my entire water bottle on the bike, so I was feeling pretty good about my hydration/nutrition.

Drew was waiting with his sign, camera, and cheers at the beginning turn around. That was actually rather helpful because I knew after I had seen him two times, it was time for me to exit the bike course. I dismounted and headed back to transition. I saw my step-mom as I was heading into T2.

I thought my second transition went smoothly as well. I ran in, racked my bike, and then switched shoes. I had unclipped my helmet as soon as I entered the transition area, so that I could remember to take it off. I turned my race belt around so that the number would be facing forward, grabbed my running hat and was off.

I started out going pretty slowly on the run. I knew that I just didn't have anything faster than that in me at that point. I looked at my watch while I was exiting T2 and realized that I was under an hour in at that point and it was looking like my hour and a half goal might be possible. The run was a there-and-back course. About half-way out, there was a water station. I took a cup of water and kept running, which wasn't very effective for getting the water into my mouth. At the turn-around, there were large cups of water. I took one of those, slowed down to a walk so that I could take 4 or 5 sips, and then dumped the rest on me to cool off and I kept running. Although I was a little disappointed with myself for walking those few steps, it was definitely worth it for the water break. I had known before-hand that part of the run back would be on the boardwalk. I was really nervous that I would feel dizzy and weird like I had last weekend at Coney Island while running on that boardwalk. Luckily, this one wasn't in the same pattern as the Coney Island boardwalk so I actually was okay. I also tried to avoid looking at the boardwalk and instead tried to look at the other runners or the ocean.

There was loud music playing at the finish line, so once I started to hear that, I knew I was almost there. I looked at my watch and it was definitely getting closer to being an hour and a half. I picked up my pace a little bit for about the last 1/2 mile of the course. And then, before I knew it, I was almost at the finish line and then I was crossing the finish line! My un-official time was 1:28:41 (according to my watch). I was really, really happy with that. I had said the other day that I would be happy with anything under 2 hours, but I was really hoping for an hour and a half, so that was awesome.

These were my splits and total times:

Swim: 9:43
T1: 2:30
Bike: 44:10 (16.3 MPH pace)
T2: 1:15
Run: 31:06 (10:02 pace)
Total time: 1:28:42
Place: 448 (out of 591) / 28 (out of 37) in my age division / 144 (out of 235) females

I know if I had been able to have a better swim and run into T1 that I would have been more competitive in my age group. However, I still feel really pleased with those results. I'm especially glad that I biked over 15 MPH average and my run was right around a 10-minute mile pace. I followed my race plan pretty well, I think. It definitely helped me to have thought it all out before-hand to make sure I didn't forget anything in transition and to have goals to try to aspire to.

So, I will say that I didn't love the race. I've been trying to figure out why that was. I'm wondering if part of it is that I got so spoiled having a workout partner most of the time that doing it all by myself was a little lonely and boring for me. I also was thinking the whole time about Westchester and how it's longer and I'm not really sure why I would want to do that since I consider myself to be a relatively sane human being. However, I do really like the training for the races and I think that it's an excellent way to keep myself motivated to stay in shape. I wouldn't be surprised if I keep signing up for them in the years to come. I'm hoping that next time when I have more of an idea of what to expect I will find it to be more enjoyable.

I do want to say thank you to everyone who helped me get this far. All the support and encoragement I got along the way was pretty incredible. I never really considered that I would be a triathlete in my life, so it's amazing to me that I can now say that I am one.

Let's Make A Deal

2009-06-26T09:35:00.004-04:00

OK, Mother Nature. Here's the deal: It can rain all day today. It can rain all day Sunday. But let's just have a little rest from approximately 6 AM on Saturday until about noon. OK? I think that's a fair compromise! I had a rough night sleeping. I woke up about 4 times during the night, which isn't like me at all. I know it's all nerves since each time I woke up, I vaguely remembered some sort of triathlon dream. The worst part was that I think I'm going to go through all of that again tonight, too!

I am mostly excited for tomorrow. I started lying out all of the things I need to take with me in the morning so I won't forget something in my sleepiness. My goal for tomorrow is to finish the race. I don't really know what to expect on the times, but I'm hoping that I can get the whole thing done in about an hour an a half. Really, anything under two hours and I'll be happy. I have no idea what to expect for transition times, but I'm hoping that the second one doesn't take as long as the first.

This is my general plan for the race: Wake up early and eat a good breakfast at home. Finish packing up and get into a cab at about 5:30 to head to Staten Island. Hopefully I will arrive around 6 AM. If the Terrier trailer is there, I will get my bike and head over to the transition area to rack my bike and start setting up my area. I would like to get in a quick run (about 10 minutes or so) and I'd also like to get into my wetsuit and get into the water so that I can acclimate my body before the actual race. If I spend about 5-10 minutes in the water, I think I will be good with that. There is a mandatory race meeting at 7:35, so that will be my time to relax and calm down before the race starts.

I am in Wave #2, which goes at 8:05. My plan for the swim is to start strong and try to stay out in front of the wave of swimmers. I would like to swim hard, but also be relaxed. I don't want to burn all my energy on the swim. As soon as my hand starts hitting while swimming in, I will stand up and start running in while also pushing my goggles up to my forehead. I will then unzip my wetsuit and peel it down to below my hips. If I'm still running to transition, I will take my cap and goggles completely off. Once I get into the transition area, I will pull the wetsuit down the rest of the way and get out of it. I plan on taking the additional time to rinse off and dry my feet as I don't think that I will have a comfortable rest of my race with sand in my socks. To finish up my transition, I will put my socks and bike shoes on. I will clip my race belt around my waist. I will put my helmet on and clip it. If I need my sunglasses, I will take those with me as well. I will then head towards the exit and out for my bike.

Once on the bike, I know the course is supposed to be flat, so I'd like to at least keep my regular average of about 15 MPH. If it's more than that, I'll be extremely happy, but I'd like to keep it at least at my normal level. I will remember to drink as much as possible on the bike course. Especially because I need to make sure that I'm hydrated enough for the run. Ideally, I'd like to finish the bike in 50 minutes or less. When heading back to transition, I will remember to unclip from the pedals before stopping to avoid an embarrassing fall! Once I've racked my bike again, I will take off my helmet, switch from bike to running shoes, grab my running hat, move my race number around to the front and head back out to the course. I will remember that drinking is a good thing and if there is water on the course, I will take it. I hope to run at a 10 minute mile pace. Obviously, if it's faster, that would be fantastic, but anything around 10 minutes/mile will make me very happy. I hope to finish the run strong and sprint towards the finish line with a smile on my face at the finish.

I'll be posting a full race report tomorrow after the race! I can't believe that it's already time for my first race. I know that it's just a sprint and that it's not a huge deal in the scheme of things, but I will say that I'm really proud of myself for getting this far. I had no idea in February what exactly I was getting myself into. I've stuck with the training for the most part and I didn't burm myself out. In fact, I am looking forward to upping the training level a bit for Westchester once Saturday is over. But, let's not get ahead of ourselves. One race at a time...

I Think I Swallowed A Bug

2009-06-25T07:26:00.004-04:00

This morning was the first time that I made it to a Terrier brick workout. That partly had to do with the fact that it's been raining for the last month and partly because the workout starts at 5:30, which is really early. I really wanted to go this morning so that I could practice transitioning from the bike to the run a couple of times before Saturday.

I got there and Robert was coaching the practice. He said that we would be doing a run-bike-run-bike-run workout. The bike portion would be the 4.0 mile loop from the 72nd Street transverse to the 100th Street transverse. The run portion would be the 0.50 mile loop from the bandshell heading south down to the end of the Mall and then back up the pathway just West of the Mall.

The first run I just wanted to laugh at. We were supposed to run with our bikes. The catch was that we couldn't hold onto the handlebars. We could only hold onto the saddle. Turns out that I'm not very good at that part. My bike just kept wanting to turn left. I know that I wasn't doing a very good job at steering. I learned later on in the workout that it is a lot easier if you hold your arm out in front of you, rather than next to you. Somehow having your arm out in front gives you more leverage over the bike and helps it go straight. Either way, on that first run, I was definitely the last person to finish (no big surprise there!), but I wasn't as down in the dumps this time as I was on Tuesday. I blamed my slow speed on my bike rather than my legs. I didn't time that run on my watch - I just included that time in the total bike mileage and time.

I used my new speed laces today for the first time. They're fantastic! Because they're longer, I'm able to lace my shoes all the way up and I still have plenty of give on the laces. My feet felt fine and didn't fall asleep at all. I also felt like my shoes were really secure on my feet, so I think these new laces are a winner.

Transitioning from the run to the bike and the bike to the run went pretty smoothly for me. I know I'm not the fastest person, but as long as I don't get too flustered I think I'll be fine. I even remembered to take my hat so that I could practice putting that on since I want to wear it on Saturday. The weather on Saturday is looking pretty good - it's supposed to be 85 and sunny, but not too humid. I think that sounds about perfect for a race, although since I've never raced before, I don't know for sure.

When I got on the bike for the first time, I noticed right away that there were tons of little gnats out and about this morning. I'm pretty sure I swallowed at least one. I spit out two or three (maybe I should learn to ride my bike with my mouth shut). I also got a bug in each eye. They were everywhere! I've never noticed these bugs in the park before, so I was quite surprised. Maybe all the recent rain has made the bugs come out in full force.

All in all today, my total bike mileage was 11.65 miles (including riding to and from the park and the initial 0.50 mile run with the bike). I finished that distance in 54:44, which is a 12.77 MPH pace. The two 0.50 mile runs (1.0 mile total) was completed in 8:09. That's right. That's an 8:09 pace! I know that I did the first 0.50 mile in 4:16, which I was still pretty happy with. On the second 0.50 mile, I was dragging a little bit half-way through. At that point, one of the guys on the team came up behind me and said, "C'mon, pick up your cadence." That was really all the boost I needed to finish up strong and in record time!

Where Oh Where Has My Flexibility Gone?

2009-06-24T22:40:00.003-04:00

Last night I had a dream about over-sleeping on Saturday and missing the triathlon. In the dream, it was Drew's fault because it was raining and he didn't want to have to stand out in the rain all morning, so he didn't wake me up. He promised me (in real life) that we wouldn't over-sleep, so I think we'll be all set for the race.

Today I had been hoping to go workout with either Laura or Drew, but work kept both of them from being able to do anything this morning. When I woke up this morning, I realized that was probably for the best because I was quite sore from yesterday's Terrier run. At first I couldn't figure out why my rear-end would be sore from running, since that has never happened before. And then I remembered the lunges. And the back-lunges. And the squats. I think all three of those things did me in. I decided that I would take the day off and let my normally unused muscles rest a little bit.

I found a restorative yoga class to go to tonight. I thought that it might be helpful to just do some restful stretching. The class I went to was actually called Yin + Restorative. Apparently the Yin part is for sore joints and the Restorative is for sore muscles. I definitely had the latter. I went to the Exhale yoga studio and had the same teacher, Marcy, that I had the last time I went for a regular class. I was thinking that teaching restorative yoga must be the most boring thing in the world. There are several people all lying around almost falling asleep and you just have to sit there for 3 minutes while they hold each pose.

All the poses that we did that involved anything to do with your hamstrings were practically impossible for me. There was one where we were sitting up with our legs spread apart. We then were supposed to fold over onto a bolster and rest in that position. I could barely lean forward my hamstrings were so tight and had to prop my bolster up with blocks in order to be comfortable. Forget about folding all the way over! The girl in front of me in class was ridiculously flexible. I was quite jealous. I think tonight was a good reminder that I really should try to stretch even more than I normally do and to try to get more yoga in as 'forced stretching'.

The Slowest On The Team

2009-06-23T07:36:00.004-04:00

Last night I went to my doctor for acupuncture for my right shoulder. I'm not sure how I hurt it (falling off the bike, perhaps?) but it definitely hurts and wasn't feeling much better over the weekend. It's definitely feeling a little bit better this morning, although still not back to normal. I'm hoping that it'll be mostly better by Saturday!

This morning was the group Terrier run and I was finally able to get up early and it wasn't raining, so everything worked out for me to make it to the run today. I switched the shoelaces on my shoes back to the regular laces, so my feet were a lot happier than they had been on Sunday when they were falling asleep with the speed laces on. I'm going to try to go at lunch today to see about getting some different speed laces, so stay tuned for more on that.

When we got there, instead of doing our usual strides workout, we did some body strength work as well. We started by doing 15 push-ups and then we would stride over to the other side for another exercise. We did squats, plank position for a minute, lunges, back lunges, mountain climbers, more push-ups, and some other get down and jump up exercise that I don't have a name for.

The run today was a 5 or 6 mile tempo run, unless you were racing this weekend. Then you were just supposed to do a 4 mile run. Of course, you were supposed to increase the pace for 30 seconds every 2 minutes, but I sort-of skipped over that part of the instructions and just focused on the 4 mile run part. The whole group headed out and north.

I was towards the front when we started and then every single person on the team passed me. Seriously, even the older guy who was walking part of the time was faster than I was. How depressing is that? When he passed me and then started walking I thought to myself that I could totally catch him now. Right when I was almost there, he started running again. So, basically, I'm not even in competition with the 50+ age group. Grrrr... I really had just starting feeling more confident about this triathlon and now I'm just thinking about everyone blowing by me on the run.

I knew I wasn't running as fast today as I did on Sunday or even the past couple times, but I thought that was okay as I didn't want to push myself too hard before the race on Saturday. I ended up running 3.75 miles in 39:21 (10:29 pace) which I think is fine for my level. There was, however, also a lot of walking involved (walking to and from the meeting place) which ended up being 2.5 miles of walking.

All in all, I do really feel okay with where I am running. It's just really frustrating to be the slowest one all of the time. I know that if I just keep at it I will improve, but I am starting to feel like I've hit a wall on pacing.

Open Water Swimming Makes Me Hungry

2009-06-21T15:53:00.003-04:00

This morning I got up early in order to get ready and packed for my open water swim and run clinic with the Terriers. Drew was kind enough to get up early too and go the grocery store so that he could make breakfast for us. We had eggs, turkey bacon and toast. Seemed like a well-balanced meal to start the day.

I left my apartment around 9:30, because I knew it could take an hour to get out to Coney Island and with slower subway service on Sundays, I didn't want to be late for the 11:00 start time. I ended up getting off the train with about 12 minutes to spare. I started walking to the meeting place and luckily saw Lisa, so that was a nice surprise to see a familiar face.

Of course, as we were waiting for everyone else to arrive, it was raining lightly. At least there was no thunder, so it wasn't a problem swimming. Everyone else got there right around 11:00. Robert, the coach, talked to us all for a few minutes before we headed down to the beach. He asked who was nervous about swimming and reminded us that as kids we would have been dying to get into the water, but as adults we all become afraid, which is sort-of an interesting thought.

Robert said that it was really important on the day of the race to make sure that we get in the water before the race in order to acclimate our bodies to the water temperature. Once we got all suited up into our wetsuits, we all headed out to the water. Those first few steps into the water made me lose all feeling in my toes. Then, once I stuck my arms in, they were freezing as well (I have a sleeveless wetsuit). However, after staying in the water for a few minutes and swimming around, I felt a lot better. My face still felt cold when I had to stick it back in the water after taking a breath, but it wasn't horrible.

After we got used to the water temperature, we all got out of the water so that we could practice getting into and out of the water for races. Getting in for beach starts, he explained, we should run until the water level got to about our knees. After that, we should do a few dolphins, kicking off the bottom, until we couldn't touch any more. Then we could start swimming. The dolphins really make your heart rate go up, so I can see if you weren't already acclimated to the water temperature, you could be easily flustered. Once we had started swimming, we would swim for 20 or 30 strokes and then turn around and head back. The exit from the water seemed a lot easier. You swim until you are hitting the bottom with your hand, then explode up out of the water and start running. You should make sure to take off your goggles right away so that you can see. Then start unzipping and peeling off your wetsuit. By the time you reach the transition area, the wetsuit should already be below your hips. We practiced the getting into and out of the water several times.

Next, Robert had us do some sighting work. The first time, he told me that I was doing it backwards. I was taking a breath and then looking to sight, when I should be looking and then taking a breath. At first when I tried to do it his way, I was getting a little confused, but after the entire practice, I realized how much more efficient that his way was. And In fact, made it easier to sight in general. The swimming area that we were in was between two jettys that were about 200 yards apart. We would swim in a triangle - from the beach to the end of one jetty, then from jetty to jetty and finally back to shore (each triangle was about a quarter mile).

Every time we got into and out of the water, we were still supposed to be practicing what we had gone over earlier with the ins and outs. We then practiced swim starts in deep water. For those, you would be treading water (or holding onto a rope). The key to a good start here, Robert explained, is to be horizontal, or nearly horizontal by the time the race starts. So, during the countdown, you should start leaning over into the water. Once we had done those a few times, we then swam in a rough triangle again. This time, instead of using the second jetty to sight, we were to swim around this guy who had been in the water the entire time we were there and appeared to be doing some sort of testing. I tried not to think too hard about all the rain we've had and how clean or dirty the water might be and instead focus on the actual swimming. I think the guy was pretty shocked when we all swam around him, but since he was just standing there, I hope he didn't mind too much.

After getting out of the water that time, Robert then talked to us about drafting and how great it can be if you find someone who is sighting properly to swim behind. That way you're doing a lot less work and don't have to sight yourself as often. All you have to do is stay on their toes and follow along. We did the drafting in small groups (mine was a group of three). We each led for a leg. We swam out to the end of the jetty, and then back and forth between the jettys. By this point, we had been in the water for about an hour and a half and I could tell that I was getting hungry and losing a bit of steam. We then headed in towards the beach.

This time, Robert had us take off our suits completely. He gave us some pointers first and reminded us to have it below our hips before we get to T1. Then he told us to yank them down as fast as we could and use our feet to step on the suit in order to get it off completely. I actually think I did very well on that part and had my suit off rather quickly.

We then all headed back up towards the boardwalk to rinse off our wetsuits and change into our running shoes. I had to eat one of the bars I had brought with me as well as drinking some fresh water. I had had enough salt water for one day, I think.

We were supposed to run for 40 minutes. 20 minutes there and 20 back. The only problem with that was that by the time we got 'there' to the end of the boardwalk, we had only been running for about 10 minutes. By this time the day had really warmed up and all I really wanted to do was to get back in the water. I also found running in the boardwalk to be very disorienting. The slats were all at a diagonal and something about it made me feel a bit dizzy. Now I'm a bit nervous about my run next weekend, since part of that is also on a boardwalk. I also don't think I can wear these speed laces that Laura let me try out. They're too short. I did lace them further up my shoes, but my feet were feeling numb almost right away. When the rest of the team got back to where we had started from, they all kept going on the 40 minute run, but I had had enough for the day. I think not having enough food/water on the swim just caught up to me. I ran for 22 minutes total (about 2.6 miles/8:27 pace).

All in all, although it started with a little rain, it was a perfect day for the practice. There were very few people out at the beach and boardwalk, which was great for us. I was really proud of all the effort I put in today. Now I'm dying for a cold smoothie and a warm shower!

We Should Never Ride on 95th Street Again

2009-06-20T12:06:00.008-04:00

Thursday night on my way home from work I stopped off at the sporting goods store. I needed to buy some body glide (after my struggle with the wetsuit Thursday morning, it seemed like a necessity). I also wanted to pick up a couple of cheap water bottles for the bike. I spent my time just browsing around the store because almost everything was on sale. I ended up getting a new sleeveless biking jersey that was on sale and then 30% off the sale price, so it only cost me $20! I also bought a couple of gu packets because Laura keeps saying that she would never be able to eat a Clif bar at the race like I was planning on doing.

Thursday when I got home I was chatting with Laura and told her about my gu purchase. She said that I should try it out before being too far from a bathroom. Going off her recommendation, I went ahead and tried my first one. I had bought all fruity flavors, since I'm not a big chocolate person and the espresso flavor also sounded pretty bad. The one that I tried was Lemon Sublime. It was okay. It wasn't good and it wasn't horrible. I did feel pretty bloated for the rest of the evening and when I woke up on Friday morning, I had really bad stomach cramps, so I'm not sure about how well this gu will work out for me. I'm going to try it again while working out to see how that goes.

Friday I had decided that I would take the whole day off. I was so excited to sleep in really late and get up at the last possible second in order to get ready for work on time. However, my body and my friends had different plans for me. I woke up on my own at 6:30 and then tried falling back asleep only to get a text at 6:47 from one friend. After that, another text and phone call around 7:15 from another friend. I guess even though it wasn't quite as restful as I wanted to be, at least I still got to lounge around for a bit longer than usual, which was still nice.

This morning Drew and I had planned to get up early and go for a bike ride. The early part was essential since the weather said that it should start raining around 10. I set my alarm for 6:30 and was pretty much up and ready to go. I had to poke Drew a few times before he was as willing as I was to get up and go. I brought Clif bars for us to eat before our bike ride, as I wanted to make sure that I would feel okay after eating the bar and going for a ride (since that's my race plan). We ate our bars, got all ready and headed out.

My plan for the ride today was to cut across to the Westside through the park and then show Drew how nice the pathway up the Westside is. Last time I didn't get to go up the whole path because it had started to rain, so this time I wanted to go all the way to the end of the path (205th Street). On our way there, we were stopped at the corner of 95th and Amsterdam waiting for the light to change and Drew's chain fell off his bike. We had to stop and fix that first. He ended up with very greasy hands that required going across the street to the deli to clean up before heading on. We entered the bike pathway via Riverside Park at 95th Street and headed North. When we got to where I had stopped before (at about 135th Street), it was all new territory and I had no idea what we were in for.

At one point the path gets very wooded. Most of the time you are riding right along the river, but this particular part is wooded on both sides and you really do not feel like you are in New York City. I couldn't believe how nice it was. It's just incredible to me how even in New York there is nature to be found. Once we reached the base of the George Washington Bridge, we began our climb up. Not to the bridge itself, it's just the way that the path goes. The first hill was pretty steep and at one point on the climb up, I wondered what would happen if I couldn't make it? I mean, I'm clipped in. If I stopped pedaling, I will fall over. I realized that my only choice was to continue to pedal as hard as I could. I think it was at that moment that if I had been wearing a heart rate monitor, it definitely would have spiked up from the extra effort.

Little did I know, there would be another small hill followed by a really intense hill. The last one was killer. I actually had to get up out of the saddle and stand up and pedal. I was thinking that I might fall over, but if I made it up the hill, it would be really fantastic. I was also realizing that before Westchester and "Claire's Climb" I'm definitely going to have to practice my hills and that this would be a really good way to do so. The big hills were probably about a mile and a half from the very end of the pathway. We got to the end and really only had one option - to head back the way that we came.

Going back meant that we had to go down the hills. I was really scared. I did not want to go. I really contemplated getting off my bike entirely and just walking it down. Drew just led the way and I saw that he didn't fall or die or go too fast out of control, so I figured I could do it too. When we got to the bottom of the first hill, my hands definitely hurt from gripping the brakes so tightly. By the time we got to the bottom of the last hill, I was ready to let go of the brakes a little bit and even got up to a max speed of 35 MPH!

Heading back home, the ride was still just really nice. There was hardly any other bike or pedestrian traffic and it was a reminder of why it's important to get up early. As we got towards the end of the ride and were exiting Riverside Park, there were definitely a lot more people out and about walking their dogs. When we were approaching the corner of 95th and West End, I could see that the light was red for us, but it seemed like it should be changing soon. Drew was leading the way and had sort-of started out into the intersection. I thought that we were just going to go through the light since the traffic seemed clear. That's not what happened.

Instead, Drew came to a complete stop, which was rather sudden to me, mostly since I was thinking that we would be going through. I think it was in that 10 seconds of me saying "Oh no, OH NO!" that I realized that neither of my feet were unclipped, I was stopped, and I was also falling over onto my left side. Ugh. I knew that this day would come, I just wasn't prepared to fall over into traffic that now had a green light. I scrambled up as quickly as I could, mostly embarrassed to have fallen. Luckily, the car that was at the front of the line at the light had seen me fall and didn't go right away. Of course, since this is New York, the cars behind him started honking since the first guy wasn't going through the light. All of that just added to me being upset and embarrassed. I got up and realized that I managed to get a small cut on my right hand. I'm sure that was from my finger being pinched by the brake/gear shifter when I fell. My left knee also hurt, but I was wearing leggings and I couldn't see any damage although I was pretty sure I would have a bruise. My left hand also got a bruise right in the middle of my palm from landing on it. I dusted myself off and realized that since the light was green now, we should just go ahead and go.

Right away when I got back on my bike, I could tell that something was a little off. Turns out I bent my handlebars when I fell. Drew was still riding ahead of me. I called to him 3 or 4 times, but he didn't hear. We stopped again for the light at 95th and Amsterdam and I told him about my handlebars and how I thought I should just go to the bike shop so that they could make sure that everything else was okay. Especially with my race next Saturday, I really wanted to make sure as soon as possible that nothing serious was wrong with the bike. At this point it was just a few minutes before 9. Drew said that he would just head home, take a shower and then go grocery shopping for breakfast. I headed off to Toga.

I got there right about 9:10. Of course, they didn't open until 10. Why should I get lucky on a day like today? I didn't mind waiting, since it seemed most important to make sure that everything was A-OK with the bike. All of the workers got there around 9:30, but they were all hanging out outside since the store was still locked up. Since I was just waiting there, one of the guys came over and asked what I needed. I told him about my fall and the handlebars and he said that was a super easy fix. He bent the handlebar back for me right there. He also went through all the gears on the bike to make sure that none of the shifting had been affected. He did say that he thought everything looked okay, but that I could definitely use some lube on my chain and I could still wait to have the bike tech guys give it a once-over.

It was about 9:40 at this point, and I figured that I should just wait a bit longer to be on the safe side. They opened promptly at 10 and they took my bike downstairs to give it a once-over. At about 9:25, my bike came back with a clean bill of health, some more lube, and I didn't even get charged for their very kind services. I'm just so glad that nothing serious happened - to me or the bike! After that, I headed back to Drew's to tell him the good news. When I got there, I knocked some stuff over in the kitchen, which prompted Drew to take away everything that I was carrying in my hands and ask me if I could please put my helmet on. I told him it was all his fault that I fell over in the first place since he stopped when he clearly should have gone!

All in all, the bike ride today was 21.78 miles, which I did in a total of 1 hour, 47 minutes (12.21 MPH average). I'm actually okay with that average. With the hills, the city riding, and the stopping we did for the fall and the chain incident, I don't think that's too bad. I know that I was going really pretty quickly on all of the flat parts, so I don't feel as down in the dumps as I usually do about my speed. Plus, I came home to an excellent breakfast that included cinnamon raisin toast! Tomorrow is the Terrier open water swim and run clinic. I'm just hoping that the weather holds out and isn't raining then.

Wetsuits Are Really Hot

2009-06-18T09:24:00.007-04:00

This morning Laura and I met at the other 14th Street Y for a swim in our wetsuits. I got there before her and started putting my wetsuit on. I was not having a easy time of it at all. I did the plastic bag over the feet trick, which really worked wonders. But the first time I tried that on my right leg, somehow the wetsuit flipped inside out on my leg, so I had to take it off and start again. By the time Laura got there to meet me, I was so hot and frustrated with the whole thing that I wanted to give up. I really was sweating with my clothes on underneath the suit.

Laura just looked at me, told me to take a deep breath, relax and try again. She was right. It got a lot easier when I wasn't as frustrated. I had pulled the suit up as high as I could on my calves so that it would be a lot tighter in the crotch than it was the last time we tried this. Last time I was carrying a lot of extra water, so I wanted to make sure that the suit was up as high as possible. Finally, we both got into our suits, zipped up and walked out to the pool. Of course, not only was this a big test for my wetsuit, it was also a big test for my new goggles.

I jumped into the pool only to discover that the water was HOT! I wasn't very happy about that. I had printed out a 2,000 yard swimplan.com workout, but I knew that wouldn't be happening today. Instead, I did a 200 yard warm-up of freestyle followed by 50 of one-armed free. Then I decided that I was warmed up enough to time myself doing a 400 (the sprint triathlon distance) and see if the wetsuit made any difference at all.

Last week, I had done this in 8:35 and had swum pretty easy. Today I decided to swim a lot harder and see what happened. So, I'm not 100% sure that it was all wetsuit related as I know that I was also pushing myself harder today than I was last week, but I finished the swim in 6:49. I think 1:46 is a huge difference, although I know a vast part of it is effort that I put into the swim. However, at the end of this swim, I was dying. I was so hot from the water and the wetsuit, I was actually a little worried that I really was overheating. The whole time I was just wishing that I was wearing my regular bathing suit.

After doing the 400, I spent some time cooling off by talking to Laura for a little while at the end of the pool. Then I decided that we should spend a few more minutes swimming, so I went ahead and did 350 more for an even 1000 yards (0.57 miles). I think the actual time swimming was about 20 minutes.

I know that today wasn't my best overall effort in the pool, although I was really happy with the sprint-distance time. I did discover some very important things. First, that I need to get some body glide. Second, that I should tuck my shirt into my shorts to prevent more bunching. Third, that I should wear my hair in a high ponytail, otherwise it gets caught in the back of the wetsuit (even when under a swim cap). Fourth, my new goggles are great! Fifth, wearing wetsuits apparently makes people want to look and point at you like you're part of a circus sideshow act. Sixth, I do not really ever want to go back to this other 14th Street Y and I'm glad that we only have one more free visit there. All in all, it was a really good learning experience and I'm sure that any practice getting into and out of my wetsuit will be helpful on the day of the race.

No Real Improvement

2009-06-17T07:30:00.003-04:00

This morning I got up and met Drew for a nice bike ride in the park. He had already done 3/4 of the loop before we met and told me that he averaged 18 MPH. I knew there was no way that I'd be able to do that, and I was 100% correct in that assessment.

The first loop was 6.15 miles and I finished that in 24:41 (14.95 MPH average) and second loop was 6.08 miles and was completed in 24:36 (14.83 MPH average). The total time was 49:17 and the total distance was 12.23 miles. I guess the good news is that I'm fairly consistent from the first loop to the second loop and I'm not losing a lot of speed. I guess I'm just getting a little frustrated that I'm not getting any better.

When I started this whole triathlon training process, I had no idea that I would find the bike to be the hardest part. Or at least the most frustrating part. Maybe part of that is that I only went on one bike ride last summer when Drew and I rented bikes so I don't have as much prior experience to compare to. Although, thinking about it now, I only completed one loop in the park, so maybe I am improving from last year. I know I'm a lot stronger and definitely in better cardio shape than I was then. If only my legs could magically get even stronger I'd be happy!

Also, this morning I took a water bottle full of Gatorade so that I could try to get myself to drink more on the bike as practice for the triathlon. I did pretty well the first loop and drank about half of the bottle. The second loop I sort-of forgot, but did take about 2 drink breaks. However, when I got home, I still had about a third of the bottle left. At this point I think that any practice with drinking on the bike will still benefit me later, I was just hoping to be able to drink the whole thing within the 12 miles.

Do Speed Laces Make You Go Faster?

2009-06-16T20:27:00.005-04:00

Last night I fell asleep at 7 o'clock on the couch. I woke up at 8:30 to make a phone call to Drew, get myself a little something to eat, watch a little TV and go right back to sleep. I had set my alarm in order to get up and go running with the Terriers this morning, but when the alarm went off, I was still exhausted. I will say that the temperature also played a role in my decision. It was only 50 degrees outside! So far, this has been the rainiest and coldest June on record for New York City. I'm a little disappointed to be living through this record-breaking time. I much prefer it when those sorts of records were set a hundred years ago!

I decided that the sleep was more important at this point and that I would get a run in after work. Today at lunch I headed over to the sporting goods store in order to buy myself some new goggles. I left my old goggles at swim practice on Sunday, so I was really bummed that I had to get new ones. I think that I got the same kind that I had before, but I won't find out until Thursday when I meet Laura for a swim. I also had some things that I needed to get at the drugstore, so I stopped there on my way back to work. Unfortunately, when I stop at the drugstore at lunchtime without eating lunch first, I'm quite tempted by those $0.99 bags of chips. I bought a bag of Cheetos and had a couple on my way back to the office.

The bad part wasn't that I only had a few at lunch. It was that I finished eating the bag around 4:30 this afternoon. I knew that they would be a bad pre-running snack. It's just that when faced with the choice between Cheetos or the giant bag of almonds at my desk, the Cheetos sounded a lot better. So, after work, instead of heading straight home to go out for my run (because I needed to digest a little bit), I did some window shopping and then went to the grocery store so that I could make dinner and also have some better snacks at work!

By the time I got home, it was already 7. I had to get myself together rather quickly and head out to the park in order to get a run in before it got dark. Luckily Laura had given me a pair of speed laces that she had so that I could try them out so it was much faster getting ready than it usually is. I mean, I probably saved 30 seconds by not tying my shoes! I also thought I'd save myself some time by only taking the key to the actual door to my apartment, not the door that leads from the outside into the foyer. But more about that later.

I walked up to the park and was actually quite anxious to start running since it was a little bit on the cool side in just shorts and a t-shirt. I was planning on doing the same 3.2 mile loop I had done last week to see if my time would improve at all. However, once I got past the 72nd Street turn-off and up to the Boathouse, I realized that I just wasn't in the mood. I turned around and went through the 72nd Street cross-over and headed home. I ran 2.06 miles in 20:11. Turns out that those speed laces made me just a little bit faster -- 9:48 pace!

After my abbreviated run, I headed home as usual. I got to the front door of my apartment building, put the key in and nothing happened. The key wouldn't turn in the lock. Now, remember that I said I had only taken the key to my apartment door and not the key to the front door? Well, that used to be just fine. It was a little secret that the key to my apartment also worked in the front door of the building. I guess they must have changed something because nothing turned. I stood there for about 5 minutes trying to see if I was wrong or if maybe I should turn the key the other way. I was staring at the buzzer buttons trying to decide who in the building I could buzz to let me in. Luckily, right as I was about to press a button, my across-the-hall neighbor came and let me into the building! Lesson learned! Must take both keys from now on!

Now, as for the laces themselves. Laura had told me that she didn't like them because they were too tight. I think I wasn't a huge fan because I thought that they were a bit short. With my regular shoe laces, I was able to lace up through all the holes in my shoes, even the ones at the top that no one ever uses. I like to use those because I think that it makes the shoes feel more secure. When I was running today, I did feel like my ankle was a little loose and could roll around pretty easily, which made me slightly nervous.

The thing about these laces is that they're pretty much at the end when they're loose. When I tighten them up, there is still a lot of give. I think if I stick them through at least one more hole going up the shoe, it'll be a lot better. I'm not going to give up on them yet, but I'm also not 100% sold on them.

Early Morning Pilates

2009-06-15T10:02:00.003-04:00

This morning I got up earlier than usual to meet Nicole for pilates at 7 instead of 8. Nicole had asked another friend of hers to come and join us, so it was a bit different having someone else there as well. Sitting here 2 hours later, I still don't understand how Drew didn't get a lot out of the pilates when he went and tried it. My stomach is still tired after this morning's workout.

Most of the workout was all things we had done before. I decided today that I really like the exercise called short spine. That exercise requires you to be laying down on the reformer (although I guess you can also do this in mat as well) with your feet in the foot straps. You then lift your legs up over your head, similar to going into shoulder stand in yoga. You end up getting both a back stretch and a hamstring stretch, which is really nice.

Today we did some exercises using the tower, which I haven't really done much of. We did some one-armed roll-downs, which made my hand really tired. I'm guessing that I was gripping the bar too much instead of using my abdominals as much as I should have. Although they were pretty tired at that point too.

The exciting thing was that Laura went and had her first pilates class in the 8 AM time slot. I can't wait to hear all about it! Hopefully Laura will want to go back and she and I can go together sometimes.

Could I Really Drown?

2009-06-14T19:31:00.003-04:00

This afternoon I went to the Terrier swim to find out that there is a new coach that is being added into the mix. Her name is Sarah and she'll be at the practices for the next couple of weeks and then will be added into the rotation throughout the year. I was hoping to have a really good practice and was hopeful that her workout would be a good one.

This was the workout:

Warm-Up:
200 Swim
200 Drill
200 Kick (with board)
200 Pull

Core:
4 x 75: right arm, left arm, perfect swim (300)
4 x 100: easy to fast (0:15 RI) (400)
4 x 100: fast to easy (0:15 RI) 400
8 x 50: sighting, 50's should be in 1:00 400

Cool Down:
50 easy freestyle

Total: 2350 meters / 65 minutes (1.46 miles)

For the warm-up drill, I chose to do one arm drills, alternating right and left arms. For some reason in the pool, I just couldn't think of anything else to do. The core work-out was really pretty good. The 75s were not very easy. I thought that it would be more of the same right-arm / left-arm drills that I had done earlier. However, instead of keeping the non-working arm out in front of you like I had been doing, these drills made you keep the non-working arm against your side. We were not supposed to breathe every stroke so that we could really make our bodies turn and make the non-working shoulder rotate as well. Doing this drill on the right side wasn't too bad. The left side, however, was almost impossible. I almost never feel like I will drown in the pool, but the first time that I did that drill on the left, I thought about the fact that I could drown very easily. Probably not the best thought to have.

The first 4 x 100 was the following:
100: 75 easy, 25 fast
100: 50 easy, 50 fast
100: 25 easy, 75 fast
100: 100 fast

That last 100 fast was killer. I was pretty beat by the end of that set. The next 4 x 100 was the exact opposite:
100: 100 fast
100: 75 fast, 25 easy
100: 50 fast, 50 easy
100: 25 fast, 75 easy

This 400 was supposed to simulate a race scenario - you start off fast and then settle into your swim, and then speed up at the end. Looking at it now, I realize that I should have timed myself on those 400s as that's pretty much the distance for the sprint triathlon and it would have been interesting to know how going faster for part of it instead of easy like I did last week affected my time.

I was really glad for the sighting drill. I've never really done any real significant sighting drills and it was good that it was part of our practice. They explained that you really shouldn't lift your whole head out of the water, that it should just be a look with your eyes. I mainly incorporated it into my breathing. I would lift my head up to the side to breathe, look forward and then stick my head back into the water. I tried to sight about every 6 strokes or so. I'm not sure how often I'll have to sight in the actual race, but I figured that getting in as much practice with the motion in the pool would be beneficial. We were also supposed to do these 50s within a minute, and at first I was a little worried that I wouldn't be fast enough, but I did them all within 45 seconds, even with the sighting, so it turns out that I worried for nothing.

When we finished up the sighting drills, we were already a couple minutes over the hour we have for practice, but I felt like I needed to do a 50 just to cool down a little bit. All in all, I liked this new coach. I thought it was a good mix of swimming and drills. Next week is an open water clinic that I am planning on going to, so I might not see her again for 2 weeks (that is if I feel like going to practice the day after the sprint, I'm not quite decided about that yet). I also met a teammate today who is also pretty new to Terrier. She's also doing Westchester, so it was nice to meet someone else who is going to be doing the same race!

A Really Good Test

2009-06-13T16:04:00.002-04:00

This morning I met Drew in the park so that I could do a brick. I had been planning on doing the full sprint triathlon distances, so I was a little unsure of how it would go. I was even more unsure when I got to the park to see that there was a 10K race going on in the park and about half of the lanes were reserved for the race.

I realized that since there wasn't anything I could do about the circumstances, I should just go and have the best ride that I could. My ride to meet Drew was 2.54 miles and took me 13:20 (11.43 MPH average), so I knew that all I could do was improve from there!

We started the loops at the 90th Street entrance, so that when we stopped, I'd be at a good starting point to get to run around the reservoir. Of course, starting further North also meant that we had to tackle the Harlem hill almost right away. Unbelievably, I actually caught up to Drew on the hill the first time around. I've told him before that if he foes slowly enough, I eventually will catch him!

The rest of the first loop passed rather uneventfully. I looked at the bike computer and it was about 24:30 to ride 6.12 miles (14.99 MPH pace). We passed lots of racers along the way. By the time we got back to start our second loop, a lot of the racers had finished, which made it harder to navigate since they were meandering all along the road. Most of them were eating Popsicles and the thought crossed my mind that I'd like to punch one of them in the face (the bad walkers, of course) and steal a Popsicle. Instead, I just kept riding my bike.

The second loop made me realize just how uncomfortable the bikes at the gym are. I think that I might have to get myself some actual bike shorts for the gym. I spent the rest of the second loop wishing that I had some better protection between me and the bike. I finished the second loop in 48:27 total time and went 12.14 miles (15.03 MPH average).

Drew had sent me this article a few days ago about transitioning. I thought the part at the end about standing up on the bike in order to get the blood to the bottom of your legs was especially interesting. Of course, everytime I tried to practice that, I was sure I was just going to fall flat on my face. I felt like it would be easier to do if I was in a very hard gear, but all that shifting doesn't seem worth it to me.

When we got to where I would be transitioning, I hopped off my bike and Drew promptly told me that he wouldn't help me all, which was fair since I won't have any help at the race. As I was trying to pull my running shoes out of my backpack, my legs were definitely shaking. I had tried to time my transition, but I was in such a rush, apparently I forgot to press start on my watch. I managed to get my biking shoes off and my running shoes on, remembered to take off my helmet, and ran over to the entrance to the reservoir path.

My legs actually felt pretty good once I started running. I started out a bit faster that usual, but realized that I probably needed to settle into my regular pace in order to be able to finish the full distance. Once I was rounding the corner towards the finish on the first loop, I did think for a moment about whether or not I would need to do the second loop. Then I realized that I would be really disappointed in myself if I didn't follow through with my original plan.

I kept on running for the second loop and finished the 3.2 miles in 32:01 (10:00 pace). I couldn't believe it! 10 minute miles even after the bike? The main thing that I learned from this experience is that I need to drink more on the bike. I was really thirsty while running. I'm guessing that there will be water stations during the race (although the race reports I've read have said that the water stations aren't that great) so it's probably better to make sure I'm slightly more hydrated on my own.

Once I had switched back to my bike shoes, Drew and I got back on our bikes and headed to his apartment. The last thing I wanted to do at that point was get on my bike, but Drew only lives about a quarter mile from the park so it wasn't too bad. We had a smoothie, played Killer Bunnies, took a nap, had another smoothie and then I needed to head home.

When I got downstairs, I realized that it was raining really hard and I wasn't very excited at the prospect of riding in the pouring rain. However, I realized I might as well do it since there is a chance that it will rain for the triathlon. The ride home was miserable. The water splashing up from the street, the rain coming down from the sky, yuck. The worst part was that once my hands got wet, it was really slippery on my handlebars and I was nervous about that. Also, when they were wet, my brakes got very loud and squeaky. I'm not sure if I should be worried about that or not since they always stopped just fine. When I got home, I was covered in dirt from the waist down and my backpack was covered as well. I do not like this rain. Now I'll have to clean up my bike, which is never my favorite thing. At least I had an awesome workout!

Just Enough Reason To Get Up

2009-06-12T09:57:00.002-04:00

This morning I woke up to more rain in the city. I really think it will never stop, even though the weather forecast claims that it will be nice tomorrow. I'm not going to hold my breath, although I am really hoping that they've got it right this time!

My gym is currently having a "bring a friend for free on Friday" promotion, so I had talked to Laura about whether or not she'd like to avoid the rain and come join me at the gym this morning. She wasn't sure since she had some work she thought she would be up late doing so I told her that if I hadn't heard from her by 8 AM, I'd assume that she wasn't coming. I had really only planned to go ride the bike for 30 minutes this morning, just to get in a quick workout so I could have my evening free.

When my alarm went off at 7, I looked outside and realized that the last thing that I wanted to do was get up and go to the gym. I also figured that if Laura really was going to come and meet me that I would have heard by then. I tried to convince myself that it would be okay to take a rest day. However, I felt obligated to actually go to the gym just in case she did show up and wanted to get in a workout. And, really, it was just enough motivation to get me out of bed, so by not coming, she still did me a favor.

So, I got changed, walked to the gym in the rain, plopped myself down on the cardio bike and realized that I really only had 20 minutes to do anything before I would have to get up and walk back home in the rain. That 20 minutes hardly seemed worth the effort in my tired mind. Anyhow, I decided to try to simulate the "flat as a pancake" aspect of the Staten Island triathlon and so I just set the bike on level 5 and went about the biking. I'll be honest, my heart just wasn't in it this morning. I only rode for 17:30 and went a measly 4 miles (13.7 MPH pace). I got off, did a couple of stretches, and went home to shower and face the work day.

I have a mixed reaction to my workout this morning. Part of me thinks that there wasn't much point and the other part of me thinks that every little bit helps. I think that rain or shine tomorrow I'm going to have to get out there and do my brick, which will hopefully be a better workout than today!

Sprint Triathlon Distance Swim? Check.

2009-06-11T09:42:00.008-04:00

This morning Laura and I met for a swim at Asphalt Green. It's a 50-meter pool that is supposed to be the nicest pool in the city. The facilities seemed really nice and they had decent shampoo and conditioner in the showers, so that was a plus in my book. As for the pool itself, I will say that walking in and seeing an Olympic-sized pool was a little intimidating. It's so long! After reviewing the rules and determining that only circle swimming was allowed and that we should stick the slow/medium/fast lanes, we headed toward the pool. I will say that it wasn't 100% clear which lane was which, but I think that we both got into lanes that worked out for us.

On the first 50, I noticed that you could clearly see where the middle of the pool was and at that point I was just about ready to take a big breath and turn around, but I just kept going. Funny how your body gets acclimated to that. Anyhow, I had printed myself out a swimplan.com workout, which was:

Warm-Up:
4 x 50m Any Stroke (even pace), rest 0:15/50m

Build Up (repeat 4 times):
1 x 50m Freestyle Breath Left, rest 0:10/50m
1 x 50m Freestyle Breath Right, rest 0:10/50 m

Core:
12 x 100m Freestyle Swim, rest 0:20/100m

Warm-Down:
1 x 100m Freestyle Push & Glide, rest 0:20/100m
1 x 100m Freestyle Easy, rest 0:20/100m

Total: 2000 meters

OK, so I was really excited about this workout. Mostly because I knew that the core part would let me get in a good long swim and I could time myself for the sprint triathlon distance fairly accurately. I very rarely take the rest intervals given on the work-outs. I only really ever stop to take a look at my little cheat sheet to see what is next. I also didn't realize until right now when I was typing this out that I was supposed to repeat the Build Up portion 4 times, so I accidentally only did that once. Oops. Also, because of the timing, I didn't have time to complete the whole core portion. I only did 10 x 100m instead of 12. So, my total for the day was actually 1500 meters (0.93 miles) in 35 minutes.

I did the warm-up and build-up (or what I thought was the build-up) and then started into the main set. I decided that I would just swim nice and easy without pushing myself to see how I did with the sprint triathlon distance (0.25 miles). My time was 8:35. I have no idea how that compares to open water, of course, but I think that as long as I can just keep the same easy pace I did today, I'll be great at the triathlon. I guess the good news is that I did finish the Olympic distance today in 35 minutes, which also seems like a good time to me. Now if only I could get this swimming to translate over to the running and biking I'd be all set.

I spent most of the time swimming today thinking about how hungry I was and how glad I would be when I got back to Drew's apartment to finish getting ready for work because there would be a smoothie waiting for me. Unfortunately, when I got back to his apartment, he was in the shower and there was NO smoothie waiting! Of course, I'm starving by this point. Feeling a little faint, even. Why does swimming make me so hungry? I waited for him to get out of the shower, shave, etc. and an agonizing 13 minutes later I was finally delivered the smoothie I was waiting for. I didn't even care that it had sapota in it!

So, now that I've completed my reverse sprint triathlon, all I have to do is put it all together. However, with all the rain we keep having it's hard to get outside! This weekend is supposed to be nice, so I'm hoping to get in a good brick on Saturday. Now all I have to do is get the weather to cooperate!

Sprint Triathlon Distance Bike? Check.

2009-06-10T21:32:00.006-04:00

Last night I could not fall asleep and stayed up watching TV way too late. That meant that I couldn't drag myself out of bed before work for a workout. Which was probably okay considering the fact that it was raining. I headed off to work for the day and had packed a bag for hitting the gym later on.

I ended up going to the gym after work and as a special surprise, Drew was able to join me! He wasn't stuck at work until all hours of the night. It was a nice treat for both of us, I think. I had been planning on riding the bike today. When we got to the gym all of the cardio bikes were occupied! How weird is that? They seem like they are usually the last choice of everyone at the gym besides me. I went upstairs to check on the status of the spinning bikes, but there was a class in there. By the time I got back downstairs, one of the cardio bikes had opened up.

Of course, I get on the bike and I realized why it was available. Every time that you pedaled the bike there was an annoying squeaking sound. Luckily, two minutes into my ride, the bike next to me opened up, so I quickly switched over. I set the bike on the random hill setting and put the bike at level 10. Then I started reading my book and just kept pedaling like I was actually going somewhere.

About 35 minutes into my ride, Drew snuck up behind me and said that he was heading to the stretching area. I finished up and did an even 40 minutes on the bike and went 14.2 miles total. That's 21.3 MPH average. What?!? How is that even possible from my little legs? Drew is convinced that I will go a lot faster during the triathlon than I do in the park or other rides since there won't be crazy people in the road or lights or anything else in my way. I'm hoping that he's right. Either way, at least I completed the distance tonight. It wasn't a "real" bike ride, but with the hill settings, I feel like it's not too bad.

I seem to be doing this triathlon in reverse since tomorrow morning I'm going to meet Laura for a swim at a fancy pool that is having a promotion where you can go and try it out for a week for free. I'll report back on the sprint distance swim tomorrow.

4o minutes 14.2 miles