And the Crap Weather Continues

WEEKLY WORKOUTS

Swimming 1:45 (3 days)

Biking 2:00 (2 days)

Running 1:05 (2 days, with 2 bricks)

Weights :50 (1 day)

Dear Person Who Controls the Weather,

Hi, my name is Pam Wiener and I'm training for my 1st Ironman. As if training isn't hard enough, why is it that you give us the gift of nice weather during the week and crap on the weekends? In case you're wondering, the weekends are when we have our longest workouts & we would like to do them outside instead of on a trainer or treadmill. The sun Monday through Thursday is ok, as long as Friday through Sunday is nice too.

Sincerely,

An upset customer

Ok, I feel better now that I've discussed my disappointment in the weather. Sunday was a beautiful day, but I wanted to voice a complaint based on the past 2 months of weather. This week was a recovery week for me which means pure happiness. As Andrew said, "You cannot do too little on a rest week." Thank you for that advice Andrew, I followed directions.

I did a 500 timed swim this week. I was surprised that my time was as fast as it was because I didn't feel like I was moving. I did notice towards the end that I was losing a bit of the technique in my stroke, which isn't a good thing. I did it in 8:04 which is about 35 seconds faster then in my 2nd week. I did my Friday swim in the morning and not at my normal gym. Man what a mistake that was. For some reason they must feel people enjoy swimming laps in a hot tub. Holy shit was it hot. I had to stop a number of times because I started feeling fatigued from the heat.

Andrew had me do a 3.1 mile run assessment to reevaluate my paces (train, long and recovery). I started out way too fast and paid for it later. My average pace was 8:10 and average heart rate was 164. My legs didn't hurt too bad afterwards, but I was definitely panting because I was out of breath. I'm waiting for my new paces from Andrew. Now let's see if I can actually sustain them. I got my 1st bit of chafing for the season. I actually was over dressed and got pretty hot during my run so I took off my long sleeve shirt and ran in a short sleeve one. @ about mile 2.25 I felt a burn underneath my arm. Yeah it hurt a little, but I'm a future Ironman so I'm tough.

Nothing too exciting on the bike this week. I only had to do ILTs and a 2 hour ride. Once again the weather on Saturday was rainy and cold, which made my outdoor ride a trainer ride. Andrew still wanted my legs to recover a bit more, so I couldn't switch my weekend days. I ended up doing a 1.5 hour ride with a 10 minute run afterwards. The trainer ride was good, but my cadence was dropping a lot. I'm having a difficult time keeping my cadence @ 90 if it's not in an easy gear. This is something that will hopefully get better with more time on the bike. It better or else Placid will be a lot more painful then it already will be.

I'm a big advocate of ice baths...in the summer. I took my 1st and 2nd winter ice bath this week and oh my was it painful. As usual, I have some weird thoughts that need explaining from others. Is it possible that the cold water that comes out of the faucet in the winter is colder then the cold water that comes out in the summer? You might say no, but I completely disagree. I just put my feet in the tub as it was filling up with cold water, pre ice and I thought death was upon me. I had one of my funnier phone conversations with my mom during my bath on Thursday night (it's a close 2nd to the gas pump story, which if you don't know it, ask me. It's pretty hilarious). I was screaming, cursing, crying, laughing and doing anything else to get my mind of the coldness. My mom actually checked in on me a little later to make sure I didn't have hypothermia. Bath number 2 sucked, but wasn't as bad.

To get into the Ironman mindset, I taped IMLP 2009 months ago and have yet to watch it until this morning. I was actually in Placid for this one and had an amazing time. I volunteered at the swim start which was good for me considering my open water anxiety. We rented a house with an amazing viewing spot on the bike & run course. There were 2 things I was able to watch again on TV that were to say the least, incredible. The 1st was Caitlin Snow coming off the bike in 5th or 6th and making up so much time on the run (2:57 marathon) to come in 2nd place. Her smile on the run was unbelievable. I wish I could have that smile for a 3 mile run. Then the most amazing thing which you typically see in the coverage of Kona was a story about Matt Long, a former Ironman who was in an unfortunate bike crash that nearly took his life. He decided to give this Ironman thing another shot, with all of his injuries and all. Below is a link to his foundation's website because my little synopsis did nothing for his story and his 2009 IMLP finish. Needless to say, tears were falling down my face this morning. I will watch this over and over again when I'm having a bad training week.

http://www.iwillfoundation.com/mattstory.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJstUoxVJuw