The final countdown (do do do doooo do do do do dooo ) Part I

Tomorrow I start the “Ironman-Specific Base” of training. AHH. Week 13. Half way through the training program. AHH. I’m totally not ready. The swim workouts are still a challenge. I am just not fast. What if I’m not fast enough to make the cutoff? AHH!

I’ll start doubling and tripling up on workouts in this phase. Some of them are optional, so we’ll see how I feel. AHH. I don’t want to overtrain, but at the same time, I don’t want to get to the start line grossly undertrained either. AHHH.

I signed up for a local Olympic distance that takes place at the end of September. According to the race website, race day weather tends to have lows in the mid 60s and highs in the 90s. I can’t even imagine what this feels like right now. I run in the mornings, starting before the sun rises, and it is 92 degrees outside. Is it really going to cool down 25 degrees in a month? I sure hope so. I don’t know how much more of this training in the heat crap I can take!

I know what you're thinking. . . "Why don’t you run on a treadmill?" Treadmills are all well and good for people who run 30 minutes at a time and/or don’t sweat. I need to run longer and I need a giant fan to blow on me or I sweat worse than I do outside. The treadmills at the gym I go to have fans in them, sort of. The fans don’t adjust up, so my boobs get a nice gentle puff of air.

As long as I hit the pavement before the sun is too intense, I’ll run outside. There is hope for a gentle breeze and at least I’m going somewhere. I don’t hear the thump thump thump of my body bouncing around on the belt. I don’t worry about my neighbors hearing me gasp for breath. Running outside allows me to just run with no auto shut off after 30 minutes.

I feel like I’ve been struggling with the workouts lately. Yay, the excessive heat warning has been extended another day. I’m quite sure I suffered some minor heat stroke on Saturday after my run. I get disappointed when I don’t run as fast as I normally do (I know I shouldn’t expect to in the heat, but I still want to!) and can’t make it as far.

The bike ride isn’t as bad, since I create my own “wind.” This morning was particularly nice. There wasn’t much traffic on the roads, so I wasn’t as scared for my life as I normally am. There weren’t too many cyclists out either. Seemed like just me out there. Me and the random coyote crossing the highway, and the rabbits who thought it was fun to run along the shoulder next to me, and the other stray dogs I carefully passed as I biked through the Res. Good times dodging all of my furry friends. The view was awesome though. There was a slight haze right after sunrise. It cast a nice view in the early morning desert this morning. The haze burned away by the time I turned around to come back. I was nice and drippy by the time I got home. All of this sweat is cleansing in some way, right?

Anyway, I have three weeks of the Iron-Specific Base (which seems to mean longer & harder weekday workouts) then I move into Race Prep (which means super long rides & runs). AHHH. Then three weeks of taper. I can’t believe we’re only 12 weeks away from race day. AHHH. And by race day, I’m sure I’ll be complaining about how it’s too cold to work out outside.

Cold Heartless Bitch

I am a CHB: Cold Heatless Bitch. For many reasons, but mostly because I don’t have many emotions. Annoyed and really effin pissed off are the two that seem to show up the most often (and this is why I run long distances).

Needless to say, I don’t cry often. I try not to let the random shit that happens in my life have any sort of crying affect on me. There was a brief time I would shed a tear or two when drunk (or not drunk enough), but that time has passed. I really only cry if someone close to me has passed away. (Most recently, my Uncle Don in April.) I do empathize (on occasion) with people who have feelings. I just don’t let their situations get to me.

Until today . . . today I cry. Now I know what it feels like to have my heart break in complete disbelief and disappointment.

I was told today, “don’t count on us coming out in November.”

"What?"

“Well Dad doesn’t think he can switch vacation around.”

"Well, you can still fly out."

“Well, I don’t know what my physical therapy schedule will look like.”

"I think you can miss one day of physical therapy to come support me in something I’ve been working three years toward. People from all over the country are coming out, but not my own parents? Really?!"

Rob Thomas said it best, “This is how a heart breaks.” Indeed, this is how a cold and nonexistent heart breaks.

Double Digits & Hitting the Wall

Less than 100 days away. AHHHH!

This past week I did zero training. I had grandiose plans of working out after work (new student orientation=early early mornings). Yeah, didn’t happen. Now I feel behind. Really behind in my training.

I had a great long run on Saturday morning. It’s amazing what cloud cover can do for your morale. I still did not run fast, but I did run for a solid 105 minutes. It felt great. I had zero pain (except the burning from the sweat dripping in my eyes). The clouds did provide some protection from the sun’s direct rays beating down upon me, but they also provided me with some thick humidity. I felt like I was running in a steam room. It was gross, yet cleansing. Every outdoor workout I have I think “there’s no way I could sweat more than I am right now.” Hmm, until the next workout. It’s freakin gross. There was not a single dry spot on my entire body. My hair was wet like I just jumped in the pool. I could squeeze sweat from my little wristband that I use to wipe the sweat from my face. Disgusting! I also need to run on Sundays. The run really zaps my energy for anything I need to do the rest of the weekend.

Biking in the heat isn’t as bad for me. I create my own “wind” on the bike, so I don’t feel drops of sweat pouring out of every pore on my body. It’s not until I stop at a light or have to change a flat or something before I realize how hot I am. I do need to wear a different color shorts. My ass is on fire when traveling west back toward my house at the end of the ride. Speaking of ass on fire . . . how the hell am I supposed to sit on that bike seat for hours on end anyway? Good grief! The little tiny pad in the tri shorts does nothing. It’s like sitting on a Kleenex. Why bother really? My friend Colin has told me about some special cream that the ladies in his tri club use. I need to try that stuff out! I guess the pain is a distraction from the cars whizzing by going 80 mph. The only thing that separates us is the white line painted on the road. Is it really necessary to cut it that close? Three feet folks, give the cyclists three feet. PLEASE.

It is going to be a miracle I even make it to race day. I have my first official injury today. I wasn’t even doing anything related to training either. Frustration! For some weird reason, when the lock in the back door of my car is flipped to “lock,” it locks all of the doors. Is this safe? What if some baby in a carseat locked the door accidentally (or grown adult)? Anyway, I somehow locked the door while vacuuming at the carwash. Inside is my purse, my phone and of course and my keys. Uhg. Do I know a single phone number? (No, especially not in a time of panic.) So, I had to go home and hop the fence in my backyard. I’m sooo glad I had my HOA add that extra foot. Yay. The stucco is especially fun to climb over as well, in 106 degree temps and zero shade (totally could have been hotter today though, lucky it wasn’t). It would have been much easier had I been wearing tennis shoes, but NOOO, I’m in some rinky dinky flip flops. Yay. I’m glad my neighbors were in the pool. They were able to give me the broken plastic chair to prop myself up with as I tried to hoist my body over the fence. My neighbor didn’t find it amusing when I asked if I could borrow his kid to crawl through my doggy door and let me in my house. “Well you have that barbed wire on top.” (Insert hick accent while dragging on a cigarette.) A. I do not have barbed wire around my fence, it is wrought iron. B. I was clearly joking, as your five year old is larger than I am and my dog is a dachshund.

And now the chair is broken in two places and my right side has a few gashes and bruises. Skin grows back right? Right. Now, I’m in decent shape. I mean, we’re 98 days from the Ironman. I do need to work on two things. Upper body strength and stretching. Had my hammies not been so stinking tight, I could have bent my leg up that high a little faster and I would have made it on attempt number one before the hot stucco burned my skin and the chair gave way. Had I been wearing appropriate shoes, I could have taken a running start and hoisted myself (although, also risk impaling myself on the “barbed wire”). Or, if my upper body strength was half of what my leg strength is, I could have held on to the “barbed wire” and pulled myself up. After a few more tries, I was able to get over my fence. (As my neighbor and his kids watched by the way. Could they maybe offer a step stool or anything to help me over? No. Assholes. I always knew they were, but this just confirms my own stereotyped opinions of them. My back yard faces the pool. They watched the whole time. It was awesome.) I retrieved my secret key from my secret hiding spot (that has since been moved so you can’t rob me) and hopped back over.

The bleeding has now stopped and the bruising is looking pretty cool. One bruise runs all the way down my forearm. My wrist hurts a lot. I hope it doesn’t affect my swimming. It happens to be in the perfect spot for rubbing the wrong way on the aerobars on the bike. Yay. At least my feet & legs are ok. I have a big gash on my toe and another near my knee (darn you stucco!) but, ‘tis just a flesh wound (with some deep bruises).

I guess this injury makes for a better story than “I’m over-trained” or “I was hit by a car” or “I drowned.” I hope this is my only injury too . . . when I literally hit a wall. It should be relatively quick healing (hopefully, my luck with bruises. . .) A bonus too. . . it’s not an overuse injury, so I have no excuses to skip out on training this week. Back to the grind! It’s safer out on the roads anyway. I wear protective gear and there’s no broken attack chairs lurking about.

" . . . because I will be an Ironman."

Welcome to my life: