Friday, May 27, 2011

Where have I been?

It has been over 2 weeks since I last put in an entry.  Slowly working my way back into shape, but there has been no sense of urgency, so I'm finding it easy to sleep in, and keep my workouts short.  I will likely need a race to show how poor my fitness is before I start getting serious.

I did a tempo run earlier in the week.  It was the first time that I have tried to run fast since the marathon.  Even though it felt pretty hard, I was happy, because I was able to keep 6:30 pace (which is about what I can do these days).

Today was a good day.  I woke up and it was bright and sunny and 80 degrees.  Clearly, I was either delusional or have escaped the interminable rain and cold of the Pacific Northwest.  Fortunately, I am not delusional (or at least don't think I am).  We chose the Memorial Day weekend to escape to Scottsdale, and I met the family at The Good Egg for breakfast.  What a great way to start the day.  I struggled through the run, as I felt sluggish.  Some of that can be attributed to the late night that we had, but since my body hasn't seen 80 degrees since around last October, I figured that was the other reason.  Not complaining at all, though.

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Checking a box... happily

The only reason that I have an entry today is that I was able to run nearly 7 miles pain-free today.  I'm hoping that my IT band problems are in the rear-view mirror now.  Between my multiple massages and the foam roller, I have been diligent about trying to get my legs healthy.  So, today was just an aerobic run around Madigan, and I'm simply glad to be able to crank it out without any drama. 

More interesting will be this weekend, when I'm planning to go for an open water swim.  The weather this Spring has been terrible, so water temperatures are kinda cold.  Okay, I'm lying:  they're REALLY COLD!  The buoys on Lake Sammamish and Lake Washington were reading 52 degrees today.  Lake Louise is a lot smaller and a lot shallower, so it should be warmer, but since we only had one day above 60 in April, there's no way it will be 60.  And next weekend, we'll be swimming in American Lake, and my guess (after getting some input from a few people) is that the temperature will also be in the low 50's.  Should be exciting.  What do you know about shrinkage?

Monday, May 9, 2011

Back in the saddle again

I'm training again.  For the most part.  It has now been three weeks since Boston, and last week, I decided to get back (somewhat) into training mode.  I have been pretty easy on my left IT band, trying to make sure that it has healed up.  So, the sum total of my running last week was 16 miles, nothing over 5 miles.  So far, so good. 

That has been the easy part.  Swimming has been a whole 'nuther adventure.  Last Monday, I jumped in the pool with David's team, the UPAC Sharks.  Actually, I have been paying my Master's dues for the past 4 months, even though I haven't been swimming.  So, it was time to actually swim.  I started out in Lane 5 (typically Lane 6 is the lane with the oldest, and therefore, fastest kids), figuring that I should be able to keep up.  And I did... at least through the warm up.  Then, new coach Ashley said, "Main set is 6 x 200:  lane 6 is on 2:45 and lane 5 is on 2:50."  Even when I was/am in swim shape, 2:50 is not going to happen.  Well, it might happen, but I'm not going to be back at the wall for a 2:50 send-off; it would be more of a 160 or 170.  So, anyway, I proceeded to move to lane 4, where it was closer to 4:00 (not by design).  Funny.  I wasn't that out of breath; I just couldn't go any faster.  That was last Monday.  Fast forward to today, where I swam at 5:00 AM.  My alarm went off at 4:35 AM, and it was an, "Oh my, am I really going to get up and swim?"  Unfortunately, the alarm woke up the dogs, so then I was up.  Since it had been a long time since I woke up to swim, I forgot how cold it is when you wake up before the furnace kicks on.  Yikes! 

My swim wasn't as terrible as I thought it would be, although still pretty slow.  Same problem:  just can't go any faster, although I didn't feel that out of breath.  After I got home, I was ready to go take a nap.

This past weekend, I went on a swim-bike.  Not actually swimming, but I think I got wetter on the bike than I did this morning in the pool.  There were intermittent torrential downpours all the way around.  The ride visited the bustling metropoli (is that the plural or is it metropoliseseseseses?) of (in order) Roy, McKenna, Yelm, and Rainier.  I rode with Lisa, Karen, and Ross, all of whom were riding their tri-bikes, and none of whom had fenders.  Arrgh.  Drafting was no fun, but necessary, since the ride was longer than I've ridden all year, and I am frighteningly out of shape.  I hadn't planned on riding for 3 hours, so I only had one water bottle, which was fine until there were about 5 miles to go, and then it got ugly.  By the time I was climbing the last hill on Old Pacific Highway, I was seeing stars.  Probably not going to see those neurons again.  Food, a hot shower, and an hour later, I felt mostly back to normal.

Ahhhhh, it's good to be back in training mode again!