Monday, June 30, 2008

T-Minus 2 Weeks and Counting

It's less that 2 weeks till race day and only 4 days till we leave! YEEHAAAA! I can't BELIEVE it's already here. HOLY CRAP. We were up at the Cadman's this weekend and I did 2 open water swims with no real panic attacks at all. In fact, I was feeling pretty good. We practiced starting in a group, with some pushing and grabbing, I practiced sighting and I was pretty impressed with myself as I managed to sight quite well. I haven't really thought about goals much over the course of my training, I've just sort of gone through the motions and done the work. On the drive up to the cottage, Gary told me I should think about a goal; think about what I'd be happy with. So, I thought about a swim time that would make me happy and I figured 1:10-1:15. A 1:15 swim would mean that I dawdled a bit and a 1:10 swim would mean I got in there and found a good pair of feet to draft off of. T1 should be no more than 7-8 minutes. I won't be changing into anything, I'll just be adding chamois cream and body glide so I should be able to get through pretty quick. If I look back to 2 weeks ago at my 175km bike, I did that in just under 6.5 hours. Come race day with fresh, rested legs & race wheels, I am hoping that I can actually pull off a 6:30 bike for the full 180. That would be ideal. An amazing day would be a 6:20 bike. But let's say 6:30. T2 should also be pretty quick as I won't be changing either. Just getting into my running shoes and putting on my visor. 5 minutes maybe? As for the marathon, my main goal is to run the entire thing. Where that gets me, I don't know. In LP I ran a 4:32 marathon and that was with a fair bit of walking. If I can manage to actually RUN the entire marathon I should be closer to 4 hours. That would make me REALLY happy. So if I say a 1:15 swim, 15 minutes TOTAL for transitions, a 6:30 bike and a 4 hour marathon, I'd be looking at 12 hours. That would be AWESOME. I'd be happy with anything between 12:00-12:30. I think the fact that Sue will be out on the course will push me to keep going. She will have about 5-10 minutes on me in the swim for sure and I'm not sure how much I'll be able to reel her in on the bike. My only hope is the run which will be motivation enough for me to keep running.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

So Much to Do So Little Time

I don't remember being this scattered & pressed for time when I trained for my last Ironman. I have been so busy lately I've hardly had time to do anything around the house except for laundry. It doesn't help that we've been away for the last 2 weekends. Last weekend we were up at the Cadmans to do our ride and then race the Muskoka long course. What a weekend. We did a 150km ride on the Saturday and then we raced on Sunday. They changed the course in Muskoka and it is WAY harder than when I did it. Holy smokes. I gave it my all on the bike course but still managed to pull off an ok run. I had a crappy swim but so did everyone else. The buoys were off and there was a current in the channel as well. I swam 44:00 minutes for 2km, which is brutal considering I'm a much better swimmer than I was when I did that race. Gary and Sue both had slow swims too (40 minutes each). Sue had a faster bike than me by 30 seconds and that was WITH her dropping her chain 3 times. She's gotten really strong on the bike. I think she may even be faster than me! If she wasn't injured I don't know if I would have been able to run her down. It might have been close. I was 14 minutes slower this year than in 2004. Slower in everything except my transitions. I owe my speedier T1 time to my fancy new wetsuit. It came off so easily it was awesome. I was pretty tired by the end of the weekend. This weekend was our last big weekend so we went back up to the Cadmans cottage again. Sue had a 6:30-6:45 ride followed by a 1 hour run. We rode 6:28 and covered 175km. We had an AWESOME ride. I had a bit of a meltdown between hours 4 and 5, I couldn't get comfortable and I was starting to feel really tired. I have been fighting a cold and I had to take a Tylenol cold & Flu before the ride. Luckily Gary and Rick came back to check on us and Gary pulled me back to Sue. I had a little break at the gas station and got my wind back. We pushed the pace on the way home. We were getting ready to head out on our run when the thunder and lighting started so, we didn't run. Too bad, I was actually looking forward to it.
Today I had a 3 hour run which I did out at Guelph Lake. I went out there to watch Rebecca do her first Olympic distance Triathlon. It was muggy and I thought it was going to rain but the sun ended up coming out. Of course I didn't put sunscreen on so I totally fried. I had forgotten just how hilly that bike course was. I killed my legs. That was one really tough run. I covered 32km in 3 hours and my average heart rate was 155 which is high for for the pace I was running. My legs are TOTALLY killing me now. I had to take an ice bath and take some Endurox. Hopefully I'll be able to walk around tomorrow. But, the hardest part is over. Now it's TAPER TIME!

Sunday, June 8, 2008

One Expensive T-shirt

This weekend marks the second time this year I have entered a race and not been able to do it. The first race was Victoria's Du which I couldn't do because of a pinched nerve in my neck. This time, I strained a quad muscle; my vastus medialis to be exact. I am not sure how I did it, but it happened at some point on my 6+ hour ride yesterday. It was about the 4 hour mark when I noticed it and it got progressively worse. Almost to the point where I didn't think I'd make it back to the car. I thought it was my knee so I was really upset. I could barely walk after I got off the bike.