Here we are just 64 days out from Canada and I feel totally unprepared. I need to do some serious jam sessions in the coming weeks if I'll have any chance of completing Canada successfully. I am totally bummed out and angry about my training. Since starting to work in retail, all I want to do outside of work is sleep. I walk a mile to and from work, I stand 8+ hrs everyday (no joke... the only time I sit is at lunch), I constantly have to be on point and happy for customers (which can get very tiring when you're not cheerful or happy), I work awful hours where I'm at the store until 9:45pm at night (and I've had to close I think every Friday night for the last 2 months unless I've requested it off), and I work weekends... everything piled on top of each other makes for a very tiring work schedule that leaves very little for training. Any chance I can get, I'd rather be laying down and sleeping. The worst part, is that I don't even get to train with Justin anymore which is something we really enjoyed getting to do while training for Lake Placid - 8 hour bike rides of us time was actually very enjoyable! Now, I never have that time because my days off are on weekdays when he is working. This past week I have been a zombie... trying to squeeze in workout sessions when I can on tired legs and body. Everything takes 10x more effort than it has ever taken before. It's awful. It's an awful awful feeling.
Yesterday, while half asleep during lunch, I told myself I would allow myself to take the day off today, Friday, my day off from work. My body needs to catch up and refresh, I thought. However, the day comes and I think about Ironman and how freakin' hard it's going to be with the training I've done - scratch the day off... time to workout! I got in a run in the 90 degree heat and bike ride on the trainer... both short sessions but difficult... it helped to make me feel like I am doing SOMETHING to prepare myself for race day. (Pic from my run today... can you spy the plane in route to landing at Reagan?) Now, I just need to get myself to the pool again... I don't remember the last time I've been to the pool. Ugh, this totally sucks.
Anyways... I am not trying to ramble on. I guess it just makes me feel better to express it in someway, even if no one reads this. I am at this moment a very frustrated athlete : ( I have not enjoyed this go around of training for an Ironman... not in the slightest bit.
When I ran the Boston Marathon, my mom had gotten me two swarvoski figurines (I collect them) of a tortoise and a hare with a note:
Elizabeth - Swarovski doesn't make a roadrunner - my first choice. So I got a tortoise + a hare - after the fable - forgetting that the tortoise won. Not so good an example if you're going for a personal best!
So here's the new moral of the fable: after all the marathons, triathlons + Ironman you've been in, it's very obvious that conditioning is only part of the answer (the hare). The courage + tenacity to push through the pain (the tortoise) makes the finish possible! Good luck - I know what an achievement being in the Boston Marathon is - I'll be thinking of you.
I was thinking of this note on my run today comparing myself to the tortoise and hare... I'm all tortoise for Canada. I need to prepare for that pain in order to make the finish possible while remembering that slow and steady wins the race - my way of integrating both versions of the fable together. I guess in the end of both the tortoise wins so I guess that's good news for me. Unfortunately, I do not at this moment have the conditioning and arrogance that the hare possesses which I think you also kind of need.
Anyways... I am not trying to ramble on. I guess it just makes me feel better to express it in someway, even if no one reads this. I am at this moment a very frustrated athlete : ( I have not enjoyed this go around of training for an Ironman... not in the slightest bit.
When I ran the Boston Marathon, my mom had gotten me two swarvoski figurines (I collect them) of a tortoise and a hare with a note:
Elizabeth - Swarovski doesn't make a roadrunner - my first choice. So I got a tortoise + a hare - after the fable - forgetting that the tortoise won. Not so good an example if you're going for a personal best!
So here's the new moral of the fable: after all the marathons, triathlons + Ironman you've been in, it's very obvious that conditioning is only part of the answer (the hare). The courage + tenacity to push through the pain (the tortoise) makes the finish possible! Good luck - I know what an achievement being in the Boston Marathon is - I'll be thinking of you.
I was thinking of this note on my run today comparing myself to the tortoise and hare... I'm all tortoise for Canada. I need to prepare for that pain in order to make the finish possible while remembering that slow and steady wins the race - my way of integrating both versions of the fable together. I guess in the end of both the tortoise wins so I guess that's good news for me. Unfortunately, I do not at this moment have the conditioning and arrogance that the hare possesses which I think you also kind of need.
Another picture from my run... would you ever think of seeing this in the middle of a city? Pretty.
