The night before...

Here we are just hours away from the start of Ironman Canada! We'll give it one word from what we've seen: brutal. Tomorrow is going to be a really difficult day - not only because it's a tough course but also because it's going to be 91+ degrees and sunny. Who would have thunk that in Canada, eh?

We flew into Seattle on late Wednesday, well, more like early Thursday since we didn't land until about 12:30am. We were at our hotel and in bed by 2am only to wake up nice and early the next day since we were still stuck on Eastern time. We spent the day having fun playing tourist around Seattle. We love that city!

Friday morning we hoped in the car and drove 6 hours over the border and into Penticton. We went straight to race registration, ate lunch and headed to the condo we rented to relax for a bit and then back into town for the pasta dinner. It was ok. Lake Placid was way better and much more motivational. We called it an early night and fell asleep almost immediately once getting back to the condo. I was ticked off immediately at Ironman at registration as I was going through the stops in the tent and arrived at the chip activation stand and the woman says to me "and do you have your chip strap?" (to hold the chip on your ankle). My reply was "No, I didn't know I was suppose to bring my own" and she says "oh, well, that's ok, you can purchase one here for $5 - this is something new that we will be doing at our races" OH MY GOD IRONMAN - SERIOUSLY?!?!?!?!?!?!? I said no thanks, I'll get one somewhere else. I would rather give my money to a local bike shop than give it to Ironman. I just don't understand how it's ok for them to charge you for a chip strap when we are required to wear a chip. Thanks for the forewarning on that one!

Today we spent the day prepping for checking in. I had a mishap while on my bike ride... my seat bolt broke. Eek!!! We brought that guy straight into the bike shop (Bike Barn, who also received my money for a chip strap) and the crew there was AWESOME! It was fixed AND tuned up in no time. Luckily, I only had to pay $50 for the bolt piece and not $300 for the entire stem, phew! Justin's bike got a nice surprise tune up as well and both bikes were looking good for racing! We dropped the bikes, bike bag and run bag off, drove the run route home and are now sitting on the couch about to eat dinner and go to sleep nice and early. I had a nice volunteer give my VIP treatment at check in who gave me step by step instructions on where and how everything is going to go down tomorrow. Ha, loved it - he was awesome!

Well, this is it! My number is 2367 and Justin's is 331. You can track us on Ironman (http://live.ironmanlive.com/Event/Subaru_Ironman_Canada).

WISH US LUCK!!!! Oh and Joey, screw you for not being here!!!!! hahahahhaha.....

Taper has begun!

Just a quick update... I completed my final long workout on Monday with a 20 mile run! Paced a 9 min/mile, so I'm happy! I tried Sports Legs for the first time, just out of curiosity and have concluded that they suck. It's suppose to prevent/delay lactic acid build up in your legs during endurance workouts. While my calves were fine, my thighs started burning with about 5 miles to go which never happens. When I say burning, I mean with every step I wanted to cry. To top it off, my legs have never felt worse the day after a long run than they did after this one - I threw out the rest of the sample pack and will not be taking those ever again. Now, time for some tapering... ahhhhhhhh. It's good to not feel guilty for not working out crazy amounts :) While our bikes have already begun their journey to Canada, Justin and I hop on a plane Wednesday night - I'll write a post on final thoughts and what not before I leave... now kick up your legs and relax a lil!

Bike riding

On Saturday, Justin and I went out for another long ride. With an 82  mile route mapped and added to the Garmin, we made our way to Potomic to start our ride. Again, we started late at 11:50am and the humidity was up and temps hot, already above 90 degrees. Before starting we decided to make this a race pace ride. Properly fueled and prepared for the efforts, we headed on out. Within 5 minutes of the ride, I was glistening (more like dripping) with sweat from the humidity. It was crazy, I hadn't even given any serious effort yet and I was soaked. At mile 20ish, we made too early of a left turn onto the wrong road and instead of the Garmin redirecting us or telling us to turn down the NEXT road when we made a U-turn, it instead decided to redirect us immediately back to the start. Not being completely familiar with the roads, we had no idea at the time. Then at mile 30 we saw a familiar road and thought "this isn't right, we shouldn't be here", and discovered we were 3 miles from the start of our ride - DANG, we're going to have to do the route over again plus add some miles at the end to get in the distance we want! I got frustrated because I hate doing loops but Justin was successful at getting me to chill out and realize doing another loop wouldn't be so bad. After all, it was a great route with some challenging hills. So, off on loop two we went. We stopped shortly into the second loop to get some shaved iced at a rickety stand at an intersection. They were delicious and perfect for a bike ride snack! After completing almost all of the second loop we noticed how lucky we were to have missed all the rain storms that seemed to have rolled through our route as the roads were wet the second time around... that is until we had 4 miles left in the loop and downpours just opened up above us. It was not so awesome. If forced us to take the last of the ride very slowly and when we got back to the start we agreed to call it quits and not add on the extra miles to make it an 80 mile ride... so in the end it was a 66 mile route with 5,056 elevation gain. We paced 16.3 mph which is not race pace but the day presented several challenging factors that slowly ate away at us such as the humidity, temps and rain.

This weekend we're planning on doing 100+ miles for our last heavy effort on the bike. Let's hope we are able to get ourselves up nice and early so that we aren't biking in the smack middle of the day. We're dropping our race bikes off either after our ride or early next week at Bike Transport to send them on their way to Canada. This is crazy how close we are to Ironman!!! I should probably start swimming...

Summer heat

Today I had plans to do a 20 mile run - I cut that one short by 1 mile and did 19 due to heat. I was stupid and left at 11:45am so it was already above 90 degrees at the start and the day wasn't cooling down (it hasn't for about 3 weeks now).
I mapped out a run where majority was on the Rock Creek Park Trails which is mostly shaded so figured it wouldn't be too bad. However, I started and ended my route along the mall making the Washington Monument my turnaround point - putting the first and last 4.5 miles in dead sunlight. I held strong for the majority of it but lately, again, due to heat, I've been needing to stop in the shade and rest for a couple minutes to cool down - but I made it until mile 15 before needing my first break in the shade. That was followed with three more rests in the last 4 miles. When I hit the street before my loop around the monument, I decided to cut it short and head straight home instead- after all, I looked like a salt stick, had gone through 5 water bottles and had heat radiating off my body. It wasn't pretty.

When I got home, I quickly downed some recovery mix with ice cold water. I weighed myself (I'm now keeping track of my weight until Ironman to make sure I don't get too out of control with the food, hehe) and had dropped 4lbs of water weight from that morning! Holy cow... my lunch never tasted so good and I treated myself to a bottle of Coke - it was delicious!

I've worn my yurbuds for two runs now (including today's) and so far I kinda like them. Yes, they definitely stay in my ears unlike other ear buds so big plus for that but they're designed for you to hear the noise around you (i.e. if you were biking you can hear cars coming) and because of this, any wind overtakes the music and when you're running along a road with lots of cars, you really have to turn the volume up. It's a bit annoying. Still would like to do some more runs with them before I give my definitive recommendation on them :)

That's it for now! Until my next post...

What's that? Things are better?!

Well, training has been.... BETTER! Yup! After my last post, I tried my best to turn the switch and make a positive out of a negative, and I did. While I still can't seem to get myself motivated for the pool (let's admit, no one is EVER motivated to go swim), running and biking has been successful. Whenever I can get the chance, I'll go for a run or hop on the trainer. The trick to getting on the bike more? Leaving the trainers set up and sitting right next to the couch. That way, 1) it never takes more than 2 minutes to get everything ready for a ride and 2) when I'm sitting on the couch watching TV, the bike is sitting there taunting me and making me feel bad. It's working (it helps that the Tour was on, too). I've done several 2+ hour rides on the trainer and many 1+ hour rides in the last two weeks. Last weekend, Justin and I headed out for a 75 mile ride in MD (though the Garmin says it was only 70 miles). It was in the 90's and no cloud coverage but we enjoyed every minute of it! You can see the ride here. This was our first official long ride so while we went slow, we were feeling great at the end and happy to have gotten out there for the day.

On the running front, I try to get a run in whenever I can... like yesterday morning, I had to be at work at 10 which means I have to be in the shower by 9 in order to leave by 9:30 for my half hour walk to work. So, I woke up at 7 as usual, had breakfast with Justin, walked out the door with him at 8 and got an hour run in - perfect. I am sacrificing my appearance by showing up to the store with wet hair as I don't have time to do anything with it - oh well. The same weekend as the bike ride, Jus and I got out for a 15 mile run bright and early Saturday morning - I headed off to work immediately after as Jus went to play kickball (jealous). Tonight is calling for a 10 mile run and I plan to hop on the trainer for a bit in just a little while. With the heat wave of last week, the runs have been HOT but they only make you feel that much stronger. I've been loving it. Today is no different... 92* but you gotta do what you gotta do!

I am thinking I need to set some goals in order to get in the pool more... brainstorming ideas now.

Last note of the post, I got some new earphones from the store this week - yurbuds. I have been hearing great things about these things and I can't wait to try them out myself; they were created by a triathlete who had gotten fed up with his earphones slipping out and hurting while on long training rides and run. I wear over the head earphones because ear buds *ALWAYS* fall out during workouts. These guarantee that they will not with their patented ear-lock technology. They are comfortable but I have yet to test them, perhaps that will happen tonight. I'll let you know what I think. Seems as though each package comes with a card with an inspirational quote. Mine was: You think I'm chasing you? You think you've got me beat? Well, you've got me all wrong. Pace is my trick. My focus is my inner strength, my iron will. Triumph is upon me. It can't be had without the struggle. I move up on you. I push past you. I cross the line focused and my doubts overcome.

Unprepared and unhappy

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.

Another picture from my run... would you ever think of seeing this in the middle of a city? Pretty.
                                               

Kinetic Half Race Report (Justin)

Last weekend we competed in our 1st race of the year- the Kinetic Half in Lake Anna, VA. Both of us were a little more nervous than usual...for me it was b/c the distance for 1st race of the year, new race wheels on the bike, unknown course/bad weather. And the biggest reason is that my training has been very inconsistent this year. My workouts have been more focused and purposeful but I'm missing a lot of them.

To spare an extra 20 minutes of sleep, we stayed at Courtney & Kyle's apartment on Friday night. When the alarm went off at 3:45am, I was happy to have had the extra rest. We dressed, ate and were in the car by 4:30am. The ride down was pretty uneventful but unfortunately we didn't get through parking and packet pick up until 6:40am...my swim wave went off at 7am...better hurry!!!


Swim (41:42)
I decided- being the 1st race of the year- to just swim on my own and not try to draft. I've worked on my swim a lot this off-season with the Masters program and was hoping to see some big improvements. The good: I was pretty confident throughout and swam a half-iron distance personal best. The bad: my time still stunk, I was weaving throughout, and I expended way too much energy. Coming out of the lake, my HR was 180 (even sprinting its hard for me to go above 165 while running/biking).

Bike (2:49:42)
The weather decided to stay overcast and drizzling- which is much better than the predicted rain storms. It felt good to get out on the bike course. The course is lollipop-shaped with 2 loops around and was pretty flat throughout. I decided to forgo the bike computer and decided to pace off heart rate alone. I stayed within my target HR for the 1st loop and then just went all out for the 2nd. Around mile 45 I started to blow up a little so I settled into a comfortable but slower pace and cruised through the last 11 miles. Good: another 70.3 personal best and I was really comfortable. Bad: Didn't take in enough calories and struggled through the last few miles.


Run (2:02:53)
Happy to be off the bike and into transition I quickly realized I left my socks in the car and only had recovery compression socks. I love my running shoes but they're pretty bad when sockless so I put on the compression socks and off I went. The run course is 3 loops with a big hill out of transition. The rest is a lot of up-and-down. My goal was to take loop 1 easy and progressively get faster. Instead, my body let me go faster Loop 2 and blew up on lap 3. All of the up and downs had taken their toll and I was spent. Good: my second fastest 70.3 run time. Bad: My body felt like poo.

Overall
Set Up events puts on really good races- Liz and I have really enjoyed the 2 we've competed in. The weather was ideal throughout being around 65 degs and overcast. It was great having Courtney at the race to cheer us on- THANKS!!! Randomly, my assigned transition spot was right next to Brian Cook (I'm good friends w/ his brother Dan and Courtney/Kyle are friends w/ Brian from high school). Unintentionally we stayed together throughout each leg of the race- I pulled away at the end of the bike and kept a 3 minute lead going into lap 3 of the run. I couldn't believe it when he passed me right as we were entering the finishing chute...so I was kinda bummed but still extremely happy to have PR'ed.

Next up is TriRidgefield...