Island Lake Triathlon RR

It is the same tri I did as my first tri two years ago. I was pretty excited about doing this tri to see my progress.

It did not go as planned. I know I am a better swimmer and much stronger on a bike now than I was before, and run, I do not think that I have improved.
I do not know what was wrong today, maybe that I was at work for 14h on Th, then drove 8+ hours yesterday from IL to MI, maybe because of cold weather, maybe because I have zero fire in me.

Ok, so the race.

The day started with scrapping frost of my car windshield. Good, isn't it?

Swim: 26:18 Hell yeah!!! They postponed the start by ~20' which gave me time to warm up, which was good I think. I felt strong, smooth, efficient. Just great! I swam alone for most of the swim. I was trying to draft off one gal but I kept loosing her feet and then we ran inti men from previous wave and sprint race waves and it become a mayhem. But anyway, I am very hapoy about the swim.

T1: I have not tried a flying mount since September and I chickened out. Embarassing.

Bike: 1:11 Which is time I rode in that first tri on a road bike in running shoes...I felt good at first but I think that I must have gotten too cold. Or maybe I need to ride the TT bike outside more (well, today was the second time I rode it outside since October) because my position is different outside and I felt uncomfortable.
By the end of the ride my hands and feet were so cold that I had hard time shifting. And I drank one small sip of gatorade the whole race because I just could not hold a bottle in my frozen hands or open a gel.

T2: Had trouble unbuckling the helmet because of the frozen fingers and had hard time putting the shoes on for the same reason.

Run: High 41  Embarassing but I am progressing. I think that I can run  close to 40 off the bike by this fall if I can run.
I had no idea what position I was in I saw some women on an out and back section and I passed the last one with 1.5 miles to go.
I felt good the whole time, except for two miles that are run on a grass (that was not cut!!!) and I was tripping over my own legs. But my running just sucks. Plain and simple.

Total time: 2:23 (I went 2:27 and 2:21 on this course before)

I am disappointed because I know I can ride and run better but I do not know why I did not. Geez, I need to get over this by June 30!!!

I was pretty confident I won but then I saw the results and I was second. So I drove 8+ hours to be second?!? Grrr. However after the initial disappointment when I was able to think clearly I realized something was not right. According to the results the first women swam 30, rode 59, ran 40. And she was 44. If there is a gal who can TT 40km (this course is accurate) under 60' AND run 40' 10k afterwards I want to see her. Is it possible? Even female TT specialists cannot easily ride 40k under an hour. So I  went back to check what the first man rode to compare. And then I saw that they updated the results and I was first. So I feel better now:)
Oh, and I got a parking ticket at the race. What a stupid day!

Any advice how to get my fire back?

Running around

I keep thinking that I will either get pretty good or that I will get injured. One of the two. The reason is that I pretty much do all my runs on tired legs, I do hard days back to back, I do track workouts off the bike and I know that I do not recover properly between training and work and I do not know how sustainable it is.

Common sense tells me that I should not do that but it is hard to fit all the workouts in and then I end up never running on fresh legs. But of course on the other hand it is good I guess because I will get used to pushing through the fatique.

This is the first time I am training for a half-marathon. Well, I already trained once for a HM, in 2010, but I think that that lasted 2 weeks and then my ITB has flared up. So it is kind of new to me. All those long workouts, wow. Totally something I have not really done before.

For example I did 7x1k @ 10k pace w/ 2min jog recovery today. It was easy-peasy but sooo long. 7x1k is a lot for me. It went pretty well, I was not sure how fast to run it so I started conservatively and then see how it goes. 4:04, 4:04, 4:02, 4:00, 3:58, :58, 3:56.
I kind of feel that I am not running my intervals fast enough. I do not know.

I also do long runs with running at HM pace embedded in them. Like for example 2x15min, or 25min. That is also completely new to me. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it does not. I kind of arbitrary chose my HM pace to be somewhere around 4:25 pace (4:25/km, not mile....but I wish:)) but how fast I run really depends on a day. For example two weeks ago I ran 25min at 4:13 pace because I felt good, but this week I tried but my legs just would not go.

I also have this one workout that I do every two weeks so I can kind of gauge my progress (1k @5k, mile @10k, 3k @HM, mile @10k, 1k @5k). Problem is that sometimes I do it after work, sometimes in the morning and last time I did it off the bike so I cannot really compare. The one off the bike was interesting.I normally do 1k in 3:50-4:00, miles @ 4:05-10, 3k @ 4:20-25. But last Sunday I did a 3h30min bike and then then did this workout. I felt awesome at the beginning and ran 1k in 3:55, mile @ 4:04 pace and 3k @ 4:14 pace, which I knew might have been little too fast but I decided to see whether I can pull it off. Turns out I could not because then I ran mile @ 4:10 pace and 1k in 4:15 or something like that. Wheels came off and I think that I might have bonked too.

I do 3-4 runs a week (depends on my work schedule): 2 interval runs (one long intervals, one short intervals), 1 long run and 1 easy short run if I do 4 runs. Overall the running is going well. ITB seems to be doing fine, it does not bother me at all. I still go to the PT every 3 weeks and I tried to run with a good form that I know helps to prevent ITB flare ups. So hopefully it will all be good. Although I can tell that it is not 100%, I can feel that there is something wrong in that right ITB in the knee area.

I am doing an Oly tri on May 25 in Michigan and it is the one I did in 2011 as my first triathlon. It is the same course and everything and I think that it will be super cool to see how I have improved in last two years. I do not expect any improvement on my run because I have not trained enough in those two years but swim should have improved and so should have my bike.

Struggles

And the struggle continues...

You know what the last thing I want to do when I get home after getting up at 5am, doing a workout, and then going go!go!go! 12 hours at work is? It is biking.
Actually all I want to do is do nothing, just sit and give my brain a rest, get a mental break. I am a vegetable by the time I get home from work and my poor brain is fried but I can usually force myself into running or swimming, but biking....not so much. You see, my bike workouts are hard and they require a lot of focus and concentration. (Swim and run are also hard but they do not require that much concentration and thus are not as mentally taxing as bike is for me) and I just do not have energy to focus.

I have had a little meltdown 3 weeks ago. I skipped 2 bikes, 1 swim and 1 run that week. It was the same week my boss told me I cannot have vacation in August to go to Hawaii for training camp and that we shall see about vacation in September for Vegas.... NOT a coincidence.  (Ok, I have not qualified for Vegas yet but you must believe in yourself)

I somehow recovered, did a few "do not care about pace/time/power" workouts and I have been alright for the last 2 weeks but I know that the tension is building again and in a couple weeks I will have another meltdown if I have to continue working 10-12hours a day.

I also have no fire in me any more. I was excited for Buffalo Springs Lake but not anymore. I am not excited for anything. I only go through motions.

I will do my best to manage everything until June 30 and try not to blow up before that.

I originally wanted to write more about my training in the last two weeks because there were some good days but I do not want to do it anymore. Zero motivation.