I feel like I’ve been playing to my weaknesses this week. I don’t feel like I’m putting enough time in my training. An hour here, an hour there. Is it really enough to get me through 140 miles? I feel like I should be amping it up a bit. Perhaps when I get back to Seattle I can begin putting in some of the real work?
Recap of Week 5 of Base Training
Monday, December 17: 10 miles on my bike trainer, followed by 1 hour of strength training with William. Here’s what a session with him looked like:
Tuesday, December 18: 1200 yard swim (45 minutes), 5K run in 45 minutes.
Wednesday, December 19: 1:10 strength training session, solo. Treadmill warmup, 60 lunges, 60 squats, 60 adduction, 60 abduction, 3 planks.
Thursday, December 20: Half mile cranky swim. I wasted time before my swim because I thought I lost my flip flops and went all around town looking for a replacement. I had to get to work so I quit early. (Ended up finding my flip flops in my OTHER gym bag the next day.)
Friday, December 21: 21.5 miles on the bike (1 hour) featuring hill intervals. Felt good, but not as tiring as I had hoped.
Saturday, December 22: 45-minute run (3.72 miles). Nice sunny day in LA!
Sunday, December 23: 0.91 miles in the pool (1 hour) and 27.3 miles on the bike (1 hour 15 minutes). My swim felt great! I only swam freestyle, meaning no backstroke breaks. I want to make sure I am in decent shape for when I eventually join a masters swimming team. The bike ride also felt great! Best part was that I didn’t feel too wiped out after my ride. I actually felt like getting a bit of running in, but I was running behind for a few appointments I had that day.
Things to do in the new year:
1) Find/join a masters swimming team (2-3x a week)
2) Find/join a tri group (thinking of TN Multisports in Seattle)
3) Fix my heart rate monitor (or figure out why it stops reading after a half hour)
4) Incorporate lunchtime workouts (what can I squeeze into the middle of my day? A run around Lake Union a few days a week?!)
5) Sign with my new trainer/coach for 1 session a week until April 28th
Things I learned this week:
1) My body is good at faking illness. It’s also kind of good at getting legitimately sick.
2) If I feel inadequate about my training then I should either get over it, push myself harder, or train more efficiently.
3) Reading more and more about 140.6 training makes me feel prepared.
4) Derailing my diet and eating the way I used to doesn’t make me feel very good. In fact, it makes me feel pretty crummy.
5) Communicating with your significant other is really important, especially when it comes to planning vacations or other funsies around a demanding training schedule.
6) You can’t do it alone. Training, yes you can do that alone, sometimes. But for the most part, training for an event of this nature requires that you cash out your karma points and get the support of people who are close to you.
Amara in Training 