At work yesterday I downed some "Grandma's Mini-Sandwich Cremes" from the vending machine. It's hopeless. I'm hooked on sugar.
Ran 7 miles Tuesday morning in the rain with a friend.
Rode a total of 50 miles Monday, ran 2.2. No rest since the half-ironman.
Wednesday swam 1,000 yards outside at Pocohontas. It was miserable.
This morning I got up at 5:00am and ran 10 miles like it was nothing. I think my mind was in the right place - floating around from thought to thought rather than thinking about my stride, impact, future knee replacement, etc. I just ran along in the dark and humidity and enjoyed the coming of light.
I learned a fair amount at that half I did last weekend. Triathletes are weird mostly. Weird like swimmers I met in high school. A bit sheltered. Kind of goofy. Lots of talk about the races they've done recently, fear of swimming, love of running. They look good though - nice legs. Really the stock triathlete is pretty well rounded overall, upper body/lower body development. Thanks to swimming I reason. Running kind of cast a gaunt thinness after prolonged use. I try to stay away from it as much as possible. That fact will haunt me soon.
During the 13.1 run last weekend I was uninterested. Good thing they don't have you do a 1 mile loop. I would have probably stopped at my car and gone home. The swim was completely different. I looked forward to the start, my pulse was steady, no pre-race jitters whatsoever. I looked around at all the toned men in my group and they all looked like nervous runners before a long swim. I knew I had the advantage. During the swim I could tell also that they weren't 'working' with the current. There was an obvious push from the lake that could be taken advantage of if one timed the pull phase of the stroke...but everyone was fighting the water. I would come up on people's feet and pass from foot to head in about two strokes then they would be out of sight. How discouraging. I think I could make a living by teaching triathletes how to swim. Something to fall back on if this CFO business sputters out.
I'm on the final approach. I keep thinking that all the time. Have I done enough? Do I have enough time to put in the aerobic base that I need? July was very weak. My plan calls for a rest week next week and then taper. I'm not tapering yet. Planning to keep building up a bit, breaking myself down, and having a two week taper. We shall see. What do I want from all this? Hmmm? Nothing really. That's my answer: Nothing. I don't even enjoy talking about it with people because it's such a long explanation....I've defined in casual conversation over a hundred times the distances for each segment of a full distance Ironman. And then people want to know how much I train, and then this, and then that, etc. I don't even bring it up if I avoid it - saves the small talk.
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