Yeah, I couldn't resist the pull of the Tahoe battle {albeit half that battle} this fall. Ironman announced the half, on the same day as the full, and yet again the pull to register for an {almost} inaugural race was great; I'll be headed to Tahoe again this fall.
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| my favorite photo of the day last fall |
Let's just talk about the journey that'll bring me to the start line:
Run - mmm yeah, we'll need to be getting back on this bandwagon again. Yet, I've jumped on so many times before and have basically fallen off the train every time. I want to do things a bit differently. New watch. New shoes. New motivation. New mobility. New body. {I wish}
Yeah, I realize I can't change who I am, nor the feet and ankles I swam my body into, and because of that, I cannot approach running the way every land athlete does. This water girl needs to give some extra attention starting from the bottom up {just like what I teach all my swimmers - kick, core, then arms} - for me, it's going to start with my toes, arch, heel, achilles, ankle, shin, calf, knee, hamstring, quad, hip flexors, butt, and yeah my head. Strength, mobility, stretching, releasing, supporting. Not to mention, positivity. These actions will get me to the start line ready to race. Because, quite frankly, I'm rather sick of getting to the start line ready to swim and bike and "survive the run" which has been my motto for oh so long. This time I want to STRIVE.
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| taking care of my poor leggies last year |
Bike - Kermit will be paired with Elsa {the power meter} again after this weekend. I've learned a bit on Super Grover this winter and how my body responds to effort levels. Granted, I haven't ran off the bike once, but I've gained some strength and guts that I didn't have on my bike before. Through very non-scientific testing, I've found I can actually back off on the cadence and lower my HR a bit, push a slightly bigger gear and climb faster. I've always been a spin to win kinda rider, so don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about 60rpm here. But backing it a bit below 90, my knee and heart are responding okay to the change. Will be interesting to see how Kermit does. And yes, I'll even incorporate a little {or a lot} of Fiesta Island interval/strength work on the bike. My motor needs some fine tuning.
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| mannyvphoto.com Dirty30 Birthday ride. Super Grover needs to be hibernated for a while |
Swim - this is going okay. I've been swimming once a week at the cove, plus floating through a couple of swim lessons here and there. Once the bike racing slows down, I'll add a couple masters workouts a week. But in all reality, I haven't lost my swim. This summer, I got a team together for the Trans Tahoe swim relay {we still need a boat! anyone? Bueller?} so I'll have to ramp it up here a bit for that. Looking forward to getting up there again and checking out the updated bike course and hoping my lungs fare better this time. Also interested to see what IM will do for the 70.3 swim start.
In the meantime, I had some bike racing to attend to! Last weekend was the criterium at Barrio Logan {downtown San Diego} and it was awesome to have teammates in both my races! {congrats to Deanna who worked her ass off this spring for her upgrade.} This weekend we headed north of Santa Barbara for the CA State Criterium Championships at the Firestone 805 crit weekend. Had a blast on my weekend away with Kyle. He's ramping up his workups for deployment in November, so we are trying to enjoy the small vacations we have together between his time away. {more on this epic race weekend to follow}
Oh and speaking of new, we just got a new Tempurpedic mattress! I feel like an old married couple, getting excited about such a major purchase, but we are sleep/recovery nerds and cannot believe we've been on something so uncomfortable for this long. It just got delivered a week ago and we spent the last four nights camping; so yeah, we're a bit excited for restful night sleeps ahead!
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