Much better than last week. My leg finally feels better after several chiro visits and getting some PT exercises. Plus the foam roller and I have developed a special love/hate relationship.

Run: 32 miles
Swim 2000 yards

Wanted to swim 2500, which would have been my longest in several years, but was starving so I bailed out.

Sunday was my long run, 14.5 miles, and was the big test for my leg. It felt fine! Massive relief since I have a half marathon in 2 weeks.

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Jen

"In order to keep a true perspective on one's importance, everyone should have a dog that worships him and a cat that will ignore him." - Dereke Bruce

I tapered my swim yardage, ran a bunch, and had 1 rough day with food. Didn't hit the time goals on the swim, but am proud of the finish.

M - 3.3 mi run + 8000 yd swim
T - 13.1 mi run + bike commute
W - 8 mi run + 1600 yd swim
T - 8 mi run
F - 8 mi run + 1000 yd swim
S - 10,000 m open water race :D 2:52
S - 8 mi run + 3600 yd swim


goals for this week: RUN - keep the easy runs easy and the fast runs fast. BIKE - at least 3 hours of it. SWIM - whatever I feel like (this morning I did 5500 and some of the fastest 500s in awhile. Go figure)

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

Jen, glad to hear the leg is feeling better...
TC, that's just amazing, I can't even imagine swimming that far!

As for me, this was a rest week from the 50k on the 11th, so M off, Tues 1hr ride, Wed an ez 35min run with the dog, Thurs ride 1hr, Fri run 17k (felt great), Sat walked ~10k, Sun ran 8k tempo with the dog. All runs felt great, and even my rides felt really strong in the legs!

This week: REST
M: ~2h40 run -> DONE; I just finished a 2h20min very (!) hilly run (~24k) and am feeling it in my left achilles :-(.
T: fly to Dallas for work; swim or walk the treadmill/elliptical for ~40min, just to keep the legs moving
W: fly home from Dallas (late); possibly a walk or easy run in the morning (~3mi or so, nothing fancy)
R: ez 35min or so with dog; pm walk the dog
F: off/optional lunchtime walk/elliptical/bike
St: off/optional ez with dog, possibly just walking
Sn: same as sat
Mon (27th): we fly out at 6pm so pack & clean & sort, OFF!

I don't know how much access we'll have while we are in RSA, but I will post my race # and tracking info etc before we leave.

AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

Mega-grats to Tigerchick - sounds like you SERIOUSLY earned that cupcake!

Last week I finally found some of my motivation that disappeared when I left my client and crashed my bike. 3 workouts seems like nothing, but after weeks of nothing, it's big.

Tuesday: Bike 7 miles. This was the "revenge ride" on the corner where I fell. I was shaking with fear until I got past it - thankfully that was just 5 minutes into the ride. Hit the end of the trail and got confused, so I turned around and went home. Ran 3.2 miles later that afternoon, but slowly as it was hot and windy. Ew.

Spend the rest of the week down in Los Angeles for family stuff. Did about 4 miles of walking on hills and didn't overeat - whew! Found a great womens fitness clothing store called "Lorena Jane" - apparently they're founded in Aus and this was their first US store. Really psyched with some new gear (old me would never run in short shorts. New me realizes that if it's 85 outside, I'm not running in capri-length pants). Adios, dignity!

This week's goals:
Monday: Bike 30 min (done :D - had a lot of fun watching "Ali'i Drive" vids on Youtube)
Tuesday: 45 min ride, 20 min run
Wednesday: Finally be brave enough to attend the masters swim class with Kyle.
Thursday: 30 min bike, 20 min run
Friday: Swim again. For realsies.
Saturday: Long ride
Sunday: Rest

Other goal: sell the project I'm proposing to a client so I can go back to work and fall into a happy routine rather than feeling like a guilt-ridden bugger in a hair shirt not working out when she has time.

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You. You make me stronger.

Do you see any correlation between your training (or not) with your not-good food days? Just curious. I know if I'm having a stressed out day I often bugger up food *and* the workout... AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

Not a good week. Raced a sprint on Sunday before adn was a little ouchie afterwards, took a complete rest day Monday, then did an easy 4 mile run/45 minute bike brick and BAM! all the old injuries screaming at me plus new hurts. A week later it is still bad and today my PT started the conversation of "so, about that IM you wanted to do in the Fall...."

So I am now reduced to swim only with no kick. My glutes and thighs are sore from grabbing the pull buoy, but I got in a total of 20k meters, including a 5 mile ows. This is my last big swim week before I start to taper for the Ches Bay 4.4--although I may be pulling that the whole way.

Sorry to whine. Congrats to everyone, especially TC. And AP, please be sure to post how we can track you. Good luck!

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No coasting in running and no crying in baseball

Quote:

So I am now reduced to swim only with no kick. My glutes and thighs are sore from grabbing the pull buoy, but I got in a total of 20k meters, including a 5 mile ows.

That is a LOT of pulling. You must have amazing lats :D
Sorry about the continued injuries. You've been struggling forever, it seems.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

Quote:

Do you see any correlation between your training (or not) with your not-good food days? Just curious. I know if I'm having a stressed out day I often bugger up food *and* the workout... AP

I always train in the morning and rarely split the workouts. Wednesday was the first day in a LONG time I've run in the morning and swum at lunch. When I have eating issues, which right now is mostly bingeing more than restricting, it's usually in the evenings and most often because of stress and fatigue. The day this week was late Sat night/early Sun am after traveling back.
The effect of bingeing on workouts is often going a bit longer than I should to burn off the calories. But I am doing so much better - I think I've only had two problem days this month, actually. And the thing is that exercising to burn off calories is seriously no fun. I love to run and love to swim (sometimes I even like cycling) but when it's a "damn it I need to get up and run or I am going to get fat" sort of run, that is just no fun at all. And it feels 'disrepsectful' to the sport somehow to use something I LOVE to do as a way to purge (exercise can be a form of purging. I kind of suck at making myself throw up). (Does that make sense?)

The biggest correlation between food issues and life is lack of sleep. Have finally figured out that the 4 am thing every day of the week results in my being super tired and bingeing. So lately I've been getting up at 5:30 most days, earlier if I have to be at school early.

Hopefully that's an honest, transparent enough answer - I'm pretty convinced that a lot of us, males and females, do this and never talk about it.

On a somewhat related note, Portia de Rossi wrote a bit in her memoir about when she was on the cover of Shape. She was anorexic at the time and they asked about her eating and exercise habits. She lied because the truth was running in the morning, running at lunch time, and eating 600 calories a day. It was a big wakeup call for me that not everything you read in magazines is true (don't make fun of me! I am sure the rest of you figured this out awhile ago ;-)... and there are probably a lot of other celebrities who say they have a healthy relationship with their bodies, do a couple cardio workouts a week, when in reality they have seriously disordered habits. I took the book back to the library or I'd copy the part here - it was really interesting.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

Thanks I appreciate the answer. I stopped doing evening workouts a loooong time ago, mostly because I found them to not be helpful for me - either too much family stress or poor sleep or bad food eating afterwards. I wanted balance so ditched the PM sessions. I do run at lunch a lot tho. But at lunch, I am at work and I actually find that easier to manage, stress-wise, than home (or did for many years).

AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

OMFG I totally missed that! Here I was pretty proud of my 6k this week! :) Amazing!

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http://harvestmoon6.blogspot.com
https://www.caringbridge.org/visit/katasmit

Finally managed to ramp up swimming to hit 6K this week in 4 days. Water has been awful so I'm proud of myself for getting out there anyway. Yesterday my ankle FINALLY stopped hurting during the runs and I think that is due to vitamin I and ice, so I'm keeping that up after every run. Seriously thought body was totally breaking down. Got my period after 6 months of none so I guess I'm not menopausal after all but the maca root is keeping the sweats at bay so happy with that. Along with someone else (tiger?) I also moved wake up from 4am to 530 and this am back to 430 (work before training). I'm not even going to try to figure out WTH is going on with the scale. :) I'm tracking calories (but not obsessively) and doing well so just hoping eventually the scale settles with me (it did on Saturday, but no idea why I've gained a kg Sun and Mon). i'm also starting to learn to fuel myself better (thanks to Saturday).

numbers:
swim 6K
bike 5 hours
run 5 hours

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http://harvestmoon6.blogspot.com
https://www.caringbridge.org/visit/katasmit

As an adult onset swimmer, I think one of my more important discoveries as a swimmer is that I have lats! Seriously, this is the first year (of four) that I feel like I actually am using my lats and related back and core muscles. It sure makes swimming alot easier on the shoulders!

And yes, it does feel as though the injuries have been going on forever. :-(

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No coasting in running and no crying in baseball

For entertainment purposes, here are a couple other things you can do with pulling - some of these you may already know

- pull with a band. "Band" means use a piece of resistance band to tie your legs together at the ankles. They'll sink. It is an excellent way to work on body position.
- pull with an inner tube. This is like a band. I'm not sure where you get them, but my pool has inner tubes that are a couple inches in radius. They're black and go around your ankles. It's like a band but provides some resistance, so it makes for a strength workout in addition to the technique help.
- paddles (not if you have any shoulder problems).
- combinations of paddles, buoy, band
- backstroke and breaststroke can also be swum with a buoy. (I've never tried fly). You can also do breaststroke pull sitting on a kickboard.
- One of my favorite things to do pulling is a set of 600s. First one every 4th length fast, second one every other 50 fast, etc. down to a fast 600
- Pulling is excellent for developing strength/power and that translates to speeeeed. 25s as fast as you can go either with buoy or buoy and paddles are really good.
- You can also tow stuff behind you - a college pool would probably have buckets tucked away somewhere. Otherwise, if you can find a sheetrock pail and drill 3 equally spaced holes around the rim, use rope to attach to waist. Same thing on strength.

Still amazed at 20k of pulling.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

TC, thanks for the suggestions. My Y has those parachute thingys to increase resistance. Bands probably are not a good idea, as keeping my ankles close together aggravates the glute min issues.

This is how bad a swimmer I am--I go faster and with less effort with a pull buoy than I do kicking. Something is off on the timing or body position when I kick (which may also contribute to the hip issues, as these seem to always flare up when I get above 15k a week). I have noticed that after I pry the pull buoy out from between my legs and give a little go at kicking (100-200 meter), I seem to hold my body position much better (hips up higher in the water?).

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No coasting in running and no crying in baseball

Good week last week. I hit my weekly mileage goal (which was the amount I was running last summer). No twinges of the injury. Yay!
So that was 6 runs, with my longest run yet, 8 miles, at a pace I'm VERY happy with!!!!!
4 bikes, 1 swim of 4k yards.
Next week the outdoor pools open! yay!!!
This week: Maintain run mileage
and I signed up for a sprint tri that will take place on Sat! My buddy's doing the race too and he talked me into it.
I already know the course, and it should be fun.
Within 2 lbs of goal weight. Liking how I look these days.

Looking forward to the long weekend because of Memorial Day. Yay!!!

I just read Chrissie's book this past weekend.

I take comfort in the fact that I am getting better and better and one day it will be gone.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

I don't think that's unusual actually - I can pull 100 far faster than I can kick it. Where's AWARE? I'd be interested in her opinion on this.


First sentence: are you kicking with a board or streamlined? That could make a difference.

Second sentence: buoy is really good for body position work so that makes sense.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

Last week's goals:
Run x 6: FAIL - 5 only.
Bike x 4: WIN with 5 incl almost 3hrs on Sunday
Swim x 4 incl 1 open water: WIN-ish - the OWS didn't happen until yesterday but I did 4 pool swims last week
Core/strength x 4: WIN
Nutrition back on track: WIN

Missed 1 run because we got back from the long ride Sunday to find friends in our driveway already! I had to jet to the grocery store before they closed (yesterday was a holiday; nothing open) so left Tanker to build a campfire, then when I got back we lit off some fireworks. I refuse to believe I would have been better off running.


This week's goals:
Run x 6
Bike x 4
Swim x 4
Core/strength x 3


Racing a sprint on Sunday - really only doing it so the half iron next month isn't the first tri of the year. Will also be good to get a real open water swim in as opposed to the running-out-of-daylight splash about I did yesterday while trying not to be carried off by the biggest mosquitoes I've ever seen in my life. The 9 bites on my arse (plus assorted others) were enough to have me wondering if I'd need a blood transfusion - those things were like small aircraft!


Cheers!


-mistress k

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ill advised racing inc.

I have a friend who developed an eating disorder in her 40s. This is getting more common as the pressure to look young continues. 40 is the new 30 only if you've had plastic surgery and are skinny. Hers started with tracking down food allergies which let to a fear of eating which led to losing weight which let to compliments. She got down to 98 lbs and she is 5'6". She's getting better thankfully.

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Jen

"In order to keep a true perspective on one's importance, everyone should have a dog that worships him and a cat that will ignore him." - Dereke Bruce

That is rough, to say the least. Those compliments can be SO destructive. My family was always the same way - you were either greeted with a generic "hi" or "WOW you look SO skinny!" My mom still does that and I blow her off with "yeah, I feel great - just did a 4 mi run".

My mom was a 1970's caffeine pill abuser and chain smoker. After having me at 23, she stayed home and stopped playing tennis and (at 5'5") ballooned to 180 (exacerbated by her having to quit smoking when I was 13 because it had GO FIGURE created enough second hand smoke for me to start coughing up blood). She worked hard to get back in shape after that and starved herself to 105, but settled up to 135ish...now walks a lot (4 miles 4x/week in a hilly area) and eats terribly - HUGE bowls of iceberg lettuce so she feels like she gets to eat a lot, but no nutritional value. She has some severe gastrointestinal issues (if she eats too much salt she gets vertigo and faints/throws up/dizzy for hours) that the docs haven't been able to treat well, so she keeps cutting out more and more foods... It's a mess, and I'm sure a lot of it is in her head (though she says the same about my panic attacks).

I know that all women deal with this in some way or another, and I don't think it's all bad. I think it forces us to endure some introspection and figure out the difficult balance of what makes us happy. We all make our decisions, some good and some bad, and are faced with the consequences. We learn to see the stick-figure clothes-hanger models and realize that it isn't normal or healthy and doesn't even vibe with our fitness goals. Hopefully we can remember to tell our daughters, neices, and friends' children that they look STRONG instead of pretty and to act SMART instead of cute. We also see the opposite - parents setting bad examples of being sedentary and eating poorly. My dad came home from work every day for 40 years, avoided all vegetables, chain smokes to this day, and drinks beer till he passes out. I have never in my life seen him do anything athletic, and it shows - my 90 y/o grandfather is in better shape!

Anywho, I've rambled... but I raise my glass of no-calorie flavored-water to all the ladies who cope with the eating disorders and hope there is help and internal strength to find the happy balance.

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You. You make me stronger.

My friend and I went jeans shopping and she brought a size 2 into the dressing Room then asked for a 0. Stupid clerk said she is so lucky to be thin, most girls would be jealous. I cringed and my friend said that she was sick, that's why she's thin.

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Jen

"In order to keep a true perspective on one's importance, everyone should have a dog that worships him and a cat that will ignore him." - Dereke Bruce

What I meant was I pull (only) with a buoy faster than when I swim with kicking (and using my arms). Kick only--hah, forget it, almost double the time it takes me to swim.

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No coasting in running and no crying in baseball

I finished Ironman Texas on Saturday in 14:18:20 - temps in the low-mid 90's, humid, and windy - typical Texas weather, but given that it had been cool for the previous 3 weeks, the heat hit everyone pretty hard. The DNF rate was ~15%, and in my AG (F50-54) it was ~24%. So why am I so annoyed that I was 1 min and 3 seconds slower than when I did this race in 2011 in better conditions and when I was 2 years younger? Then I'm annoyed with myself for not being happy about just finishing. I'm still processing the whole experience and I'm sure I'll come to terms with it. I made a mental error on the run that cost me a chance to beat my time - I slowed to look at my Garmin and saw 14:00 and thought it meant 14 hours. It was actually my pace at that moment, and I was really at 13:xx hours and could have met my goal if I hadn't decided that since I'd missed it I was just going to walk more and get through it without worrying about time. Of course, I need to remember that I wasn't in the best shape to be thinking and doing math calculations at that point!

I was disappointed in my swim but had an excellent bike - I felt good most of the time, pushed through the low moments ~miles 70-85, stuck to my nutrition plan even when I didn't want to ever taste IM Perform again, had the sense to stop twice when I was getting dangerously hot and pour extra water on my head, cool off, and assess whether I was safe to go, and finished strong. The run is always my weakest event, and it took me almost 6 hours. The stats show that the average run times were 18 min slower than last year, and I was "only" 17:40 slower. I don't think I overdid it on the bike, I think it was just too hot on the run - my HR and "time not moving" were close to what I do on my long, hot training runs. I was queasy and had breathing problems on one segment of the 3-loop run - I have asthma, and there must have been something in that section, but I got through it.

A lot of my friends didn't finish, so I'm trying to encourage and support them and help them figure out what went wrong. If I can just be as nice and as reasonable with myself as I am with them, I'll be fine!