Pretty good week... ran 6x, biked once (errands), swam 6x. Got a bunch of work done.


Goals for this week:
at least one day off from running
swim 6x
bike 2x
10+ hrs dissertation work

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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

Things are pretty good over here, thanks for getting us started and keeping us accountable tigerchik.

I had a good race this weekend and got in all of the training I had on my schedule. I ended up riding my new (to me) tri bike at the race (an Olympic Tri) and it was a good experience -- I wasn't much faster than I am on my CX despite a pretty significant weight difference and I lost a water bottle due to handling that needs improvement but I feel more confident I'll eventually tame the bike and get comfortable in aero. I am traveling to the East Coast this week so I won't have another chance to ride it -- but I have six weeks till my 70.3 and am planning to get in lots of quality miles when I get back.

Last week was a sorta taper and here's how it went:

2 rest days
2 yoga sessions
2 swims (both in the pool)
1 ride on new bike -- still adjusting but no falling off bike :)
1 run (hill repeats and HR pace work)
1 race

Hope everyone has a great week!

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(Formerly SoCalTricurious, now in the PNW).

Last week's plans:

- get over this run suckiness - it just feels so not good, so slow and lethargic, dead legs... try for 4x and be happy with 3. DONE -4 including a run to work on Friday morning.
- ride 2x FAIL but I chose running over riding
- coach 3x DONE and man some parents are pains in the BUTT. Grrrr, was very frustrated after last bout of games.
- drill/skipping/core - 2x FAILish, I got 1 done but that's OK.
- more diligence on food - getting a bit lax and having the GI issues returning, part of what (I'm certain) is contributing to the suckiness when running (hard to have enough energy when you aren't digesting properly) - DONE and feelin better


This week:
- Coaching 3x. Solve the football problem. It sucked up way too much of my time and energy last week, so much so that I think this will be my last run as a football coach. But I have a master plan to at least end the season on a positive note....
- Run 4x including the Friday run to work
- Riding is optional. Maybe Thursday :-)
- Drills & Skipping & Core 1x


AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

Last week's goals:
- swim x 2: win
- bike x 1: win
- run x 5: win with 6 - over 75km
- core/strength x 4: win

Had an incredibly tough but stunningly beautiful long run on Saturday - spent more than 3hrs traipsing around Dundas Valley Conservation Area, hopping on and off the Bruce Trail. I'd run a 50k there just shy of a year ago and it's a magical place, even if all the short hills are murder on the legs.


More trilliums in bloom - some places were just carpeted with hundreds of them.


Photos can't do this spot justice. It takes my breath away every time.


The forget-me-nots make me smile.


This is even more stunning when the trees are in leaf.


Canterbury Falls off the Heritage side trail.


It's a long way down in some places..

Also made brunch at our place for my lovely mum on Sunday - had a nice visit and ate way too much, but still got out for another trail run at Puslinch Tract as the sun set afterward.


Golden sunshine and budding leaves.


I was stronger running uphill than I figured I'd be after pounding my legs through 2,500ft of climbing on Saturday.


Time to head home.

Didn't make it to the pool Sunday evening, but I hit all my targets and spent time with my mom, so meh.

This week's goals:
- swim x 2
- run x 5
- core/strength x 2 (already done)
- mobility/stretch x 2

Have a 25k trail race on Saturday, so bodyweight strength training only yesterday morning & this morning, then I'll foam roll tomorrow morning and do some yoga Thursday AM. I'm not really dropping mileage as this is supposed to be a "just training through" race (have a 50k four weeks later and that 12hr five weeks after that), but I'm not going to increase, either. Ditching the pool on Thursday evening to get some extra sleep, and I'll run on my lunch break tomorrow so I can just make dinner & go to bed after we get home from visiting my mum (we go every Wednesday & don't get back to the house until ~9pm). Hope after all the elevation change I've been running in the last few weeks this course - which is a new one to me and includes a river crossing with 2.5k to go - feels "easy".

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ill advised racing inc.

you have the prettiest pictures... where do you live so I can move there? Is there a university nearby?

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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 was a bit of a implosion.
I didn't accomplish much with regards to workouts.
Life stuff kept happening.
Swam 1x, ran a few times for a total of 19mi (week prior was 33mi)
and got in 100 mi of biking in 3 outings.
got in 1x strength session (so yay on that)

Other:
I met with a nutritionist / functional medicine practicioner. This was not covered by my normal health insurance. It was quite fascinating. Loads of things to think about and investigate. She had a theory that my iron issue is due to some type of nutriton issue where I'm not absorbing nutrients. And there were other things too. Anyway, I'll see how it progresses. But, down side... she wanted some blood tests but my PCP won't do them. And who knows when I might get in to see him again.

That sounds like a lead in to a diagnosis of celiac disease. Maybe you could try, on your own, to go gluten free for some period of time and see if it helps?

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No coasting in running and no crying in baseball

Hi kids,

I resumed gluten yesterday, slowly. I had some pretzels and got gassy but I don't know if they are connected. I ate several things yesterday :-)

Today I had a veggie wrap and tonight pasta. I guess this will be the real test on how I handle gluten.

I made it to all 3 classes last week and am feeling progress with my strength. It's nice to move up from 8lbs to 10lbs to 12lbs on bicep curls. I started at 5s! We do about 60 during the class so go up 2 lbs really adds up. I'm doing about 5 full pushups for each set of 15, so I end up doing about 20 full pushups and 40 modified. My knee is really bothered by several of the exercises but I'm doing some of them anyway. I need to build up my leg muscles and squats and reverse lunges are OK. It's the step-ups that I have to be careful.

The gym is between my office and home. I'm working remote tomorrow and making the extra trip back to the office for a short meeting just so I get to the gym.

Friday will be a crapshoot. I'm taking the day off from work and having lunch with a friend downtown Seattle. If I go to the gym that is 2 exits past my apartment. That will take some willpower to keep going.

If the weather stays nice I'm going to do some walking on Saturday. I need to check on how my knee is holding up.

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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

You have your pick of two in the area - Wilfrid Laurier & University of Waterloo. Depending on your favoured branches of maths, you might be interested in the Perimeter Institute for post-academic life.

You will have to start adding an extra U to some words, but we'll generally be polite about it if you forget.

I know I'm incredibly lucky to have access to the sheer volume and variety of trails and natural spaces both in my own town (Cambridge, ON) and nearby - the whole tri-cities area has committed to trail infrastructure in a big way, and the regional conservation authorities in the general area (Grand River - most local with 12 parks & 7 conservation areas; Hamilton, which maintains Dundas Valley + 8 other parks & 12 passive conservation areas; Halton with 8 parks & Credit Valley with 9 conservation areas + the Elora-Cataract Trailway) maintain an incredible array of parks within a 60 mile radius of us. Then there's the Cambridge to Ancaster Trail (77km over three sections), the Avon Trail (110km), the Waterfront Trail (740km), the Bruce Trail (890km)... I could probably run trails somewhere different every weekend for an entire year!

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__________________________________________________________
ill advised racing inc.

I am well, thank you. :-)

My goals last week were:swim x 4 (1 done), run/walk x 4 (1 done), trainer x 4, 1 x TT outside. Pretty ambitious for me so let's see how it goes.

I achieved: swim x 3, r/w x 2, trainer x 1 and my very first TT. The TT was so much fun - it was a team TT with my other half so I just sucked wheel the whole way! So far joining the road club has been a good move for me - it's forcing me slightly outside my comfort zone and my handling and willingness to withstand suffering are both improving.

Things fell apart when I realised I was going to be heading north to help out at the big fire. I started prioritising sleep and rest over workouts. I got back from the north yesterday and am slowly starting to recover and start getting the smoke smell out of everything.

This week: I have a College of Paramedics exam Friday & Saturday so workouts will be fitting in around that. Hoping for r/w x 2, swim x 1, trainer x 1 and club ride x 1; if it doesn't happen I won't be giving myself a hard time. And my physio exercises which have fallen by the wayside in the last week.

Thanks for doing what you do!! I can't imagine there's any time/energy/desire to workout when your job is a constant workout.

Thanks, but our department is a volunteer one so it's not constant in the same way as career departments. It is rather unpredictable though (which is part of what I love).

My doc did run the celiac test and it came back negative.
I pressed him, because I had heard that if you aren't eating enough wheat you can get a false negative, but he was insistent that any amount of wheat in my diet would trigger a positive on the test.
I'll keep y'all posted on the nutritionist.

And THANK YOU for doing your part. AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

seems silly your MD won't run the tests, given that insurance probably pays for them...

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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

Thank you for being a volunteer firefighter.

Good luck on the exam!

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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

re - my dr and the nutritionist - Yes, my insurance will pay for the tests if my dr orders them. I had the nutritionist send over her notes and whatnot, plus the tests she wanted. His response was that he didn't understand some of what she had written and was only willing to order the tests we had previously discussed.
So Wed. night I took the time to compose a lengthy email to send via the patient portal system explaining a bit more on what I had discussed with the nutritionist. I haven't yet received a response, and at this point I'm wondering if I will. At this point I'm seriously thinking I need to switch my PCP, but man it's such a pain. My PCP/dr wants to see me again before he'll order any of these tests, and I'm just not willing to miss so much work to do so. Plus I just saw the guy on 4/21! Granted it was for mostly a different issue, but my appointment was for 9:10am, and I didn't get to work until 11:30am (granted, I work an hour away, but crap I just started this job in March and I can't just be taking off like that like crazy). I had Wed. off but he wasn't in the office that day. So I'll have to wait perhaps until my next week day off, and I don't know when that will be yet - I get an 'exchange day' for taking weekend call.

Cautiously optimistic for ya... and two exits? ppssfftthhh - go to the gym :-)

Hey, for the step ups & your knee, can you try a lower step up? I find that if I do a lot of step-ups and the height is not "right" for my height & leg length, then it really bothers my hips (and lower back). I find if I can keep the motion a little "lower" it helps a lot. Maybe try that? ie: less than 90deg bend on the knee prior to the pushing up?

AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS