Training Update: Week of April 6

Apr
2015
15

posted by on Triathlon

After a very busy weekend and some lingering soreness from my training sessions, a new week began. It is absolutely crazy how quickly weekends pass. Just not fair…

Monday morning started with a core workout. I definitely was not feeling too energized, but I got my one-hour session knocked out. The evening included a PT appointment, so core was the goal for the day.

Tuesday PM:
2500-yard swim. Unfortunately, I have to say that this swim was terrible. Truth. I can’t remember the last time I felt this way about a swim. I have been so focused and have seen some improvements over the last few weeks, but there were no signs of this during the swim. On my way home from the pool, I called Tony, as I always do. He asked me how my swim was and I reported the same to him. I then said that there was no point in discussing it (which is a good thing for me because I have a tendency to over analyze things) and I was just over it already. I believe that it is good to reflect on what may have not gone well and what I should work on for next time, but this was just one of those workouts that I just pushed aside and did not spend time trying to wrap my head around it. Done.

The good news for Tuesday was that a package was waiting for me when I arrived home. These Honey Stinger Waffles are absolutely one of my favorite choices for sports nutrition. I have been completely hooked on the honey flavor for quite some time. When I read that they debuted a new caramel flavor, I had to try it! I am absolutely not surprised, but I like it! I believe this is the only product I would “risk” buying a full box before ever trying the flavor. The Honey Stinger products taste so natural and I knew I could not go wrong with adding caramel to my shopping cart!  #HSHIVE

Honey Stinger

Wednesday AM:
After a slow start to  the training week, next up on the plan was a tempo run.  I was still working on the same tempo pace from the past few weeks.  I have been gradually working up the time that I am able to sustain the pace in the targeted heart rate zone. I was hoping to get in the 45 minutes for the main set (with 5 minute warm-up/5 minute cool down) that I had not been able to total quite yet (before needing to slow the speed for heart rate). Would today be the day??? YEP! It felt good to get this run done and meet this goal.

Wednesday PM:
Back to the pool…with only 24 hours since my “session to forget”, I had another swim workout on the plan. This 2500-yard swim was ok.  Better than Tuesday’s swim. One thing that I was not on track with was with a series of 3x200s.  These 200s were supposed to be performed at slow, moderate and then fast paces.  A couple of weeks ago when I had this series in my workout, I was able to really nail it.  (Historically, I have not had enough differential in the three different speeds.)  Today, I did not have enough variance between moderate and fast.  I just need to keep at it to gain the consistency!

Thursday PM:
The plan was to ride with the TriLife store group ride. This was actually the plan for Tuesday, originally, but the threat of rain forced me to change the plans. I was holding out hope that Thursday would cooperate, but the threat of severe weather, drove me home to the trainer. I got in a great 80-minute trainer ride and watched out the window as the storms moved in.

Friday:

rest-day-big-deal-1

Saturday:
I met my ride buddy, Susanne, in her neighborhood as a friend of hers had planned a 50 mile ride and that was the distance I needed as well. The morning was actually a little cool and I will mention that we have been COVERED in pollen. This time of year we typically get inundated with the yellow stuff coating everything in sight! Luckily, I don’t really have allergies to the stuff, so I just continue my outdoor activities. We had a good 53 mile ride, in just a bit over 3 hours, and it ended up being a terrifically beautiful day to be out on the bike. I definitely had a covering of pollen on my skin afterwards, but that just made for an even more enjoyable shower!

Sunday:
With another beautiful day forecasted, I wanted to get out on the greenway late morning to get started.  I had my fingers crossed for a solid run. I just want to see my efforts with the tempo runs pay off on my long runs. While the run was not easy, I felt better than I did last week and my pace was more in the range of what I was hoping….8:53 average for the 10 miles. Tony ran my pace with me and having a partner always is a great addition to a long run!

Sweaty Selfie

Sweaty Selfie!!!

After we got home and cleaned up, Tony and I tried something that I have heard about/read about before, but just have never tried for recovery. “Legs up the wall”.

Legs up the wall

Legs up the wall!

We stayed in this position for a decent amount of time (I didn’t time it) and I thought it was a very interesting feeling while my legs were elevated (sensations through my legs). Towards the end, my feet felt a little tingly. Overall, I am glad we remembered to give this a try. Later on in the afternoon, I commented to Tony that my legs felt pretty decent…I thought better than they generally do after a long run.  I think “legs up the wall” may have been beneficial!

Do you put your legs up the wall?

Total training time: 9 hours 59 minutes
Swim: 5,000 yards
Bike: 71.72 miles
Run: 16.29 miles
Other: 1 hour

I also incorporate twice daily PT exercises that are meant to strengthen/stretch my glutes, hamstrings and re-align my hips. This probably averages about 25 minutes a day and I have not included that in the above totals. However, this is probably one of the smartest things I am doing daily!

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