best race t-shirt idea EVER

If they do this for IM Coz, I will pee all over myself with excitement.

sleep...cough....mope...repeat

Yet another speed bump in the world of Ironman training.....I get the flu. In the middle of summer. What the heck.

Well, I work around kids, little carriers of all matters of germs and creepy crawlies that they are. I thought I had allergies. I thought I had heat exhaustion. I thought I was overtraining. Thursday I was sick enough to call in sick and go to the doctor (which pretty much means I'm writing my last will and testament.) The doctor says, "Have you had your flu shot? Didn't think so!"

The fever was gone Friday morning and has stayed gone, which means that as of yesterday, I'm allowed to rejoin the world of the living. However, the worst of it is still not gone - I am TIRED. Alls I want to do is lie on the couch and watch tv and take naps, which is pretty much the opposite of me.

I was looking out the window at the beautiful morning and I got pretty mopey about it. I so want to get out on my bike but I don't feel like I would ride very far without getting exhausted. Plus I have the cough that will not die. Nothing, prescription, non-prescription, holistic, seems to even touch it. And the doc said that the flu can turn into pneumonia, which is about the last thing I want to happen.

I do want to try to keep up with a little bit of running this week, since I'm still trying to regain run fitness. I'm probably going to ditch most of the biking and swimming. Unfortunately, my boss would probably like to stake a claim on the little bit of energy that I do have.

Hopefully I can bounce back soonish.

On a brighter note (literally and figuratively), I did muster up the energy to do Color me Rad with my buddy Dana yesterday. I took it slowly, I didn't time it, I didn't care about the time; we just did it to run around and have fun and get ourselves covered with color.

before....

 

...and after. I think we succeeded!!

All right, ya'll. Send me some good vibes. I know I probably just need to relax, take care of myself, and ride this out until I'm 100% recovered and back to being the spastic ball of energy that you know and love. Unfortunately, my level of patience is right about equal to my current level of energy. Nonexistent. I feel much more like squishy pudding man than Ironman these days. Can't wait for that to change....

eat, sleep, work, train, repeat

I know I know, I haven't blogged in a while. I don't know that I have anything unique or wise to impart at this point, but I can at least update everyone. Let's see....

Well, ya'll saw that I am officially in for an 11.25 Ironman! I'm both stoked and terrified. I'm hoping I can do the 70.3 version of rev3. If not, I have deferral as an option. However, I'm proceeding as if I'm doing the half rev. The only thing I'm concerned about is that 13.1 mile run.

The return to running is going pretty well. I was doing some barefoot running, actually, to try to strengthen my feet a bit, but now I'm dealing with some muscle pain in both feet. Arrgh!! It's not debilitating, though, not at all, and it's just one more thing to keep an eye on, in addition to the tib. The tib, with the exception of the occasional twinge, is hanging with me pretty well. I've been running on foot three times a week and doing a longer 1-1:30 pool run twice a week, and I've been able to slowly add mileage and phase out walk breaks during the foot time. Longest run so far was 3.4 miles - no walking.

I'm noticing a big difference between this recovery and the last time I came back from injury. This time, I'm not nearly as concerned with speed. Several reasons for this....one of them is the weather. I don't know how many of you are local compared with out of town, but let me tell you about summer in Ohio. It's not only hot but it's HUMID. It's like breathing soup. It's impossible to run at top speed when it's so muggy. I know I have to run slower anyway. Plus, I'm training for a race that I will literally be thrilled just to finish. I'm not concerned about how fast I can run it. I won't be in top form after a 2.4 mile swim and a 112 mile bike ride anyway, and as long as I meet the other cutoffs, I'll have 6.5 hours to do the marathon.

Even though I have other possible races coming up, I'm seriously not concerned with how fast I run them. My overarching goal is to get to the Ironman starting line healthy and I don't care about pushing my speed.

Plus, after that long of a hiatus, I'm just happy to run again. I don't care if it's slower than I used to run. The old me would've been really disappointed about my pace lately. Ironman-in-training me has other priorities!!

I'm taking this month to be very careful and baby myself as far as running goes. I'm hoping to be up to the level of my training plan by the end of August.

Biking is going well. I'm way ahead of the game, training wise, now that I've added 2.5 months on to my training. I've been doing 50+ mile weekend rides and feeling good about them. I'm not thrilled about making them longer just because of the sheer length of time that'll take up, but hopefully I can find some company. I have my eye on a couple of organized century rides before the IM.

Swimming is still not my fave, but at least I have masters twice a week to hold me accountable, and it's making me stronger. I don't know about faster but I'm feeling stronger and better in the water, which is probably even more important, considering I'll be in an ocean with currents and fish and jellyfish and a few thousand people. I got in a lake over the weekend with a friend who was doing her first ever open water swim (she did great!!) and there were currents and waves large enough that I was starting to get seasick, but I did not freak out. That's some pretty good progress for me. The swim cutoff still worries me, and I need to get in a measurable open water swim - at least 2 miles - before the IM so that I know how much wiggle room I have with that 2:20 cutoff.

Consider yourself updated....that's all I've got for now!! 18 weeks and change until Coz.

What I just did.

It's for real now.

The World is Right Again

The doctor said I CAN RUN!!!

I may or may not have gone out and ran as soon as I got home from that appointment. In the 100 degree afternoon heat. It felt amazing.

He wasn't thrilled about the idea of doing an ironman this year, but it's not out of the question. I'm still deciding. I'm going to see how the return to running goes before I officially decide, although if you know me, you probably know which way I'm leaning.

I'm really happy with how well I've handled the recovery process, especially lately. Mentally, I'm able to prioritize and look at things in a different light than before. I may blog about it one of these days, if you really want to read what that outpouring will look like.

In the meantime, though, in case you missed it.....

I CAN FREAKING RUN AGAIN!!!!!!!!!

I really can't deny that my world does look just a bit brighter now. :)

Ride Cincinnati - year 2

Remember Ride Cincinnati?? The 100k bike ride I did last year after my usual training ride was about a third of that? The ride that I was thrilled to conquer because I spent a good portion of it being miserable?

It was that time again. This year, though, I was optimistic about what it would bring. I've done longer rides this year and I can keep up with the group really well. I can ride up crazy hills. (I still hate them though.) I knew it would go better this time around, I just didn't know how much better. And, a few days beforehand, a friend posted about how ridiculous the mile 25 hill and the mile 32-immediately-post-turnaround hill is and how it's so bad you can barely keep your bike moving, and I got nervous about them again. But I know I did them last year, and I know I sucked as a cyclist last year, compared to now at least, and last year I NEVER rode hills. I would be ok.

First of all, I will so do the event again. I love this ride. However, I will never again pick up my packet the day of. Parking sucked. I was trying to get into the parking lot, turning left, and alllll the people turning right would not let me in. I ended up whipping around, squealing my tires (I am NOT nice before 6 AM) and finding a spot farther out. By the time I rode to packet pickup, got my stuff (and maneuvered around the many cyclists riding all willy-nilly), took it back to my car and rode back to the start, there were only 5 minutes to go. Luckily, I still managed to find my group.

There was the sloooooow start over the bridge again, and one of the guys in our group got a flat tire. Seriously. We weren't even over the bridge into KY yet! Haha. A few of them stayed back, the rest of us moved on, and I ended up AHEAD of the group. I wasn't trying to be, but I did want to make this a good training ride. Not necessarilly FAST....well, ok, I did want to be competitive with my time from the year before, but moreso, I wanted to see if I could maintain a comfortable but steady pace, and an easy gear/high cadence combo. I've been reading up on Ironman stuff and it sounds like THAT is the way to do an Ironman bike, in order to keep your legs from getting completely blown up before the run.

I accomplished ALL of those goals and then some. These are the highlights:

-Made it to the 31 point whatever turnaround in 1:53, nearly 10 minutes faster than last year's time.

-That hill at mile 25? I KILLED it. It still wasn't fun, but I high cadenced my way up that mother and felt strong about it. I was surprised when I reached the top because it felt relatively quick.

-OK, the last few miles between that hill and the turnaround were kinda blah. They're quite rolling, and at that point, I was getting hungry. I was dying for those animal crackers. I love animal crackers.

-Yep, the rolling hills sucked coming back, too. The first hill after the turnaround was the worst part of that ride, but that wasn't even TOO bad. It just sucked because I probably took too long of a break and my legs had locked up a bit. Even so, I was able to strike up a conversation with someone and laugh as I was going up that hill - until I freaking got ahead of him!

-Yes, *I* was PASSING people on hills!!! I know, I couldn't believe it either.

-I felt strong the whole entire ride. No lie. I passed lots of people in the last handful of miles.

-The other hills on the ride? Piece. Of. Cake.

-I hit 50 miles in less than 3 hours. That wasn't even my goal but it was total icing on the cake. I saw 49.8 and 2:59 and I gunned it, while staring at the Garmin (not smart!) to see if I could do it. Yep, it still said 2:59 when I hit 50.

-I pretty much did the race all by my lonesome. I chatted with people here and there, but didn't have anyone to talk to. And...I was good with it. I got a little bored, but not torturously so. Honestly, I figure it's good IM training, since I won't have company on the bike. I still enjoyed it, and time seemed to pass pretty quickly.

-Not only did I keep the same speed throughout, I negative split that bad boy. I was at 16.5 average at the turnaround. I finished at 16.6 average....and it came down from 16.8 in the last 3 miles because we hit town and had to ride single-file and deal with lights and traffic.

-Nutrition was good for the ride. One bottle of gatorade (which I had to keep reminding myself to drink because it wasn't that hot, but I knew I was starting to bonk at the halfway point), plus bread with pb, a large portion of animal crackers (yay!!!!), some trail mix and a gel (for the caffeine - did I mention I had to get up at 5 am?) at the turnaround.

-I think I will want to eat about 25% more than that when I do a half ironman. I was pretty hungry afterward, and I'll still need to fuel a run.

 -I did it in 3:45. 40 minutes faster than last year, feeling about 100% better. Rock. On.

If I can keep building up the mileage, at this rate, I think I can feel good about the bike leg of the Ironman.

decision....

....still pending. I do believe I've got most of the logistics and funding figured out, but I've decided that the smartest thing to do (and the thing that will give my husband a little more piece of mind) is to wait until I see the doctor again on 6/28 and run the IMCoz plan by him before I sign up.

However.....

I check the active.com registration page about every other day. Right now it says the race is over 80% full. If that changes too much, screw it, I'm signing up.

In the meantime, I've discovered pool running. I can't guarantee it's helping, but I hear it does. We shall see.