Monday, March 4, 2013

Feeling Bullet Proof

I have a two month period with no races, so I've been looking back at past ones.  Below is a race report from my first (and only so far) sprint triathlon.

As for things currently, I am looking forward to racing the Scottish Duathlon Championships in a few weeks.  I've been feeling so good in training, which I know I keep saying but I just seem to absorb the work and keep on going.  I had a run on Sunday that I wasn't sure how it would go, 1:45 of warm up and then intervals of 1-2 min sub 7 with equal rest just slowing down slightly.  I was shocked at how great it felt, I didn't have to push for most of it, until the 1 min intervals when I knew I was going to make it to the end so started to pick it up.  It was unreal, I still cant get used to seeing the paces I am after doing a solid base period.  With the weight training and base period I just feel like my body has become bullet proof, something like this would have had me shuffling by the end just hanging on, and now my form felt strong the whole way through.  When it got hard, I just tightened up form and relaxed into the discomfort, felt like I was practically being pulled forward.  I'm paying such close attention to how my body feels because making it to Ironman injury free is goal number one, but there wasnt an ache or sign of breakdown.

I feel like I'm starting to sound like a broken record saying how good I feel when everything I read is talking about how people are beat down, hurt and exhausted from training.  All of these articles about trying to get motivation to go out and do the next workout, and I'm still craving each one, and cant wait to get out there and have fun training.  I think its a combination of a solid plan, building up to be able to hold the work, the strength training to have the foundation, and the mindset of just having fun that has me seeing such gains in my running and biking and still feeling fantastic and full of energy.

I'm not the only one seeing it, I had a massage today after a few weeks without one and it was the easiest massage I've had in a while. My muscles just melted, everything loosened up right away. So I'll keep on cruising along, preparing for Ironman Kalmar.

Anyways after all my blabbering on what was just supposed to be a post about my first sprint, heres the race report from last year:


First Sprint Triathlon RR! Would have been faster…but had a coughing fit in transition :s

Yay I survived my first sprint triathlon, and second one ever. I was worried about this one, after doing Ironman 70.3 last month my legs just did not want to go fast :s They were in endurance mode, and with a 500m swim, 22k bike and 5k run I needed to pour on the speed!! 
 
Now this was a local race, and I’ve been trying to break into the triathlon scene around here, so I wanted to bring it with a good performance. My legs had started picking up speed the last week before I was to taper a bit (just 5 days) to absorb all of the training and I was feeling sooo pumped just to get out there and push! 
 
I know there has been a lot of talk about 5k’s how some people say its “only” a 5k, or they “graduated” from that distance to longer, and the sprint tri is the equivalent. Well I don’t know that I have ever entered the pain cave like I do in 5k’s in any other distance I’ve done so far, the pain of going fast is so different than the endurance work, and I love it! So this was the 5k equivalent (even ending with a 5k run) and I have a reputation of winning 1st female in 5k’s, or at least AG (not as impressive as it sounds, small running community) so I had a little to prove out there :p
 
Unfortunately things don’t always go to plan…day before the race wake up with a sore throat and swollen glands :’( With running, and triathlon, so much of it is mental, I knew I could still race with how I was feeling but I was feeling deflated and upset that all the hard work I put in wouldn’t be reflected because my body decided to rebel…even though I had been tapering and not beating it up like usual! This is the last tri I had on the schedule, and I really wanted to try this distance, so I decided if I wasn’t feeling incredibly worse the next morning I would race, if for nothing else but the experience.
 
RACE MORNING:
 
Ugh…my body was definitely still fighting this bug, usually my HR when I wake up on a race morning is around 43-55…it was at 90!!!  I pumped up my tires and it shot up to 160, and I was breathing heavy…this is going to be a tough race…
 
Showed up to the race, the great thing about a local race is the swim was in the pool I train in, and the run on a course that my run club meets at. It’s so nice to have a familiar course J Got my transition set up, and it was nice to see a few members of my running club out there, there are just two triathlons within 5 hours of here and they are on the same weekend, so the runners start tri training, it was so nice to see familiar faces….even though I got some comments on how I should probably just go back to bed :s
 
Swim start, my goal for the swim was just not to get passed by a bunch of people, it was so nice that this was a wave start with people starting every 30 seconds according to estimated finishing time. Sooo much more of a fan of starting by myself than the terrifying traumatizing experience of starting with hundreds of other swimmers in open water and being dunked and swam over…I think I need more time to forget the experience before I try another Ironman event (but a full WILL be happening next year). Finished the swim only being passed by one person, and just happy to be out of the pool, onto the bike!
 
1st transition went pretty well, got out on the bike, and again started seeing HR and it was 30 bpm higher than its ever been on the bike…even though my legs weren’t feeling too taxed. Other than that bike went well, never really felt the burn in my legs like I had in training, my HR was just too high even though I wasn’t putting out much effort. Transition 2 was pretty slow for a spring at 1:50…a coughing fit while trying to tie my shoes slowed me down…which doesn’t seem like much but would have moved me up 3 spots! The 5k was the same as the bike never reached the burn that I usually feel in the 5k run, HR was high and lungs burned from the coughing, which reduced me to half marathon pace…
 
Overall though finished in 1:14:19, which I am ecstatic about considering how I felt!!! It was enough to win my 1st in AG and 3rd female overall. I really like this distance, and cant wait to do another one. However now my focus is running for a while as I prepare for my first marathon. Last time I tried this I got a pelvic stress fracture, so name of the game is stay injury free!!
Runners who tri!!  Running club cleaned up in the local tri...I'm the one in the middle :)