Friday, July 11, 2014

Pregnant is not a synonym for Invalid

Ok I promise this wont turn into a total pregnancy blog, I have some fun ones coming up recapping my adventures using a borrowed bike at TriRock Philly and the MaccaX Training camp before Challenge Atlantic City!  I'll still be training away and exploring Colorado over the next few months :)

Obviously some things have had to change.  Gone are the 20+ hour training weeks, pushing my body to the limits mixing intensity and volume and seeing what this body is capable of.  That doesn't mean I'm going to spend the next 5 months sitting on the couch and eating bon bon's :p  Its been great having access to the blogs of some professional female athletes that have recently had babies to see what they went through and that I am not totally insane training (well I call it training but its more like exercising) through my pregnancy as long as the doc and my body give me the ok.  One thats been great has been Beth Gerdes blog.  She is a professional triathlete that just had her little one and is navigating getting back into training and a newborn with an Ironman on the books in the next few months.

As for me it's been a variable schedule just being sure to listen to my body, some weeks were just above 10 hours in the 1st trimester with the fatigue and nausea making even that tough!  Now I'm back into a routine and the 2nd trimester is honestly a breeze, symptoms are gone, I'm not really showing yet and energy is back so there should be some consistency around 15+ hours a week, but its mostly aerobic so its not too stressful on the body!

4 months along, not much to show yet!

This weeks schedule:

Monday: 45 minute swim, 60 min bike at MAF, 45 min Strength train
Tuesday: 2 hour run scheduled...but ended up being a rest day! Blood drawn and a house of contractors by the time I got a chance to run I was exhausted so I cut the run.
Wednesday: 60 min swim with drills, 3 hour bike ride w/ 4*20 minutes zone 3 (yay a little bit of work outside of MAF feels soo good!)
Thursday: 70 min run with strides in the morning, 50 minute run at MAF in the afternoon, 60 minutes Yoga
Friday: 30 minute swim w/sprints, 60 minute bike ride MAF.

Saturday and Sunday are still to be determined but likely a 2-3 hour ride on saturday and a 2 hour run Sunday.  Love it, Lucho adjusts my training and gives it to me 24-48 hours in advance so he can keep an eye on how I'm responding and adjust accordingly, before it was to keep me on the razor edge getting to peak fitness, but now its so I don't overdo it.

So, not quite sitting around on my ass these days.  To help with that I got the BEST baby gift from the hubby!  I must have lost my mind to want this, but I think its more this triathlon obsession that rattled my brains than baby, I got a treadmill!  I never thought I would be so excited about drawing on my inner hamster and run while not going anywhere.  I love my toys and this thing is pretty bad ass, it has incline, decline, fans, wireless, I can map any route on google, wirelessly upload it and it will show me the street view and adjust the elevation as I run through!  It will be awesome when baby comes along and I cant get out of the house to run, I can just cruise on this, not to mention I can program any race run portion and get a feel for the course beforehand.  Right now its being used to get out of the heat, its been over 90 degrees here the last few days so I've been on the treadmill so I don't cook the baby!

Street view of the beginning of the Kona Run!
Yesterdays run, did some video work for analysis.

Now heres the fun part, as soon as you get pregnant EVERYONE becomes an expert on your body and pregnancy...seriously.  There has definitely been some unsolicited advice along the lines of the baby will fall out if I keep running, or I cant swim because my water will break and I wont know it did and that I'm in labour.  Its not completely new, most endurance athletes have had the friends and family tell them how they are killing their knees, hearts, and call them crazy and overambitious to do this insane sport (ok cant really blame them for that part it is crazy).

I know a lot of it is said out of concern for my wellbeing, but at the end of the day I'm going to do what my doctor advises and what feels right.  If you have experience as a pregnant athlete, I'm always looking to learn more, if you've never been pregnant and heard from a friend who knew someone who's 2nd cousin got pregnant and ran a disastrous mile I'm not interested.

So I apologise in advance if I stick my tongue out at you and keep running by as you tell me baby is about to fall out :p  Thats all for now, I'm going to go torture my pregnant ass with the foam roller and I promise I'll get back to the training and travelling fun with the MaccaX crew, stay tuned.

Carpe Diem

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