Yep!

A little reminder from the folks at Geekfill.

Race Notes: Beginner's Triathlon

Last Saturday I did the beginner's triathlon hosted by the Tri Club of San Diego. I cannot say enough good things about the Tri Club - fun, professional and supportive of triathletes of all abilities. There are weekly club races, tons of workouts and great sponsor discounts. This race was actually a free race for members.  The club wants you to have a chance to learn and make mistakes.  Love, love, love the Tri Club.

Since I've been training a lot on my own, this was my first chance to put it all together in a race event.   It was a short course on familiar training grounds.

Pre-race:   This was my first swim in my new wetsuit. Wetsuits may not be allowed at Vineman. It depends on the water temperature. I didn't want to train in a wetsuit and then get slayed if wetsuits were ruled out. I managed to put on my wetsuit in public without too much struggle.  I'm a big fan of the plastic bag trick to get it on over the feet.  (I learned that from Chris McCormack, Ironman World Champion.  If it's good enough for Chris...)

Swim: I stepped into the mushy, low tide shore and sank 6 inches. I spent a few minutes convincing myself to not be grossed out by the oozing mush. My new mantra is, "It's chocolate pudding. They lined the ocean with chocolate pudding."

Then the gun went off and I started swimming and panicking. Big time race jittering panic. Jumpin' junebugs on pogo sticks! Why? I'm a strong swimmer in a buoyant friggin' wetsuit. One of the swim buddies (thanks Tri Clubber!) helped me calm myself.  Once I had myself calm, the swim was fine.

Here's what I learned on the swim.  I can to do a better job of sighting as I round the buoy..  Also, my shoulders did tire out from the wetsuit. I need to do more swimming in neoprene.

Transition 1: Doh! Timing chip got caught on the wetsuit. Time lost while I unraveled that snag.

Ride: Easy breezy on the pancake flat Silver Strand. No issues.

Transition 2: A smooth grab and go.  I'm off to the run.

Run: I got caught up in running with people and over did it on the pace. I need to set some alarms on my Garmin to tell me when I'm going too fast. Otherwise, I get over-eager and run myself out of gas.

Post race:  The Tri Club eats like Rock Stars.  The post race buffet was: pancakes, eggs, bacon, sausage, bread pudding, yogurt, granola, berries, bananas, oranges, coffee, juices...did I mention this was a free race?  Thanks Tri Club!  I took yogurt, granola and fruit, because it would have been really easy to over eat with all that food after a short race.

Overall, a successful, short race.  I can do this.

Sign Up Sunday

I had a great bike ride with my husband yesterday.  Great, other than one episode of whining as we climbed a really tough hill. (I was whining; he's a climbing superstar.)

When I got home I felt a bubble of confidence or something...I signed up for the San Diego Tri Club's beginner's "race" next Saturday.  And I signed up for California Ironman 70.3.

Crazy.

Reassess and Move Onward

Since I began this training plan, I've missed 4 workouts.  That's not bad for 7 weeks.  Well, except that 3 of those workouts were in the last week.

What happened?  Last week we were in Lake Tahoe on Sunday which is the day I normally map out my training sessions on my weekly calendar.  I traveled directly from Tahoe to work at my LA office on Monday and Tuesday.  That meant I never got around to scheduling  my training sessions until Wednesday.

Considering that I worked for Day-Timers and have read every time management book on the planet, I sure suck at managing my calendar.  My work requires that I spend a lot of time in meetings.  If I don't block out time then every morning, lunch and evening will be filled by an appointment.  If I want to have 2 consecutive hours available to train I need to protect that time.   Duh.  This isn't quantum mechanics.

Lesson learned.  Training happens when schedule it.  It doesn't miraculously fit into may day.  As much as I hate schedules, I need to plan.

What Happened?

Lake Tahoe decided to dump some really bad weather on America's Most Beautiful Bike ride.  When Steve opened the hotel room door at 5 AM on race morning, my first thought was "It smells like snow."  If you grew up somewhere snowy, you know that before it snows the air smells....snowy.  It's hard to explain, but it's a specific scent.  I was worried about Steve and cycle team  getting pelted by snow, sleet and ice as they rode 100 miles up and down mountains.

The team went out to ride and I went back to bed.  When I woke up, the weather was marginally better and much warmer. I decided to go for my planned 2 hour run.  I ran out past the finish line and spent the next two hours running up and down the last few miles of the course cheering for cyclists as they finished.  The riders were freezing, exhausted and filthy from road splash and they smiled to see someone cheering their efforts.  I was the only person cheering on that lonely stretch of  road - especially when the sky opened up and dumped freezing cold rain on me for 30 minutes.  The cyclists had appropriate rain/cold weather gear.  Not me, I was in tri-shorts and a sleeveless running dress. It was chilly, but I love cheering for people and decided to stay out to finish my run.  

After that run I felt confident.  I ran over 13 miles and I felt that my triathlon was going to be easy.  For some nonsensical reason, I've been really worried about the run portion of the race.  A solid, long distance run totally boosted my confidence.  Unfortunately, that confidence surge didn't last.  Since then I've had a bunch of lackluster workouts and my confidence is gone.  

Lake Tahoe Edition

I'm in Lake Tahoe with my husband's cycling team.  He's coaching for Team in Training this season. Tomorrow is a huge day for TNT - 1500 cyclists will ride one hundred miles around Lake Tahoe and thousand of runners and walkers will do the San Diego Rock N Roll marathon.   Every year those cyclists and marathoners raise millions to cure blood cancers.  I'm incredibly proud of our TNT participants, mentors and coaches.

Of course, tomorrow morning I'm going to be terribly jealous since this is not my event.  Event day is so special. Tomorrow I'm gear girl, cheerleader and finish line welcome committee.  But I'm not a participant. Sigh.

My own triathlon training is coming along well.  I feel strong and I running much better and faster than I have in the past.  When we got to Tahoe yesterday, I ran fast for over an hour - at 6200 feet over sea level.  That would have been impossible before I started this training.

Tomorrow, I've got a two hour run and then I'm support crew for the cyclists.  Soon enough, it'll be my event day.