1 down, 19 to go.

Today marked the end of week 1 of triathlon training. I am glad the first week is over and ready to keep moving forward. It will take a few weeks for my body to really get used to the increased work load that I have thrust upon it.

One of my friends at work asked what the difference was between what I normally do and my “training”….good question Darla. Here’s the answer. The last few months I have been working out 6 days a week – usually about 6-7 hours per week. I did a mixture of just about everything and tried to have fun doing it. This included running, cycling, swimming, weights, step aerobics, boot camp, kick boxing – anything that sounded good. I was a little less regimented with my eating (translation – many more cookies, candies and cakes than usual!). The last two months, we were training for the Shamrock 15k Run. I knew that run would be 9 miles of mostly uphill, so we spent the weekends doing long runs on the Leif Erickson trail in Portland – which is mostly uphill. We completed that on March 15th.

The triathlon training schedule is much more sport specific. The event will be a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike ride and 13.1 mile run. The training is all of these things and lots of them. I really worked hard with the weights over the winter and have built some good lean muscle and strength, so I will continue to incorporate weight training and ab work into my current program. I don’t want to lose what I have gained and that strength and stability will help with all the other workouts and my performance on August 16th.

Here is what the last 6 days have entailed:
(a total of)
1 hr and 30 min of swimming
2 hrs and 5 min of cycling
2 hrs and 10 min of running
2 hrs of weights/ab workouts
for a grand total of 7 hours and 30 minutes.

Here is what the heaviest week of training will entail:
(a total of)
3 hr and 15 min of swimming
4 hrs and 50 min of cycling
3 hrs and 55 min of running
2 hrs of weights/ab workouts
for a grand total of 14 hours.

I did all my cycling in my garage, with my bike on the trainer (a contraption that holds the back wheel and allows you to make your bike a stationary bike. My running was done outside in the rain and cold and usually dark. During the week I often had visions of how things would be during the heaviest week. It will be in August and it should be light out from about 4 am to 10 pm. It should also be hot. What a difference that will be.

During my rides, I visualized how it will feel on August 16th. After all the training and prep, I think the day will be awesome. The hardest part really is the 20 weeks leading up to it. The event is just one day. It should take about 6 hours. By that time, 6 hours should be a piece of cake…right? While I spend time visualizing all of this, I am working hard to take it one day at a time. I find myself feeling a bit anxious when I start to think of those weeks that will have 12-14 hours of training. If I just focus on what I have to do today, I just feel better.

So that’s that.

In other news – Trevor is getting better every day. He swam this week and felt pretty good. The dr said he can start riding the bike next week and running in one or two more weeks. Although he will be 4 weeks behind me in training, I’m sure it won’t show once we get to Lake Stevens, he’s pretty resilient! His black eyes are just about back to normal. Its almost like none of it ever happened. Almost.