Hello! Happy Monday!
So ... week 13 is in the books. Week 13 was a little "meh" for me, which is fitting since it's number 13. Nothing bad happened: no injury, no set back, no workouts I couldn't physically do. I just didn't feel as good as I usually do. Oh, and we had more snow on Thursday. A Nor'easter this time. As my friend Robyn said on her Facebook status, "We're getting a blizzard! Everything is awesome!!". Ha! Everything was awesome and everything was closed on Thursday: schools, work, the YMCA. So my scheduled Thursday swim did not happen. Ah ... what are you going to do. Because this does tend to get in the way of scheduled workouts, school, work and life:
But the big news? The big exciting news? Our power meters arrived and the guys at Philadelphia Bikesmith put them on the bikes. Only He-Man can express my feelings about this:
I have to give credit where it's due: Amy texted me while she was on the bike that she felt like yelling all He-Man style "I ... HAVE ... [the] POWER!!!". Truth. So what's a power meter? It's a device that hooks onto your bike that, well, measures your power output. It is a great way to train because you can determine and measure your power and use that as a gauge in training. So, my coach can say: "you should be at X power for endurance; Y for tempo; etc." The only negative, and it is a big one, is now we have to do another round of time trials to set our thresholds. You know how I feel about time trial on the bike. Full on grumpy cat.
Week 13:
So ... week 13 is in the books. Week 13 was a little "meh" for me, which is fitting since it's number 13. Nothing bad happened: no injury, no set back, no workouts I couldn't physically do. I just didn't feel as good as I usually do. Oh, and we had more snow on Thursday. A Nor'easter this time. As my friend Robyn said on her Facebook status, "We're getting a blizzard! Everything is awesome!!". Ha! Everything was awesome and everything was closed on Thursday: schools, work, the YMCA. So my scheduled Thursday swim did not happen. Ah ... what are you going to do. Because this does tend to get in the way of scheduled workouts, school, work and life:
 |
| the snow is awesome and beautiful and magical |
I have to give credit where it's due: Amy texted me while she was on the bike that she felt like yelling all He-Man style "I ... HAVE ... [the] POWER!!!". Truth. So what's a power meter? It's a device that hooks onto your bike that, well, measures your power output. It is a great way to train because you can determine and measure your power and use that as a gauge in training. So, my coach can say: "you should be at X power for endurance; Y for tempo; etc." The only negative, and it is a big one, is now we have to do another round of time trials to set our thresholds. You know how I feel about time trial on the bike. Full on grumpy cat.
Week 13:
Swam: 1:10 hours* (2100 yards) *I was supposed to do another swim workout but had to bag it because of snow. This 1:10 includes a 20 minute swim lesson too.
Biked: 4:24 hours (all on trainer)
Ran: 3:29 hours (22.95 miles)
Workouts:
Monday - swim
Tuesday - 75 minute endurance run
Wednesday - hard bike, 2 mile "shake out" run, swim lesson
Thursday - endurance bike
Friday - run with sprints
Saturday - brick
Sunday - bike and run
My Monday swim was tough. I was tired and felt sluggish. As good and strong as I felt the week before (both in the water and out), I felt sluggish and just tired in every way in the pool Monday morning. My intervals were all a good 10-30 seconds slower than normal. I told my coach, who said if I still felt sluggish in a couple of days to let him know. Luckily I rebounded after a good night's sleep (and going to bed at approximately 8:30 pm).
Tuesday's endurance run was fine. I've made peace with the fact that the treadmill is my only option in this kind of weather. And frankly, an endurance run is really not bad on a treadmill even if it's a long one. I just settle in, listen to my music and watch everything around me. The one thing that is both awesome and awful about a long treadmill run is I get to see at least two waves of people complete their entire workouts in the time I'm on the treadmill and new waves come in.
Wednesday was a busy day. I woke up super early (i.e., around 4 am) so I could get in my bike before the kids got up. This particular bike is tough and I always hate it until its over; when it's over I feel like I can do anything. It starts with 20 minutes at endurance pace and then I have to do two sets of lactic threshold (or "LT") pace for 20 minutes. LT pace is very hard - it's a tough effort and I have to just put my head down, hang on and pedal. I was really sweaty. Here I am post workout. See the beads of sweat on my arm? Oh that's just a sampling of the sweat.
Later that day I had a 2 mile "shake out" run. I did it in late afternoon from my office. It was really cold, but at two miles, I just powered through. Then later that day I met my swim coach for a lesson. It is really amazing how helpful the swim lessons are.
Thursday was supposed to be a swim, which my coach considers to be a recovery type workout, but I could not do it because all the YMCAs were closed due to 12+ inches of snow. So I did about 55 minutes on the bike at an endurance pace (meaning: easy, steady, comfortable). The happy part of this bike is that I took some time on that snow day morning and figured out how to set up my TV, DVD player and Wii in the playroom - I was able to watch TV on the bike! Do you know what this means? I can watch HGTV on the bike! I snapped this picture from my phone mid-workout!
Friday's run was on the treadmill. This run - I love it when I am outside but I do not like it on the treadmill. But I got it done. Amy had a treadmill run as well, so we grabbed two treadmills next to each other at the Y and ran "together". Bill was also at the Y finishing up a swim workout and came up to say hello when he was done. Go team! Here's my treadmill computer (honestly: I only took this picture so I could remember the data to put into my training program).
Saturday's brick was affected by the weather too. This is a tough brick: it's a mix of endurance pace and tempo pace: 30 minutes endurance then 20 tempo on the bike followed by 2 miles at tempo pace and 10 minutes endurance on the run. I decided to do the brick at home: bike on the trainer and run outside. Big mistake. Big. Huge. The bike ride was fine. But the run was not. The roads were icy and slick, and I made it a half mile when I decided to turn the heck around. So, all was not lost. I got in a short, but slow, one mile brick run. But I should have been smart and gone to the YMCA.
Sunday I had a long bike (mix of endurance and tempo paces, which I love because I can read magazines, the iPad or watch TV the whole time) and then an endurance run, which, having learned my lesson from the day before, I did on the treadmill. I decided to make up some miles on Sunday so rather than doing 30 minutes at endurance pace, I went for 45. Every little bit counts, and it assuaged my feelings of disappointment in myself for that risky run the day before. :/
I hear the weather is supposed to warm up this week! Oh 50 degree temps. Oh ... baby. And hooray! The Frostbite Five Miler is on Saturday! I'm very excited to race, and I have a race plan. I'll probably give a quick overview of the race here in the IMLP recap but then do a separate, full race review later in the week. I'm hoping to run it around a 7:40 pace. Happy week everyone!
My Monday swim was tough. I was tired and felt sluggish. As good and strong as I felt the week before (both in the water and out), I felt sluggish and just tired in every way in the pool Monday morning. My intervals were all a good 10-30 seconds slower than normal. I told my coach, who said if I still felt sluggish in a couple of days to let him know. Luckily I rebounded after a good night's sleep (and going to bed at approximately 8:30 pm).
Tuesday's endurance run was fine. I've made peace with the fact that the treadmill is my only option in this kind of weather. And frankly, an endurance run is really not bad on a treadmill even if it's a long one. I just settle in, listen to my music and watch everything around me. The one thing that is both awesome and awful about a long treadmill run is I get to see at least two waves of people complete their entire workouts in the time I'm on the treadmill and new waves come in.
Wednesday was a busy day. I woke up super early (i.e., around 4 am) so I could get in my bike before the kids got up. This particular bike is tough and I always hate it until its over; when it's over I feel like I can do anything. It starts with 20 minutes at endurance pace and then I have to do two sets of lactic threshold (or "LT") pace for 20 minutes. LT pace is very hard - it's a tough effort and I have to just put my head down, hang on and pedal. I was really sweaty. Here I am post workout. See the beads of sweat on my arm? Oh that's just a sampling of the sweat.
Later that day I had a 2 mile "shake out" run. I did it in late afternoon from my office. It was really cold, but at two miles, I just powered through. Then later that day I met my swim coach for a lesson. It is really amazing how helpful the swim lessons are.
Thursday was supposed to be a swim, which my coach considers to be a recovery type workout, but I could not do it because all the YMCAs were closed due to 12+ inches of snow. So I did about 55 minutes on the bike at an endurance pace (meaning: easy, steady, comfortable). The happy part of this bike is that I took some time on that snow day morning and figured out how to set up my TV, DVD player and Wii in the playroom - I was able to watch TV on the bike! Do you know what this means? I can watch HGTV on the bike! I snapped this picture from my phone mid-workout!
Friday's run was on the treadmill. This run - I love it when I am outside but I do not like it on the treadmill. But I got it done. Amy had a treadmill run as well, so we grabbed two treadmills next to each other at the Y and ran "together". Bill was also at the Y finishing up a swim workout and came up to say hello when he was done. Go team! Here's my treadmill computer (honestly: I only took this picture so I could remember the data to put into my training program).
Saturday's brick was affected by the weather too. This is a tough brick: it's a mix of endurance pace and tempo pace: 30 minutes endurance then 20 tempo on the bike followed by 2 miles at tempo pace and 10 minutes endurance on the run. I decided to do the brick at home: bike on the trainer and run outside. Big mistake. Big. Huge. The bike ride was fine. But the run was not. The roads were icy and slick, and I made it a half mile when I decided to turn the heck around. So, all was not lost. I got in a short, but slow, one mile brick run. But I should have been smart and gone to the YMCA.
Sunday I had a long bike (mix of endurance and tempo paces, which I love because I can read magazines, the iPad or watch TV the whole time) and then an endurance run, which, having learned my lesson from the day before, I did on the treadmill. I decided to make up some miles on Sunday so rather than doing 30 minutes at endurance pace, I went for 45. Every little bit counts, and it assuaged my feelings of disappointment in myself for that risky run the day before. :/
I hear the weather is supposed to warm up this week! Oh 50 degree temps. Oh ... baby. And hooray! The Frostbite Five Miler is on Saturday! I'm very excited to race, and I have a race plan. I'll probably give a quick overview of the race here in the IMLP recap but then do a separate, full race review later in the week. I'm hoping to run it around a 7:40 pace. Happy week everyone!
See you swoon,
i like snow, they are so pure and beautiful.
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