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Not a whole lot to report today. I went out for a short two mile run, right here from the house. Headed up 441 on the shoulder and took the next road to the north. It’s just a short piece of pavement going past an RV park and up to about 5 or 6 houses. Got me about .9 miles, so when I came back I ran around the Lerado Farm property for the other 0.2. It was much warmer than it has been.. mid 70s and very hot sun. A little bit of Florida acclimation?
Tonight was supposed to be the last of the Motion Makers Tuesday Night Rides. Unfortunately, it started raining late yesterday and hasn’t let up since. Well.. now that it’s dark and cold and the ride time has faded with the light, I can hear that is has finally stopped. That’s not much consolation – I was looking forward to this one last outing.
I guess every once in a while it does rain on…
So I had two options for 1pm Sunday rides. One was a route called the Ring of Fire. It’s a loop ride in the Cullowee range named for what it does to your legs. This is the same route where I crashed on a descent not long after I moved here.
I chose the other route.
Saturday was my last real training day of any difficulty. It started out being planned as a complete Half Ironman distance, but gradually got whittled away to quite a bit less. By the time I started out in the afternoon, it had been reduced to a 12 mile ride / half mile swim / 10 mile run / 12 mile ride. By the time I was finished it had been reduced even further.
That’s what happens when you don’t check the Saturday business hours at the gym while planning out your day.
Tuesday – Motion Makers Ride. Wednesday – 2100 yard swim. Thursday – 4 mile run. Friday – swim? ride? Saturday/Sunday – undecided: some kind of ride, some kind of swim, 10 mile run, possibly getting cut as low as 8.
Tonight was the penultimate Motion Makers Tuesday Night Ride; only one more for 2009. And what a great night for a stroll up to Balsam. Clear skies and high pressure. The temperature when I left the house was 70, falling down into the upper 50s by the time I returned. The ride was earlier than some can make, but we still had a group of about ten.
Nice.
Got access to the Ironman Florida Athlete Information Guide today. This is of little real interest to anyone, including me. However.. the cover photo is really cool. Er… hot. Does this mean we’ll be “swimming in a lake of fire”?
On Sunday I swap 25 yards down the length of the pool at the Franklin Health Center. Then I did it 168 more times. 169 x 25 yards = 4225 yards = 2.4 miles. 2.4 miles plus one extra yard actually. And then, just because I was on the wrong end of the pool when I was done, I did one more length. I suppose I could have gotten out and walked but that didn’t really occur to me until just now.
Hey, I was tired.
Well, there it is. The final long run is complete. I did 20 total miles and managed to “run” the entire distance, with the usual exception of a handful of .1 mile walks and food/drink stops. I had planned to walk an extra two miles afterward but cut it down to only a half mile. It was cold and windy and spitting rain and I didn’t want to catch a chill.
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
My buddy, Sam “I’m an Ironman, the announcer said so” Hill, sent me an email today that cracked me up. He took the lyrics from the Jimmy Dean song “Big Bad John” and rewrote them as an inspiration for me during Ironman Florida. Quite amusing. Before I get to the lyrics, I’m gonna paste a YouTube video of the song. I would imagine I’m not the only person who didn’t know the song and would have to look it up.
Not only am I not a big country fan, I’m also not nearly as old as Sam!
As previously mentioned, on Sunday I went to a free seminar hosted by the Asheville Triathlon Club. It was a panel of five members, all of whom have completed at least one Ironman length triathlon. With only four weeks to go, I wasn’t really interested in training tips, nutrition, etc., but I did want to hear about their race-day experience. And I also had one very specific question…
How, exactly, does a chronic over-trainer manage to do a three week taper without going insane?
I just keep gettin’ lucky. Friday I got a nice night for running. Saturday with no training it was rainy and drizzley. Sunday was spectacular for my ride up on the Parkway (mostly). Monday with only a short run and a swim it rained, and rained, and rained. Today it also rained, and rained, and rained… right up until one hour before I wanted to ride and then it stopped and the roads dried out.
It’s like I did a Rain Dance In Reverse or something.
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