Training

OK, I'm not a total idiot. I realize that I need to kick it up a notch for a half-Ironman. Funny how my blog from 2 weeks ago said that I was crazy for thinking about signing up for this race. I think my mother agrees. But that's OK.

This weekend, I ran 5 miles on Saturday evening, and 9 on Sunday morning. Saturday afternoon I did some ocean swimming while Husband surfed. The water is cold without a wetsuit, that's for sure, and I didn't wear goggles, because, umm, I didn't want to look like a total dork. But I swam around a bit, covering the same 50 yards a few times back and forth along the beach. The tide was coming in and the waves kept getting stronger, so I headed back for our blanket afet 15-20 minutes. I look on it as desensitization therapy. I need to just be more comfortable with open water swimming to do it more effectively.

Saturday's run was pleasant and relaxing. It was during this run that I really started convincing myself that the Montauk race was the thing to do. I ran up to the beach, and investigated the possibility of swimming from the beach, through the channel, across the lake and all the way up to our backyard. Upon investigation, I realized this was not one of my better ideas as it is (a) really far, around 2.5 miles, and (b) full of boat traffic. It would not be wise to bob around where all the fishing boats are coming in. Scratch that idea. There is a perfectly good swimming beach here, in a cove so any waves are pretty minimal. Husband doesn't like to go there because you can't do any surfing, but I can improvise.

Saturday night, we went out for dinner and drinks, knowing that I had to get up for my 10 miles early Sunday. This run was pretty crappy. No breakfast, because I wanted to get out there and get it over with. Started out kind of dehydrated and headachey. (Note to self: no more drinking before long runs!) Left at 8:30 instead of originally planned 7:00. Took a shadier, more "interesting" route through the park on the way back, got lost, and was attacked by horse flies for like, 30 minutes straight. Everytime I get the slightest bit unsure of where I am in the woods - and I was probably 200 ft from the main highway - I start thinking about The Blair Witch Project. Yes, I am crazy like that. Anyway, I had already decided to cut my 10 miles down to 7 because I felt terrible, but my "short cut" through the woods meant that I wandering around in a circle for 30 minutes, so I think I did 9 miles. I was weak and starving and grumpy. Grr. Immediately scarfed down whole wheat toast with almond butter when I got back to the house and felt MUCH better. I did some stretching and noticed that my now-dry skin was covered in a thin layer of salt crystals. Even my face. Like I took a roll in some Morton's salt -- really. This is a whole new level of sweating for me. I had a salty, fried lunch to replenish.

Back to training. This week's marathon training calls for: 4-4-4-8-4 miles, for a total of 24 miles. I'm going to replace one of the 4-milers with swimming, add a swimming day during the week and one on the weekend, and 2 bike workouts on the weekend. Instead of 2 rest days per week, I'll have one, and double up workouts some days, with a focus on swimming. So maybe it will look like this:

Monday: swim 1 hour
Tuesday: run 4 miles
Wednesday: rest
Thursday: bike 30 min, swim 30 minutes
Friday: run 4 miles
Saturday: run 8 miles, swim 1 hour
Sunday: run 4 miles, bike 10 miles

Although I have several books on triathlonning, I recognize that I don't really know what I'm doing. So I signed up for a 2-day training clinic in prep for the Mighty Montauk. It's in 2 weeks, so I'll just keep hobbling along until then.

Everything's going to be alright.