Rocky Road

Thursday night we had a 10 mile run on the schedule. The first four miles were fantastic. Then pretty much out of nowhere my stomach decided to rebel. It felt gurgly and sloshy and unhappy. I started going through all the possible culprits: What did I eat today? Could it be that GU I took before the run? Have I been drinking too much water? Is it because the weather is cooler than it's been?

I lumbered along for the next two miles stopping occasionally thinking I was going to hurl. (I didn't. Which is good. Puking in public is so uncool.) Then somehow I managed to pick a fight with my partner. Because being heartsick is the perfect compliment to being sick to your stomach? I don't know what was going on with me, but it was not pretty. I finally got home and could cry and puke in private.

Turns out it probably wasn't something I ate because the GI issues got even worse and went on for days. (At one point John was considering taking me to the ER against my will. What a horrible night!)

In addition to the physical shenanigans my stomach was pulling - I had the mental demons rampaging through my head. "How on earth can you think about skipping training this weekend? Don't you know what that's going to mean for your race? These are the last few training sessions of any length. You're going to lose every bit of conditioning you've managed to scrape together. How can..." It just went on and on.

Lying on my bathroom floor I realized there wasn't much I could do about my stomach. But there was a LOT I could do about those damn demons. One of the coolest things I'm learning in my coach training is how to tackle and dissolve limiting beliefs. We use several tools, but the one I decided to try is Byron Katie's process of inquiry, which she calls The Work. Essentially you question the truth of any thought that is holding you back or causing you discomfort. Through a specific formula of questions, you give evidence on why your thought might not really be true, and you come up with a "turnaround" thought that is at least as true if not more true than the original limiting one. My thought, "Being this sick is going to mess up my race!" was causing me nearly as much agony as my aching tummy. I crawled in bed with my computer and went through the questions. Is it true? Is it really true? What evidence do I have that it might not be true. That's where I got stuck. I couldn't come up with any concrete proof of why my thought might not be true.

Just then my email pinged. I started not to look at it but it was a newsletter from my coaching mentor. Usually I read every word the woman writes but I was mad at myself for not sticking with my "Work" and found myself skimming this one. That is until the word "triathlon" jumped off the page. There in the middle of the page was a story about one of the master life coaches who trained for a year for a triathlon only to have to have emergency eye surgery 18 days before her race. She ended up getting cleared to compete with the proviso that she not put her face in the water. So at the last minute she modified her swim stroke, let go of her expectations for the race, and (of course!) finished with flying colors. Here was my evidence! She faced a bigger physical challenge even closer to her race day and yet - her race was fine. I skipped the rest of the newsletter. I finished my inquiry, dissolved my negative thinking, and shut those demons up. I wish it had made me stop puking right then and there because THAT would be an even better story. But I did find some amazing peace that helped me settle in and take care of myself.

My race is just going to be whatever it is. I'll follow the training plan for these last two weeks but I am done stressing. I'm quietly excited. I figure I've gotten my vomit quota in for the year so I should be good to go. I look forward to all of the brand new experiences the Beach2Battleship half iron is going to be! Peace.

TODAY I LOVE: Synchronicity!

Happy Hour*

Let's talk about the best part of the day - the part of the day when you can rest on your laurels, and bask in the glow of your accomplishments for a short time before the thoughts and pressures and questions of "what's next?" intrude. Yes, we're talking about that happy hour* immediately after a key workout. You're done! You're sweaty! Your metabolism is ramped! And you are instructed to make sure to have a recovery meal within the hour.* Does anyone else have trouble making this happen?

I understand the benefits. I am all about the recovery process in general. Sleep more? Yay! Don't overtrain? No problem! And I am regretfully familiar with the shaky, plungey feeling of having waited a hair too long to ingest recovery calories. I'd like to avoid that feeling. Oh yes, I would. It's getting from the what/why to the how-to part of the equation where I experience a significant fail. A simple, one-line instruction gets complicated tenfold in this mushy thing I use for a brain. Here's a sample of what my post-workout, train wreck of a thought process is like, "Consume recovery meal immediately. Er? Consume. Eat. Recovery Meal. Eat Something. Eat Something Healthy. Immediately. Now. eatsomethinghealthynow. I'm with you! Eat Something Healthy Now. Like now, before I leave the trail head parking lot? Or like now, on the way home? Or like now, as in after I take a shower and don't stink anymore? And wait! What exactly are the parameters of a "recovery" meal? How many calories? Solid? Liquid? A combination there of? Does it count as a meal meal or a snack meal? And..."

Gels - like AccelGel promote themselves as recovery meals. Protein, small package, easily portable - sounds like a great idea. Until after my workout, that is. I cannot possibly make myself consume (another) gooey gel at that point. I've tried and tried. My stomach and throat become allies in gel resistance. I've read chocolate milk is a near perfect recovery meal - nutritious, delicious, easily accessible. But I'm not a chocolate girl. At all. Plain milk seems weird. Should I drink plain milk? Plain skim milk? Or beef it up by turning it into a recovery shake? How does that work? Thermos in the car? Five bucks at a Smoothie King on the way to work (assuming I had a job or knew of a Smoothie King)? Arrrgggghhhh.

So I'm throwing it out there. I need specifics, people! Even if you never comment - I need you to pony up today. Do you have something (other than gel/gu/shot blocks or chocolate milk) that works for you as a recovery meal? (And if you say shake, please Lord, give me details because the idea appeals but ends up being a complicated, unholy mess in my world!) Do you think it makes a difference whether your recovery nutrition is in the form of solid food or a drink? Do you suck it up and pay big bucks or do you have low tech and cheap solutions? Do you mix things up by having a different solution depending on whether you're racing from the gym to work or heading towards the comfort of your own home? Do you do something different if your workout is in the morning versus at night? Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope. Srsly.


*Hour? Or is it a half hour? Even more pressure! I read different articles giving differing time frames with no explanation of why the longer or shorter window. I'm really pushing it to ingest something within an hour. If I've really only got half that amount of time to figure it out - I am so hosed.

Post "Race" Blues

The IMCDA peeps (GeekGirl, Sweet Baboo, SWTriGal, Tac-Boy, and BigUn to name the ones I follow the most closely) are out of the water and on their bikes! I LOVE the athlete tracking. I've also had some relative success with the video feed. (My main computer is a Mac on which the feed does not work. It took me a while to get it set up on my old PC but it's been fun to watch it off and on.) You can hear the guys on walkie-talkies passing back and forth the stats on the leaders, commenting on who looks particularly strong. IronMan Nice and Japan both happened today too - which makes a buttload of Iron mojo spanning the globe! A-mazing.

Forgot to say good luck to Kevin and Wes racing this morning. Can't wait to read their RR's.

Ok enough vicarious living. Time to figure out how to motivate myself to move today. I plunged yesterday. I gave myself permission to rest and recover, but I don't think I have the hang of it. I ended up sleeping almost the entire day! My legs felt like they had a fever. I stretched and soaked, drank lots of fluids. I was very achey and grumpy. I finally took some advil and a big nap, which helped. I still feel pretty blah. I'm fighting off food cravings. (An iced, caffeinated, carbonated sugar water something combined with a fried starchy cheesy something sounds beyond wonderful to me right now!) I think I'll get on the bike trainer and watch a movie. Maybe that will help? I hope so because otherwise my family very well may put me in a cardboard box on the sidewalk with a sign that says, "Free to a good home." We've taken a vote and none of us much like the post "race" me!

Stress Much?

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
Yeah, crazy week. You? Seems like this is a stressful time for lots of folks.
School finishing up means finals for the kids and trying to hold it together for just a little bit longer. It means end of the year pool parties, finding long lost library books, sorting and purging clothes (as my kids have to pack to be gone all summer), and summer hair cuts. We've also celebrated three birthdays in one week (with another coming up in June) and had out of town guests.

"Training?" you ask. To which I reply, "What's that?" :(
I did swim. Once. That is IT this week. Luckily it's a light volume week anyway with a trial run triathlon (on our own) this weekend. I do realize that skipping workouts is not the same as light volume. I'm tempted to say I need a new category of extremely light volume, but I am hoping to have it together enough not to need a label like that very often. I'm not going to beat myself up about it, though. I made the choice this week to spend extra time with my family. Partly they needed me. Partly I needed them. (Swimming is good for relieving my anxiety over the court stuff but hugs from my guys reminds why it's worth it to keep fighting in the first place.) Partly I had to get over the frustration of not having enough energy to do it all.

So. Swim, bike, run tomorrow - sprint distances. On fresh legs and arms. Very fresh. So fresh they may have forgotten what to do! I'll let you know how it goes. Good luck to anyone racing (Willie - you're the only one I know of for sure!) Everyone else - enjoy your training and recovering.

Double Trouble

I ended up sitting on my sick, lasy ass taking a recovery day yesterday. I had weird, lingering sinus trouble after the migraine. Does anyone else have trouble making themselves swim through that? I know, I know. A lot of people have trouble making themselves swim, period. But I have a confession: I love the water. And not just pool water. I love being in the open ocean, too.** That makes me a freak in most tri-circles. Sadly, even among the the triathletes who do admit to a love of swimming, I'm out of place . Have you seen them? They're built like triangular, human Gumbies! Veritable dolphins, they thread in and out of the water, legs like rubber hoses propelling them swiftly through a 3200 meter workout. Meanwhile, over in the "SLOW" lane, I'm churning and splashing my way through a painful and choppy 600. But not even that yesterday. Yesterday, breathing like Darth Vader, my chances of drowning due to asphyxiation in middle of the first 100 were unacceptably high. So I bagged my swim in favor of continued existence. Which brings us to today's two workouts to make up for it. Again. That's twice in two weeks I've had to double book myself with remedial work. As a fledgling athlete, I worry a lot about being able to navigate the difference between commitment and convenience, self-care and slacking. Some Sage advice helped! Me? I'm now confidently off to the trail and the pool. Happy Training y'all!

**Lakes, on the other hand, completely squick me out. Sea water is clean and buoyant while lake water feels skanky and engulfing. Also, I am waaaaaay more afraid of mutant catfish than I am of sharks. Give me the ocean any day (and twice on Sundays!)

***Edited to add:
Swim report - did you know it's possible to sneeze while swimming?! Possible, but not advisable. Or fun. Just saying.
Run report - negative split baby! I ran the return route 40 seconds faster than the out leg! Either I piddled along at the beginning or I hustled on the way back. Or maybe some of both?

Much Ado (With A Side Of Benadryl)

I'd been saving my sassy new green suit for St. Patty's day! (I know! I'm geeky like that. I gotta have fun with the small things.) The only hitch was that the 17th fell on a Monday this year. Bastard! Mondays are usually bike days for me with T/Th being swim mornings. No problem! I'll just flip Monday's bike with Tuesday's swim, fiddle with W/Th, have the regular Friday rest day, and still be on track for the long Sat/Sun workouts. Because the color of your bathing suit is a GREAT reason to muck with your training plan! Ahem.
And alas. It was not to be. I felt a little odd last night - vertigo, migraine symptoms with no pain anywhere, breathing issues. I had crazy dreams about all of the bones in my head being fused together into a tight, solid mass. The only air passageway was one hollowed out by a caustic acid. When I woke all the way up, I felt almost the way I had in the dream only with the added bonus of proto-hives on my neck and chest. Needless to say, the last thing I wanted to do was shimmy into the green suit and head for the pool! I'm feeling better now: breathing tense but ok, welts gone, head still a little woozy but thoughts are lucid (<--at least they seem so to me). I must have had an allergic reaction to something, but I cannot figure out what it could have been! I haven't tried anything new in the kitchen or the bath. Weird! In spite of it all, I've gotten some "work" done this morning. I've caught up on email, done some research on Armenian Church history, and gotten the better part of four pages rough written. Needing a break, I thought I could go back to the training plan as written before color-coordination became an issue. I logged on to look up how many minutes my ride was supposed to be and Doh! Today is a rest day. No minutes on the bike; no workout whatsoever. Handy that. I could use a rest day - if only because I'm worn out from all the drama surrounding my coulda-almost-might-have-been workout! Peace.

On Rest And Rain

The second half of yesterday was comically wretched. We are talking stunningly awful - although luckily not even close to tragic. Stupid, annoying, weird, and frustrating - all in a temporary, this too shall pass kind of way. I was thankful to have completed my workout early because otherwise it wouldn't have happened given the downward crap spiral. I couldn't wait to go to sleep and have the day be over! This morning I was grateful to wake up and realize it was a rest day. None of the ick of yesterday and not even a workout looming on the plan. Rest day. It was soothing to lie in bed listening to the much-needed rain pitter patter on my concrete-like yard. Resting was going well. That is until the day actually started and I discovered the following unpleasantnesses: two of the five kids finishing their homework over breakfast, the mess left (on the floor and the wall) by a puppy with an intestinal disturbance, the remnants of the welcome mat after the puppy apparently tried to eat it (thereby explaining the floor/wall/poop fiasco), and finally that I had gained a whole 'nother pound back.

Is it too late to change the plan? 'Cause I'd much rather work out than have a "rest" like this. Just saying.