Bucking Betty

LOL ! Thanks for all your suggestions, much appreciated! A few of them have made the shortlist. For some reason, I'm finding NTR's suggestion of "Cheryl" very amusing (apologies to anyone named, or whose female relative is named, Cheryl). 2P, Artemis was the goddess of the hunt. Rather appropriate for a tri bike. However she did also have a thing for killing off men so I don't know if R will agree with that suggestion ;-) Will keep you posted on a decision which will probably be made after a few glasses of vino on Sunday night.

I've had a much better week work-wise. I've managed to do all my session so far this week (as opposed to only doing 1 from 5 last week). And I've managed to fry my butt by getting back into the physio-ordered stuff. I'm off to Queensland on Friday night for the long weekend - to join Team Mango as R does his first HIM - so I've had to shake up the training a bit this week to fit it all in.

Monday
AM - my maiden (indoor trainer) session on Betty - an AT session with 2 x 10mins AT efforts at 5am.

PM - a (scenic) 1.6k swim.

The fact it was scenic was about the only good thing about it. After 9 days out of the pool (I missed both sessions last week), I felt like I'd lost my 'feel' of the water. I completely forgot what set I was up to. And then I got stuck in a 'medium' lane with a woman practising her kicking sans-flippers. And then I got clipped by a man doing butterfly. I was in a rather ordinary mood by the time I'd finished. But after we got home, we turned on the telly to watch something while eating dinner & discovered a program on "Compass" about the situation of women in Afghanistan 5 years after the end of the Taliban regime. Anyone who thinks the position of women in Afghanistan has changed very much - or is likely to change any time soon - is kidding themselves. Talk about a reality check - a huge reminder of how lucky I am as a woman to be born in the west.

Tuesday
PM - massage + gym session (including 4mins run)

My hip has really improved recently. No niggles during the run & more importantly, none on the walk back to the car which is when it normally really affects me :-)

Wednesday
AM - a day off work (woohoo) and long ride - 49.09k in 2:08 (aver 22.9k/h)

After a sleep-in, I headed out on the M7 bike path with Betty for my long ride. I woke feeling tired & flat and given that it was my first time on a 'road bike', I decided to ignore speed & distance etc & just get used to handling her. So I took it easy, clipping in & out from time to time to wear the new cleats down a little, rode the brakes a bit going down hills (getting used to the difference between brake pads & disc brakes) and took it very carefully when cornering. I just basically had a play. However I wish that Betty had Apollo's lower gears - geez, it was hard work getting up the big hills.

Lance said it's not about the bike. Well, with all due respect Lance my boy, I think the bike makes a wee bit of difference. Today's ride was 2.5k/h faster than my last session on Apollo over largely the same course with, if anything, decreased effort. I wonder what will happen once I stop playing & start riding!

Betty the b*tch however is responsible for my first ever cleat stack - Apollo has never thrown me off before....



It actually look much more impressive than it really is. It's a bit smeared because the only thing I had to clean up the blood was my training program (sorry TA!)

Thursday
PM - 4mins run, LOL.

I went to the gym to do my usual gym session but my butt (Tuesday's gym session) and knee (yesterday) were too sore to do my eccentric exercises so I did my warm up, ran for 4mins on the treadmill & then went home to do my daily dose of physio-ordered stuff. I might even upgrade to 5 mins next week - woohoo - stay tuned ;-)

Tomorrow morning (Friday) I have a 50mins hills session on Betty before work. Then after work it's off to Queensland until Tuesday where the temperature forecast is in the high 20s for the next 4 days. Bring it on :- )

Sexy Betty

I'd like you to meet Betty -

After shortening her stem, increasing the height of the seat (I have a short upper body but long legs), taking the aero bars off (for the time being) & putting a comfy (read: girls) seat on it, she looks like a completely new bike.

Perhaps she needs a new - and sexier - name to go with the new look. Any suggestions ?

Priorities

Bro, unfortunately my early starts are more related to work-related pressures than to any determination on my part !

What's that saying about not being so busy making a living that you forget to make a life? That pretty much sums up my week - although I haven't forgotten to "make a life" (one particular 'excursion' was a wonderful & krazy reminder) the "making a living" part certainly has got in the way. It has been a truly horrid week at work. 3 nights so far this week I haven't been home from work until after 10pm. Needless to say, the training has suffered. Let's see - it's Thursday night & all I've done since my long ride on Sunday is visit the physio on Monday where I ran niggle-free for 4mins - god knows how given that I haven't been doing my exercises recently - and an easy 30mins spin on Apollo on Tuesday morning. Thankfully it is a recovery week - talk about perfect timing! All I need now is a recovery week from work so I can get some training done. A well timed sick day next week should help :-)

I can't say that I'm feeling particularly rested or 'recovered' right now but I'm sure the combined effect of getting off my ever-increasing arse (now that work pressures have eased momentarily) for a swim or ride tomorrow followed by a relaxing weekend down the coast with R will fix that :-)

Good luck to all my friends running - and cheering - on Sunday. My thoughts will be with you.

Great expectations

Well, my goal to post more often seems to have gone out the window as the work has flown in - it has been completely fn feral at work lately. My work is very cyclical in nature and unfortunately right now it is in 'manic' mode with no signs of letting up. But I have tried to get more sleep this week (work permitting) and I've done all of my training sessions - but none of my physio-ordered ones. I guess that means I'm another step closer to getting to the Gong in one piece but a step further away from a return to running. Oh well, you can't win them all I suppose.

Monday night I made it to the gym/pool too late to do both my swim & gym session so the gym session was sacrificed. 1.5k swim, the particular highlight of which was that I didn't drown attempting backstroke - let's just say, I don't remember the last time I tried backstroke. And BTW Hamburglar, my references to swims being scenic is unrelated to the black line, what's on the bottom of the pool or even the men's water polo team training in the adjacent lane on Monday nights ;-)

Wednesday morning saw a 4.45am start for 45mins hills session on Apollo in front of the telly, once again using grindy gears for untimed intervals. Thursday morning saw another 4.45am start but this time so I could go to work :-( Work is seriously interfering with my adventure racing career right now ;-) Yet another 4.45am start on Friday morning, this time for an interval session on Apollo -

10mins w/u
10mins x 30/30s
5mins spin
4 x 3min hard/90sec spin recovery
10mins c/d
Total: 53mins

My soul received plenty of nourishment on Friday night when Owly came to stay (*hugs*). Today brought another early start. While Owly stayed at home, R picked me up & we headed down to the bike shop so his spare road bike - a very sexy black creature with the unflattering name of Betty* - could be fitted for me. Don't tell Apollo but I'm planning to use Betty for my Gong ride and the road triathlons. Unfortunately they didn't have the triathlon shoes I wanted so they are ordering them in and we are heading back down there on Thursday night for the fitting (hopefully I can get out of work in time). From there, it was home to pick Owly up & then a drive to Katoomba to catch up with Blousey & 2P over brunch (*waves*). I've got a gym session & 2k swim on the plan for this afternoon & another long ride on Apollo tomorrow.

Edit: Well I didn't make it to the gym in time for my physio-ordered session but I did complete my scenic 2k swim. A tough session but good - I've been really concentrating on my stroke recently. And while I need to work on my breathing to my left, I'm feeling much stronger & much more able to keep my stroke long during efforts and/or when tired. Happy days. After my swim, it was home for a shower, a snack & then I was taken out for a lovely flash dinner :-)

Today sometime about 3pm R & I eventually made it out for our ride along the M7 bike path. 3 weeks into my new program & the consistency is already paying off. I am feeling much stronger on the hills in particular & my average pace for the various sections of the path is increasing slowly but surely. Last Sunday's outward journey must have been an anomaly as we reached the same point today almost 6mins faster than last week. Today was another negative split - 1min 10sec this time - in total we did 40.02km in 1:56:45 (aver 20.5k/hr). Slow I know.



Don't tell Apollo but I'm looking forward to getting out on Apollo & seeing how much faster I can go :-)


Recovery week ahead - yippee !

* apologies to anyone reading this named Betty :-)

Crazy crazy

Well I think I was 90% of the way to my goals for last week - more sleep (most nights) and another blog update. Add in doing all my training sessions this week (including my physio ordered exercises which I have, um, let slide over the last week) & I'll be an even happier girl ;-)

Let's see, on Wednesday a head cold had well & truly set in so I skipped the planned interval session & stayed in bed instead. A good idea as it turns out because I felt pretty shocking on Wednesday & Thursday. After a long sleep-in on Friday morning (thank you APEC), I got on the bike for a 60mins session in front of the tv for an aerobic session with increased resistance to simulate hill climbing during the add breaks which proved to be one tough session. After some lunch & a quick shower, I headed to the gym for my usual physio-ordered session including a 4 min run.

Saturday saw another sleep-in, a lovely lunch & then a visit to the pool for a scenic 2k swim.

As for today, I really did not want to do my long ride. R had agreed to come with me to keep me company. To be honest I didn't want to ride - I woke up feeling completely wasted - utterly exhausted. R was a bit worried that I was coming down with the flu but with Sydney to the Gong looming ominously, I didn't want to miss a long ride because I didn't feel like it. So I agreed to start & that we would turn back if I wasn't up for it. I had 100mins on the plan so we rode along the M7 bike path for 50mins. At the turnaround - somewhere beyond Elizabeth Road, I felt like cr*p - I wanted R to go back & get the car & pick me up. But after a GU and a shot of inspiration, I actually flew home with an 11mins negative split!! The fact that it is largely downhill from there is mere detail ;-) Still by the time I got back to the car I felt fantastic. Man, that GU is good stuff - shame it tastes so horrid. I used to love the Expresso Love flavour - I almost gagged on it today. Ick ! Anyhoo, hours later & I'm feeling great. Apollo however isn't so well - he is off to the shop tomorrow for some much needed TLC. Fingers crossed he is back before Wednesday's interval session.

New horizons

And I'm not just talking about this -







Another busy week & a bit. Thanks for the comments everyone. I know 3 mins isn't much Hamburglar, but after not running for 8 weeks - or is it 9 now?, I forget - I'll take it. It's not quite niggle free yet but getting there :-)

Anyway my new horizon is triathlons - particularly off-road triathlons & multisport 'adventure races' which was the reason I bought Apollo rather than a road bike in the first place. As I can't do Six Foot next year I've been hunting around for a good goal (trail) race without much success. I've always said that I'd do a triathlon eventually. I had managed to resist the temptation and ignore my triathlete uncle who, for many years, has been trying to talk me into doing one. But when my uncle & R met recently, their combined efforts proved far too persuasive ;-) Seriously though my swimming & riding over the last 9 or so weeks certainly wasn't done with a tri in mind - I've only been so focused on it because I couldn't run - but it seems a good idea to use the base that I have built up. I haven't identified my tri debut race just yet - I will leave that decision until I'm running reasonable distances again. But I have a nice shiny new triathlon program which kicked off last week (thanks TA) & was very excited last weekend to discover that Xterra is coming to Australia - finally!

Enough rambling - the week & a bit that was:

Monday 27/8
Back to the gym after work for the usual session (including 3min run) followed by a scenic 1.6k swim including my first attempt at drills. Thankfully I was wearing fins so I didn't take on too much water. It was also my first ever incidence of chaffing. I've never suffered from chaffing when running but unfortunately I discovered a bit too late that one of the straps on my swimmers was twisted on my shoulders. Unfortunately it left a lovely red mark right on the base of my neck at the side. What's worse is that I only realised (after I got to work on Tuesday) that you could see the mark above the neckline on my dress. How embarrassment.

Tuesday 28/8
Up at 4.50am for a session on Apollo on the trainer. It was supposed to be a hills session but I couldn't quite bring myself to go out in the dark (something I will have to get used to, I know) so I did untimed intervals using a combo of different high (grinding) gears & spinning for 40mins including 5mins w/u & c/d

Thursday 30/8
Saw a return to the gym for the usual session (including another 3min run) followed by a scenic 2k swim. Somewhere around the 1.2k mark, I realised that I had eaten very little food during the day due to meetings which made this session a huge struggle. I was absolutely stuffed by the end of it. Still, it got done - unlike my Friday morning interval session. After a late night packing for the weekend & watching the World Champs, I decided to go for the extra hours sleep.

Saturday 1/9
After a mini sleep-in, I went out for a 30mins walk (including 3min run) along the country roads near our hotel in the Hunter Valley on a gorgeous warm morning, befitting the first day of spring! Happy days :-)

Sunday 2/9
All of Sunday was a struggle after 4 hours sleep due to the wedding & then having to be up at 4.30am for the hot air balloon ride (my first!). After getting home & unpacking, around 8pm I decided that there was nothing like the prospect of a 90k ride in a matter of weeks to get me off the couch so I did my scheduled 85min ride in front of the telly while watching the World Champs.

Monday 3/9
Got caught in the office so only had time for my scenic 1.45k swim tonight - no gym session.

This week is another big week of training & other assorted other stuff. Work is really feral at the moment. My goals for the rest of this week are -

(a) get more sleep than I have in recent weeks; and

(b) blog more often than once a week to avoid essays such as this.

I had also set myself the goal of doing every session on the plan but work has already screwed that up - on top of which a sore throat & head cold has descended over the last 48 hours. Hopefully I can recover quickly & be ready for a big weekend of training (thank you APEC).

Total for August - 13.6k swimming, lots of time on Apollo (note to self - get cadence sensor) and - wait for it - 15 minutes running. LOL.