11...

A long post - apologies in advance!

Thanks to Ewen for fixing my blog header. I love this photo. I took it from the front of seat of a bus on the trip from the town of Arica on the coast at the northen end of Chile up to La Paz in Bolivia in 2005. It brings back fond memories of a great trip; my first into the mountains :-)

Barb, you will love Yeppoon - it's a fantastic event! I hope to do it again next year.

My attempt to self-diagnose the problem in my jaw Sunday week was w-a-y off the mark; a visit to both the dentist & doctor on Tuesday revealed that the primary cause of the problem was an ear infection but I also have a slight issue with my bite. I asked someone to take me out the back & shoot me but they refused. The ear infection meant that there was no swimming later in the week. It was, thankfully, a recovery week so it simply meant a slightly easier week than normal

Mon: after last Friday's walk/shuffle debacle, I decided to leave the watch at home during today's walk/shuffle and run all the downhills, some of the flats, none of the uphills / inclines / false flats & generally not beat myself up over how much, or how little, I ran. Needless to say, I was in a much better head space when I returned home. As much as I am struggling to get back my "run fitness", I need also to remember that I haven't run since July 2008 - yep, almost 2 1/2 years now - so all my ligaments & tendons are going to take time to get back to full (run) strength. 45mins in total.

After work it was off to swim squad for about 2.5kms of torture. I wasn't pushing myself as much as I probably should have been but it was still a hard session. I say "about" 2.5km because I lost count when the hard efforts started. And then the bungy cords come out.. :-O The session also left me thinking that perhaps my tooth problem was in fact an ear infection because I couldn't put my ear plug in because my ear was a bit swollen nor could I rest my swimming cap on my ear (like I normally do). Turns out I was right :-)

Tue: back on the bike this morning for another windtrainer session, this time the "Suffer-O-Rama" Spinervals DVD. Certainly a case of false advertising with this DVD; it says it goes for 45min but in fact went for 53min. But there was no false advertising in its name; there was plenty of suffering. 21.8km. Av. 24.8km. Av.HR 143. Spent what felt like the rest of the day either waiting for, or seeing, both a doctor and dentist.

Wed: 60min pilates w/ Carly. She has given me the ok to (slowly) increase the duration of the shuffling component of my walk / shuffles. Someone needs to tell my aerobic fitness that...

Thu: rest. I had planned to get up for a run but I've been feeling very tired this week (not surprising given that my body is fighting off my ear infection) so I turned off the alarm & went back to sleep.

Fri: A day off work to celebrate one year since the best day of my life...


But before the celebrating could start, there was hard work to do; a 2.5hour ride which, due to Sydney's inclement weather, was spent in the garage on the windtrainer with R & Coach Troy to keep me company. If anything this session gave me an excuse to go buy more Coach Troy Spinervals DVDs; if only so that I had an aerobic/base building type DVD which was more appropriate to replicate a long ride rather than the torturous one we did which was full of (hard) efforts & intervals. Finished with 53.3km in 2:15 for 23.7k/h av. Then it was off to Lilianfels at Katoomba for a lovely weekend

Sat: rest

Sun: after returning from the mountains, I was feeling rather guilty about the amount of food I consumed. So - while it wasn't on my program - I took myself off the gym after we arrived home. I figured that after 2 days of laying around eating, drinking, sleeping, talking, reading, eating & drinking, I was sufficiently recovered. 45min strength session.

Mon: another enjoyable (approx.) 45min walk/shuffle this morning sans-watch. The only time I have gone without Garmin Elektra over the last 4 years has been on those rare occasions when I forgot to charge her or she refused to play. So it's rather liberating to train without her reminding me of how slow I run (or ride for that matter).

Then it was off to swim squad after work for session with James (B+) today. 2.85km in total including quite a bit of speedy stuff. I think that maybe, just maybe, I might be getting closer to that place where I left my swimming form after Yeppoon. The fitness is still lacking but it's slowly returning.

The training this week isn't too heavy due to being entered in the enticer race (250m/10km/2.5km) at the Nepean Triathlon event on Saturday. The distance hardly seems worth getting out of bed for. But it's a bit special for me. It's hard to believe but this will be my first race of any kind in which me, myself & I will do the whole event AND cross the finish line since July 2008. Yep, almost 2.5 years. I'm a bit nervous; not about the race itself but about how my hip will pull up afterwards. Keep your fingers crossed for me please! Edit: as an aside, I know 2.5km is very far but let's just say I have't run 2.5km non-stop yet. Probably only half that. So it will be a true walk/shuffle during the race!

MTD:
Swim: 5.35km
Bike: 75.1km