27 days to go!!
Wow! I can’t believe Ironman Arizona is almost here! Time sure has flown, and all that has happened in such short time. I am a little tired, but I feel strong. Like my coach told me, what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger! I still wonder how we are putting all this together in one day!
So this weekend was my longest training so far, or as I called it, my weekend of excruciating hell!! I had to run 20 miles on Saturday. Its awesome to run in Miami in this time. The weather is not too hot, not cold, and seeing good friends on the road is always a plus. It went flawlessly, perhaps a bit slower than I would’ve like to. But that’s ok, in training, that’s why we have bike drills and track days, that’s where we get the heart rate pumping. My legs were really tired (yeah, moving your legs for almost four hours non-stop kind of does that to you!!) When I woke up on Sunday, I realized I was very sore from the day before…not a good sign, since I was about to have a long training day ahead of me. So I started my ride with the group, then they stopped for something technical, so I went on, since I was sure they were going to catch up with me, plus half of them were only doing a short distance and I had a long way to go. I normally don’t care, because there are so many cyclists on the road on Sunday morning. But this day the roads were empty, and the wind was hitting really hard! So my bottles were well stocked (the liquid was perhaps too salty, next time I should take the salts pills instead of throwing them in with the liquids. So I did a couple of loops past Robert’s. I was very concerned about the dogs, since the farmers open the gates and then the mean dogs run wild, and they LOVE to follow the bikes, and they are not cute!! Thank God no dogs were in sight, I was however, starting to lose it, repeating the loops with barely any tail wind. I had recently done a new fitting, a much more aggressive one (for the non cyclists, aggressive means being more aerodynamic) I had also bought a new saddle. So my ass and cooch were hurting, my upper back hurt even more! But the biggest issue was the wind. At some point I was doing 10 mph, horrible! I know!! I had no one to draft from, but I guess that’s works to my advantage as far as training goes. I stopped at this little Cuban shack on the road, which smelled like a Puertorican “chinchorro” I don’t really eat fried stuff these days, but the fried pork smelled really good! They were very nice and inviting, but I still had a long way to go. With fresh liquids I was on my way, which meant about 2 hours of head wind, so it was feeling very unpleasant to say the least. In that area past the Homestead Speedway you feel the wind coming in every direction. So I made another stop on the way, got fresh water and tried a Coke for the first time in my training. I didn’t feel much different as many people claim when they drink it. I was ready to lift the bike and throw it against the curb. My liquids were as hot as lukewarm soup. Have you ever had a mix of warm CarboPro, Accelerade and salt pills? Veeeeery nasty!!!! I had to continue to drink some anyway, because I could risk being dehydrated. So I completed 113 miles in over 8 hours….EIGHT HOURS PLUS??? Are you kidding me??? I was so pissed!! I have a piece of paper on my fridge that says “Swim: 1:45, Bike: 6:00, Run: 5:00) Its just inspirational, but knowing I was so far from my mark made me somewhat disappointed. I choose to believe that is not that I in fact suck, there were several factors involving my “oh my God, I SUCK!” day: 20 mile run on Saturday (plus a very busy day after) a new fitting, mad head wind.
I really didn’t want to run the 40 minutes. My upper back was really sore, and even my eye lashes hurt. Not to mention it was like 2pm already. But this is a crucial part of the training and needs to be done. You guys know how much I critize the Gallo-walkers, when they annoyingly run all together hovering the sidewalk then suddenly stop with no advice whatsoever (and Gosh, they don’t shut up!!). Well, I had to Gallo-walk the run (4 min run/1 mile walk) so even though I was extremely tired, my run felt fresh, except that I added way too much CarboPro on my water, so it was kind of nasty. I am glad my nutrition was right on the money, that’s one of the important parts in this training. If your hydration and nutrition are off, so is your race.
Now I’m looking forward to this upcoming weekend’s race: Miami 70.3, everyone I know is racing it! I am doing it as a training, so its even more fun!!
Let’s have fun you guys!!! See you on the road!
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