Challenge Roth Training: Week 18

8 weeks to go.

Week 18 totals:
Swim: 2. 3950m, 1hr 57min
Bike: 2. 5hrs 40min, Saturday Ride: 79mi
Run: 2. 19mi, 3hr 31min
Strength: 1. 15min
Total time: 11hr 23min

Challenges:

Spent part of the weekend up in Flagstaff, so Sunday's prescribed 8-miler was done at altitude (starting at 7000ft) and proceeded up the side of a mountain for the first four miles. It was virtually the same course as my very first race ever (the Run for the Magic Half Marathon). The intervening six years haven't made the route any flatter, but luckily it's still just as pretty. Ran with Cassie and Not-So-Imaginary Scott and a couple of Cassie's other friends. It was actually really fun, but man was it brutal.

Accomplishments: 
Saturday morning's 80-miler was actually a really good ride. Cool temps, light wind, minimal hills. Felt like I nailed my nutrition. Also, I wore my new bike jersey that Gerry gave me (the one that matches Hansel), so obviously that makes me faster. Averaged 17.4mph for the 80 (well, 79) miles.

Surprises:
Coach LO asked us all at Tuesday's group swim how we were feeling. All of us replied that we were feeling surprisingly good, considering the beating our legs had taken at Bike MS a couple days prior. With that in mind, she tossed us right back into regular training, which included a 10-mile run on Wednesday morning. Starting out, I felt great cardiovascularly, but it soon became apparent that my legs were just toast. My warmup pace felt like a brisk 9:45. Turns out it was actually an 11min mile. Oh boy. Both glutes and my right IT band felt like they were going to snap in half during miles 2-4. As usual the last few miles felt the best. Rolling out my legs on Wednesday night was EXCRUCIATING. I cried. No shame. JK hovered nearby saying, "Isn't there something I can do for you? I just feel like I should be able to do something." I squeaked out, faux-dramatically, "There's nothing you can do. Just bear witness to my pain." Ironman training is awesome.

Bonus:
On Sunday, Cassie and I were doing my prescribed post-run leg strength exercises in a little park near the mountain. A group of rough and tumble young men (possibly in their late-teens? I'm a terrible judge of ages.) sauntered in to sit on the nearby picnic tables for awhile. They were a little obnoxious, but seemed to be pretty harmless. As they were leaving, one of them swaggered by and asked "Do either of you ladies have a band-aid--?" We very clearly did not have any band-aids on us, and began to reply in the negative, when he continued, "--because I scraped my knee when I fell for you." Oh. Oh, honey. We gave him the obligatory eye-roll and half-smile, and he continued on his way.

The trip up to Flagstaff had a purpose. My fabulous cousin Cassie, my partner in crime for nearly all of my racing/riding/obstacle-ing adventures over the past seven years, and just flat-out one of my favorite people ever, is moving away. She's off to Dallas for a new job and new adventures, so I needed to visit and get in one last weekend of our patented Power Relaxing (TM) before she heads east. We did the aforementioned athletic endeavors, and then balanced that out with pedicures, barbecue, frozen yogurt, movies, and Alpine Pedaling. It was a wonderful weekend, and she's a wonderful person, and I'm going to miss her so much.

Challenge Roth Training: Week 17

9 weeks to go.

Week 17 totals:
Swim: 2. 2700m, 1hr 22min
Bike: 3. 9hrs 59min, Saturday Ride: 80mi
Run: 1. 3mi, 0hr 29min
Strength: 0. 0min
Total time: 11hr 50min

Challenges:

Spectacular helmet horns.

While this was technically a rest week, and the days leading up to the weekend were relatively light training-wise, Saturday and Sunday were filled with Bike MS, and oof. Saturday was a tough day. I felt pretty good for the first couple hours, but some unpleasant interactions with motorists kind of put a damper on things, and I just didn't feel like I had much power on the climbs. By the time I got to the farthest-out point on the course, with the relentless wind (20-30mph) and hills (5000 feet of climbing) and heat (96 degrees), I was pretty well fried. I found Gerry at the aid station/turnaround, and we sat in the shade for a bit (and had one of the most uncomfortable, invasive conversations of my life with an older gentleman who was hell-bent on giving me all sorts of unwelcome advice about my disease and my medication choices and my future). Eventually we got away and, having decided that 75 miles of hills was plenty for us in those conditions (our route was 93 miles), tried to find a decent cell signal so we could call in a rescue vehicle. We slogged our way back to a tiny, middle-of-nowhere gas station for a total of 80 miles for the day, where we sat in the shade and waited patiently for Brett to pick us up. It was a beautiful ride, it just wasn't my day.

Accomplishments: 
In contrast, Sunday's ride was wonderful. After a couple miles of my butt being very unhappy with its close proximity to my bike saddle, I settled into a pretty good rhythm. I was near the front of the pack as we turned onto Page Springs Rd. Most of the people stopped at the aid station, but I kept on going, which meant I had the whole smooth, curvy, swoopy, tree-lined prettiness to myself. Didn't see a single car. It was just me and the road and it. was. glorious. The long hill back into Cottonwood wasn't awesome, and it was a bit of a slow climb up to Clarkdale, but all told I was very happy with this ride, especially after my discouraging ride the day before.

Surprises:
In two years of being diagnosed with MS, I've never had such horrible experiences with tactless individuals as I did at this past weekend's event. On Friday evening as I was enjoying pizza and beers with my team, the emcee for the event (who also has MS) came over and introduced herself to the team. As soon as she found out I was the reason we all were there riding, she felt the need to regale me with this little gem: "Oh, you look like you're doing really well! That's great. A friend of mine who has MS was super athletic and was doing great, too, and then one day she woke up and couldn't use her legs. Now her children have to change her diaper. It's very sad." What the eff, lady? In what universe was it appropriate to drop that story in my lap? My team and I sat there in sort of stunned silence, and eventually she moved along to spread the joy to others.

BUT THAT'S NOT ALL. The guy I mentioned earlier, the one at the 75-mile aid station, was just the icing on the cake. He rode in about ten minutes after I did. I overheard him mention to the volunteers that his wife had MS for years, and his daughter also has it, but she's doing great. If he had to rate her symptoms on a scale from 1-10, with 10 being the worst, he'd peg her at a .03. She's just doing wonderfully. And (STUPID ME) I chimed in with something like, "Oh, that's so great to hear! I was diagnosed a couple years ago and it seems like I only hear the really bad stories. It's nice to hear about someone doing well!" Which, APPARENTLY, meant that he was allowed to ask me all sorts of invasive questions and then ruthlessly judge my answers (I was too stunned by the audacity of it all to think of a good way to tell him to fuck off. Not candy-coating that at all. I flat-out hated this guy by the end of it.).

What medication am I on? Oh, that one is really rough, and it doesn't really work. (Oh, shit. I guess I better inform my specialist at the Mayo Clinic that some random dude knows better than him.) Have my lesions improved? His daughter's have and she's not even on medication anymore. (Awesome, that seems like a treatment plan that will work for everybody.) Am I married? Is Gerry my husband? Do I plan on getting married, because I better make sure my husband knows what he's in for, and I really need to work hard on finding and keeping a man. Do I plan on having children? At this point I literally said "Ok, I think we're done here." and started to walk away, but he just barreled right on and told me that his daughter made "the courageous choice" to have a child, but was I aware that X, Y, and Z could happen, and there were things I should keep in mind and maybe I should consider adoption like his sainted daughter has decided to do from here on out. Just on and on.

And to top it all off, he informed me that there are people out there who always want to give advice, and he just thinks that those people should consider what it's like to walk a year in his shoes because they don't know his life or what's best for him. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? I'm sure I was just standing there gape-mouthed at this point, like, do you HEAR yourself? Finally he asked what my name was, and I told him and sort of pointed at my Team K-Lar jersey and he said, "Oh, that's your team! I've seen quite a few of you guys out here today. How many are you?" I told him we had 36 people signed up and he said "Oh, seems like you have a pretty big support system then." And blessed, wonderful Gerry goes "YEP. SHE DOES. BYE." and we left.

What. The actual. Fuck.

Looking back there are SO many things I would have said and/or done differently there. Lessons for the future, I suppose. While my Midwestern Nice doesn't allow me to be rude to people (to their faces...), next time the invasive, inappropriate questions start (oh man, I hope there isn't a next time...) I'm going to make like Liz Lemon and shut it down.

Bonus:
Now that I've vented all of that resentment, here are some pictures from our pretty, pretty, horrible, wonderful ride!

Can't complain about a free photo, but...really?

Gah, so pretty!

I mean really.

Start of day 2.

:)

Challenge Roth Training: Week 16

10 weeks to go.

Week 16 totals:
Swim: 3. 5350m, 2hr 52min
Bike: 4. 7hrs 0min, Saturday Ride: 70mi
Run: 3. 20mi, 3hr 20min
Strength: 0. 0min
Total time: 13hr 12min

Challenges:
Sunday was WINDY. JK and I repeated last Sunday's workout and rode the 30min Bike together, and he ran 2 miles out with me on my 8-mile run. We had the wind at our backs all the way out on the bike ride, which made the ride home kind of horrible. And I had to run directly into the wind for the first 4 miles of my run. By mile 7 of my run, I was DONE and wanted to walk so badly, but I kept talking myself out of it. Managed to run it to the finish.

Accomplishments: 
Friday's swim actually went really well! I could feel the catch (when I was doing it right) and was actually able to swim my Fast 400m faster than my Easy 400m; my fast effort is finally actually faster than my easy effort! It also helped that the person in the lane next to me was slower than I was, which NEVER happens. Not to bag on slow swimmers (because Lord knows I am one), it's just nice not to be the slowest person in the pool for a change. :) Also I swam in the outdoor pool and the sunset was beautiful.

Surprises:
Had a 10-mile run scheduled for Wednesday, and the days have been getting hot, so this meant I had to knock out the run in the morning before work. KB and I met up at 5:15 to run around Tempe Town Lake. This was one of the best runs I've had in a long time. Maintaining the pace on the 1.5-mile intervals was just the right amount of challenging, and the weather was amazing. Beautiful sunrise to boot. I wish every run was like this one.

Bonus:
I promised to fill you in on the official name for my new bike.
Blog friends, meet Hansel. Hansel, these are my blog friends. 

That Hansel. So hot right now.

A little bit German. A little bit funny. It's everything I was looking for in a new bike name. Kudos to JK for the suggestion. :)

Challenge Roth Training: Week 15

11 weeks to go.

Week 15 totals:
Swim: 4. 6700m, 3hr 27min
Bike: 4. 6hrs 14min, Saturday Ride: 60mi
Run: 6. 26mi, 4hr 35min
Strength: 0. 0min
Total time: 14hr 16min

Challenges:
Ugh. Such a crappy run on Sunday. JK joined me for the first half, so at least the company was nice at that point. But the second half just got worse and worse. Felt very sluggish and hot and kind of dehydrated. I think that may have been part of my issue on the bike ride the day before, too. Need to focus more on my day-to-day hydration.

Accomplishments: 
Raced my third Splash & Dash of the season (1500m swim, 5k run), and holy moly, it went really well. Steady, strong strokes on the swim. Got a little bit off course as I headed toward the first turn buoy on the second lap because I was swimming directly into the sun and a yellow buoy is impossible to see in those conditions, but I figured it out and corrected. 1500m open water swim PR by 3+ minutes! Actually felt good enough post-swim to jog to my spot in transition, and felt pretty good on the 5k. It was so nice to actually have some people around me on the run. Hooray for a faster swim! The post-Splash & Dash 5-miler was a relatively slow run, but it went infinitely better than the similar run I did a few weeks ago. And JK joined me for most of it, so the company was particularly nice.

Surprises:
Ended up in the lane next to Coach LO at the pool on Friday evening. No slacking on that swim! My arms were so tired after the splash & dash the night before and the two other swims I'd already done that week, but I still managed to hang pretty steady on the 8x200m set.

Bonus:
Had dinner with some friends of JK's who are in town for a couple weeks. Always so nice to meet people he knows from his former life, and eating at Four Peaks Brewery is never a bad thing. Also finally took my bike in and got the aerobar tightened down so it'll stop slipping on every. single. ride. Though I attempted to tighten it on my own several times, apparently I am not as strong as a torque wrench. Who knew.

Coming up next week: my new bike finally has a name!

Challenge Roth Training: Week 14

12 weeks to go.

Week 14 totals:
Swim: 3. 4000m, 2hr 3min
Bike: 2. 2hrs 20min, Saturday Ride: 26mi
Run: 3. 11mi, 1hr 58min
Strength: 1. 60min
Total time: 7hr 21min

Challenges:
Drove down to Mexico to do the Rocky Point Tri at the Las Palomas resort in Puerto Peñasco.

The winds and sea were ridiculous on race morning, resulting in huge surf and water conditions so dangerous that they downgraded the planned 1000m swim to a 300m "swim." We basically just thrashed/walked in waist-deep water while getting pummeled every few seconds by giant waves. This is also the only triathlon I've ever done where I've gotten kicked in the face during the swim. (The very next day the ocean was perfectly peaceful, of course. Harumph.)

I was disgruntled after that stupid "swim" and subsequent barefoot trek over tiny, sharp, painful rocks to T1, and so took my sweet-ass time in transition. I applied sunscreen, dutifully missing the same crescent of flesh near my shoulder blades that routinely gets fried during triathlons, and trotted out of transition probably close to last place. I did not care.

The official weather report for race day was wind speeds of 34 mph, gusting to 49 mph. Good God. We rode directly into this wind the entire way out on each of the three loops of the out & back bike course. On the positive side, this meant I spent 95% of my ride in the aero position and I managed to pass many, many people. On the negative side, it was brutal and I absolutely destroyed my hamstrings, which did not bode well for the awaiting run.

I finally made it to T2, and the woman next to me on the bike racks came in just after I did and said something to the effect of "Did you have fun out there?" "Nope." was the only thing I managed to say in reply.

And to complete the trifecta of complaining about this course, the run. was. ridiculous. It was entirely on the Las Palomas golf course. Now, I haven't been on a lot of golf courses in my life, but I never imagined that they would have such steep hills. Like "put your hands on your knees and hike up them" steep. Just continually, one after another. With maybe a minute or two of regular running, maybe a half mile or so on spongy golf turf, but then more steep, steep golf car(t? Which is it, Bea?) path hills. The only upside was that even though my legs were trashed from the bike, when it was possible to run I managed it just fine, usually at a sub-10 pace. Finished the run, collapsed onto the slip-n-slide, and immediately got a free beer.

Final thoughts: Race - awful. After-party - way fun, and obviously the only reason people do this race more than once.

Accomplishments: 
Actually managed to finish that race solidly in the middle of the pack, which means I passed a veritable shit-ton of people on the bike (and a few on the run).

Surprises:
I've made a concerted effort to work on the "catch" phase of my swim stroke this past week, and it seems to be paying off. On Tuesday, I swam 400m in approximately 10:15. On Thursday, with some focused effort on my stroke, I swam 800m in about 19:45. Progress!


Bonus:

The view from the enormous suite that all seven of us shared at the Las Palomas Resort. It was a pretty great place.

Triathletes starting the swim. I mean come on.

Gerry, Al, and Mikey waiting for the awards to start.

Check out those trophies! Al took 2nd overall in the 5K.

The day after the race was gorgeous. No wind. No waves. Sigh.

This guy consistently places 1st overall in the Kristen's Favorite People category.

Challenge Roth Training: Week 13

13 weeks to go. (Halfway there!)

Week 13 totals:
Swim: 2. 3200m, 1hr 33min
Bike: 2. 2hrs 55min, Sunday Ride: 30mi, elev.
Run: 3. 8mi, 1hr 42min
Strength: 0. 0min
Total time: 6hr 10min

Challenges:
Splash & Dash #2 of the season, and my third time swimming in Tempe Town Lake in the last two weeks. The post-swim sneezing stuffy nose is out of control.

Accomplishments: 
Actually had a really great swim! Felt very steady and solid the whole time. Could have gone farther, but was happy to be done. Also, this was a solid 7 minutes faster than any Half IM swim I've ever done (and those are even a little shorter distance). Go me!

Surprises:
Saw Bombay Bicycle Club at Crescent Ballroom on Monday night with Mike, Cassie, and Jason (who was covering the show, of course). Royal Canoe, the opening band, was really awesome, so during the break between sets I headed over to the merch table to see what they had to offer. There were two albums to choose from, so I asked the guy working the table, "Hey, do you know the name of the first song that last band played?" "Yeah." he replied. "I mean...I'm in the band, so..." And then I died of embarrassment while lamely saying, "Oh jeez, I'm sorry! I was sitting in the back, so it was kinda hard to see..." I'm sure his ego took a hit that night. But I did buy the album, so I guess that's something. Cassie suggested later that I should have just leaned into it and replied with a sarcastic "Hookay, buddy. Yeah, me too. I'm totally in the band." And of course BBC kicked a whole lot of ass. It was a really fun night.

Hey, I know that guy.

Bonus:
This week was a glorious, glorious rest week, which you may have guessed from the relatively short total time for the workouts, which I'm sure you always read through carefully. Rest week means I only had to do one workout each day (Splash & Dash notwithstanding). Rest week also means that most of those workouts were short. 3 mile run! 45 minute bike! Friday do whatever you want! Turns out what I wanted to do on Friday was walk by the lake with my man, head down to get some frozen yogurt, and walk back. Now that's some ironman training I can get behind. I also got to introduce JK to Fountain Hills during our 2hr bike ride early Sunday morning. It was lovely.

Challenge Roth Training: Week 12

14 weeks to go.

Week 12 totals:
Swim: 4. 6500m, 3hr 19min
Bike: 3. 3hrs 2min, Sunday Ride: 28mi, 374elev.
Run: 5. 20mi, 3hr 20min
Strength: 1. 10min
Total time: 9hr 51min

Challenges:
Raced my first Splash & Dash of the season on Thursday. This race series (typically a 1500m swim followed by a 5K run) is a good opportunity for multisport athletes to get in some open water swim training as well as work on transitions. Outside temperatures hit 99 this past week, which made the 6pm starting time just a wee bit warm. This was my first real open water swim in a race setting (not coaching) since IMCDA, and it showed. Got a little panicky all the way out to the first buoy, which resulted in a lot of embarrassing doggy paddling. But once I managed to calm down, I actually had a really good swim. My time was exactly where I'm used to it being for 1500m, which means I was moving at least a little faster for the majority of the swim to balance out the crappy first couple hundred meters.

Accomplishments: 
I raced my first Olympic-distance triathlon since Lavaman 2011 - and set a new PR! The Marquee Triathlon was on Sunday, and it obviously went well. PR'd by a few seconds on the swim (I'll take it!), averaged 18.25mph on the bike, on a windy day, on a course with precisely 36 turns (which means a lot of slowing down to corner safely), and actually ran the entire run course without stopping to walk for the first time in any triathlon I've ever done ever. All this resulted in a time of 3hrs 22min, which is one minute longer than my time for Lavaman. Doesn't sound like a PR, does it? Ah, but this bike course was 4-miles longer than the Lavaman course. Bam! 

Surprises:
Rode the new bike for the Marquee Tri, and aside from a few issues, I loved it. Issue #1: every time I hit a bump, my left aerobar would drop down a bit. Every couple miles I'd have to sit up and try to yank it back into place without crashing. Issue #2: dropped my water bottle about 3 miles into the course, so didn't have any hydration for the next 20 minutes (which doesn't seem like a huge problem, but I was an hour into my race by this point and (obviously) you can't drink while you swim (lake water notwithstanding), so I was really getting thirsty by the time I reached the first bike aid station.)

Bonus:
JK and I had plans to see Broken Bells on Thursday. He was covering the show, so he arrived on time (headed over right after cheering me on at the Splash & Dash), but I was ridiculously late because I had to run an additional 5 miles post-S&D, then hurry up and try to eat something and get cleaned up. I managed to catch the last 30 minutes or so of the show (which was GREAT!), but apparently missed a top notch opening act and the first 2/3 of the main set. Oh, Ironman training. Sometimes you're a real bitch.