Fun in the sun

Bear in mind, I know how silly this will sound.  But…do you have any idea how different it is to experience Hawaii when you can swim?  I’ve come to Maui several times with my family, in high school and after college, but I never spent any time on a beach or went out swimming to see what was there.  Because I could not swim.  I did scuba dive – petrified the whole time – but it’s not exactly the same thing.  Oh, Internet, the power of being able to just jump in and swim out offshore and look at things underwater with the knowledge that you know how to survive out there!  Not only learning how to swim but all my open water swims in rough murky Santa Cruz…it gave me a lot of confidence facing the occasional big swell or wave today.

I would swim every day if this were my swimming pool

Even more fun is all the neat stuff to look at.

Let’s go look over there!

My little friend didn’t seem too bothered by the papparazzi

Life wasn’t too rough outside the water either.

Despite all the fun and eating (and not so much drinking for me after that first night), I have actually been consistently getting my workouts done as well.  Today is 4 weeks since the most amazing race of my life, and my first week of training for a whole new year is done - lots of short, light easy sessions and technique work!

Training totals for December 14-20:
Swim: 3500 yards
Bike: 24.5 miles
Run: 10.1 miles
Strength: 1 hour
Total time: 6.3 hours