Training, Life, Yadda Yadda

It's race week so I finally have a little down time to write about what's going on.  I've got a sprint tri this weekend and another in 2 weeks, with Nationals 4 weeks after that.  As expected, training has gotten fairly race-specific at this point.

I'm starting to see the method to the madness as we get closer to the races.  I looked at my early track workouts 6 or 7 weeks ago…my times for most intervals are about a minute faster now.  If nothing else, I think the experience of finding that push point and just going hard around the track will pay off on race day.  Or, as I said in my race plan, "gasping for air and making dying animal noises."

The insane bike interval workouts are feeling easier (note: NOT easy, but easier) - word from the boss is that I should take a bike test.  Thank goodness my upcoming race is flat and therefore may serve as my test.  This weekend in the middle of our long ride, I finally tackled Old La Honda, a very very popular cycling road in the area.  It looks like this…

And as far as the swim, well I just keep showing up and doing whatever I can to keep up with my lane mates.  Sometimes, it really hurts.  Last week there was a crazy set of IM 25s that left me at one point wondering if I might crap myself in the pool.

Last week my agility friends took me out for a going-away dinner (even though I'll still be in class with them for another month, the timing was just convenient for everyone).

It was so nice to see everyone outside of class - we clean up ok!

I've been taking agility classes from Tania for over 10 years now!

First Mary was my agility classmate and now she's my masters lane mate too!

The nice part about a super-fun evening out with friends is that it made it very easy to swear off alcohol afterwards as part of my get-serious-about-race-weight-for-nationals initiative.  Once we got back from Boston, I stocked the house back up with proper healthy foods and have just focused on eating clean consistently.  It's amazing how fast you see results from such things!  Minimal alcohol drinking, very little sugar, just lots of fruits and veggies and healthy carbs like (stolen from my coach) baked sweet potatoes (which by the way fill a sweet craving nicely!).  Not only that but Jeff and I usually eat out most nights…we've cooked 6 out of the past 7 evenings at home (every night except my agility class outing) and they've been exceptionally healthy meals at that.  

I'm alternately thrilled and sad about all these goodbyes and parties.  This is the start of my last full week at the office…I'll go back in next Monday to close things out and do paperwork but this is really finally the end!  After nearly 7 years at this company and 13 years with some of my coworkers (including my boss), I feel ready for the exciting changes ahead.  The countdown is truly down to single digits.  My "real" summer starts in one week!