Week Five: Comfortably Numb

A really really long swim

It was eventually inevitable. Last 70.3 training it happened at Week Three and on a much greater scale as I ended up with full blown bronchitis that lasted for about two weeks. This week it started as fatigue, a scratchy throat, sinus pain...and now I have laryngitis. If that's as bad as it gets I will not complain. I just want to push through and not let it affect my green streak.

Overall it was a good week. I was afraid between feeling under the weather and having another holiday in the mix that I would finally break and not get everything done, but I managed to get it all in with a few minor modifications to my plan. The smartest thing I did was to move my long run to Friday so I didn't have to run with a hangover on Saturday. That was really good pre-planning - thanks Coach for the suggestion!

Challenges of the Week:

• The obvious challenge was pushing through when not feeling 100%. I had some tough workouts, especially in the pool, and I am happy for making it through those swims with times I can be proud of.

• Flip-turns. Let's just face it. My flip turns are ugly. Apparently I have a chicken-wing that likes to fly out and interfere with the gracefulness of the turn. The harder I work on fixing it, the uglier it gets. It's kind of like my dancing.

• Keeping the focus on me and my performance, not on those around me. I had what I thought was a really good and fast long run at the end of the week based on my comparison of my pace to others and was later disappointed to find that I was still running at a much slower pace than I would like at this point. I need to base my performance on feel, heart rate, and effort... not on comparisons with others

 Lessons Learned:

• It is possible to push through when I don't really want to or feel like my body wants to. It just takes more focus and discipline.

• It's amazing what a mental boost a little bit of praise or an observation on an improvement in an area can do for my self-esteem and motivation. When timed just right it is enough to carry me through a tough week.

• I am becoming a believer in visualization as a tool for mental preparation. I don't know if it's going to work yet, but I don't think imagining every swim stroke, pedal stroke, and step in this upcoming race over and over in my mind in a positive fashion could be detrimental. I figure that if I picture success I will have success.

• I had no idea how a feeling of intense disgust and anger over my performance at last year's race could be used to internally motivate me to never experience that feeling again. I am determined to eliminate any fear, self-doubt, or panic that arises during my preparation for this year's race. There is just no room for it. It just makes me angry thinking about it.

Planned Time: 11:58:30
Actual Time: 12:16:24