Cats and Dogs or Cows and Sheep

Raining cats and dogs! not ideal when you know at some point you need to pull off a 100min run sometime today.  I mean do you go now or wait until it's raining cows and sheep, cos that is how the day is looking on the weather forecast, and Im not sure I have enough patience to do 100min on the treadmill.

A good day yesterday with a swim in the morning then a 50 WT in the evening (note I have swapped Tuesday and Thursday WT sessions).  A good way to get out of the cooking, cleaning and ironing - anyway isn't that why you get married :) Love You !!

Below is this weeks training plan, from next week it is looking to step up again with more amd more focus on hill rides as we begin the preparation for K2 in October.

Must be in Heaven

Nothing like the satisfaction of having a good 90min swim, then sitting on the couch with a coffee and breakfast in front of the TV watching the Olympic's ... Heaven :)

The number for today must be 8, as we did many sets of 800m i.e. 8 x 100, 800, 2 x 400.  Perhaps I should get a lotto ticket ?? One of the sets required the slower lanes to wear fins (that's me), now I know what it must feel like for these Olymipc swimmers when they go fast, unfortunately even with fins I can't get anywhere close to their times. Such disappointment when you take them off and you feel like you are not moving at all, dam reality !!  

Buggar the wind and the rain

Group ride day (Sunday), me and one other braved the wind and rain to complete a 2 hour ride this morning.  Great work considering last time it was just the two of us, we bailed out of the ride and went for a coffee instead and were sprung by coach.

Not so reassuring when 'camp mother' of the Sunday bike ride yells out from across the carpark, 'Gee you guys are brave!!', she was referring to the gusting wind.  She and a few others were heading off for the final of the Run Auckland Series.  The advice was to stay away from hills and make sure you maintain the pedalling motion as helps to balance when you do get hit with a gust.

Decided not to wear the new shoes as opted for socks this morning, also wore my newly purchased leg warmers, they were fantastic and did keep the legs warm, however a major design flaw as although you should be able to move then down when you get warm, they should at least beable to keep them pulled up!. Next time I will have to wear them under my normal bike pants, but then seems to defeat the purpose of being able to remove them quickly ???  

Apart from the cold and wet we both managed to stay on our bikes, and Im glad we made the effort as it has been sometime since I actually got out on the road.

PS saw the misses out for a joy ride when she should have been on the bikes with us :)

Coach is Back, and dont we know it!

Saturday brick time again, today was a special day as coach had her first day back after the birth of her beautiful sporting star!.  Not a good start for me, not able to find room to setup my bike in the wind trainer hall, so when I did the mad dach to the pool, across the skate park from the hall, I was a few minutes late.  Hard to sneak in when everyone is watching, Buggar!.

A good swim session today with a set of 400s and some IMs (one length of each stroke for the uninitiated, butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke and freestyle), certainly a killer if you have not swum them for a while.  Unfortunately I had a wee sickee in the pool, but managed to hold it in my mouth until I reached the bathrooms, good one!.

The ride was hard with some long sets in high gears.  Coach took the session so no opportunity to ease off, although I expect she ran out of words whilst trying to distract us from the sore legs as she revealed this blog to the class.  Nice one, so welcome new readers, although this blog had started as a private affair only distributed to a few, but never mind and it is great to get a ripping when I am feeling down or need a kick in the ass.

The run off the bike was mean't to be a 30-40 min run, clearly I am way slower than everyone else as I took a good 50mins although I suspect I saw more of Le Roys Bush track than others since I seemed to get lost in the various paths available.  However eventually made it back to the car absolutely buggared.  Lucky for me when I got home I was allowed a 2 min shower to get rid of most off the stink before heading our to watch Miss Amelia play netball.

Welcome back coach, just in time to keep me honest :)

Friday Off, not likely!

Being Friday it was mean't to be my day off from training, however as I already had days off during the week I felt the need to get out for a run, so managed to knock off a good 60min steady run with hills.  I ran past the same group of ladies 3 times as I completed a figure 8 around the local streets, down thru the forest and back up colonal road from the sugar factory.  Each time I past them I put ona brave face to indicate I was out for a relaxing run, Im sure the heavey breathing indicated otherwise :)

I am nowhere as fit as I think I should be, certainly I don't feel as fit as I was when I was training for the Lake Hood Half Ironman.  I think the problem is a happy life makes it harder to get out for long periods.  But anyhow my vow for next week is to complete all prescribed sessions, starting from this weekend where I can good hard sessions planned as coach returns from parental leave.  Goodness!

PS: The ping pong balls were used appropriately.  We have a swim drill called fists, and as it sounds you hold your hand in a fist and use the placement of your forearm to catch the water, however some tend to cheat a little (not me ofcourse :) )so those lucky few were given ping pong balls to hold.  Works a treat as you need to form a proper fist to hold them tight.  Nice move coach!

The Swim Tool Kit

Todays swim session was back to technique using all the tools in the kit (fins, paddles, pull bouy, bands, kick boards and ping pong balls).  Apparently a easier session after Tuesdays 800m time trials, buggar I missed it. :)

So I bet your wondering about the ping pong balls ah?, well add your smarty comments and see who can guess, I will let you know in the next update. :)

Late nights no good for an early start!

Ended up working late last night, so although good intentions of going for swim this morning I slept through the first two alarms and only awoke after the cat decided he needed food at 6:08.  After another 10min snooze I managed to drag my butt from bed and jump on the bike (wind trainer).  No matter how good the music it is soooo boring.