Vineman Week Six

5/23-5/29

Finally had a successful week of training that I feel good about! I bumped up my swim yardage and am feeling so much stronger in the pool, I went for a great, fast 10k run (unofficial PR, actually!), did an awesome brick (the bike being my fastest avg. mph yet!), and hit another distance PR on my long ride. Still need to get more running mileage in, but for now I'm pretty happy with how things are going. I had to work over the holiday weekend, but I took advantage of the free evenings to workout and even go out a couple times : ) By the end of the week I was definitely exhausted from it all!

Monday

swim: 1,500 yds, 40 min.

• warm-up: 400 (200 w/ pb)
• 3x100 (on the 2:20)
• 100 easy w/ pull buoy
• 3x100 (on the 2:20)
• 100 easy w/ pull buoy
• cool down: 300 (100 w/ pb)

Tried a another new workout put together by Pat (my boss), that included some longer intervals. I actually really liked doing sets of 100 more than 50s. I still had to swim harder than usual, but I wasn't going all out either. I finished most of the intervals between 1:55 and 2 minutes, then had 20-25 seconds of rest. This workout was also a step up for me in yardage (I previously hadn't swam more than 1,200), but I felt strong throughout. Hopefully this is a sign that I'm getting better!

Tuesday
rest.

Wednesday

run: 6.25 mi, 8:31 avg pace.

I had a split shift at work, so I took advantage of my 2 free hours in the middle of the afternoon to go for a run! I wanted to go a bit longer than I have been lately, and figured I'd aim for 6 so I still had some time to get ready for work again. I didn't have an exact route in mind, but I knew that I didn't want to run toward McKinley and East Sac since I run there all the time. So instead I started from my store in midtown and headed to the Capitol.

The Sacramento Capitol is surrounded by a huge park that ended up being a little over a mile around, so I just ran some laps. It had been raining earlier that morning but ended up stopping just in time for my run, the sky quickly trading it's dark clouds for blue skies. I had some new jams on my iPod and was cruising, just trying to listen to my body and not focus on my Garmin. To my surprise, I was running sub-9s without pushing very hard! I maintained a steady effort and after maybe 4 laps I headed back to the store. While I haven't raced very many 10ks, I was delighted to see that I actually ran an unofficial PR : ) I really needed a run like this to get me jazzed about running again, so it was a very good use of my break time : )

Thursday
[brick]

bike: 21.3 mi, avg 18 mph.

Pretty uneventful ride, but I did hit some of my highest speeds and finished with my fastest average for a ride so far!

run: 3 mi, 8:43 avg pace.
I didn't want to start out as fast as last week (8 min/mi), so I just let my body run what was comfortable. Faster runs on brick workouts seem to be the trend, however, probably because my legs get warmed up on the bike. I took my pup along on the run and the poor thing was having a hard time keeping up! I probably need to start running her more to get her back in shape. I'm really enjoying these brick workouts and feel so strong afterward. I'm hoping to up the distance on both the ride and the run a bit in the coming weeks, too. Hopefully they pay off come race day!

Friday

swim: 1,700 yds, 45 min.

• warm-up: 300 (100 w/ kickboard)
• 4x50 (on the 1:05)
• 200 easy w/ pull buoy
• 4x50 (on the 1:05)
• 200 easy w/ pull buoy
• 2x100 (on the 2:20)
• 200 easy w/ pull buoy
• cool-down: 200

After feeling so good after Monday's longer swim, I decided to push the distance to see how much I could handle. Lately I haven't felt very tired at the end of my swim workouts, like I could keep going, so I think it's time that I do! I combined a few elements from a couple different workouts to get one longer one. I actually really enjoyed the mix of things on this one, and the interval sets made it go by a lot faster. I was tired after and my shoulders and arms were even a little sore, but it was a good feeling!

Saturday
swim: 1,500 yds, 40 min.

• warm-up: 300
• 4x50 (on the 1:05)
• 200 easy w/ pull buoy
• 4x50 (on the 1:05)
• 200 easy w/ pull buoy
• cool-down: 300

To be honest, I can't remember exactly which workout I did this day! I think this one is right, but I at least know it was 1,500 yards again. I'm finding that if I don't write down my swim workouts after I do them I can't keep them straight. Sometimes I even find myself forgetting what days I swam (and I've called my gym to double-check, ha!). I got off work a little early and took advantage of the late afternoon and near-empty pool. The weather, on the other hand, didn't want to cooperate so instead of a sunny swim, I had to deal with rain and wind. It was actually warmer in the water, so once I was in it was great, and actually kind of fun! After all, it doesn't really matter if it's raining if you're in the water already, right? With the early start I finished earlier than originally planned and so was able to join a bunch of my coworkers for a fun night out on the town!

(source)

Sunday
bike: 45.26 mi, avg 17.3 mph.
For some reason I was kind of dreading this ride, so despite having the whole day off I didn't get started til late afternoon. I wasn't really feeling it on the first half. My legs felt tired and heavy, it was windy, and I was tired. Luckily things improved as I rode on, and the second half was much better than the first. There were tons of people and families out on the bike trail enjoying the holiday weekend and beautiful weather, but some of them are completely oblivious to trail etiquette. More than once I had to shout at people that were taking up both lanes or swerving back and forth. I even saw a kid almost get plowed over by a cyclist because he was stopped in the middle of the road. It was a little frustrating at times, but it comes with sharing the bike path with everyone. My speed was a bit slower than previous long rides, but I'm now over 2.5 hours so it's to be expected. 

On another note, my pinky was unfortunately much worse after the ride. After taking a few days off from riding after Monday, it was actually doing a lot better, so I had high hopes. But now it's actually the worse yet, and the next finger over is starting to lose motor control. It's definitely discouraging, since I can't exactly stop riding, but I do have a plan of action in terms of improving my bike set-up, including new handlebars (mine are waaaay to wide for me), adding clip on aero bars, and getting refit. Crossing my fingers that this does the trick and things don't get much worse in the meantime.

I also realized afterwords that I am not taking anywhere near enough fuel when I'm riding! It's hard for me to equate my effort on rides to that when I'm running, and because it doesn't feel as hard (at least not in the same way) I don't feel like I need as much fuel. And in terms of electrolytes, the wind tends to dry up a lot of sweat so it's not always clear how much fluids I need. On this ride in particular I only consumed one Gu and a few Chomps, and no electrolytes. While I didn't bonk, I felt really drained the rest of the evening and the following day. I'm definitely going to start increasing my calories on future long rides and bring along salt caps, too. Just another one of those learn as you go things! I wrapped up my ride much later than planned so it was a mad dash to get ready before heading to a staff BBQ to celebrate Memorial Day.

Totals:
swim -  4,700 yards
bike -  66.56 miles
run -  9.25 miles