The Only Thing We Have To Fear...

One quick post before I go to sleep on the night before the race. These are the top 25 things I FEAR tomorrow (hey, it's my short list); we'll see how many don't come true!

1. Oversleeping the alarm
2. Being too nervous to eat breakfast

ON THE SWIM
3. Having my goggles fly off when I jump into the river
4. Having my goggles kicked/punched off my face in the water by another athlete and/or being swum into/over by another athlete
5. Leaky goggles
6. Seeing dead fish/a dead body/anything unsavory in the water (c'mon, these are my FEARS)
7. Drinking any of the river
8. GI issues from said drinkage of the river
9. A long bike transition

ON THE BIKE
10. A flat tire (or two!)
11. Not making the bike cutoff times
12. Dehydration on the bike
13. Crashing on the bike
14. Drafting penalties on the bike (4 bike lengths back is a lot and hard for me to gauge)
15. Difficulty climbing hills
16. Somehow missing the Team Sisk cheering section in La Grange
17. A long run transition

ON THE RUN
18. GI issues
19. Leg cramps
20. GI issues
21. Somehow missing the Team Sisk cheering section along the run course
22. GI issues
23. Blisters
24. GI issues
25. Not crossing the finish line by midnight

Now that I've listed my fears, I hope they won't occupy my mind tonight. Time to get some sleep!




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Twitchy in Taper

 A couple months ago, I told Wes that triathletes seem to be a twitchy lot.  I'd been for a swim at the Y early that morning and in looking around at the swimmers in the pool, I felt like I could tell those who were triathletes and those who were just going for an early morning swim.  You see, the triathletes were, well, twitchy.  Wes asked me what I meant by that, and it was hard to articulate.  The ones I pegged as triathletes were the ones who were timing their laps and flying through their speedwork; they had bike water bottles on the pool deck as well as their workouts listed on paper and in ziploc bags so they wouldn't get wet; AND they looked like they couldn't wait to hop on their bikes.  There was just something about them, something twitchy that I have begun to recognize in myself.

Two weeks ago, I entered the 3-week taper phase of my training.  It's the last bit of training when you dial it all back to give your body a chance to rest and recover before race day.  I've posted on facebook a bit about my love/hate relationship with taper, and I know plenty of pure runners and triathletes who agree.  For reasons that are obvious, taper is a welcome relief from the long and often intense hours of training, and that certainly holds true with my Ironman training.  Taper means shorter workouts and a bit of a break on the zone 4 heart rate, high-intensity work.  In that regard, taper also means that I get a little bit of my non-training life back.  Even an hour or two gained back on the weekends translates into all kinds of possibility: long naps and much needed rest, a return to my love of baking, or even just watering the dehydrated flowers and tomato plants (the tomato plants, sadly, have not survived my full training plan, may they rest in peace). In short, taper means balance.

But taper also means faith in the training plan: faith that all of the hard work will pay off and that easing off the workouts will mean waking fully rested on race day.  Taper means rest, but when you've been going as hard and as long as you do in a full iron distance training plan, it's honestly hard to rest.  Oh sure, the first few shorter workouts in taper were great.  I felt really tired as my body began to relax into it, and I actually slept quite well.  But then I started to have (the usual) doubts about resting so much.  Somehow a 3 hour bike ride didn't seem like enough riding.  I mean, there's NO WAY that a 45-miler two weeks before the race could possibly be a good idea.   Today, a week before the race, my workout was a 1-hour run.  For months I've been doing 1-hour runs twice during the week.  THAT was my long run today?  In preparation for a MARATHON after a 2.4 mile swim and a 112 mile bike ride?  Good grief, who writes these plans?  My body has grown accustomed to the energy burn, and now it wants an outlet.  What it needs is rest, but what it wants is to go.

The love/hate relationship becomes apparent.  I relish the rest, and I fear (and thus hate) it at the same time.  What's more, I'm not sleeping well.  At all.  I need to sleep, but my body wants to go.  I've awakened multiple times in the middle of the night the past week only to find my mind racing with thoughts of, well, racing.  I go to sleep thinking of Louisville, and I wake to the same thoughts.  In case any of you are reading this blog for the first time, I feel compelled to reiterate that I am not going to win this race!  My ability to complete it isn't even guaranteed.  I will need every last minute of the day to get myself across that finish line.  Wes keeps telling me to relax and embrace the taper, but I honestly don't know how to do that.  I think I am relaxed, only to wake in the middle of the night.  What makes me feel better?  A workout.  My life has become insane.  I love it, but it is insane.

I'm not sure what kind of company Wes thinks I've been for the past couple weeks, but periodically I will say or do something twitchy-like (such as waking at 3:30am, going to the Y for a long swim, going non-stop until I meet him for lunch, and then talking a thousand miles a minute the entire time we're together), and he shakes his head and smiles.  This Ironman that I am married to knows all about twitchy taper and recognizes it in his wife.  I've given up on trying to convince him that it's not the taper effect.  It is, and I know it.  So now there is really nothing to do but wait.  I have one more week to go.  Actually, I have one more week not to go.  I plan to do my best to try to rest, relax, and soak up this last week of taper.

What I really want to do is race.  :)

The End Is In Sight

I have fallen shamefully behind on updating this blog.  Summer, training, vacation, and life in general happened, and here I am, two months since my last post and now just under two weeks until the race. 

The past couple months have held both ups and downs in my training.  At the beginning of the summer Wes and I went on some incredible bike rides.  We rode the Silver Comet Trail from Georgia to Alabama at the end of May, and I logged 96 miles the first day and then 106 miles the second day, setting new distance records for myself.  A week or two after Silver Comet, we rode the Tour de Cure century ride and enjoyed the fun of a pace line and faster speeds.  I was on a real high from these longer distance rides, boosting my confidence in my ability to go the distance.

In July we went on vacation to Maine and enjoyed some long bike rides around the beautiful countryside in southeastern Maine and long runs along the beaches.  We attempted to do some north Atlantic Ocean swims in our wetsuits, but that water was just too frigid cold.  We went number after about 10 minutes!  Vacation in general was great, and it was nice to see some new scenery while we were training.

Incredibly, aside from a few minor aches and pains here and there, I've remained injury free.  I'm knocking on wood as I type that.  With 13 days until the race, I'm not quite out of the woods.  I've been swimming often, with plenty of open water swim practice.  I've swum the full 2.4 miles once in the pool and once in Jordan Lake, and I'm planning on one more go at it this week.  I feel pretty good about my swim, and even though I won't be fast, I also won't be last coming out of the water.

I know I can bike the distance; I came close three times this summer with three century rides.  They were early on in the summer, though, and I do worry about being able to get through 112 miles quickly enough.  In case I haven't mentioned in a previous blog, I'm not particularly fast at any of the three disciplines.  It really will take me until close to midnight to finish this race.  Before this season, I tend to ride distance around 15mph.  I've had a tough time maintaining even that pace this season, for some reason, so I am reasonably concerned.  But I will do what I can do and hope for the best.  I'd really hoped to get faster as the training season went on, but it just hasn't come to pass.

I've had a long love affair with running, but at the beginning of this training season I was ready for a divorce from it.  I don't know what happened, but every run early on this year was an exercise in patience and torture.  I just didn't want to do it.  As the summer wore on, though, I kept at it and gradually began to enjoy it again.  I went for my two-hour taper long run yesterday and really loved every minute of it.  I kept up a pace that was faster than what I meant to run, but I honestly couldn't slow myself down.  Yeah, it was one of those good runs.  But I've run a couple of marathons, and I know what I'm in for with the marathon I'll run to complete the Ironman.  Actually, I should be so lucky as to only experience what I've experienced on previous marathons.  It's going to hurt.  A lot, I understand.  I'm at once excited and terrified of what I'm going to experience.

I want so much to finish this race by midnight.  It's become a very important goal to me, and I dream about it, about crossing that finish line in the dark of the night with hundreds of people cheering me across the line.  I've also imagined what it would be like not to finish in time, to have come so close to the goal but then to fall short.  I decided a few weeks ago that thinking about what if I don't make it does me no good.  My energy is better spent imagining success.  I keep thinking that if I can visualize it, maybe I can make it happen.  And I keep visualizing my success.  It looks so good!

As the race date draws near, I find myself contemplating this journey and the people and experiences that have brought me to where I am right now.  I look forward to posting a few more times before August 28 and capturing these thoughts.

Open Water

I do not like swimming in open water. For those of you who are purists and will argue the semantics of what I refer to as ‘open water,’ let me clarify right now that I mean anything that isn’t a pool. Period. This includes lakes, rivers, reservoirs, oceans, any body of water where 1) you can’t see what’s below you, 2) there are microscopic organisms swimming around (other than those found in the pee from the kids at the Y’s pool), 3) there are huge organisms that want to eat me swimming around, and 4) any combination of numbers 1-3.

I’ve had friends and family remind me that I grew up swimming in lakes. This is true. I learned to water ski in Oklahoma lakes and upon occasion found myself taking a nose dive into said lakes after falling off/out of the skis. I always worried about a giant catfish opening its huge mouth just as I crashed below the surface of the lake, ready to swallow me in one fast gulp, but somehow I avoided this fate. I have incredible luck.

There is something particularly *special* though about freestyle swimming in Anything Besides A Pool (hereafter to be referred to as ABAP), when your face spends more time fully in the water than it does out of it. I do not like it. I do not like it one bit. I DO it, but it often involves panic, fast breathing, and may sometimes involve tears. In the interest of saving time during this type of a swim race, you exhale, cough, sneeze, pray for ABAP monsters to leave you the hell alone, all while your face is in the water. And because I can’t see what lies (or swims or wants to attack) beneath me, I tend to keep my eyes closed when my face is in the water. It’s true. Like a little kid, I squeeze my eyes shut until it’s time to breathe or sight. I once tried keeping my eyes open in my goggles when my face was in the water in a local lake, and the greenish-brownish-murkiesh-scary water was too much to take. I couldn’t see two inches down, and it scared the bejeezus out of me. You’d think this would make me swim faster, but mostly it just makes me want to cry. If I need to take a break while swimming, I also won’t let my legs and feet dangle vertically below me, for obvious reasons (things down there want to make a meal out of me…why make it easier?!).

I’m pretty sure I was smoking crack the day I registered for Ironman Louisville (with its 2.4 mile swim IN THE OHIO RIVER). Last year when I was a spectator for Wes at this event, nobody was eaten by the river monster that I am convinced lives in this river. Everyone emerged from that river, so I apparently ASSUMED it would be okay and that you just jump in and go. I had a nightmare about this a few months ago. In the nightmare, I was swimming in a river of what looked (but trust me, did not smell nor taste) like molasses and, defying science and logic, I was able to see a dead body underneath this water of molasses-like substance. It was horrifying and exactly what I expect on the day of the race.

To help me get over my fear of swimming in ABAP (get OVER it already!), I have begun to participate in more open water swims this summer, thinking that this will somehow help ease my panic when I actually swim in ABAP. Wrong. Okay, in fairness I’ve only done 3 or 4 open water swims so far this season. But every time, I mostly still want to cry and my breathing gets shallow and fast, at least in the beginning of the swim. I recently came to realize that for the first few strokes in ABAP, I in fact hold my breath while my face is in the water. This is a problem, since we naturally must exhale before we can inhale! It doesn’t take long before I remember to breathe-2-3-4, breathe-2-3-4, but it’s right about that same time that I also remember that the lake monster wants to eat me. It’s tough being me.

To facilitate the open water swimming (and since you shouldn’t do open water swims alone, because then no one would be able to document when the lake monster has made a meal of you), Wes and I have begun to swim with a remarkable group of triathletes who do an open water swim in Jordan Lake here in NC every Wednesday evening. The group is called RunSwimRun (RSR). We run about 3 miles from DG’s house (I’m using initials here to protect the innocent), swim around 1400 yards in Jordan Lake, then potentially run back to DG’s house for food, drinks, and good company (some folks drive down to the lake and just do the swim). I say we potentially run back, because last week I was so tired from the 3 mile run to the water and the emotionally exhausting 1400 yard swim (it’s hard to be on your game when you are mindful of lake monsters, TRUST ME) that I caught a ride back with DG and his wife to their house. Plus, we were the last ones out of the water, and the rest of the crew would’ve eaten all the food by the time I got back if I ran it.

As of this week, my training swims in the pool have bumped up to 3500 yards, so 1400 yards should be a piece of cake, even if they are in open water. Uh, no. They are the opposite of cake. They are more like fried liver or something yucky. But I will say, open water swimming seems to be getting a little bit easier for me. I didn’t cry last week, not even on the inside. Alright, full disclosure here. I haven’t cried yet this year in open water, but the panic feeling and fast, shallow breathing were not an exaggeration. The RSR group is very supportive, and I’ve met a few fellow open water scaredy-cats who know my anguish and believe in my lake monster theory. But rather than let the monster eat us, we just squeeze our eyes shut tightly, exhale when our faces are in the water, inhale when our faces are out of the water (very important to get this step right), and swim like we believe we are Dara Torres. ABAP monsters be damned.


Jordan Lake 1-Mile Open Water Challenge, June 12, 2011 (BEFORE)


Jordan Lake 1-Mile Open Water Challenge, June 12, 2011 (AFTER with my friend, Robin...so happy to be alive!)

The One That Started It All

Last weekend my dear friend and coworker, Candy, and I completed Ramblin' Rose Raleigh. RRR is the shortest of short triathlons I've ever done: 225 yard pool swim, 9 mile bike, and 2 mile run. It's a very novice-friendly race, as is one of its sister races, Ramblin' Rose Chapel Hill (RRCH is only slightly longer with a 250 yd pool swim). It's also a women-only race, and there is so much love and encouragement for and from fellow moms, daughters, sisters, and girlfriends. The Ramblin' Rose series races are great first triathlons to do.

RRCH was the first triathlon I ever attempted (and completed). It was in October, 2008. Wes had been dabbling in triathlons for a couple years by that point, and he'd convinced me to give it a try. It seemed like a lot to coordinate in one race (and it is...three sports and transitions... What?!), and after I completed RRCH I felt like a complete bad ass. I'm serious. I was slow; I worried endlessly about completing the swim (remember, it was 250 yards in the pool...my warm-ups for my current 3000 yard swim workouts are longer than that) and wasn't so sure I could run 2 miles after biking 9. For my friends who participate in long distance triathlons, that probably sounds laughable. But for first timers (and remember, we were all first timers at some point), even RR was daunting and a little intimidating. So after I crossed that finished line, with Wes cheering his head off for me, I indeed felt like a bad ass rock star.

A month or so later, Wes completed the inaugural Beach2Battleship iron distance race (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, and 26.2 mile run). It was his first (but not last) iron distance event. I went with him and our good friend, Peng, and cheered my head off for them. And I swore (and I honestly meant it) that they would NEVER, EVER catch me doing a full ironman. Ever. Period. I had no interest (read that as nil, zilcho, not gonna happen) in ever pushing myself to those limits.

After that first RRCH in 2008, I decided to tri again. Over the course of the next year, I completed several more triathlons, going up to the Olympic distance Bandits Challenge. (*Funny note: I completed Bandits Challenge dead last that year and heard my name being announced as the last finisher, as the guy on the mike stopped the awards ceremony to declare my finish to cheers of dozens of gathered triathletes. I couldn't have been happier.)

By the end of 2009 I started to think about *maybe* registering for a half iron distance event, which would certainly be as long as I would ever go. No, seriously, not a step longer than a half. I registered for and completed Beach2Battleship half in November of last year. Before that event, however, I traveled with Wes to Louisville in August (last summer) for Ironman Louisville and fell in love. The energy and vibe of that race was like nothing I'd ever experienced. The elite, professional athletes were amazing to watch, but so were the regular athletes. The ordinary people. MY people. To watch those regular folks cross the finish line gave me hope. It inspired me and let me believe that if THEY could do it, then maybe I could do it. It would be hard, and the training would be grueling and time consuming. Some days, it would suck. I'd watched Wes go through training for two iron distance events, and it looked really, really hard. But yet, in spite of all the warning sirens going off in my head, there was something that pulled me in (incredibly...hadn't I SWORN I would never do an iron distance event?!). It was months before I figured out what that something was. At some point on that day in Louisville, I saw myself in those regular folks who were racing. I saw the anguish and pain of the day, and then I saw the delight, relief and near surprise on their faces as they crossed the finish line. They had a notion that they might be able to do the race when they registered. There was never any guarantee, just a possibility. And then they did it. Months after I registered I realized that on that day, the something that pushed me to register myself for this year's race was a belief in myself. If they could do it, maybe I could, too.

A couple months after I participate in Ironman Louisville this year, I will again participate in RRCH, the one that started it all for me. I will join hundreds of other women, the majority of them first-time triathletes, in the pool, on the bike, and on the run. By their mere presence at the race and desire to participate, they show that they at least believe they can. Really, what more can you ask for?

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Rejection and Bouncing Back

Ever since my training started 14 weeks ago, I've toyed with the idea of hiring a triathlon coach to help me reach my Ironman goal.  As I've documented throughout my posts, I am s-l-o-w.  Generally, this doesn't bother me much at all.  I enjoy my activities and tell myself I get more bang for my buck in the paid events.  Honestly, often my goal in triathlons is just to meet the cutoff times.  For anyone in the Triangle area of NC who has done Bandits Challenge (Olympic distance, badass, hilly tri), you'll appreciate the fact that my only goal was to finish within the 4:15 time cutoff.  I finished in something like 4:19 or 4:20 but had a strong (for me) race, and the Setup Events guys did not pull me from the course because, as they told me, I was "running strong and looked good out there".  I was elated.  I was also the last person to finish the race.  Those are the stars I reach for.

I run *about* a 5-hour marathon (I've run Marine Corps Marathon in 5:11 and then 5:03 the following year...still hoping to break that 5-hour mark) and try to enjoy every moment I'm on the course.  I typically average 15mph on the bike (though I've been struggling for some reason to hit that so far this season), and I swam 1.2 miles in the Beach2Battleship half iron distance event last November in 43:15 (with a current).  As far as endurance events and long distance triathlons go, I'm slow.

Slow might be a problem in Louisville.  I feel pretty sure that I can meet the cutoff times, but there are those lingering, nagging doubts about ability and my triathlon prowess.  I can't type 'triathlon prowess' in the context of myself without a little chuckle.  Bottom line is that I have some concern.  In my training plan, speed work is incorporated but I wonder whether it will be enough.

So since the beginning of my training I've contemplated hiring a coach.  I recently mentioned this to the unbelievably fantastic massage therapist (Julie Barton at Advanced PT in Cary) I see about once a month to work out the kinks.  I began seeing her a little more than a year ago in conjunction with an equally awesome physical therapist at Advanced PT for a longstanding, chronic problem along my right shoulder blade, and I continue to see her because she is OUTSTANDING.  Julie gave me the name of one of her clients who is also a triathlon coach.  I took this recommendation and ran with it, deciding to stop thinking about hiring a coach and actually HIRE a coach.

I emailed the coach and explained my situation to her.  I went into detail about my aspiration to become an Ironman in Louisville this August and how I was worried about my pace being a limiting factor.  I also explained that I was most concerned at this point with my swim time, as my husband (pseudo-coach) was working with me on my biking, and I felt like I could handle the run on my own.  I sent my email to her on a Sunday and awaited eagerly for her response on Monday.  Monday turned into Tuesday, then Tuesday into Wednesday.  Did she not receive my message?  Did it get lost in cyberspace?  I was hoping to meet up with her by the end of the week, ready to stroke! stroke! stroke! in the pool towards a time that would make Ian Thorpe and Michael Phelps proud.

When her email arrived, I was delighted and excited, ready to become a new kind of athlete in the pool.  And maybe she could help me with my cycling and running.  I'd come this far in deciding to hire a coach, I might as well go all the way.  To hell with a 16-hour something Ironman time.  Maybe I could finish somewhere in the 15th hour!  Oh, the POSSIBILITIES!

I read beyond the first line of her message, in which she apologized for the delay in her response.  She went on to explain that she took three days to respond because she was mulling over whether she had time to add another athlete to her schedule.  Whaaaat?  Whether she had time?  Uhhh, this wasn't in my plan.  She HAD to have time for me.  She was recommended to me.  I was to be her star athlete, who would go from slow to fast.  I could elaborate here on my confusion and disappointment, but the point is this: I was confused and disappointed.  She rejected me.  She wished me well and told me to keep her in mind for "the next time".  THE NEXT TIME?!  THIS WOULD BE THE ONLY TIME, LADY!  I was rejected and dejected.  I have no plans to ever attempt an Ironman again.  And the one coach I'd approached had rejected me flat out.

I spent that entire day feeling crappy about the irony.  Maybe she'd rejected me because I am so slow (*perhaps* I am a little bothered by my slowness).  Maybe I went into too much detail and gave her too many reasons to kick me to the curb before we'd even gotten started.  Maybe I seemed too needy.  Maybe...I needed to get a grip.  At least that's what my wonderful and ever-so-supportive husband told me, but in different words.  I think what he actually said was something more like, "Honey, triathlon season is in full swing.  Maybe she just doesn't have time."  Huh.  Well, maybe.  I suppose that's a possibility, too.  But that doesn't really allow me time to feel dejected and sorry for myself.  In fact, that seems like a very matter-of-fact, business-like way to look at things.  Hmmmmm.

After a couple days, the sting was mostly gone.  I swung from a feeling of rejection to an attitude of defiance.  Fine...she doesn't want to help me?!  Then I'm going to do this myself.  I will become an Ironman ON MY OWN.  And a couple days after THAT gem crossed my mind, I came to the reality of my situation: in no way am I doing this on my own.  I may not be paying a coach to tell me exactly what workouts to do at what pace on which days, but I am following a very detailed training plan written by an Ironman (Don Fink).  I swim in a pool at the Y with Ironmen (and they have the M-dot tatoos to prove it) with whom I chat and talk about training.  And most importantly, I bike, run, eat, sleep, talk, and generally spend nearly all my free time with an Ironman who is the love of my life.  Wes is a never-ending source of support and encouragement.  When I am feeling low and incapable, he reminds me of my ability and desire to do this thing.  He is my original source of inspiration to attempt to complete Ironman Louisville, and he is my biggest fan.

With or without the expertise of a hired coach, I will jump in the Ohio River on August 28 knowing that I am as well prepared as I could possibly be.  And I know that when I exit the water (before the cutoff time...here's hoping!), my biggest fan and the best coach I could have asked for will be right there, waiting to cheer me on through the rest of the biggest triathlon day of my life.

Catching Up

It's been a few weeks since I've posted.  As I've mentioned before, life happens and other things take priority.  That said, I've been reminded by my most loyal fan (Wes) that my loyal fans are patiently waiting on a blog update.  Personally, I think that group consists of one (Wes), but nonetheless I'm back at it.  This post serves as an update on the past few weeks' activities.

The weekend after Mariana broke her hand, Wes and I found ourselves riding alone.  There is a world of jokes to be had there, but we prefer to believe that all our usual riding partners were just busy.  It was, afterall, Easter weekend.  So we changed things up a bit, hopped on our cross bikes, and hit the south side of the American Tobacco Trail.  The south side of the ATT is not really road bike friendly.  It's 11 or 12 miles of mostly gravel path.  There is a section of about 3 miles that is part paved, part crushed gravel, but to get to it you must ride on gravel.  The south section of the ATT is why we bought our cross bikes.  As it turns out, Wes commutes to work every day on his, and during the winter months when training began I rode mine on the trainer in the garage.  Now that the weather is nice, it's nice to get my cross bike rolling on the trail.

From our house, we ride 6 or 7 miles to get to the northern-most trail head on the south side of the ATT.  With 11 or 12 miles of trail to ride headed south, it's about 18 miles one-way from our house, making for a nice (read that as challenging) 36-mile ride roundtrip.  The trail is *generally* pretty flat (with some low-grade inclines) but on crushed gravel it's constant work.  There is little coasting on this type of terrain.  It's constant work and a really nice calorie burn.  It was a nice change of pace this day.

At the turn-around point, we paused for a quick snack of a power bar, and Wes took a picture of me in my FS Series bike jersey (I still need to send the pics to the FS Series guys).









As we were getting ready to head back, Wes decided to take off his leg warmers as the temperature had started to rise a bit.  He LOVES being the center of the paparazzi's attention. :)




The rest of the ride this particular day was fairly uneventful.  I felt pretty tired and depleted, which on the one hand was somewhat disappointing since it was a shorter ride but on the other hand was understandable since riding this trail on the cross bikes is more constant work.  As we rode through the 3 miles that are part paved, part gravel, I stayed on the paved part while Wes worked it on the gravel.  We FINALLY had found level ground.  My heart rate was staying around 150, and so was Wes's.  He commented about how I was working him, and then we realized he was working as hard as I had been working all day.  WELCOME TO MY WORLD, IRONMAN. Needless to say, I took some pleasure in the leveling of the playing field for those three miles.  For those who can't imagine it on their own, Wes kicks my butt on the bike, and then some.  I enjoy any time we are riding side by side when he feels like he is working as hard as I am.  It's a rare occasion, to be sure.

I ended my ride after the 36 miles roundtrip.  Wes went on that day to ride enough to total 73 for the day.  Yep, he's an ironman alright.

The next day was Easter Sunday.  Sundays are run days, and after our run Wes suggested we ride our bikes to Duke Gardens.  The Gardens are in full bloom this time of year, so we hopped on our bikes (I on my road bike and Wes on his cross bike) and rode through the streets of Durham to Duke Gardens.  It was a gorgeous, warm, and sunny Easter Sunday, and it was the perfect time to view the Gardens.  On the way, we stopped for lunch on Erwin street and then had a frozen yogurt at Local Yogurt.  The fountain outside Local Yogurt is inviting, and I nearly took a dip.




After we found bike racks on Duke's campus, we spent some time walking through the beautiful gardens, admiring the in-full-bloom flowers.  For those who have never walked through Duke Gardens in Durham, NC, it is so worth it if you are ever in the area.  There are so many beautiful things to see.  It's acres upon acres of color, shade, and bloom.  It is well worth the time.








Some of my favorite features are the shade plants.  I have a yearly, ongoing battle with deer that live in our neighborhood.  They've taken it upon themselves to relieve me of my 10 hostas in my front garden, eating them down to stalks every year.  It's been a springtime source of frustration for the past 8 years!  Wes gets a chuckle out of it every year, and every year it aggravates the you-know-what out of me.  I've tried everything I can think of, including chemical deer repellants,  praying to the garden gods, and this year planting marigolds all around the hostas.  I'd heard that deer don't like marigolds and will avoid the hostas if the flowers are near.  Well...not so, at least not in my garden.  Grrrr.  I'm open to any tried-and-true suggestions.

In any case, I was envious of the huge, still-intact hostas at Duke Gardens and long for the day when I can have my own that aren't eaten down to stalks!  I didn't get any photos of the largest ones, but this pretty little plant in the shade also caught my eye.




There are also plenty of water features and soothing sounds to be found and heard. 




On the way home, we rode a few miles on the north (fully paved) portion of the ATT, and Wes found a shopping cart someone had left on the side of the trail.  There is a grocery store in the shopping center that splits the north and south sides of the trail (along with interstate-40...there are plans to build a bridge to go over I-40 to connect the north and south sides, but we still patiently wait for that).  He is a good deed doer, so he literally rode with the cart back to the grocery store and deposited it safely where it belonged.  I ran interference from the back.





Last weekend, Wes and I decided to try something different for our long bike ride.  We rode with a local cycling club, the Tarwheels, and followed a nearly 50-mile path in and around Durham, Chapel Hill, and Pittsboro.  We crossed the Haw River a few times, and I took a moment to capture the view.  The ride was beautiful and pushed the pace for me just enough that I felt like I worked hard the entire ride.  It was a hilly 50 miles, and my legs felt it for the next few days.




Finally, this weekend our long ride started with a tour of local greenways sponsored by Eastcoast Greenway Alliance.  The morning consisted of a large group ride through 28 miles of local greenways in and around Durham.  We took off from the Durham Bulls Athletic Park, with a kick-off wish from Congressman David Price.  There were many, many more cyclists that participated than I'd expected.  It was great to see so much local support!  The photo below shows just a fraction of the folks who attended.



I had to pay photographic homage to the Bull at the ballpark across the lawn.




After the 28 miles were complete, Wes and I rode across the street to Mellow Mushroom for our typical Saturday ride lunch.  We then proceeded to add more miles by riding to Maple View Farm Country Store, where they have the most fabulous ice cream in the area.  MVF is obviously rural farm country.  It's a working dairy farm that has a very popular ice cream store.  We've ridden past it before but (shockingly and sadly) never stopped there to have a treat until yesterday.  I decided then and there that the only time we could ever eat their ice cream is when we've ridden our bikes to the store.  No driving for us!  It's way too delicious to not feel obligated to burn those calories!  We had a nice stop that included large waffle cones and the purchase of pecans and farm honey.  Wes packed those goodies into his pannier on his bike, and we were again on our way.  By the time we reached the house, we'd logged just under 73 miles for the day.  Though the ride was broken by lunch and ice cream stops, I'm still considering it "a ride".  That said, it was my longest ride EVER.  Nearly 73 miles!  So exciting.  The trouble is, I have to keep one-upping myself, so who knows what next weekend might hold?!

As I've been writing today's blog, I realize that I tend to focus on the bike rides.  I really do swim and run, as well.  In fact, a few weeks ago I upped my swims to three times a week (instead of the two my training calls for).  I'm now swimming 2500 yards each time I swim, and those workouts take pretty much exactly an hour.  Thankfully, I can swim 2500 straight yards in the pool a bit faster than an hour, but I still want my swim time to get better.  *IF* I can swim a straight line in the Ohio River in Louisville (which is extremely doubtful in open water), I'll be swimming 4,220 yards (2.4 miles).  At my current pace, I can expect to swim the Ironman distance in well under 2 hours, but that's not accounting for current, nerves/anxiety, and a whole lot of other flailing bodies vying for space and speed.  I finally sought out the assistance of a coach to help increase my swim speed, but I was denied (more on this in a future post).  So I keep working on it on my own in the Y's pool.  It's early mornings (I wake up just before 5am on swim days to swim before work) and a lot of effort, but I'm hopeful it will eventually pay off.

I've begun to fall out of love with running during this training, but I think it's because it's become an after thought.  I'm very focused on my swim and bike times, and I'm putting forth a lot of effort to get faster in those sports.  There is much more for me to gain by swimming and biking faster in this race.  As for the run, I just need to get to it (i.e., not get DQ'd for not meeting times on the swim and bike) and then get through it.  The thought of running (okay, let's be honest here, run/walking) a marathon AFTER I've swum 2.4 miles in the disgusting Ohio River and then biked 112 hilly miles in and around the countryside of Louisville is something I just can't imagine.  Having run 2 marathons, I can't fathom dealing with that kind of pain after what will be my longest bike ride.  I need to figure out how to reconcile that, because that's the plan.

Tomorrow marks the beginning of Week 15 of 30 for this training plan.  I am nearly halfway through this adventure, which is simultaneously frightening and exciting.  Will I be ready for Ironman Lousiville on August 28?  Time will tell.  I know I plan to give it everything I have.