March Training Recap

Hi! Remember me? I use to blog here!

Woof! March has been a crazy month. You know what they say… in like a lion and out like a lamb! The first week of March was a solid training week. I went in the second week strong as well, but soon developed the sniffles. By the weekend I was starting to feel a cold coming on.

A second round of sickness was making its way around the office. I lucked out and missed the first one – the flu! But managed to catch the latest around of germs being passed around the water cooler. I was able to complete most of my workouts during week 2, but by Friday I was exhausted and dealing with a massive headache. I took that Friday as a rest day and had to teach spin the following morning at the Bay Club.

I woke up that Saturday feeling worst than ever, but still taught spin. I arrived a few minutes late to the class because I forgot my shoes at home and had to go back to my house after I realized the missing shoes. Urgh! The owner of the club was in my class observing making sure that I was actually capable of teaching spin classes. The class went well. I used one of my more tough interval workouts and everyone loved the class. Personally for me it was a rough class for two reasons: 1) I got stuck with the broken bike that wouldn’t adjust the resistance to an easier resistance, and 2) I felt like crap and almost passed out a few times. But, I survived! The owner had nothing but good things to say about my teaching style and one guy even told her I was varsity. Yay me!

The new car!

The new car!

That following Monday my car died on my way home from work. I stopped at a stop sign to make a righthand turn and she died. Luckily, a nice man pushed my car around the corner for me so I wasn’t blocking traffic and AAA came and towed my car to my mechanic after waiting for over an hour. So embarrassing! My mechanic looked at my car and determined it was most likely the fuel pump. At this point in my car’s life I decided that it was time for her retirement after all she is over 14 years old with over 165,000 miles. Last week I purchased a new car! Eeek. It’s bittersweet. I really love my new car, but now I have a monthly car payment. Urgh, now I’m really an adult. I guess you have to grow up sometime, right?

I finally got over my cold by the end of last week and got in a few spin sessions, but no rigorous workouts. I’m back on track now though since my first tri of the year is in 4 weeks! Yikes!

~ Happy Training!

Three Things Thursday (The Saturday Edition)

I’m doing Three Things Thursday on Saturday because, well, I was busy on Thursday and I like to beat to the march of my own drum. I’m currently in the middle of cooking dinner (aka experimenting in the kitchen) and I have some time to blog. This week was stressful. I mean crazy stressful. I was dealing with stress about my car, work, school, and personal stuff. I’m actually impressed that I held it together so well. However, there are a few things that I feel I need to address/vent about, hence, the three things.

1. Cars – I mentioned in a previous post that my car died. My father brunt out my clutch, plus it was way overdue for a timing belt. We brought it to our mechanic two weeks ago for his assessment on whether it was worth fixing or if I should be buying a new car. Neither a new car or extensive car repairs were in my current budget. Luckily, I had a huge tax return coming (which was suppose to buy my new tri bike) so that alleviated some stress, but I still had to rearrange my budget to fix my car and also buy my new bike (priorities, I know). My car was fixed and I just dished out almost $2000 to fix it today. Yikes! My mechanic said I should get at least another two years out of it. He better be right. I was driving my sister’s car earlier this week and had a flat tire on Monday. My father filled it with air that morning and assumed it was just a slow leak (he’s been filling it with air every couple of months so it was reasonable guess). On Tuesday my boss told me it was flat again. Awesome! I called AAA and they came and put the doughnut on it. Then I got to drive my father’s car for the rest of the week. And then three deer ran in front of me while leaving work on Thursday night. I saw them in time to stop, but they scared the bejesus out of me! The last thing I needed to do was hit a deer with my father’s car.

2. Overtraining – Last Sunday I worked out with my personal trainer for an hour, had an hour swim, and also did a 1.5 hour ride on the trainer. It was a rather normal Sunday training routine and I had three great workouts! I posted on my facebook page about it and a friend made a rather rude and baseless comment about it. I was very pissed off about the comment because it was completely baseless. Overtraining is a serious issue that needs to be addressed (I’m working on a blog post about it, which hopefully I’ll finish next week). Yes, I’ve had some tough and sometimes long workouts, but that is the life of an endurance athlete. I have two half Ironmans this year with the hopes of an Ironman next year. I’m not some fat ass who one day decided to put the bag of chips down and get my obese ass to the gym and overdo it in the first week causing injury. I have an aerobic base where I can do long workouts and be completely fine the next day where I repeat more workouts. I understand and place a priority on rest, recovery, and good nutrition. I also know what my body can and cannot handle. I understand the biochemistry and physiology behind the body while it exercises and recovers. AND I’m not stupid! My biggest pet peeve is when someone talks down to me like I’m an idiot. I’m no Albert Einstein, but I’m not stupid! What really pissed me off about the comment was that it insinuated that he knew better than me. In reality, he does not know what my body can handle and what my current training schedule has been. See number 3.

3. Friendships – I wanted to have a little chat with the person mentioned above about his comment because it really upset me and I was upset all week. He texted me today because he needed to get something from me and I told him I wanted to have a little chat about his comment because it really pissed me off. His reply was that he didn’t care and I should just get over it. That upset me even more! I might have even shed a few tears over it because it hurt me. I consider him to be a really good friend and I’ve always respected his opinion. We’ve always had a bit of a weird relationship, but he’s never been a complete asshole before. Deep down, I know he is a good person and someone I admire.

In college I was heavily involved in politics. During a particular election cycle I supported a different candidate from a different college that I strongly believed in and not the one that everyone in my college club supported. At the time I lived with my best friend and few other people. One night when I was downstairs making dinner her boyfriend decided to go into my room and onto my personal computer and post something rude on my facebook under my name. I was very pissed off about it and in retrospect probably didn’t handle the situation the best way I could have. However, both my best friend and her boyfriend completely lied to my face that they had no idea who would have done that to me. I have not talked to her since then and I will not until she wants to apologize for her poor behavior. I highly value friendships and I will bend over backwards to help a friend out if I need too. However, I do not tolerate jackasses in my life. Life is too short to waste time on people who don’t care about you and your well-being. I’m currently not on speaking terms with the person who made the rude comment about my training. He is certainly entitled to his own opinion, but he needs to realize that he made the comment in poor taste. It really hurt my feelings and I have since deleted the comment. And, now he doesn’t care that he hurt my feelings. I would really like an apology, but I’m not sure that it will ever come. I’m currently sitting at the crossroads wondering if I should just brush it off or stay true to my gut that is telling me to say “screw you, you suck.” All I really want to hear is “Hey, I’m sorry I communicated my comment in a poor taste. I am worried about your training and if you might be doing too much too soon. Let’s talk about it.” Is that too much to ask for?

Race Report: The Mid-Winter Classic 10 Miler

The title should really read the “Mid-Winter Class 10-Miler: The Almost DNF”

I’ve been putting off writing this post because I needed to get over my disappointment from the race. I had a goal for the race and I was positive that I could meet and exceed it. However, I failed. I failed hardcore. It came pretty close to a DNF. The DNF that no endurance athlete ever wants behind their name.
From a young age I was taught that failure was not an option. My parents, mainly my father, always made sure that we didn’t fail and if we did then there were consequences. So failure has never been an option for me and when it does occur then I beat myself up about it. I failed on Sunday and I succeeded to beat myself up about it for the rest of the day. I’m beginning to believe that my dislike of running stems from my belief that failure is not option. I hate failure; therefore, I hate running because I feel like I’m always failing. However, lately I have been running so much better and, dare I say, I actually might enjoy running?!
As I mentioned in my previous post, I was sick pretty much all last week with a sinus infection. My head was foggy and I felt like it wanted to explode. I worked a few half days and went home to sleep. I also got 4 days off completely from working out. I also lost my appetite, which usually occurs when I’m sick. Eating anything usually makes me nausea and I can only get a few bites in before I either want to puke it up or it just isn’t appetizing anymore. By Friday I was feeling better so I definitely planed on running the race. On Saturday I went to packet pick-up at Maine Running Company and also got a new pair of kicks at a sweet price! Thanks to a kick ass friend (who ran 23 miles last Thursday for his birthday and then a super fast 63 minute 10-miler)!
I woke up on Sunday and had my regular breakfast of oatmeal, peanut butter and banana. I went to go start my car (which is a standard) and my clutch wouldn’t go in. I tried twice and then started panicking! How the hell am I going to get to my race if my car wouldn’t start? I tried a third time and mu clutch went in and I was able to start my car. I got the the race start and go ready, did a warm-up, peed about 10 times, had some water and a gel. We lined up and the gun went off. The first mile was fast, mostly down hill. The next few miles had some hills but I felt good and settled into my goal pace.
The first 5 miles of my race went very well. I was running good and I felt good. I had a gel and a little water at the mile 5 water station and then continued past the Spurwink Church and started cruising up the hill towards Crescent Beach on Rt 77. Then it hit me. I felt lightheaded and dizzy. And then the tunnel vision started to occur and I knew it was an “oh crap” moment. I thought for sure I was going to eat pavement. I remember thinking that if I was going to pass out then I hope I don’t land on my teeth because I don’t want to get dentures. Weird thought, I know. And as a side note I have a tendency to pass out on occasion from no apparent reason so I’m well verse in knowing when my body is going to pass out and mile 5.5 was one of those. During my freshmen year of college I was sitting at my desk eating a bowl of cereal when the next thing I know my roommate is pulling me out of my trashcan and asking me if I’m okay. I just passed out for no reason. She was very worried about me so she bought me to the ER to get checked out. The doctors did a blood sugar test, a EKG, and a urine and blood test. Everything came back perfectly normal. The doctor told me “well, it’s not uncommon for young women like yourself just to randomly pass out.” In other words, they didn’t have a friggen clue why I passed out. Awesome.
Anyway, back to the race. So I felt like crap starting around mile 5.5. There was even the ambulance parked on the hill leading up to Crescent Beach. That was the moment when I considered DNFing. I walked for a little while to take my breathe and gather my thoughts again. I felt a little better so I started jogging again. Then I few minutes later I would feel like crap again and walk. This happened for the rest of the race. Between miles 7-9 I got going pretty good for awhile then the cold wind picked up and I started having trouble breathing. Fantastic! Let’s just have an asthma attack too! But, the end was near. I saw my running coach about 200 yards from the finish and I told her I was going to pass out because I knew I was going down if I stopped. She finished the last bit of the race with me and held me up at the finish. She bought me inside and gave me water and some food. I started feeling better afterwards, but my head was pretty cloudy and my nose was running. Great. I probably just made my cold worst. Once I felt better I got changed into warm, dry clothes and got in my car.
My car started but it was acting funny. The engine would rev up every once in awhile if you added more pressure to the gas. I decided to make a pit stop at Panera Bread to grab some food. I got my food and got back into my car to head home. It didn’t start. And it didn’t start during the other 10 times I tried. So I do what every girl does and calls her father. “Wah, my car won’t start! Help me!” My car was making funny noises while braking occasionally so my father drove my car around the block a few times Saturday night. While he was getting out on my car he must have pushed my car mat up underneath my clutch. It was the reason my clutch wouldn’t push in in the morning. I realized that before I left in the morning and fixed it. However, it’s the reason my car wouldn’t start! Grr… so my father came and saved the day (or so I thought). He got in started and I had him drive it home. I followed him and my car was a smokin’. Awesome, my father just killed my clutch. He called me and told me to pick him up at our mechanic.
Well, I guess I need a new clutch, new timing belt and possibly some front brake work. My car is 10 years old and has almost 140,000 miles on it. It’s been a great car and it’s the original clutch, which is pretty impressive! But, the question is, is my car worth fixing. Our mechanic, whom we have used for years, is going to take a look at it and let us know if I will be paying close to $2000 in repairs or buying a new car. And my visions of a new tri bike and powermeter are slowing disappearing…. Ugh, NOT my day!
I laid on the couch for awhile on Sunday and had a pity party. I was super disappointed with my performance in my race. I was running so well and then I got sick. I talking with a friend and he reminded me that I had a bad race. It happens. My important races are in the summer. He’s right. I had a bad day and I had a lot of things stacked against me.
So what happened? My day before race day and race day nutrition was fine. It was my nutrition earlier in the week when I was sick. I didn’t eat much at all so the energy storage just wasn’t there. I actually weighed myself the morning of the race and I weighed about 3 pounds lighter than when I last weighed myself on that Monday before. As much as I loved seeing the new weight I knew it wasn’t a good sign. Another reason was I didn’t sleep much either so my body was tired. And obviously I was still sick.
So lessons learned from Sunday:
1. Don’t run races sick (someday I will learn this! See previous post about my half marathon experience)
2. Don’t let your father drive your car because he’ll burn out your clutch!
In other news, I had a great run tonight in my new shoes! I’ve finally got my appetite back and have made some yummy meals that I’ll share soon!