As the school year came to a close, I stacked my upcoming vacation with trips and tried to figure out how to squeeze my training in with them. The day before vacation began, I had a major day o' activity to start things off right. Thursday the 24th of June was the day my best friend NM was moving to Philly for a year-long residency, so we had to do a run to commemorate it. We always run together on big days including graduation from PT school, my wedding day, etc so this was no exception. We snuck in a very early, hilly 5mi or so before the rest of the city woke up. It was bittersweet, I'm terribly sad to see her leave NY, but excited for the opportunities ahead. After work I was able to come right home and begin the packing process before driving up to Van Cortlandt park for another of the 5K series, no muffin this time because I really held back and took it easy, finishing 1 min slower than last time at 24:08 or so. I didn't care that I had a 9:00 mi 2 because I was saving a lil energy for soccer! Yup, post 5K I trotted back to my car and went directly to a 50 min soccer in the sweltering heat. We won! When I arrived back home, my hubby was home from work so I told him to get his stuff together, he was coming with me to NJ for the night because we were leaving for Calgary, AB Canada in the morning and had to bring the cats down to Mom's house. That worked out nicely! Boy did I sleep good that night...
View from our hike to Grassi Lakes, it was unreal!
Canada was a blast, we spent much of the long weekend in the Canadian Rockies at a beautiful, picturesque lodge tucked away by a great big lake. I was really hoping to get in more training, like a trail run and open water swim, but the trails were too far from the lodge and the lake had leeches in it!! Eww, no thanks. I did manage one run though... But it was an adventure! I asked a nice Aboriginal man where to run and he told me the road (boring) so I asked if their was a path around the lake and he assured me that there was. He mentioned that it was "a bit uneven" and I waved him off. Pshhh, I thought. He neglected to mention the loads of bear poop, the disappearing trail, and the ancient, decrepit bridge that I made it halfway across before noticing that the other half was broken and under water. Sadly, I ended up on the road after all. Boo. I didn't notice the altitude too much, I think we were only at about 3,500ft or so. The hike we did was at about 5,400ft, yay for gorgeous mountains and crisp, blue glacier lakes. I was so relaxed and happy.
When we returned to the States, I took off to NJ for a beach day with Mom on Tuesday and got in a solid 5x1mi intervals workout before the heat crept in. It was fine to get up early on vacation to run because I was all mixed up in terms of my time zones. If it weren't for the heat, I think I could have gone even faster on my run, but I had 5 solid miles anyway. After a hot day at the beach with Mom, I ventured back to the city to spend one night at home before jetting off again. It happened to be the most gorgeous of nights, the humidity was gone and the night air was cool and fresh, it was a preview of the rest of my week.
Friday we swam and then after breakfast (yum we had some amazing and fresh food) we ventured to Schroon Lake where I rode around the lake along the course of the Adirondack Marathon (wow, HILLS) for a 26.2 mi ride in 1:45 with a quick mile run after to make it a brick. Whew, the sandwiches we had after the ride/run were unreal too, and I don't think it was just because of my hungry bear state of mind.
We did one last swim on Sat morning with SF's bf paddling his kayak alongside us so we didn't have to bring along our little beachball-string-ankle strap contraptions along to make us visible for any boats on the lake. The beach balls were fun though, hehe especially on the first day when we had a tailwind on the way home and the ball kept smacking me in the head and arm because it was beating me. Anyhow, our last swim was great, I feel like I really got a good rhythm of breathing and sighting down, which is something I didn't feel like I had at the tri in Harriman. Sadly though I had to get in the car and head home to NYC and then on to Jersey for a wedding Sunday. Ahh, what a great way to spend the week though.. we ate delicious foods right from the garden and drank cold beer and even had to bundle up because it was so chilly at night. I wish I could bottle that feeling of relaxation, happiness and sleepiness from a good workout and really great company. I'm so lucky to have such great friends in my life.
I'm feeling pretty pumped for the upcoming NYC Tri... I did another 10 mi bike (much flatter!) and 3mi run Brick workout on Sunday morning just to get in some more time in the saddle and practice the bike to run transition. I realize that it is going to be difficult on race day, but I think I can still do really well. I guess we'll see... 13 days to go!
You are such a stud!! Looking forward to cheer leading along the NYC Tri course!
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