Eat, Sleep, Swim, Bike, Run, Work, Repeat.

It's that time of year again! Okay it never really stops being that time of year, but triathlon training has begun in earnest. I know it's that time because I haven't yet added extra sleep to my regimen and I'm feeling it. I am sleepy by Wednesday and by Thursday night I'm curling up with the cats by 9pm, ready for bed. In fact, I'm heading home to take a glorious nap right now before an evening run.
I'm psyched for the season ahead, I have my sights set on NYC Triathlon in August and Princeton 70.3 in September with some shorter races (5K's, sprint tris) sprinkled in for fun along the way. You know I need to whet my competitive appetite frequently in the summer. My work hosts a large fundraising event with a 5K annually and this year it's June 7th,this Saturday. My heart skips a few beats just thinking about it, I have a reputation to uphold with several wins (for staff members) in previous years. I'm excited for the day in general though. If you're looking for a 5K IN Central Park this weekend, you can still register at http://YAI.org/cpc and know that your entrance fee goes to support some of the greatest programs available in NY and NJ for people with disabilities. Heck, you can even join the Roosevelt team when you sign up!
Back to training and racing, I'm pretty stoked to be working with Baker (you might know him as @Lord_Baker on Twitter), the Ironman master, this summer to help me reach my training and racing goals this year. I am excited to be working with him and training with Joe (@CardiacCrusher) this summer, especially knowing we're all doing the same races. I think it's going to be a stellar year.

Tri training is in full force

I have been keeping myself occupied away from the phone and computer lately with plenty of training, but with the heat wave in full force outside I thought I'd catch up on my blog. I finally got back on the bike at the end of June after a long hiatus and I'm actually happy to be back on it. The bike is not my favorite part of the triathlon, I'd be happy doing swim/run races forever, but the bike is there so I'd better get going on it. I am TRYING to get into a routine where I bike to work or just get out and ride at least once a week, so we'll see how that goes.

I got an early start on the weekend last week and hit the road with my bike strapped to the trunk of my car on Thursday night as I headed for the Jersey beaches. I always panic a bit for the first few minutes while driving with the bike on my car rack, but since the George Washington Bridge was the first part of my drive I was extra nervous. I made it down to Mom's without any problems after an hour or so of "omg my bike looks like it is coming loose!" which were all unfounded. I tried to make it an early night, but I didn't even arrive at Mom's until around 10 or 10:30 which sucked because I had to get up at 5 to swim.

Thursday afternoon I spent some time searching online for a swim club or tri team to join for their morning ocean swim and I stumbled upon the Jersey Shore Tri club. Someone from the group kindly emailed me back and let me know they'd be swimming in Bay Head at 6am. Perfect! I joined the group bright and early with a stunning view of the sun rising out of the sea a fiery magenta. It was gorgeous, I miss swimming in the ocean and any other open water during the week so it was great to hit the open sea. As frequently happens, I was the only swimmer out of the 8 or 9 of us there who was swimming in traditional swimsuit, everyone else was pulling on those horrid, sweaty wetsuits. People always have excuses too about why they need them, "I'm getting old" (bullshit) or "I need the buoyancy" (also bullshit, we're in the ocean) but no one in this group was like that, so I respected them for that. I still wish people would practice in traditional suits so they they could improve as a real swimmer and if they still felt the need to cheat in a race, then so be it. I digress.

The swim itself wasn't as beautiful as the sunrise had promised thanks to swarms of slimy, gooey salp which surrounded me, tried to get in my mouth and probably are growing families deep in my ear canals. Salp is a tiny planktonic tunicate, in other words it is a gooey sac-like filter feeder that eats phytoplankton. They look like this and travel in packs of like a billion:

Imagine fishing thousands of these out of your suit and hair.

The salp are supposed to hang out near Antarctica, but they appear to be lost and are hanging off of the east coast in the very warm water. People often mistake them for "jellyfish eggs" or "fish eggs". If you've ever seen caviar you'd know that they are not fish eggs, but from experience I can tell you that they taste about the same. Eww.

The group and I swam about 1.5 miles or so, swimming north a few jetties and then back to our starting point where we decided to keep going because the water was a nice ~73 or so and everyone felt fine. I liked this group. I don't regret doing the extra half a mile or so, but man was that the worst part of the entire morning. The clumps of salp were so thick that I had to put my head down and swim as hard and far as I could before taking a breath. I did not want to swallow any of those buggers. Yuck. Imagine yourself swimming in a pool full of chopped up gummy bears with little stringy bits between them. I made a vow right then and there to never complain about the weeds in the St Lawrence River again.

After the swim I changed into my bike gear (I always feel like a goober, how come some people look so COOL on a bike?) and headed out for a 30 mile ride. I picked 30 because it was my target distance a week or so before, but I only had time for 25. I'm not following any particular training plan right now, so I just hopped on and headed south. The shoulders along Rt 35 in Bay Head, Mantoloking and beyond could use a little smoothing, my hands and butt could attest to that for a few days post-ride. I enjoyed my ride for the most part though, and was happy for the nice weather and fairly light traffic since it was still really early in the day. I rode south through Lavallette and Seaside Park and Heights until I finally hit Island Beach State Park at the southern tip of the island. It is a great place to ride and I saw several other cyclists out, but I wasn't going the full 10 miles in and back out today. I hit the 15 mile mark, had a snack and turned around, I was really happy to finally have the wind at my back. I was able to kick it up and head back to the car much faster than the way down because the wind was pretty strong. Boy, I hope I don't have a headwind for my half ironman, that'd be a bitch. I managed to make it most of the way back before hitting a nasty pothole with 4 miles to go. Ouch, the thump reverberated in my hands for the final few miles. *mental note: get new cycling gloves* I finished 30 miles in 2:01:13 and I'm happy with that. I have no real concept of a great cycling time, but I felt good and I felt like I put in a good effort. I think at this point in my training I just need to rack up some time in the saddle. I should probably bring my bike Upstate with me this weekend to get in a few hills.

It was shortly after I posted my swim and ride on Facebook that I realized "Wow, I'm tri training!" I have three triathlons on the horizon, two of which are coming up pretty quickly! TheNJ State (sprint) Tri is on the 23rd, the day after what would have been my Nan's 88th birthday and I'm doing it with a friend that I've known since childhood. I'm really looking forward to racing again! The NYC triathlon (Olympic) is on August 7th, less than a month away! I also have the Pocono Mountain 70.3 in October, but lets not talk about that just yet. Yikes.

Tomorrow I plan on biking to work for the first time and I'm excited about it, but a little nervous about the logistics and forgetting something important like underwear. I'll be sure to post about my adventures soon.

The Mother's Day double

After an exhausting day at Bear Mountain on Saturday, I was zonked when I woke up on Sunday too. (I Realize this doesn't bode well for my plans to possibly run the half marathon next year). I lounged around trying to get my mojo back and trying to get myself together to go for a swim. I had lots of little projects around the apartment, one of which required a trip to the hardware store. The minute I stepped outside, I knew that I HAD to get out for a run. I missed my usual Saturday morning run because of Bear Mountain, and I would have missed my Sunday swim if I'd gone to NJ... There seemed to be only one thing to do: run and swim.
After some deliberation over how to organize my day, I finally decided to run to the pool (at first I dismissed this as crazy) and then swim. The plan was to take a very tiny bag with me so I could put on clean clothes after my swim and shower. It worked out perfectly once I worked out the details.
I was hoping for a somewhat speedy run down the west side Greenway because it is downhill from home and then flat as can be. I took off at a warmup pace around 8:00 and proceeded to pick up the pace to sub 7:30's for the remaining miles. I had to work at it a bit along the busier parts of the Greenway on the UWS, but it almost felt effortless. I racked up 7.5 miles in 56:00 or so and was really happy with the effort. I then rinsed off and hopped into the pool for a mile at a moderate pace. I decided this was good training for my swim to swim at mile while "tired". I didn't feel tired though, I felt great. I swam a total of 2000 yds before grabbing a giant coconut water and heading home. I felt awesome and was floating on endorphins until I got home and crashed. I was happy to have worked that hard and pushed myself instead of lounging on the couch all day. Ahh, tri season is approaching quickly.
It's Tuesday now and I still have some lingering soreness in my adductors and quads, but most of the soreness worked itself out in the pool Monday afternoon.
I'm putting in the miles and getting tips here and there regarding the Great Bay swim coming up in 5 weeks. My training has been steady and I'm feeling good about a possible finish in under 2 hours. I'll have a better idea after some open water practice at the end of the month.

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New year, new training log

This is one of my best, most useful Christmas gifts and I'm so excited to start using it today!!! In the past it has been difficult to keep track of my running AND my swimming/biking all in one place because I couldn't get in the habit of posting to Daily Mile and my paper journal only had room for my runs so I'd have to squeeze in other workouts in the margins. It wasn't pretty. I'm really excited for this journal because it is perfect for 2011: Year of the Triathlon. Check out the fun features!

Each week is two full spreads with a tally at the end for EACH discipline. Yay!

There are training grids for every month to keep track of things like hours training, distances, heart rate, whatever you like to keep track of to help your training.

A race results page that can actually fit ALL of the info from race day!

Handy tips for a bike newb like myself.

"Why Not" Friday

One of my favorite summer things to do is to pack up on a Thursday night and get the hell out of the hot, sweaty city for a long weekend. I don't work on Friday's, not really by choice, we don't have enough kids that need PT for me to work full-time, but I digress. The opportunity to slip onto the GWB on a traffic-free Thursday night after a soccer game was irresistible yesterday and I made it to Jersey in record time. After stuffing my face with Mom's blueberry sour cream coffee cake and laying out my gear, I hit the sack.

4:55am came quick and I dragged myself up to get ready for a sunrise swim in Bay Head with a local triathlon group, the Sandy Hookers. (love it.) I've joined a few of their swims this summer and last, and always enjoy the company. Last time I swam, the week before the NYC Tri, the water was a bathtub 75 and I had a great swim. It being August and all, I expected the water today to be closer to 78 and unbearably warm...boy was I in for a surprise. The last few times I joined them, there have been at least 1 or 2 other folks without wetsuits, but not today. 25 of us geared up to dive in, but I was the lone nearly-naked swimmer. I got a lot of "umm you're not wearing a wetsuit?!" to which I replied, "nah, I don't need one." One guy tested the water while we were getting ready and came back to the benches suggesting that it may be too cold for him to go in. In my head I'm thinking, "wimp, geezer, etc." I walked to the shoreline with all of the black fish (that is what they look like in wetsuits) and felt the icy water splash up my calves. OH WOW.

The water was NOT 78, but way, way colder. I figured it was around 69 or so because I couldn't fathom August being any colder... more on that later. I dove in and swam out to meet the other brave souls who were ahead and we treaded water while waiting for the folks on shore to hike up their skirts and get in so we could get moving. After substantial whining, everyone was in and we were off. It felt amazing! I was definitely chilly, but fine. I'm not modest so I'll tell you I was in the lead 2 the whole swim with a nice guy who was chewing tobacco before and after the swim. Gross, but unimportant. We waited at each jetty for everyone to catch up (bad plan) and I got very concerned looks each time, "how ya doing? cold?" Duh. :) When we reached the final jetty someone guessed at the temp of the water and one of the group organizers corrected them and said, "well yesterday the temp was 62, I'd say this is 62 also." I wish he'd not mentioned that because the rest of the way back I was wondering at what temp I'd get hypothermia. Oh well. The swim back was easier than out because the current was coming from the south and we also didn't stop to regroup. That was a blessing because I had no feeling in my hands or from the knees down, but it also meant I spent some quality time alone. I had one moment of "oh god, where is everyone else?" but I could see that I was barely 400ft from shore and neednt worry. I was so cold that I contemplated getting out with 1/4 of a mi or so to go, but decided that jogging along the beach would have sucked with numb feet, so I stayed in and finished it up. I think we swam about 2 miles, around 50 mins for me.

As I stumbled along with my frozen feet up the beach, the guy who didn't do the swim because it was too cold offered me sips of his hot coffee. I'd never met him before today, but I gladly accepted. I was shivering insanely and my lips were blue, but I was kind of proud to have survived the cold and had a great swim too. It took nearly 1/2 an hour to stop shivering and that 30 mins included a big towel, a fleece, the car heater and a hot latte. Once I warmed up, I began sweating because the outside temp was nearing 90 at 7am.

And then the "why not" portion of the day....

After my trip to the coffee shop (where I changed my outfit), I returned to the car and gathered my crap for a bike ride. I haven't been on the bike since the tri 3 weeks ago and have been dying to get on. I also have a tri next weekend, so I needed to get my ass back in the saddle. I puttered around and made sure I had everything before heading out with the intent of riding 15-20 miles. The tri is a sprint next week and the bike is a hilly 15mi, so I just wanted to get in some miles and 15-20 seemed reasonable and not too taxing. I did just swim 2 miles in the ocean, I deserved to slack on the bike, right? Wrong. A mile into the ride, I caught up with 2 men and a woman on bikes moving a little faster than me, but a reasonable pace for me to catch. They were friendly and welcomed me to join them so I figured "why not?" I feel much safer riding with others anyway, especially on busy roads. They asked if I was going to Island Beach State Park and I casually answered that I was headed that way. What I should have said was that I was going in that direction, because IBSP was 12 miles away from where we met. Surely I was going to turn around before that. I was having some ITB pain in my left knee, which happens often on the bike sometimes. As we approached the park, I realized that I was at 13 miles and oops, hadn't turned around yet. We were riding into the wind most of the way (remember, the current coming from the south in the water, the wind was too.) so I told myself that it wouldn't be a big deal to ride the length of the park with them and then turn around and have the wind at our backs for the ride home. They asked if I was going to go with them further and I couldn't think of any reason not to, so I did.

They were CRUISING once we hit the park- 22mph! Way fast for me, but they told me to draft and we had a nice ride out..into the wind. When we turned around, we discovered that the wind was changing and now was coming from the NW. DAMN! The ride back was hot, hot, hot and I gulped my water and chomped my GU chomps and we refilled water and I drank some more. Just thinking about the ride back is making me exhausted right now, it was long but I really enjoyed it. They were excellent company and I showed them a few back roads to get off of Rt 35 for a bit. I was sad to leave them, they were staying a mile or so past my car, but I was happy to get off of the bike and so was my knee. Ouch. I'll be icing that for a few days.

Despite my post-swim/ride savage hunger, I was so happy. I rode 43 miles! And why? Well, all I canthink of is "why not"?

I have an ocean swim race tomorrow morning- 1 mile in the chilly water! Last year I missed placing in my age group by 30 secs or so after no open water training, so I'm hoping to redeem myself this year.

The Stuff Dreams are Made of

Twice in the last two days people have asked me about my training, my boss and my good friend's fiancee. They are both athletic in some sense of the word, my boss cycles and Jon runs and plays soccer, so they are far from the "how long is your next marathon?" types. I got into a conversation about the various things that I'm currently in training for... Brooklyn Half Marathon, the Green Mountain 200 mi Relay, the Olympic distance NYC Triathlon in July (probably prefaced by a sprint tri in June for practice) and I started getting really excited just talking about it.

See, this is the kind of life I always dreamed about. I dreamt that being a "grown-up" would be really, really fantastic and I'd get to do what I wanted and go explore the world, make really cool, interesting friends and be incredibly happy. I am doing all of those things. I have been feeling extremely fit for the last few years, and lately I feel so incredible. I am having a hard time holding myself back from overtraining because I constantly feel like "getting out there and kicking some ass". I've been housing my swim sessions (4000 yds? sure, lets do it.) and feeling really strong in the water and feeling awesome on all of my runs- even when tired or without rest days.

I'm so lucky to have a career that allows me flexibility in my schedule and a lighter load in the summer. I actually work 3 jobs during the week, I'm a Pediatric Physical Therapist 4 days a week at a preschool for children with multiple disabilities, it doesn't get more rewarding and challenging that that, does it? I also provide Early Intervention PT services to children 0-3 yrs old in their homes one day a week after work and on Fridays, which is challenging and wonderfully rewarding. The remaining 3 afternoons I spend at a private school in the city where I run an after-school running team for kids 6-12 yrs old as part of the New York Road Runners Youth Programs. It is an exhausting, non-stop week of all physical activity (sitting at a desk? What's that?) but I have running and swimming to thank for keeping me in shape so I can do my job and do it well. If it weren't for my wonderful husband of 5 months, I wouldn't be able to maintain my crazy lifestyle and work such bizarre hours. He brings home the (veggie)bacon in ways that the PT world doesn't offer and supports me unconditionally in all of my endeavors. In two words: I'm lucky.

I have what I've always dreamed of having and I refuse to let anyone try to make me feel guilty for enjoying it 1000% of the time. I've worked hard to get to this level of stability and fitness and I'm going to keep working my ass off, literally and figuratively, until I can't do it any longer. I have such a supportive, loving bunch of people in my life thanks to twitter and dailymile, people who encourage and inspire me daily to become a better athlete and person. It's amazing what happens when that many like-minded people get together (virtually and in real life) and support each other. It sure is nice to hear, "hey Amy, awesome 10 miler!" instead of "10 miles?! oh thats just CRAZY!" for once.

I actually had a serious conversation with a friend at work this week about doing the Ironman Timberman 70.3 next year... I believe he said, "we can totally do that." I agreed and I meant it. I can't wait for what lies ahead....