Atl_runner's group - full for now. (Page 5)

Post your May totals.. lets see where we are starting from with this group. This is a a typical month for me, but one that you will be seeing more of as I train toward Ironman Wisconsin. Generally speaking, my bike is never that high, and my run is usually over 100. My swim hovers around 15,000 on average.. I like the way my schedule is trending and it's heading in the right direction.

I bet that is my highest running mileage month ever.  Probably the same for swimming.  And I bailed on two workouts this week--an hour swim on Monday and 75 minute run last night.  Monday was real world getting in the way of training and last night was the body demanding rest and me listening.  Hoping that pays off on Sunday at the race!

Group, I'd like your take on unscheduled rest days.  I bailed on last night's run because I was just beat.  Didn't think it would be a satisfying run.  Sure, I could have slogged through it but the two hour bike the night before was lacking focus and I felt physically and mentally drained.  Today is my scheduled rest day and I will probably stick with that seeing as I'm racing Sunday.  I've got some guilt as I'm in a build phase but still believe that listening to my body is the right thing to do.  That said, I still think about the interview stuff in "What It Takes" where the pros talk about how tired and run down they are in IM training and how that is part of endurance training.

I'm interested in feedback from all of you.  (And Ron in particular as he's a coach!)

I see I fell off the pace for running and swimming. Not surprising given two tapers this month. And I 86d the pre-marathon buildup so no double digit long runs. 

 For the totals in April and May, I think those are about all I could support in the balance of family, work, etc.  I think it works out to 10 hours per week on average. 

Next year I'm going to try a couple of HIM and an IM the year after.  For those, it will definitly be mucho hours on the weekends.

When I am tired, I typically will cut workouts short rather than skip them all together. 

Like yesterday I was supposed to run 2 miles.  I was too slow, hot, tired and hungery so I called it quits at 1.2 miles. 

Cutting a workout is a 50/50 thing. There's few coaches who would say anything other than 'listen to your body', and that cutting is fine. Problem is, and I know this is true of a lot of people, that a lot of times, my best workouts happen when I least want to do them. When I am physically tired, sore, and everything else that gets in the way. I have, and do skip workouts.

One thing they teach you at USAT coaching school is that coaching is both an art and a science, and is as much instinct as it is knowledge. I have an athlete that approached me about changing their schedule going into this weekend.. she has a race. I knew where I was going with the conversation, but I asked her over and over, why she wanted to modify.. until she finally said what I wanted to hear, and that's that she thought she could have a better race this weekend. Her instinct told her to forgo a difficult workout, and replace it with one that was still very good, but not as tough. With that, she now knows that her race is not riding on 100 percent of what I say to her, but she now has taken ownership by actually doing the modified workout and in her mind, having good reason to do so.

So, knowing the little I do about you to this point, here are my thoughts. 1st, I don't like that the workout you skipped is the one event you do the least of regularly. You might want to look into your thought process leading up to the 75 minute run. The dread of doing that may have contributed as much to your decision as did the fact that you are sore, tired, and (which brings me too the second point) you are racing this weekend. From that standpoint, I think that it could have been a good decision, but would have rather seen you do what Jonathan22 did, and get out there and at least do something, even if it's just 10 minutes. Third point, is that in the end, you will be fine. Skipping this workout is not going to make or break anything for you. It may help, but it won't hurt. You know you best, so I am sure you made the right decision.

So anyway.. that's where I stand on the subject 

I'd started this post including both my april and may numbers for comparison, but I accidently deleted the april table and now it has disappeared from my log as well...apparently never to return again!  Anyway, this has been a HUGE month for me!  Obviously the running sucked, but everything else is way up.  I made the switch from working out 3-4 times/week to now doing 5-6 times/week.  Also the bike commuting has been a big help.  I'm amazed that all my silly little rides (plus a few big ones) have actually added up to more than 100 miles for the month.  Wow!  I don't think i've ever come anywhere close to riding 100 miles in a month before!  The almost 10,000 M of swimming is pretty cool too.   Yea overall I'm really happy with this month...i've seen some major changes in myself...now to get back into the running thing....come on mr. foot doctor...where are my orthotics??? lol

In response to the skipping workouts question....first don't look at my log for this week! lol  I'm stressed out with school and gave myself permission to skip workouts for this week (last day of classes) and next week (finals week) when necessary since I have enough on my plate as it is.  A week from saturday is my graduation, so there probably won't be much goin on workout wise that weekend either.  Probably a lot more eating rich food and such.

But, for "normal" times....while I agree with the listen to your body thing, for me personally I have to be really careful in what I allow myself to skip.  I have a history of depression as well as other mental illnesses, which basically means that I can talk myself out of anything in order to sit on the couch and be lazy and depressed.  (Tri'ing is a big natural "medication" for my depression, by the way!).  So when I start feeling like skipping a workout, I have to really work to figure out if my body really isn't up for it or if it's the bad thoughts in my head trying to get me down.  Usually it's the latter, which is why i've never been successful with a workout program in the past.  I convince myself that i'm too tired or too sore or too whatever to go. 

Another BTer suggested to me that when I feel like this to go do the first 5-10 minutes of a workout, and if I still really want to quit then give it up and try it again another day.  So far i've completed every workout after I've started....if nothing else because i've gone through all the work of gettin dressed and ready and actually getting out there and I don't want it to go to waste, but also because once I get into the groove my body usually decides it feels ok afterall and I end up enjoying it, or at least being able to find some good in it.  Usually it's those times when I try to talk myself out of the workout that I actually need it most.  (i.e. feels like i'm under too much stress to workout, but i'm better able to cope with the stress and work through it if i've gotten a workout in)  I'm sure others are much better at the listen to their body thing than I am, but for right now my body is a freakin manipulator!  It lies to me all the time about what it can really do.  

Uggghhh - This is completely pathetic!!!  It's like being caught naked after a swim.

Well I did the race this morning....I was horribly, painfully slow and just couldn't find a groove to save my life.  Before my shins started buggin me I was actually starting to like running, but I really struggled to enjoy it at all today!  Anyway, the race report is up....it's pretty random and probably doesn't make much sense (a lot like my morning!) but it's there.  I guess the good news is I have lots of room for improvement...or something like that...I so badly want to conquer this running thing, but it seems like there's so many more frustrations than successes.   

Ok, whine over!  Come read my race report and make me feel better.  

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/discussion/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=78070

Race report from my Oly this morning.

Whew.. my race is done. Did a 5:43. It was a very difficult course. I definitely underestimated the difficulty of the bike. Good part, I was shooting for between 5:40 and 5:50, so I hit that. I knew it was going to be difficult, so I knew my time would fall from the race three weeks ago. It was also really hot out there and as I hit the second half of the bike, it got really windy as well. This course was all hills.. the bike, the run, and yes, even the swim seemed to be up hill.

I'll post a race report tomorrow, and my splits on this when the race posts them.

Total Time. 05:42:58

This weeks schedule:

• Mon - swim 2000 yards and bike 50 min
• Tue - run 3 miles
• Wed - swim 3200 yards and run 6 miles
• Thur - 1h bike and run 3 miles
• Fri - swim 1500 yards and run 3 miles
• Sat - ride 1:30
• Sun - ride 30 min and run 9 miles

Peter and atl- congrats on your races and meeting your goals!  You both amaze me with your speed!   

This weekend actually turned out to be pretty cool for me.  I managed to do all 3 of the distances for my first tri (well except for the run...that was 2 miles instead of 3, but close enough).  Granted it was on 3 seperate days, but still it's pretty cool.   I'm especially happy with the swim on friday.  I wasn't sure that I could go a half mile but I did it and in better time than I had expected. 

I've finally settled on a first event.  I'm doing the Danskin sprint tri on July 15...it's a .5 mile swim, 12 mile bike, and 3.1 mile run.  Judging from my times this weekend that'll take me about 1:45 plus transition times....which would've put me in around 65/99 in my age group based on last years times.  Of course who knows how it'll go when I do it all in one day, but at least I know I'm actually capable of all the distances and that I'm apparently faster than some people who have done it in the past, and that's reassuring.   (you think I'm thinking about this a bit too much? lol)

I have no plan for this week.  Except for school.  I have a final exam monday, a final exam wednesday, a paper due tuesday and a paper due thursday.  My softball league has rescheduled our triple-header from last week for tomorrow, so I'll have 3 hours of softball tomorrow.  Then on Tuesday i'm going to try to swim and then go to my killer abs class, since I've been liking that tuesday schedule.  If any workouts happen beyond that I'll be happy, but not planning anything specific.  On friday I have friends and family coming in to town for my graduation, so we have 2 big dinners (fri. and sat. night) and a sunday brunch planned so it's gonna be a lot of food and a lot of sitting still!  Real workouts will start with a vengence again next monday, as i'm sure I will gain at least a few pounds during this week and the weekend!  Oh well....you only graduate college once!  Gotta make the most of it!