Deuces Wild Half Ironman

One week ago today I completed my first half Ironman in Show Low, AZ.  Tough course, at 6000 ft elevation.  Record high temps in mid-90s. 

I felt rested and ready heading into the race.  Had a great swim - 37.5 minutes, compared to my goal of 40-45 minutes.  20th out of the water.  Feeling good!  Got onto the bike and had a pretty good ride, although my last 10 miles my HR was down and my legs were burning.  My avg speed was 20.6.  Then coming out of transition, my quads were hurting and I was feeling dizzy and nauseous. I ran 12:12 pace miles, after spending a LOT of time at aid stations and walking.  UGH!

Very frustrating.  My coach believes I dehydrated, so I'm working on improving my hydration and my eating in races.  This is why you do so many races - good training for what you need to work on!

Next time!

In the meantime, Tyson has a knock out race... finished 30 minutes better than he expected and had a great, breakout run.  Very exciting :)

Racing Season...

It's been a while and a lot has been going on since my last post.  I have been training a LOT... specifically running and riding - I rode a couple of 80+ mile rides, six or seven run 5 10-14 mile runs. 

I did my first triathlon of the season - Tempe International - a few weeks ago.  And, I had a poor showing.  I didn't taper at all, and it was hot, and I had a swimming problem.  The swim was SO bad that a kayaker came up to me to ask me if I needed a break.  REALLY??!!  After 34:58 struggling minutes in the water, I finally made it out.  I sped through transition, got on the bike and felt great - did my bike split in 1:10:28 - one of the fastest .  Then, I finished it up with a 48:16 10K, total time 2:36:17.  4th in my age group and 29th female.  UGH!  Very frustrating!

This very poor swimming showing motivated me to sign up for Masters Swimming... two weeks of masters swimming and i was feeling pretty good...

Raced Tribal Sprint Triathlon this last Saturday morning.  This race in 2009 was my first triathlon.  And this particular race is geared towards swimmers - the sprint swim is 1000m, where most sprint races are 400-600m or 750m.  I just went out to give it my best shot and ended up 6th overall female and won my age group!  With a total time of 1:27:56!  I was 24th of 75 out of the water (WOW!  Huge improvement for me!), 4th on the bike and 6th on the run.  FABULOUS!  Very exciting for me, and I beat my 2009 time by... drum roll are you ready for this... 13 minutes!!!!!  (Last year I finished in 1:41:00).  Wow.  What a great feeling!  And, last year I was 73rd of 90 out of the water - wow.

Prepping for this weekend's half Ironman at Deuces Wild in Show Low, AZ.  I'm looking forward to it. I'll report back :)

Boca Raton here I come!

Headed to Boca Raton for 4 days of training... swimming in the 73 degree ocean, running aling the coast. Can't wait.

Did a nice 2500m endurance swim last night, ending with 6x100 pull.  Follow that with boot camp at 5am this morning and I can almost not move my arms today!  Niiiiice. And even nicer, I took the kids with me to the pool and they had a blast.  I just found a solution to swimming during family time... bring them!  They loved it.

AND, I just picked up a new long sleeve wetsuit. I'm in!!

Racing and Training

This weekend I decided to go out to the Colossal Cave Stage Race south of Tucson.

- Sat 9am 6 mile time trial
- Sat 6pm 20 minute Criterium on a go kart track(!)
- Sun 7am 45 mile road race

Wow!  What fun!  Perfect temperatures. I'm feeling fairly rested (ran or swam every day this week while traveling in Chicago, but no real hard efforts).

There were 3 gals in the race - me, Alex from Bike Haus, and Leann from Yuma. Alex is on her way to being Cat 1 (this was her first Cat 3 race), and Leann and I are fairly similar.

I killed the TT on Sat and started in first place. Then, I came in second in the crit after leading many of the laps. 

Sunday was a tougher day... the 3 of us rode together for the 5 laps of the 9 mile course.  But the other 2 gals kept dropping me on the last hill right at the line. I would catch them on the downhill, but the finish was right at the top of that hill, so I knew that wasn't going to work for a finish. So on the last lap, I picked up the group pace hoping to wear the other gals down, and my efforts didn't work. I came in third.

My efforts put me in 2nd overall.  Bummer.  My redeeming grace is that I won $120 for my efforts... 

Great race and great racing mates.

Swimming

So.... I have had 2 not so fun open water experiences in the past couple of weeks, so I'm emersing myself in the swim. I had a technique session with Nick yesterday and basically I'm starting from scratch!

Just left the pool - it was a tough 4x500 workout because I'm focusing on my arms and my body rotation. Wow!  I'm going to struggle for a while until I get more experience.

I'm excited for the challenge... !! 

Bike workouts CAN be fun?!

Back from a glorious trip to Tahoe with a great group... now back to the real world. To work by 730am, put in a solid day of catch up, and left around 530 to meet Tyson for a bike workout. My first ever official bike workout.

15 min warm-up. 13 minutes at 160 HR and 2 minutes rest x4.  My base training HR zone is 143-153, so 160 isn't too far out of my regular range.  But, I've had a tough time getting my HR up lately.  Not sure what that means.

I'm meeting with Nick in the next couple of days. Worried a bit about the amount of training I'm supposed to be doing, and about fitting it all in. And worried about my HR being too low.

Endurance swim workout in the morning...

Tahoe

I'm taking this week off to snowboard... I thought there would be a pool here, but nope.  Just me and the mountain!  Last day of boarding tomorrow, then back to town and back to training... :)