A Week's Worth of Work

After a recovery last week I was rearing to get back to training this week and excited to find out what my coach had in store for me.  And with a 20+ hour week she did not disappoint me!

Bike:  This week came with a continued focus on the bike, which was to be expected.  I've really been enjoying spending more time cycling & I think I can tell that it's starting to pay off :)  I spent 14 hours in the saddle this week, totaling over 250 miles!  I did my first interval workouts of the year on Monday & Wednesday and really had to suck it up because both days were about 45 degrees and raining!  Ugh, I am so not a fan of cold or wet, let alone cold + wet.  However, I figured that it would be good practice for rainy races (and a good time to practice peeing on the bike).  It felt good to pick up the pace on these rides, though both days I was FROZEN by the end and ended up using up all the hot water in the shower trying to de-thaw.  If I'm going to continue to ride in weather like that (which I intend to), I need to get some better rain gear.  I'm open to suggestions, particularly about a good water-proof jacket b/c my windvest with the sleeves zipped on isn't quite cutting it! 

One thing I was really looking forward to on the bike this week was riding to Hanging Rock on Saturday w/ a group of roadies.  Unfortunately, the weather continued to not cooperate and they forecasted low 30's and snow!  So, the group decided to postpone the ride and Kurt & I skipped town and visited my parents in Wilmington.  We got really lucky b/c we completely avoided the storm and did our first century of the year!  We rode from Porter's Neck up to Topsail Island and back, taking turns doing 5 mile pulls.  We even got to see the ocean and snap a few pix.  I felt pretty good on this ride until about mile 70.  At that point fatigue started setting in a bit and the wind was freakin' relentless!  Kurt somehow was feeling great and I didn't want to slow him down so I just embraced the suck for a while.  Around mile 90 I popped out of it and started to feel better; maybe it was because I knew the end was near ;) It was an epic ride and it feels good to have a century under my belt this early in the season!

Run:  Like the bike, this was the first week that I started incorporating some specific interval work into my runs.  I did two hilly 10 milers during the week, each with about 5 miles of pace work ranging between 6:30-6:45.   I enjoyed these runs because I love the feeling of running fast; it's kind of liberating.  I got in about 30 miles on the run this week and I'm happy with that, especially b/c the quality was high.

Swim:  OK, so I haven't been swimming that much lately (twice this week) and at one point I started worrying that maybe I should be swimming more.  I asked my coach when I was going to start swimming 4 days/week.  Her response was, "When your biking gets really good."  Touche.  Gotta focus on the priority right now ... it's all about the bike right?   And despite not swimming that much I still seem to be getting faster, so I can't really complain :)  Oh, and speaking of swimming here's a funny story.  So Kurt was offered a temporary job as a counselor in Greensboro and started his first day on Thursday.  Thursday morning is one of our swim days and he decided that since it was his first day he would skip practice that morning so he could make sure he was organized and situated heading into his first day on the job.  I went to practice and then afterwards as I was pulling back into our apartment complex I saw Kurt all dressed up in his suit and tie (suit and tie) driving out.  We smiled and waved to each other.  Literally 5 seconds later he called me and said "I just hit a car."  Oh shit.  In the morning when you leave our complex and the sun is coming up it is really hard to see out the windshield because of the glare from the sun.  It's even more difficult to see if you have had to scrape frost off your windshield, which he had done.  There have been many times on my way to work where I have had to roll down my window and stick my head outside in order to see.  This scenario is even more potentially dangerous b/c there's a bus stop at the end of this road so a schoolboy (or girl) could easily get hit.  Anyhow, on Thursday morning there was a woman driving in front of Kurt and when she got to this section of road she couldn't see so she just came to a complete stop in the middle of the road!  Kurt couldn't see her and then ran into the back of her car.  To make matters worse, as they were waiting for the police to come, another guy turns out of the complex and runs into the back of Kurt!!!  A collision sandwich.  (Thankfully no one was hurt and the bike rack is ok.)  At this point, TriGuy drives by on his way back from his morning lifting session at the gym.  He rolled down his window and looked completely bewildered.  There was nothing he could do of course, besides offer his condolences.  After way too long, the cop finally gets there and exclaims that he has been to this spot before and seen many crashes like this before because of the sun.  So what does he, with his infinite wealth of experience, do?  He writes Kurt a ticket for being "unlawfully unwilling to come to a stop to avoid a collision."  Dude, are you serious!?  He also gave the same ticket to the guy who ran into Kurt.  Gee thanks officer.  Great job.  Note that the woman who decided to park in the middle of the road where there was no parking spot was not found to be at any type of fault whatsoever.  Both of the other cars were totaled and had to be towed.  Kurt's Jeep Liberty was the only car to drive away from the accident, though it does have some cosmetic damage that needs to be repaired :(  If I had to come up with a moral of this story it would have to be this:  don't skip swim practice.