I feel as though somehow in the middle of the night, someone picked up Calgary and put it back down at the exact latitude and longitude of Vancouver. The weather has been uncharacteristic here this June as it has been mostly grey, rainy and cool. More like Vancouver! It really feels as though the ELF’s post On Success has been the theme for this week!
Yesterday the rain and wind continued, but there was speed work on the schedule. Time to suck it up and get out there in the rain! I threw on capris, a long sleeve tech shirt, a rain jacket and a hat and met up with Kelly over the lunch hour. For interval work I’m a big fan of setting up a workout in my Garmin so that it will beep at me at the appropriate times as opposed to me watching the time. Finally the Garmin caught satellites and it was time to go. The rain was nice and soft as we got started on our ten minute warm up. I then had 8 intervals of 2:00 hard, 2:00 recovery. The first interval felt pretty good and then I slowed it down for the recovery. All of a sudden the recovery was over. Was that really two minutes? I wasn’t paying attention. I ran through the second 2:00, then looked down when it was over. Oops! I had accidently set the recovery time for 1:00, not for 2:00. Oh well, less recovery, who cares?
The intervals in the rain felt good, but as we finished up our last interval the rain was starting to get heavier and heavier. Good timing to be done!
On Thursday night I had a practice swim at Lake Midnapore for my Chinook Olympic Triathlon on Saturday. As I’ve mentioned, it has been grey and rainy all week. I was a little scared of how the water would feel. I struggled into my wetsuit, but luckily Brian from Tri-It showed up for his practice swim and he was offering to help people with getting wetsuits on and adjusted. It is amazing the little tweaks you can make to the comfort of a wetsuit by pulling it up properly around your arms, shoulders and neck. Luckily the good folks at Tri-It will be on hand race morning to help us out with wetsuit adjustments!
Ok, now the wetsuit was on it was time to suck it up and get into the lake. It was supposed to be 18C…maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t? Wow, I don’t know if I’ve ever been in water that cold. My feet went numb within a minute. A few brave souls dunked and started swimming right away but I wasn’t sure if I could get my head underwater. I doggy paddled it for a bit, but that wasn’t going to help me at all. Time to just go for it and dunk!
BRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As I started swimming I kept my breathing to one side as it seemed like my face didn’t have to get as wet that way, then eventually I was able to start bilateral breathing. I swam along the edge of the lake for a bit, then picked a spot across the lake to swim to and practice sighting.
So there we go….now time to race on Saturday! Hope everyone has a great weekend!
8 comments:
I wonder what's up with the weather! Good for you not letting it get in the way of those workouts.
Good luck at the tri this weekend - hopefully the water will feel a little warmer!
Thanks for providing the link to ELF's post on success. What a great and motivating read! :) :)
I know just what you mean about the cold water too -- at the half Ironman in Shawnigan this year, when I came out of the water, I couldn't move my hands or feet. They were so cold/numb, my transition was laughable. They simply would not work!! It was so frustrating watching my hands remain still as my brain commanded them to open. So weird.
Good luck at the race this weekend!! :) :)
Have a great race tomorrow! I find getting my face wet is the hardest part too! Specially when its freezing!
Our first OWS was chilly too, but at least you got it out of the way now, and you'll be ready to rock the race tomorrow!!! Have a good race, can't wait to hear about it!
Have an awesome race tomorrow!!! I hope the weather is good to you!
Thanks for the insight regarding the water. I will be thinking of that as I get in tomorrow.
Good luck to you!!
Good luck in your race Leana!! Have a blast out there and stay warm!! ;)
I love the Chinook race! You're going to have a blast. I ride that bike course often and enjoy it more and more each time. Oh, and as you go down the big hill and around the curve after the golf course into that flat little valley, make sure that everything is tight and you're standing up a bit as you go over the bridge. There's some rough pavement there and both races had a bunch of water bottles strewn around. And yes, what looks like downhill heading west after 37th street isn't really, and it's much easier coming back than it looks to be. Can't wait to read about your day!
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