Team Tri Life Ironman Canada Training Camp – Day 3

At 7 am on Saturday morning we gathered by the Peach in Penticton.  This morning’s plan?  A 4 km open water swim.  It was a beautiful morning out but it was already starting to cook.  My wetsuit has a “performance fit” to it.  That means it fits tight and it takes me about 15 minutes to put on and requires lots of adjusting.  It is a workout in and of itself.  This way I’m not dragging half of Lake Okanagan around with me on the swim though.  I was sweating trying to put the wetsuit on which made it even more difficult.  That, and my left hand wasn’t working so well.  Riding without gloves on my 180K ride resulted in a little swelling on my left hand and my ring and pinkie fingers were not cooperating.

Finally my wetsuit was on, I put my Garmin in a Ziploc under my swim cap and started swimming.  There are buoys that follow the shoreline and from the Peach to S.S. Sicamous and it is about 1 km.  Since I was last in the water it felt like I had the entire lake to myself.  I just swam nice and calmly, staying in a happy place.  The only negative part of the swim was that I couldn’t quite get those fingers on my left hand to cooperate so I wasn’t pulling the water very well on that side.  Swimming back toward the Peach the sun was coming up and sighting was a lot more difficult.  Something to keep in mind on race morning.  After the swim my Garmin said I’d only gone 3250 m and I was feeling a bit bummed that I had somehow managed to short the swim.  Angie didn’t trust my Garmin, and lo and behold, when I uploaded the data to SportTracks mapping indicated I swam 4250 m.  I guess there must have been some loss of signal in the water at some point?

After the swim we all walked over to Smith and Company for coffee.  It was nice to have some downtime to talk, to rehash the swim and look forward to the next activity, as opposed to rush, rush, rush.  If you ever pop in I highly recommend a Zoe’s Heaven – half a bagel topped with egg, cheese, ham, green peppers and banana peppers.  Good stuff!

After coffee we grabbed our bike and run gear and met back at Skaha Beach for a ride.  This was no easy recovery ride we were going on…  We rode out to Okanagan Falls, keeping it in zone 1/2.  It was really warm by the time we made it to OK Falls.  Luckily we had a support truck out there and we went through two bags of ice and a bunch of water after only 35 min of riding.

From OK Falls the real work started – we turned on Green Mountain Road, affectionately known as “the wall.”  There is a 9% grade and several hairpin turns.  Angie wanted us to try and climb to the top and there was no pressure if we couldn’t make it the whole way.  I’ve been up Green Mountain Road before.  In a car.  To get to the winery at the top.  On the bike was a whole new experience!  I made it to the first hair pin turn.  My heart rate hit 183.  I pulled over and unclipped and I had to put my head down on my aerobars for a minute.  My legs were shaking.  I contemplated walking up and trying to then ride a bit further, but when our support truck came driving by I felt pretty comfortable with my effort for the day.

We were going to continue on the road, meet up at Highway 3 and do the descend from Yellow Lake to Penticton again.  The wind was just as ridiculous as the day before and it was way hotter.  Given how quickly we were going through ice and water Angie decided we’d be safer to turn around and ride home.  I made it back to Skaha for a quick 10 min run, which luckily ended right outside of an ice cream shop.  That is a great way to end a workout!  There was more yoga in the evening and luckily I was feeling a bit more flexible.

Day 3 Volumes:
Swim – 4250 meters, 1 hr 38 min
Bike – 38.58 km, 1 hr 43 min
Brick Run – 10 min
Yoga – 1 hr