Epic Day

I had carefully prepared for this day all week. Wanting to be a little rested but not too much while also leading "normal" life.

Well the week was far from normal. Steph gave birth this week and Cate and I now have a little baby in our lives and that was the adventure for the week. So this week was anything but calm and relaxing. Because I am who I am I still got most of my workouts in this week. I also took Friday off to just hang with Cate and get a massage and my swim lesson. She leaves soon for Europe and I just wanted to spend time together today.

I had everything ready. (Those old IM packing lists that I saved come in really helpful!) All my bags for the day were packed. All my nutrition mixed up and in the cooler. All I had to do in the morning was eat and get dressed and drive to the start.

For Breakfast I had 3 pieces of cornbread and a blueberry, banana, Perpetuem, and Yogurt smoothie. I'm not sure how many calories that was but I'm guessing about 700 - 800. (Can I tell you I LOVE my magic bullet!) That will be a necessity for IMC.

So I headed to the river with plenty of time. Just like I want to do for the race. Enough time that I don't have to stress about getting everything done. A song by Pink and an older song Beautiful Oblivion played on the radio and also in my head for the rest of the day! Taught me to be careful about what I listen to race morning because it will likely echo in my head for the rest of the day!

I was ready to swim before Zan and Chris showed up so I got in and started swimming. The water was much colder than the lakes. It took a little while to get used to it but eventually it felt better. The temp was 63 degrees.

I was trying to work on some of the things Laurie had me doing during my swim lesson on Friday to speed up my stroke rate a little. I tried to slip my elbow up earlier and swing my hand through a little faster but it just didn't feel good. swimming against the current made it feel even worse so I eventually decided just to go back to the "good feeling" swimming and work on it in the pool first.

Unfortunately my neck got burned again by my wetsuit which made it uncomfortable for the rest of the day.

Got out and headed to the car to move things to our transition area for the rest of the day by the 205 bridge. Quickly checked in with Zan re: the plan for the day and giving her the instructions and reminder to myself. 1st loop easy, 2nd loop steady, 3rd loop should start feeling a bit harder but will probably be the same pace as the 1st if you pace correctly.

I headed out for my first loop and kept reminding myself to be patient. I swear the first 80 miles are all patience. Then the real work starts. I headed up to Crown Point. I worked on drinking every 10 minutes and consume just over a bottle an hour. I tried to hold my power on the flats to around 140 and climbing to 170.

Got to 205 in 2:25 for 40 miles (this includes a rest stop) so total ride time 2:21. Grabbed my nutrition for the next loop from the cooler and headed out passing Zan as she was heading in.

Again I reminded myself, patience. I had plans of skipping stopping after the second loop by trying to pack everything with me. But decided against this so that I would have cold drinks.

The second loop was 30 miles. Which is when I realized that today was going to be 110 miles, not 100. Good! A good test. I really needed to put more chamois butter on as I could feel some heat rash developing on my rear. But I didn't want to take the time. I figured I could do it when I stopped at the van.

The third loop I was still feeling really strong and good. I pushed up the pace a little pushing my watts to maintaining 150 while not letting my HR go above 134. I was actually able to push around 165 watts at this HR.

Heading up the hill I noticed I didn't have the same power in my legs as I did the first loop. I was struggling to push 170 up the hills without my HR going too high. So I decided to just spin and not try to push it too hard.

I thought I would run into Zan on my way down the hill from Corbett but I never did. I was concerned that she had decided to just do 2 loops and then the run and would be discouraged. When I got back to 205 I found that she had just shortened her last loop so that we could do the last section together.

I changed and got ready to run. I carried a water bottle and a thing of concentrated perpetuem. We ran for 45 minutes which quite honestly felt quite easy. Our average pace was 5.6 mph which is faster than i will run the IM because that is higher than what I want my HR at that point. I also was able (after the first initial shock) to stomach the concentrated perpetuem with water. I didn't like my carrying method so that will need to change. I think what I might do is carry a water bottle in my hand with Perpetuem and then had the concentrated stuff in a flask and then every... 5 miles refill the water bottle with the stuff in the flask. 1 flask of perpeuem, a flask of gu and a water bottle and salt tabs should be all I need for the run... oh and pepto bismal, can't forget that!

Overall a great day. I didn't feel real tired afterwards. I know I could have kept going. I think the 1/2 IM in a couple weeks will feel almost short if I pace it correctly. It will be a good rehearsal for the IM. I'm looking forward to it. It will be fun.