Countdown

Eleven days from now I'll be participating in my first real triathlon. Yikes! I won't think about whether I'm ready for it, whether I think I've trained enough. I'll have to be ready, have to feel trained. No excuses, I'll get it done.

Slowly.

Saturday was our last combined team workout. The Big Kahuna group will be racing their own tri this coming Saturday (good luck Phil!) and have started their taper. My brain has started it's own taper and I have to keep reminding it that my official taper doesn't begin until the weekend. A one week taper? What's up with that? My body has always been very happy with the standard 3 week marathon taper. I don't know if this is normal with tri training, or just something that our Coach likes. Since my intention is to make this my last triathlon I guess I'll never know.

Anyway, on Saturday we met at Campolindo High School to jump in the (overheated, bathtub warm) pool and after a warmup and a couple of drills, swim continuously for 30 minutes. I managed to seed myself into a lane with a couple of slow swimmers and was happy to follow slowly behind. My breathing wasn't great so I didn't want to push it.

After the swim and leisurely change into running clothes (no, we didn't transition, we spent lots of time in the locker room getting ready) we headed out to run. To my dismay we were again running up and down the BF hill behind the school. First, my lungs weren't happy from the air quality and running up a hill would be challenging. Second, running down a hill is terribly hard on my back and knee. Great, I'd get to see how I felt doing both. It had heated up already, not surprising since it was getting to be late morning by then.

I ran and walked one circuit and decided that the second time I'd take a shortcut through one of the side streets and avoid the steepest part of the hill. Ooopsie though, I missed the street. I discovered that walking down the hills hurt my back more than slowly jogging, so that's what I did. I also discovered that my water belt jabbed my back and spine exactly where it hurt and I'd have to find some other way to carry my electrolyte drink until it feels better.

Sunday morning was a bike ride with our group scheduled for 90 minutes along the same old route; from the Rudgear Road Park & Ride along Danville Road, south until time to turn around, then back the same way. The most interesting part was all the road kill; I counted 2 dead skunks in the middle of the road (eww) and at least a half dozen flattened squirrels on the northbound shoulder. Yuck. I wasn't feeling very strong so I cheated and turned around early, finishing with about 70 minutes.

Saturday evening I went to dinner with my mom and had exactly the worst possible thing to eat. She's been going on about the most wonderful fish and chips she'd ever had and I had to try it and when could we go and Saturday seemed a good time. Note to self: fried food is absolutely out of my diet until my stomach is compleltely recovered from whatever has been making it hurt. One reason I didn't have any energy during the bike ride was that I was unable to eat anything beforehand and unable to eat on the bike. I was unable to eat Sunday afternoon at a party I went to (and I missed paella), unable to eat Monday. All that from some fish and chips.

After the ride I went shopping for a new water belt. I ended up with one of the Fuel Belt 4 bottle belts that sits on my hips instead of my waist and doesn't hit my spine. So that meant I had to give it a try; we don't really have any significant runs scheduled before the tri. I met with Bree and Nitro for a 4 miler along the Lafayette-Moraga Trail and the belt worked great. I'll have to get used to filling all those little bottle separately but for a 10k I should be fine without needing any refills. The run went well and included breaks for Nitro to check out other dogs and great smells. I felt good afterward and oh boy oh boy do I miss running!

Tonight we're scheduled for our longest swim of the season. I'm looking forward to the taper!