Getting Ready for Triathlon Season

I'm still having a hard time comprehending that the Nike Women's Half Marathon weekend is over already. Part of me wants to jump into training again but part of me just wants to relax. I'm listening to that part of me and enjoying sleeping in and being lazy. I do have some big goals for the rest of the year and if I want to have a shot at achieving them I need to let my body recover properly. I also think I mentally need the break. Finals are starting next week and the last thing I want to worry about is having a hard week of training.

So today is Thursday and I haven't run or exercised at all since the race. I thought about going for a quick shakeout run but chose sleeping instead. I'm not sure if I will get in anything this weekend since I will be working at the Frederick Running Festival and will likely be on my feet almost the whole weekend.

With summer right around the corner, I have been starting to look at which triathlons I want to do. I got a road bike for Christmas and am excited to train on that this year instead of my hybrid. I'm not 100% into the idea of triathlon training right now but I know that will change once I spend some time out on the roads in Pennsylvania. I don't live in the best area in Maryland so I do all of my rides on the trainer until I'm home for the summer.

I mentioned a couple months ago some of the races I was looking at and although I have yet to register for any I am still planning on doing those same races. I will most likely not do an early June triathlon because the ones I found are either too expensive for what I would want to pay for a sprint or are too hilly. I am not a very experienced biker at all and besides being terrible at riding hills I am also terrified of them. I want to have time to work on hills rather than scrambling for the first two weeks I'm home trying to ride every hill I find.

I will be adding in additional races as I discover them or if I just feel like racing, but as of now my triathlon schedule is as follows:

June 24- York YWCA Ladies Y-Tri Sprint Triathlon
August 3- Culpepper International Triathlon
August 25- Keystone State Triathlon

Out of these races Culpepper will be my goal race. Even though it is a little farther away than I was looking for, it looks to be a great race and fits my schedule perfectly. And the other two triathlons are much closer to my house. The first one is barely over two miles away! These races are also more for experience, since I am still such a tri newbie.

Last year I did two triathlons and had two very different experiences at both. My first triathlon was around 2 hours away, was an Olympic distance and was on the hottest day of the year. I ended up walking almost all of the run because it was so hot and I was definitely dehydrated. My second triathlon was 30 minutes from my house, was a sprint, and was a cool day with rain during most of the race. I also had some bike issues and lost close to 10 minutes trying to fix my bike.

I don't know that much about triathlons but I am hoping to make some serious improvements from both training and my racing from last year. Triathlon training will also slightly overlap with fall marathon training once again so that will likely affect my training towards the end of July and August.