Road to Ironman Lake Placid Week 3

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I'm going to call week three a big success, mostly because I finally got my butt to the pool and put my swimming demons to sleep. Well maybe not to sleep completely, but hopefully for a little while. So swimming went well this week. Unfortunately running did not, in the sense that I only ran once. That one run actually went pretty well but running once a week is not enough to train for an ironman. The reason for only running once, though, was that it was nice enough to bike outside. I will trade running for biking outside in February any day of the week!

So here's how the week played out:

Monday was day 1 of my attempt to get back into swim shape. This swim featured lots of mid-distance pull intervals to make up 3200 yards. Overall it wasn't too exciting but to be honest it takes a lot for me to find a swim workout exciting. I closed out the day with a quick functional strength session.

Tuesday marked a mini-breakthrough in the pool for me. This swim was the inspiration for my new weekly series "Swim Set of the Week." The thought of 30 x 50 sounded anything but fun but quite frankly I loved this swim from start to finish. I haven't had one of those swims where you push yourself the entire time, where you're pushing yourself so much you can't comprehend how hard you are working because there isn't enough time before the next interval. This is the type of swim I have craving and man it felt so good.

Tuesday evening was 60 minutes of intervals at the Gung Ho weekly trainer ride.

Wednesday was the one and only swim I did this week but it was a solid run with a lot of work. While these weekly hill interval runs are about building strength while maintaining good running form, it was really nice to see considerably progress over the last time I did this workout. Three cheers for getting faster. Also, it's amazing how tired your legs can get over a four mile run.

Thursday was swim #3 for the week. With 2800 yards, my weekly total was brought up to 9100. A number I haven't seen in quite some time. This wasn't such a great swim but it wasn't as bad as some of my other swims have been this year so I'm calling it a win.

And of course, my evening was spent at the Gung Ho weekly trainer ride.

Friday. After four days of quality workouts my body and my mind were craving some R&R. A gentle yoga class couldn't have been more perfect as it also gave me a chance to stretch out my incredibly tight hips. Seriously, I could barely get into pigeon.

Saturday was day one of two that I was able to ride outside. It was around 40 degrees and while that isn't warm by any means, it was warm enough to tolerate heading outside. I only rode around 12 miles Saturday because my toes went numb during the ride. This was my first time riding in colder weather so I wasn't entirely too sure how many layers I needed. The answer turned out to be two. Two of everything.

Sunday was supposed to in the 50's but instead the temperature barely cracked 40. I was determined to get in more miles than Saturday so I did my best to bundle up. And my toes still went numb. You can't win them all. I made it a little over twenty miles before heading back to my warm car.

Although riding outside wasn't as enjoyable as I had hoped, it was still nice to spend some time on two wheels that weren't on a trainer. What made both of these rides so rewarding was seeing all of the work I have been doing every week manifest itself. It is so easy to lose sight of the big picture sometimes.

In non-training news, this was my first week coaching Girls On the Run. I was a bundle of nerves the first day, never really spending much time with children before. Fortunately all of my girls are super sweet and really excited to be in the program.

The other exciting thing that happened last week was that I have officially been accepted into grad school. I'm beyond thrilled, proud, honored to say that I will be attending Temple University in the fall to pursue a Master's in Kinesiology. This more than makes up for all of the stress I went through last semester. Now I just need to find somewhere in Philadelphia to live.