Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Field Trip Week!

The weekend was full of family functions: a baby shower and a christening for two different babies from different sides of the family. Poor Robbie was a champ for coming to both parties!
(Us at my cousin's christening afterparty at the country club. Fancy!)

Did some training, of course- an open water swim cut short due to too many people in the lake, a couple of my old loop, done 5 minutes faster than 4 months ago followed by a super speedy 5k brick, a 40 mile ride with Dad along for 20 miles of it, keeping the pace up- 19 to 20 mph a lot of the time. Go Dad! I swear, he never ceases to amaze me.

Tuesday started the fun part of the week- I woke up at 7 with no obligations until 6 at night when I had tutoring, so Vlad and I made plans to meet at Point Pleasant to do an open water ocean swim. Yay!

I got there early to run barefoot on the beach, my favorite pastime, and then met up with Vlad. He showed up with a full sleeveless wetsuit, swim cap, and fancy goggles. I had my bikini and my old goggles. The water was chilly, but once I got in, it wasn't bad. Before this, I had never done a legit open water ocean swim- I swim in the ocean, but not like I'm actually racing. So it was a whole new experience. Fun though! I freaked out when I swam over a school of tiny fish, and Vlad soothed (not!) me by saying "well, they usually only swim when something big is behind them." Thanks! I didn't let it worry me, and we swam for about an hour, taking rest breaks as we navigated across the shoreline trying to avoid getting yelled at by lifeguards. By the time we stopped, the tide was coming in and the water was getting rough, making it harder to swim without swallowing tons of salt water. Afterwards, we got to hang out on the beach for a bit and talk about our favorite subject- triathlon- for a while before I headed back to meet Robbie when he got off work so he, Ad and I could do my other favorite thing- Panera for lunch!

Later, Pete and I went on another crazy 5 mile run. I'm still getting used to these 7-7:30 min miles, but Pete just goes along like it's nothing! No fair... I am getting better at it though. Or at least I was until mile 3, when all of a sudden, I got a crazy cramp under my rib cage and couldn't breathe deep without it killing me. It was the only time I've ever actually stopped mid-run for a minute. I started up again though, and I was ok. So I have no idea what caused it. Weird...

At night, my stomach started killing me and my legs got really tight- a cross between running on a beach and running fast later, I guess. I think my stomach may have hurt from drinking in so much salt water at the beach.

Felt better but not great this morning, and eating is still kind of weird.

But today I'm heading down to Mercer County Park, home of the NJ State Tri, where I can ride and run the course (running with Stephanie!), so I'm excited about that. And tomorrow, Pete and I are going to Holmdel to do a super sprint workout on the cross country track there. Friday, going to SBR for new shoes! I'm just all over the place this week...

1 comment:

Missy said...

Salt water wrecks my guts - pound water when you're done to dilute...helps me. How nice to have your dad along and can I say, speedy! Niceeeee.