Free Training

It used to be that I could go to the gym, do my workout, shower and get home without speaking to a single person. It’s not that I’m antisocial or anything, but usually I prefer to just get my workout done, and get out. I’ve never really had a need to be buddy-buddy with anyone at the gym. Lately, it seems like I’m just a magnet for conversation. Yesterday, I got to the gym and the main floor was relatively quiet, but the weight room was pretty busy for a Friday evening. After a quick warm-up, I dove into my NROLW routine. After a few sets, a guy came up to me and asked if what I kept my legs straight or bent doing what I was (single-leg Romanian deadlift) and whether it worked the hamstrings because he had been having trouble with his hamstrings. I said yes it did and briefly explained how to do it so I could get back to my next set. A few sets later and go figure, the guy is trying the move! And his form was all wrong. I felt obligated to go correct him because the way he was moving he was bound to hurt his back. I never thought for a second that he would actually try it right then! His form in the next few reps were much better, thank goodness. I think he must have thought I was a trainer or something at first. He made a comment about getting some “free training” and I made sure to tell him that I was definitely  not a trainer. Through all this, I lost track a bit of my rest times, which kind of bugs me, but oh well. I hope the guy has better luck with his hamstrings in the future and doesn’t hurt himself doing anything he tried because I did it first!

My workout was NROLW stage 3 workout A.

A. One-armed dumbbell snatch – 3 sets of 6 with 105s Rest @ 17.5 lb DBs

B1. Dumbbell single-leg Romanian deadlift – 3 sets of 6 with 105s Rest @ 30 lb DBs

B2. Barbell bent-over row – 3 sets of 6 with 105s Rest @ 85 lb barbell (1st set) and 75 lb barbell (2nd and 3rd set)

C1. Dumbbell single-arm overhead squat – 3 sets of 6 with 105s Rest @ 12.5 lb and 25 lb DBs

C2. Dumbbell incline bench press – 3 sets of 6 with 105s Rest @ 22.5 lb

D1. Plank – 3 sets of 120s with 105s Rest @ BW

D2. Reverse Wood Chop – 3 sets of 6 with 25 lb (1st set), 20 lb (2nd set), 25 lb (3rd set)

Body Weight Matrix – 2 sets (24 squats, 12 lunges each leg, 12 lunge jumps each leg, 24 squat jumps)

Eating-wise, I’ve stuck to the plan the last few days. Thursday ended with 1772 calories, Friday with about 1685 calories and today (Saturday) with about 1886 calories. Today was a little high, but yesterday was a little low and I worked out, so I thought it would even out a bit. Friday and Saturday are approximate because we went out for dinner on Friday night and I had leftovers (white pizza with red peppers, mushrooms and artichokes) today for lunch. It was delicious and worth every bite.

Tomorrow morning we need to get to the gym between 8 AM and 2 PM because it closes early for Easter Sunday.

Happy Easter!

As Expected

The scale was back in the range I expected this morning. I made a few changes to my eating plans for yesterday, but still hit my goal range for calories and macronutrient ratios. Today was a success too, but I was hungry through the early afternoon. My breakfast and morning snack were identical to yesterday, except I had a cup of green tea yesterday. Maybe the small amount of caffeine suppressed my appetite yesterday? Or perhaps it was the timing of my meals? I had my usual big salad for dinner instead of lunch today, so that could have contributed as well. Total calories for today were 1720.

Tomorrow I have an early morning to get to class, so apologies for the late stream of consciousness post. It’s late, I’m tired and I’m not even really sure why I’m posting instead of sleeping. My class is public speaking and I am giving my last speech of the semester, so it’s probably nerves keeping me up. I can’t wait for this class to be over! It’s the last requirement to complete before starting veterinary school in the fall! Woohoo!

Already a loss?

Yesterday, I ended up eating 1713 calories, which is a little less than predicted. My dinner plans had included two servings of broccoli, thinking I had some in the freezer but I did not. I subbed a single serving of frozen peas and carrots instead and had more than enough food.

This morning I stepped on the scale. Imagine my surprise when it showed a loss of another 1.6 pounds since yesterday morning and a number I haven’t seen in probably 6 months! I know this is probably just a normal weight fluctuation or my scale is broken, but it’s still nice to get that momentary gratification. A pound or more in a day is really a much faster rate of weight loss than I want to maintain. If this trend continues, which I doubt it will, I will probably have to increase calories a bit. I am very satisfied on the amount I’m eating right now and do not feel hungry at any time during the day (except when I first wake up in the morning), so I shouldn’t need more but we’ll see. Logging will help me notice trends like this.

I forgot to mention one of the other changes I have made to my diet. I used to religiously eat 5-6 times a day, with 2 big meals and 3-4 smaller snacks. Recently, I had been eating two large meals and one small and a continuous snacking off and on through the evening after getting home from work. Needless to say, that had to go. I’m back to planning for five times a day with an additional shake or smoothie on workout days.

Today is a workout day, so I’m planning to eat 2049 calories. I already had 305.5 for breakfast (milk, cottage cheese and raisins), 300.5 for a morning snack/2nd breakfast (hobbits anyone?) of oatmeal and some add-ins, and I just finished a BIG salad for lunch with 637.5 calories. I’ll have a small afternoon snack of carrots and hummus again for 85 calories, do my workout and then have a post-workout protein shake for 170 calories. Dinner will be 550 cals of leftovers from last night plus some cooked spinach and a little dark chocolate. This is 27.41% cals from protein, 32.34% from fat and 40.25% from carbs. By the way, I find it funny that the Daily Plate tells me that I’m over my recommended amount of fat and protein every day. It also hates the amount of cholesterol (from eggs on my salad), but I must say I’m not convinced that dietary cholesterol has much effect on body chemistry. I used to have high cholesterol while avoiding fatty foods and foods with high cholesterol, then when I changed to eating closely to the way I am now, my cholesterol went down. Go figure. Of course there were other factors that I’m sure contributed, but it doesn’t seem like a couple of eggs every day has much effect on my levels.

My workout is New Rules of Lifting for Women stage 3 workout B and 15 minutes of running intervals. Exact workout may be posted later, but I don’t have it in front of me at the moment.

Finding Balance

Has there ever been a time when you felt your life got really out of balance? I know I have. After Timberman last summer, I was so relieved to have completed it that I essentially stopped trying to live a healthy lifestyle. I think I had gotten out of balance by putting so much time and effort into training and thinking about training and eating for training for nearly a year that once it was all over I went a little overboard in allowing myself to eat junk and not exercise. I remained active by normal standards (walking daily), but in comparison to my previous commitment to 1-3 hours of exercise at least 5 days a week, I was a sedentary blob.

As a result, I was feeling pretty disgusted and annoyed with myself, and as any readers still out there know, increasingly neglected my blog because I just couldn’t own up to the lack of focus in my fitness journey any longer. I gained about 10 pounds pretty quickly after the HIM and could tell my body composition had changed for the worse. I knew I needed to get myself back on track without the illusion of accountability from recording on the blog. I decided not to do any races this year and start with just 2 days a week of working out. I have continued with the New Rules of Lifting for Women (NROLW) program. I recently added a third workout day in every week, so I lift with my mom usually on Tuesdays and I lift with Curtis on Thursdays and Sundays. I also run with a friend on Fridays when it works with both of our busy schedules. I’m really happy with this schedule. I still walk daily with Tara as well and feel it is just the right amount if exercise for me right now. I wouldn’t mind adding another 2 days eventually, but I am still building back to that. Since the NROLW program has interval training worked in, I’m still usually running 1-2 times per week but in short and sweet doses (about 15 minutes) that I can handle.

I am just now (started last week) trying to get my nutrition in line. Even though I had gotten back on a regular exercise schedule I hadn’t lost any of that extra weight I was carrying. I was still eating poorly and too much. Last week, my focus was to get more protein in my diet, less refined carbs (and more whole grains and fruits/veggies) and be more mindful of my portion sizes. With just those things, I lost 2.4 pounds. This week, I’m tracking my diet to see where I’m at calorie-wise and what my macronutrient ratios look like. Ideally I’d like to aim for 1700 calories on non-lifting days and 2000 calories on lifting days with 30% from protein, 30% from fat and 40% from carbs. If I have another loss this week I’ll stick with the same calories in for next week. If I have a gain or maintenance, I’m going to decrease by 200-300 each day. I’m using The Daily Plate at livestrong.com for tracking.

For today, my breakfast (oatmeal with add-ins for protein) was 330 cals. Morning snack of cottage cheese and raisins came in at 210 cals. My lunch salad was about 458 calories. I have an 85 calorie afternoon snack of hummus and carrots planned. My dinner of quinoa, broccoli and turkey burgers with a desset of dark chocolate is planned for 674 calories. That gives a total of about 1757 for the day. My meals are a little weird on Mondays because my afternoon is scrunched since I have dog training in the evening and eat my last meal around 5pm before I leave for training. Most other nights my dinners fall between 7 and 8 pm.

I’m not promising a daily update on progress, but I’ll be checking-in.

Nutrition

Today ended up being an unplanned day off from working out, but a busy day otherwise!  I had both school and work today, and I had a haircut tonight, so I felt like I was constantly going from one thing to another.  Usually, I lift weights with my mom on Mondays, but we decided we’d do our workout on Wednesday instead.  It actually works out much better for me since I did a weight workout yesterday and should really have today off from lifting anyhow.  I also have an exam on Wednesday, so I’ve been busy studying for that as well.  Tomorrow night will be a nice short 5 mile run with some uphill work.  Unfortunately, I’m still going to be stuck indoors on the treadmill!  It’s probably going to be raining all day tomorrow, yuck!  I hopeful that the rain melts some more of the snow though.  We’re down to grass in some areas and the backyard only has about 4-6 inches left to go!  Of course, the huge mountains of snow on the sidewalks are going to take a bit longer, but ever littly bit helps.  I can’t wait for spring!

I realized today as I was tracking my calories, that I haven’t talked about nutrition in awhile (if ever), and I think it’s about time that I do!  I’ve always considered myself a fairly healthy eater, but I’ve come to learn that I had very unhealthy eating habits, especially in college.  I hardly ever ate breakfast, unless it was the morning hangover breakfast at a local restaurant after a night of heavy drinking.  And more often than not, I would get through almost an entire day without having eaten anything.  I remember there being days when I would get home from class at 4:00PM without having had a single morsel of food all day.  By this time, I usually had a couple of diet Cokes and maybe a cup of coffee to tide me over.  Needless to say, I was usually starving by the time I got home and remembered to eat!  I would then proceed to binge on anything I had.  Luckily, I was a fairly health conscious shopper, so I usually had pretty healthy foods on hand.  Looking back, I’m not sure how I ever thought that that was ok!  By the time I had graduated, I was sick of eating like that all the time and vowed that with a more stable schedule, I’d be able to develop healthier eating habits.

Fast forward a couple years to now.  I can’t even imagine going through a day without breakfast!  And a morning snack. And lunch. And an afternoon snack. And dinner.  Plus the pre- and/or post-workout snacks when needed.  The first thing I added was eating breakfast regularly, usually oatmeal.  Soon after, I had my cholesterol levels tested and found out my levels were fantastic – all within normal limits after having been elevated the past few years.  By spacing out the calories I was consuming throughout the day and exercising regularly I lost about 5 lbs.  I do track calories on and off when I feel I need to re-evaluate or if I have noticed a weight change.  For the most part, though, I eat intuitively.  But, my biggest struggle in healthy eating habits is remembering that I don’t have to “clean my plate” when I am full.

I eat mostly whole foods, with my staples being oatmeal, nut butters, salads, and eggs.  I do use protein powders in shakes and to boost a meal’s protein levels if I feel like I’m lacking (most often in my oatmeal).  Dinners typically consist of some protein source (chicken, fish or beef and occasionally pork or buffalo), a veggie, and a starch (potato/rice/noodle/bread).  I LOVE bread, rice, and noodles and could eat any of them plain in mass quantities.  I’ve learned to manage that and restrain myself from overdoing (most of the time!).  I do drink wine regularly, but very little other alcohol on a regular basis.  I do not subscribe to “low-fat” or “low-carb” options typically, it’s a fine balance if I choose those options over full fat and full carb options of how many calories there are and what they did to it to make it low fat or low carb.  I don’t mind eating out, and I usually don’t restrict myself from ordering what I want and eating it too!  This even includes fast food (mmm Wendy’s spicy chicken sandwich combo!), and I don’t feel guilty about it afterward.  Although one of my biggest pet peeves is that fast food restaurants usually ask you if you want “medium” size and don’t give a choice of “small”, so you have to specifically say you want the “small”.  I nearly always am completely full from a small meal, so I have no temptation to get a larger size.  Especially since the “small” size of today is actually the “medium” that I remember from growing up.  But I digress…

I have mentioned that I like to shoot for 30/30/40 split of calories between protein/fat/carbs.  I actually find that my intuitive eating actually has me closer to 25/35/40, and maintaining my weight well.  However, I feel like I’ve stagnated in muscle growth a bit and want to address that, which is part of the reason I set calorie counting as a goal for this month.  I’d like to see those protein levels a little higher and the fat levels a little lower to see if it makes a difference in my body composition.  I am aiming for about 2000 calories on non-workout days and 2300 on workout days, give or take.  This is based off my calculated BMR (calories I need to just stay alive) according to height/weight/age and using the Harris Benedict Equation for the multiplier.  While these may not work for everyone, I find that they do a pretty good job of estimating my caloric needs.

I realize this post is somewhat disjointed and choppy, but it sums up my nutritional habits, background, and ideals for me pretty well, so thanks for sticking around if you’re still here!  Do you have a set nutrition plan that you follow? Or is it more ad hoc with some loose ideals?

Today’s Calorie Count

Breakfast: 310

Morning Snack: 125

Lunch (out to eat): 996

Afternoon Snack: 362

Dinner: 420

Total: 2213

Fat: 38%

Protein: 22%

Carbohydrate: 40%

My biggest struggle in healthy eating habits is remembering that I don’t have to “clean my plate” when I am full.

Making it up as I go along…

I have gotten a little off-track with my training plan, but I’m hoping by tomorrow I can get back to normal.  Curtis was away at the end of last week and over the weekend, so my schedule was a little helter skelter from that, not to mention my classes started on Wednesday, so I had to adjust to that as well.  I intended to run fairly early on Friday, either in the morning or right after class, but it didn’t work out.  I slept in and had forgotten a friend was coming over after class.  After she left, I ended up reading for awhile and then falling asleep for a couple of hours.  By the time I woke up, it was 5:00 PM!  I decided to go to the gym and run on the treadmill.  I did 5 miles then 4 pickups for a total of 5.95 miles with the walking and cooldown included.  The pickups were done for 30 seconds each at 9 mph.  I did not run on Saturday because again I fell asleep in the afternoon when I planned to run and by the time I woke up it was dark and since my gym closes early, I decided to forego it.

Today, I had a 10K course plotted out and brought along a cue sheet with me so I could do my practice 10K.  Unfortunately, one of the turns did not seem to exist.  I think what I had seen on the map appeared to be an intersection, but was not.  I ended up just backtracking and picking some trail routes that I hadn’t run before and tried to make up the lost distance.  Around the point I hit the dead-end, I also lost my cue sheet.  I figured I’d just try to guess-timate 6.2 miles.  I felt pretty good throughout the whole run, never got tired or winded so I think my pace was pretty good.  I forgot to put on my watch though, so I have no idea what that pace was!  Clearly, I was a very disorganized runner today.  It turns out, the course I ran was 6.14 miles, so pretty close to the 10K I was aiming for!

Tomorrow I’m going to attempt to get my act together and run in the morning since it’s just a short recovery run.

I made myself one of Susan’s breakfast cookies for tomorrow to get back on track with my nutrition.  I need to go grocery shopping, though, so I don’t have snacks or lunch packed yet.  I’m still trying to figure out what to do about those for tomorrow.

Nutrition

I almost broke my oath to post tonight!  I decided that since I lifted AND ran yesterday, I could take today off from training and do my run tomorrow instead.  Especially since I am not working and only have one class.  Instead I spent the evening at my friend’s place to let our dogs play and get some energy out.  If I had the amount of energy that Tara has…wow!  I don’t even know what I would do!  They wrestled and ran around the apartment for about 3 hours (not to mention she had spent an hour running around at the dog park beforehand!).  Needless to say, I am just now (10:30) getting home and in bed and realized I haven’t yet updated the blog today. But here I am, and I’m going to attempt to summarize my training since my last workout update….

Friday – NROLW Stage 4 workout A

Saturday – Unintentional day off

Sunday – 7.2 mile run (treadmill)

Monday – NROLW Stage 4 workout B

Tuesday – Unintentional day off

Wednesday – NROLW Stage 4 workout A and 6.4 mile run

Thursday – Day off

Since this weekend is a relatively easy weekend, I figured it would be ok to do three days in a row of running if I do my workout in the morning tomorrow and afternoon/evening on Saturday and Sunday.  The plan calls for doing a 10K Saturday, but I was unable to find one back when I looked a few weeks ago.  I may try and find one tomorrow, or I’ll just run a 10K route against myself.  I’ve never run a 10K outside of the triathlon before, so I’d be curious to see how I did in a race.  Maybe I’ll try and find one on another weekend coming up.

By the way, this may be too much information, but I’m not going to be posting heart rate stats for the next few workouts at least.  My chest strap has been cutting into my chest and it’s quite painful!  I don’t really notice it when I’m actually working out, but afterward it stings really badly.  I’m hoping once it heals, I can figure out an arrangement that doesn’t cause any sores.

I mentioned in my super-short post yesterday that I’ve had a horrible eating week, and I have!  It’s been horrendous.  Even though I don’t talk about it often, proper nutrition is very important to me.  I try to eat intuitively, but keep my calories within the “enough but not too many” category, keep macronutrient ratios fairly stable, and eat as many fresh and whole foods as possible.  This week was a throwback to my pre-triathlon days of snacking without purpose and eating mindlessly.  I think this is mostly due to the fairly extreme schedule change, which I’m going to have to learn to work around.  Now that I’m taking classes, I no longer am able to cook oats at work every morning for breakfast and lunch is going to have to be on-the-run most days.  This weekend, I’m going to take some time to figure out a new plan for eating around my schedule for this semester.  I forget how much it throws me to not have a good food schedule in place for myself.  I think something like this might work:

@wakeup – breakfast

@ 10:25 – small snack on the go

@12:00 noon – lunch

@ 3:00 – afternoon snack/pre-workout

@ 6:30 – post-workout snack

@ 8:00 – dinner

I’m probably going to have to throw that out the window, but it might be a good start. 

The Great Larabar Experiment

I’ve been feeling a little bleh yesterday and today, so I decided to make today a rest day.  I picked out an On Demand yoga program to do as my active rest.  It was ok, but not really what I was looking for, there was a lot of pilates-type moves for core strength.  I wanted some more stretching type moves to do, but oh well.  It only took 20 minutes, which was nice.  I don’t think I’d do it again, though.

After I was done, I decided to attempt to make some homemade Larabars.  I even took pictures to post!

First, I took an entire (well actually a little less because I’d already eaten several) 10 oz container of Sunsweet pitted dates and checked them to make sure they were actually pitted.  Once I had removed the one stray pit I found, I microwaved the dates for about 30 seconds since I thought it would be easier to work with them if they were slightly heated.

I dumped the whole container of dates into the food processor and turned it on.

It didn’t take long for it to become a paste-like consistency.

I added 1/2 cup of almonds (1/4 cup at a time).

And 1/8 cup of cocoa powder.  The food processor turned it into a very sticky ball of dough.

I spread it into a small baking dish and put it into the refrigerator to harden.  After an hour or so I moved it to the freezer to be faster.

After they were sufficiently hard, I cut them up into 16 squares to store.

This one only made it as far as my mouth! It was tasty!

Here’s the nutritional info:

Serving size -2 squares (1/8 of whole)

Calories – 148

Fat – 4 grams (rounded up)

Carbohydrates – 30 grams

Protein – 2.5 grams

I think that next time I’ll add a bit of chocolate protein powder, but I’m pretty pleased for my first attempt.  I’m excited about getting some more dates and trying some different combinations of flavors.  The pecan pie Larabars are especially interesting to me.  Yum, I’m salivating just thinking about it!

I must be crazy

After my workout (which I’ll get to in a bit) I stopped by the running store and Trader Joe’s.  I decided to break the rule of “not introducing anything new during race week”, and I bought elastic shoelaces.  I haven’t definitely decided to use them yet, I’ll try them out tomorrow to see how they feel.  I don’t really want to have to worry about tying my shoes on Saturday, so if things go smoothly, I’m probably going to go for it.  My other exciting purchase of the day was Luna bars from Trader Joe’s.  They sell them for only $.99 per bar!  And they let you buy them by the box at that price.  I haven’t found anywhere else where they are less than $1.25 per bar.  I bought a box of S’mores (my favorite) and a box of Chocolate Peppermint Stick.  Yay for good deals!

For training tonight, I made up my own swim workout because I forgot to generate a workout on swimplan before I left for the pool.  I decided to do a 2000 yard workout instead of swimming for the set time of 60 minutes.  I tried to really focus on making sure my breathing was even and I didn’t get out of breath at any time.  My biggest problem with breathing is that I turn my head too far out of the water, so I lose a little time with every breath.  Since I breath every third stroke, this adds up.  I’ve gotten a lot better this season, but it’s something I need to continue to improve.  I also wanted to do some sighting drills to prepare for the race and to test out my plan to sight every 6 strokes.  What I came up with was this:

Warm-up:

200yd Freestyle

Main Set:

2 x 200yd Freestyle with fins (0:15 RI)

2 x 200yd Freestyle with pull buoy (0:15 RI)

8 x 50yd (2 x (Butterfly, Backstroke, Breastroke, Freestyle)) (0:15 RI)

4 x 100yd (2 x Sighting every 6th stroke) (0:15 RI)

Cool Down:

200yd Freestyle SLOW

You can probably tell that I LOVE swimming other strokes.  In high school, I swam butterfly and the 500m freestyle.  Part of the reason I first decided to compete in triathlon was that I missed swimming competitively, but I didn’t really know how to get back into it.  Now, I’m obsessed with triathlon and I’ve gotten this crazy idea in my head.

I want to do a half-Ironman. Next year.

Crazy, right?  I haven’t even gotten through the Sprint this weekend or the Oly this fall and I’m already thinking about the next big thing.  I won’t have to make a decision for awhile, but the idea is planted in my brain.  The distances are 1.2 mile (1.9 km) Swim, 56 mile (90 km) Bike, and 13.1  mile (21 km) Run.  I know I can do the swim distance, and I would choose one in the fall of 2010, which I think would give me plenty of time to double my current bike and run endurance.  Hmm..sounds feasible.  It would be a huge step and I’d really have to work hard to get to it, but I think I can do it.  I want to do it.

Eek!  It makes me all jittery to think about it!

Oh, and there’s 4 more days till the Sprint!

Race Plan

Before I get into my race plan, my workout today was the usual full body weight training including tons of squats (jump squats and knee-up squats), followed by a 30 minute walk on the treadmill on a 5-8% incline (varied throughout the time).  I was supposed to run today, but my legs felt a little weak after lifting.  I think it was partly due to my brick yesterday.  Anyways, I thought it best to take it easy and walk instead of stressing them more right before a race.  Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, on to my race plan.  It’s probably more detailed than necessary for a Sprint race, but I want to get into the habit of planning out my week prior to races.  I think it’ll be helpful with my confidence and mental status in the week of the race.

Tuesday

I will do a light swimming workout, doing about 60 minutes of short sets.  I will focus on breathing and practice sighting on the end of the pool.  My goal with this workout is simply to get into the water and build confidence, there is no need to push myself.  I will make sure that I have two pairs of goggles that are properly adjusted during this swim.

Wednesday

After work, I will go to weight training and go light on legs.  I should be able to do a normal arm workout as I will recover in plenty of time for Saturday.  After weight training, I will go for a one hour bike ride but stay in Zones 1/2 and include a few accelerations in Zone 4/5a.  My focus will be continued confidence with clipping in and out of the pedals.

Thursday

I am taking the day completely off from exercise.  I will use the time I would normal spend working out relaxing and preparing mentally for my race.  Thursday night I will pack all my race gear and things for the rest of the weekend.  I will put my bike on my car if it is not raining.

Race Packing List:

• 2 pairs goggles
• extra swim cap
• bathing suit
• wetsuit
• heart rate monitor/watch
• water bottles
• sports drink
• energy bar
• helmet
• cycling shoes
• tire pump
• bike
• cycling shorts, and gloves (probably won’t wear, but bringing in case)
• socks
• running shoes
• jersey
• shorts
• sunglasses
• anything else?

Friday

I will leave work early (around 3PM) to drive down to the race site.  If I make it in time, I will check-in and pick up my packet.  If I don’t, I’ll just do it on Saturday morning, there will be plenty of time.  After arriving, I will take a quick 15 minute run and a short 30 minute bike ride, which is also what I will do to warm-up on Saturday morning.  I plan to be asleep by 10:00PM.

Saturday

I will wake-up at 6:00 AM and eat my usual breakfast of a bowl of oatmeal and a banana.  Then I will take a quick shower (Side note-I know it’s weird to shower before a race, but it helps me focus and prepare mentally for the day) and get ready.  I will wear my bathing suit as my bottom layer.  There is supposed to be a high of 74°F, which should be perfect.  I’ll bring some extra layers in case it gets cold or is raining (40% chance) though.  At 7:00 AM I’ll head over to the race site and pick up my packet that I probably missed out on getting on Friday night and find out what wave I am in.  I’ll set up my transition area and eat a nutrition bar and sip water throughout the morning.  I’ll rack my bike and attach my race number to my bike, helmet, and shirt, then head over for body marking.  At 8:00 AM, I’ll do a warm-up of 15 minutes running and 30 minutes biking.  I’m not sure I’ll get in the whole warm-up, but I’m going to try.  I do not plan to swim in the morning unless the water temperature is above 70, which I do not expect.  At 8:45 AM is a mandatory race meeting, so I’m probably going to have some downtime between my warm-up and race start.

When my wave starts, I will line up near the front, but towards the outside.  Once I am in the water, if I am able to make some gains on the leaders, I’ll move toward the inside and sight on the buoys every sixth stroke.  I plan to go out strong and keep an even pace through the whole swim.  I expect to stay toward the front of my wave for the swim and exit the water early.  As soon as I am on dry land, I will undo the velcro and zipper on my wetsuit and pull off the top half.  Then I will remove my cap and goggles on the way to my transition area.  Once in transition, I’ll take the bottom half off and put on shorts and my shirt with my race number pinned on.  Then I’ll put on my shoes (no socks), helmet and sunglasses.  Finally, I’ll take my bike off the rack and run to the mount line.

The bike begins with a short up-hill stretch, so I must make sure to clip-in as soon as possible for maximum efficiency.  After the initial climb, the bike portion levels out for a mile or two, so I will pace myself in anticipation of the climbing later on.  Throughout the bike, I will sip on a sports drink and if I need more food, I’ll eat a nutrition bar.  For the last 2 miles of the cycling course, I will increase my cadence to 90+ rpm to prepare for the run.  I will also try to keep my heartrate low for this last bike portion, and slow my respiration so I am not out of breath starting the run.  When I reach the dismount line, I’ll run my bike to my transition area, rack it and remove my helmet.  Then I will change my shoes and put on socks and running shoes.  I’ll run out of the transition area, and settle into a 10 minute mile pace.  After the first half of the run, I will pick up the pace to 9:30 by increasing my cadence.  At each of the aid stations I’ll drink water.  When the finish line is in sight, I’ll pick up the pace with as much strength as I have left to finish strong!

I’m going to try and stick to my plan as much as possible for these next days and into race day.  I’m hoping for a stellar performance on Saturday and I can’t wait to see how it goes!

5 more days.