Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Third time is a charm... Well sort of

OK, so it's been a couple of weeks already since we finished our third 70.3 Ironman. In a sense it was a race that we were kind of looking forward to but not really if it makes sense. Yup.... Confusing we know. Maybe you have seen posts from Res on her blog about our motivation and how bad of a job we were doing keeping up with our training schedules. So that's the "not really" part of it. We felt a bit unprepared, and maybe were underestimating the distance. It kind of happens... But don't let that fool you it is still a big race and a long day. We went in with our training as much as we got in, one thing for sure we were rested. We did our long workouts and hit them hard but we felt strong on them, long swims were great, long rides didn't really bothered us so much and the runs.... Well the runs suffered but we had some miles in the running shoes that made us think we were going to be OK.

The week leading to it was of course crazy busy with work. We didn't do our typical day off before the race. We typically leave Friday as a day off and since the race is on Sunday it leaves us Saturday to "rest" more. Well... If you know what happens at the Expo day then you know you do anything but rest. So our approach this year was leave the house on Saturday, go in to check-in, eat, rack bikes and leave... It actually worked out pretty good in our opinion. It eliminates the amount of walking you do trying to walk to places you don't really need to be at. Also it helped with the nerves, which were pretty high due to the weather conditions we were going to have so the less time we spent at the expo and around athletes the better for us... Yes... Antisocial mode helps sometimes.



We were able to see the coach, he gave us some last minute weather related tips and off we went. We went to the hotel with K (our Sherpa of choice for the weekend). She wasn't doing the race since she got sick but still offered to come down and help us with cheering, and also for the drive back home after the race. Anyways we went to the hotel and stayed there until the next Sunday morning. Did the usual pre race stuff.

Sunday came, we enjoyed the benefits of being in the club village this year. It is pretty nice to have that since we have a place to camp near transition. We just got there while the team people got ready. We chatted a bit but not much, usually we are not too chatty without being rude.  There were a lot of nerves because of the weather which at that point we had nothing else we could do other than let Mother Nature take her course with our day.



This year we our waves were different than last year, Res went first then Puli. The swim was rough, chop and current took at beat on us and it was not fun to see people taken out as we were getting off the dock. The bike while uneventful we were being very cautious as the roads where wet. A little of a tail wind on the way out and cross wind on the way back made it for a fun bike. Galveston is an out and back bike which it's cool because you see everyone and we saw pretty much the whole team. Getting off the bike we hit the run. Puli didn't feel well, he was getting belly cramps after probably taking too much salt water on the swim, Res keep pushing forward with her awesome steady pace. 





It was a great day. Puli managed to have a PR on this course and a sub 6:00 70.3 with a 5:59. Res managed a 6:40 which wasn't a PR but knowing our load over the next months a number she can work with since we don't want to get injured nor push too much too early as the year will be long and this is just the beginning. We definitely have learned to read our bodies, our fitness and endurance are there, we need to put longer hours and get some speed but other than that we have a tough couple of months coming up and want to do well without breaking apart.

We were also glad to spend time with almost all our teammates and our cheering crowd who were awesome. One more for our 70.3 distance... Again one of our fave races and we will probably do it again, being so close to home. 

Time to get motivated so we can get the peak of our Challenge Atlantic City training in and work on our weak points. Other than that... Let's continue having some fun. :)



PS. Even if the weather is overcast... Do not forget sunscreen! Those sun rays will still burn you and we want to continue playing outside so let's avoid the risk of cancer.


Wednesday, April 2, 2014

A year of 3's

It's been a while since we did an entry, it sucks when real life and grown adults stuff gets in the way of fun. Our year has been crazy busy with work, life and the usual nuances of adulthood. Our workout life has been pretty uneventful, since we are keeping our racing limited we don't have as many exciting things to share when it comes to triathlon... You get us... We hope.

So what have we been up to, not much... Honestly.  Back in February we did our 3rd half marathon. Our 2nd time doing The Cowtown. It was a run that we did to keep a tradition we are trying to start to do The Cowtown and try to get our medal display that they normally have after you run a few of them. This time is 3 medal display, so we are only 2 away :).

Anyways, it was a run that we had not trained much for. Last year if you remember we wanted to close the year with the Dallas marathon! that clearly didn't happen and the wheels fell off after that. We couldn't get our motivation to run or do major workouts, then family in town, the holidays, the cold weather, the really cold weather just added up to no motivation and lack of training. Well.... Guess what... Lack of training sucks when you try to run a half marathon or try to run... period. We had a long run before it of about 10 miles, we felt pretty good but we knew we were not in for any PRs. But we were fine with it, we know we have a long year ahead of us and we are taking it slow. With our races this year, going and killing a super fast half Mary is great but it is not worth at the end with the recovery and how much it would hurt. So we did it... Puli managed a PR by a little over a minute and I managed to finish not walking, not a PR but surely felt every mile of those 13.1. 

We know it's not an excuse, but the cold weather really messed us up this year...we will pay for that in the summer but for now we just want warmer temps. So finally we feel like we've been getting to a constant good volume of workouts, not 100% but more than 50%. We are feeling stronger on our swimming and biking but our run has suffered a lot since we haven't done much of it, crappy weather means not going outside to run.

On Sunday we are going to our 3rd Half Ironman. It will be 70.3 Ironman Texas. We know it is going to be an interesting race, we've had a couple of confidence booster workouts where we feel awesome about it so we will see. Last year our volume was really starting to peak for ironman Texas and burn out was also kicking in, so this year we feel we are more rested so hope that it actually translates to bodies more recovered, we will see... Stay tuned for updates on it.

By now you probably saw the trend... A year of 3s. 3rd half marathon, 3rd half ironman, and you got it, 2nd AND 3rd Full distance with Challenge Atlantic City and Ironman Arizona. Our peak will start probably when we come back from Galveston next week, it will be a good gauge but unlike last year we don't feel burned out. We are trying to keep ourselves from triathlon burnout as we still have 7 months of heavy workouts. A lot can happen and getting injured ain't going to be one of them. :)

So... For now... Hope you haven't missed us too much, we will try to do better, hopefully you will get to see more of us either here or on Res' blog and we can share more of what we've been up to. Hope you enjoy these videos we are leaving you with. After all we TRI to have fun and we pay to have this fun... Might as well... Enjoy the ride :)