Close to home

Some things don’t even seem real until they affect you or someone you care about. Sometimes, even though you keep up to date with the news and world events you still don’t realize how “true” they are because they are not happening right at your front door.

Well, reality struck yesterday. I have a girlfriend who lives in VA. Yesterday morning as I turned my cell phone on when I got to work; a text message popped on my screen. It was from her. It read something like this: “We are all together and safe. Our house was totaled by the tornado, so please keep us in your prayers” My heart broke right there and I immediately thought: Why? Why her and her family? I know they are safe and healthy and together; and that is the most important thing. But I can’t imagine the despair of having a house one minute and it being gone the next. Everything you own, GONE. Having to start from scratch all over again. It just makes my heart ache. I want to help, but I am not sure what to do. I have reached out to her to let her know she can call me whenever she needs me; and that is as much as I can do. That drives me crazy. The feeling of not being able to do more, wanting to be there by her side and not being able to because even though you would leave in a heartbeat, reality is that you have a family and a job you still need to attend to. And that makes me mad.

I am sorry this post is a downer, but I struggled with this all day yesterday and every time I think about it, it brings tears to my eyes and I can feel my heart break just a bit more.

This week is a rest week for me so there won’t be a lot to update, I am retesting on all 3 disciplines to see if I have made some kind of progress. I am seriously hoping that I have improved my swimming times and also that I am able to run at a higher HR threshold because that would mean being able to run faster on the same HR zone as before. I have done my swim test this morning and I am awaiting response from Coach. Running test is tomorrow and bike test is Saturday. I am single parenting this weekend because Todd (my husband) is volunteering at the Wachovia championship (golf) Thursday thru Sunday; so it will be a good chance for mother/daughter bonding time. I need to come up with some fun ideas on what to do. Any suggestions?

Mind games and pool courtesy

Well, another training week is almost over, and the good thing is that next week is a rest week!!! A rest week with almost 7 hours of training scheduled, lower intensity training, but 7 hours nonetheless. Yikes! I am looking forward to an “easier” week.

I had some good days and some other not so good days this week. Most of the “not so good ones” were related to swimming. I just can’t believe how hard it is to make progress on that discipline. I know that I am better from when I first started in multisport 2 years ago, but I still don’t consider myself good enough. It is a hard mind game that I keep playing with myself. It requires a lot of energy to keep pushing and not giving up with the hopes that I WILL get better and that I just need to keep trying. But you know how it is sometimes when you need to see some kind of improvement to keep motivated?? I think I have reached that point with swimming. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll keep swimming because I NEED to, but it would be nice to see that I am getting at least slightly better… so that I can face the swim workouts with a better mindset. I do try as hard as I can, and I will keep trying as hard or even harder; I just wish I could realize some improvement. That’s all.

Speaking of swimming… I got to the pool on Tuesday after work to do my “prescribed” 2600 yds and all the lanes were taken. I approached a woman that was swimming in one and asked if we could split the lane, she said: No problem. So I jumped in and started doing my stuff, sticking to my side. Since I don’t do flip turns, when I get to the end of the pool, I put a foot down, turn around and go again. That is when I saw that someone else had jumped in our lane and was swimming towards the other girl there. I think that by pure chance they did not collide head to head. The girl that was there when I got in (lets call her girl A) had a conversation with the other girl (Girl B) and explained to her that she could not just swim in the same side of the lane as her. If you were to look at girl B you would have thought she was an experienced swimmer. She was wearing a “fast looking” suit and the head cap you get at the local tri’s. But if she was an experienced swimmer, she would have known about pool courtesies. Girl A convinced her to switch lanes, not need to cram us all up in one lane when there are lanes that only have on person. So Girl B switches lanes. Girl A and I keep doing our stuff and when she is done she leaves the pool, leaving the lane all for myself. So I start swimming in the middle of it. No need to stick to the side since I am alone on it, right? I get to one end of the pool and as I am turning to go back I see Girl B swimming in my lane, in the middle of it! She didn’t even TELL me she was coming in; she didn’t even ask me if she could join in. I would have said yes! She continues to do her thing, not minding my presence and I get pissed off. I stand on her way at the end of the pool to prevent her from doing a flip turn. I proceed to tell her that I want to split the lane, not circle swim. She argues with me. At this point I am getting really upset. I simply said: I do not want to circle swim, we are splitting the lane. After that I put my goggles back on and kept swimming. I think I kind of intimidated her because maybe 5 minutes after that she left. I know that the way I acted was not the most polite of all, but she could have caused us to hurt ourselves. All it would have taken was for her to ASK me, or even call my attention before she jumped in.
Rude people piss me off.

On Wednesday I had a nice ride outside. Only bad thing was that traffic. That caused a lot of stop and go. A lot of clipping and unclipping. I almost fell down a couple of times, but I was able to keep my balance and go. I think the kind of pedals I chose were not the best ones. After being used to the ability of clipping on either side, this new thing is hard work! When and if I get a tri bike I will think about getting different pedals and maybe even different shoes. Don’t tell my husband though since I just got these pedals and shoes :-)

Thursday was Masters Swim again. Not a pleasant experience and definitely the worst day of the week.

Today I got up early and did my scheduled brick. Rode the bike on my trainer and then ran outside. I felt good running! I had not felt this good on my feet in a while. I felt light and speedy (even though I was not really going fast... still training in zone 2) and could have kept going for hours.

We are off to MN this weekend to visit family. It will be a long and fun weekend. Lots of stuff planned for the short two days we will be there. I anticipate getting home on Sunday and being exhausted. I am looking forward to running alongside the Mississippi river tomorrow morning, but wouldn’t you know it? After being beautiful up there for the entire week, tomorrow it is forecasted to be cold and rainy… I guess I will have to pack my winter gear. See ya when I get back.

The decision has been made

After much thought, and I mean, months of going back and forth about this. My husband and I have decided that we are not going to have any more children. We have one beautiful, strong willed, sweet little girl and as it stand right now that is the perfect family for us.

I can't tell you how this decision has been hunting me for the past couple of months. At the end of last season I was super ready to get pregnant and become a mom again. It didn't happen as I had wished for it to happen and I literally put my life on hold. I drove myself crazy. I was going to sit out this season and not race, maybe train very slightly, just for the chance of maybe getting pregnant. Not only was I making myself miserable, everyone around me was feeling it too. So I took a change in direction and decided to sign up with Liz for coaching. And then it hit me. 

When I was pregnant with Megan I gained 50 lbs. Yes, you read correctly, 50 lbs. It took me a very long time to lose the extra weight. As a matter of fact, if we compare what I weighted pre-pregnancy to what I weight now, I am still 5 lbs "overweight".  I do not have the best self esteem when it comes to my body. I know it can endure things, childbirth, 1/2 marathons and tri's are proof that I have a strong body; but I don't necessarily like the way it look all the time. Growing up I was always "dieting" as I had a tendency of being on the "chubby" side. I was never fat, but I was never skinny. So this has a very big psychological background. Today, for the first time in almost 4 years I like the way I look. When I look in the mirror I am not disgusted by who/what stares back at me. And that my friends, is huge.

 The second reason behind this decision is my family. I am from South America, and everybody I knew up until I turned 26, when I moved to the US, still lives there. My best friends, my parents, my siblings. Everybody. And I miss them. And I only get to see them maybe once a year. Traveling is expensive and if the bill is high for 3 people I don't even want to think of what it is going to be like for 4. There is no way we could afford to go every year, or maybe every other year. And that is a long time. I know I am the one that decided to move here, and I do not regret that decision a single bit; but I still miss them and want to see them as much as possible. 

We also don't think we would be good parents to 2 children. We both work full time and have our hobbies. He golfs and I train/race. These hobbies are the ones that keep us "grounded", they're our "me" time. These hobbies help us be better people, better parents. They take our minds out of our daily worries at least for a little while. But the hobbies take up time. And maybe for selfish reasons, I don't think we are ready to give them up yet. 

I still believe this is the right thing to do for us at this time. We have not set anything in stone. We have not taken any drastic measures to prevent a pregnancy. Still the decision makes me feel guilty. Megan will be an only child. The statement hurts my heart and at the same time makes me feel relieved. WOW.

Outside

Today was my first ride outside in a very long while. Before I got my indoor trainer I had not been on the bike since early March. It was my first ride after switching to road bicycle pedals (I had Mountain bike pedals on my road bike -long story-), and since every little new piece of technology/gadget/bike part has a learning curve attached to it, I fell. Not when I was trying to unclip. No, I have that one kind of "mastered" (keep repeating unclip in my head until I reach a stopping point), but when I was trying to clip on. With my old Mtn Bike shoes I was able to clip on either side of the pedals, the road pedals are a different story.. They only clip on one side... I fell on my butt, got a monster bruise... One so big that when my daughter saw it she said: "Wow Mommy, that's the biggest boo-boo I have ever seen!" I felt like an idiot and did not ride outside for a while.

Fast forward to today. Coach prescribed a 1:30 ride, outside on a flat course; with some sets at a faster speed and different HR zones. Well my friends... Charlotte is NOT a flat city. I tried to find the flattest course I could. Turns out it was not as flat as I thought it was. You know those inclines that look like flats and then when you charge at them you realize that you legs are kind of burning? And why would your legs burn if you are on your small chain ring riding a flat? Because the stupid road is not flat!!!!!! Anyway, I tried to make the best out of the ride, and decided to stick to the plan that Coach had given me. Intervals on the big ring and all. 

I think I did pretty well, got through the ride and was not as tired as I anticipated I was going to be. I guess the only thing that truly concerns me is that sometimes (well, on every workout really) my HR creeps up over the limit that I am allowed. And I am worried that by not truly staying in the zones that I need to stay I am not making as much progress as I should be making. Do you know what I mean? And since I am still not very good at "knowing" what zone my HR is just by realizing how I feel/breathe; I have this need to be glancing at my watch every 30 seconds to make sure I am staying in the range I am supposed to stay. It is confusing, I know :)

I have signed up for my first little race of the season. May 9th will see me getting to the start line of a local 5k that begins at 7 pm. I have never done a race in the PM, it should be cool. One thing I know, I am itching to go fast and this should definitely do the trick.

Swimming, Swimming and more swimming

Wow, what a week so far! I am not sure how I have managed to survive it yet. But I am still here.

My goodness have I swam this week!

On Tuesday after a lousy day at work I went to the pool all by myself and swam the prescribed 2200 yds. There were some hard sets but was ok overall. The toughest ones were the ones where I was suppsoed to sprint. Talk about a burn in you lungs! That is one sensation that I cannot get used to and to this day it still makes me a bit panicky. Truth be told I had to stand up during some of those sets because the “ugly” sensation became too much for me to handle. I kept thinking about Liz’s words of wisdom, the ones that she shares with everyone in her blog and how we are always our own limiters; and that made me push harder and harder. I was still not very satisfied about the results but I do have another 2200 yards under my belt. And that has to count for something, right?

Wednesday was an interesting day. I was super busy at the job and wasn’t even able to break properly for lunch. I ate at my desk and got caught up reading about some of my new blogger friends… I even managed to find some new inspirational people. After the regular 8-5 day was done I headed out to do my run. This was my first run outside in a while. Since I started working with Liz, she has me training on HR zones. I was used to running fast, going places; and having to considerably slow down has not been an easy adjustment. It almost feels unnatural as I shuffle along trying to keep my HR in the zones that coach wanted me too. The town I live is not exactly flat, so an “easy” run is populated by little hills that can throw your HR out of the place you want it to be. So there was a lot of walking involved, which of course I do not like to do when the workout prescribes an easy “run”. But, since Coach know what she is doing and why she is doing it, I was a very good student and played by the rules. Then came the hill repeats. Hills are my nemesis… they have the power to defeat me, every.single.time. This year, I am going to fight them teeth and nails and I am going to prevail. I am going to learn to not be scared of the stomach aches that happen when I run fast uphill. And once I do I am going to get to the top of the hill and I am going to smile victoriously. These hill repeats were of the not so hard kind. I had to do five of them. Run up the hill at a considerable effort, and run down it easy. The good thing I discovered is that all of this HR training is working. By the time I was about 75% into the descend, my HR was already on the recovery zone. And Coach says that is good.

After the run I headed for an easy swim with my old tri group. It was a mere 1000 yds, but were very focused on from. There was an instructor present and she was able to watch my stroke and give me some pointers to improve it. Very productive. I got home last night at about 8:45 pm. I left at 6:30 in the morning. Long day!

This morning I went to my first session of Masters Swim. After having swum the noght before I do not think it was the best of ideas. My arms were already tired and I do not think I got enough rest. I was scared/nervous about Masters, but it turned out to be ok. I was on a lane all by myself; which I think kind of defeated the purpose of me attending the group sesssion, but maybe once the instructor gets to know how I swim she wil put me on a lane that has people on it. The workout was quite challenging, and honestly I am glad I went and I am done for the day.

My body is tired, but I am still going to do everything that is on my schedule. I will give it my all, and then when rest day comes around,it will be even more enjoyable.

IronMeg!!!! and other random things

One of the bloggers that I read frequently, Meg, became an Ironman yesterday at IMAZ! You should stop over by her blog and congratulate her!

After reading about her experience I realized I REALLY want to do one! Even though I am scared of the water start with all 2000 people in it, even though I am afraid of getting swum over, and kicked and punch. Even though I have never run 26.2 miles, let alone doing it after riding for 112... But with the proper training and dedication and the help of my coach; one day I will become one. This I know for sure.

I had a bike workout scheduled for today. I got up this morning at 5 am, changed clothes, took a sip of water, put on my contacts and jumped right onto my trainer. It was a zone 1-2 ride, with some intervals for building leg strength. For a portion of the intervals I needed to stand up to pedal. I know how to pedal standing up... outside, when the bike is actually moving and there is some give on each side (bike can rock a little bit), but doing this on the trainer seemed weird and even dangerous. I kept thinking I was going to fall to the side, hit my head or break and arm or something. I am new to this trainer thing. I barely got it last monday, so I was not sure what to expect. 

The first interval was interesting, I managed to keep my HR in check until I had to stand up, and then I lost it! My HR jumped all the way to zone 3... almost 4. So I sat down. I figured keeping the HR in check was more important than pedaling standing up. Truth be told I did not ask my coach about this... note to self: send Liz an email....

Interval number 2 found me not being afraid of falling anymore as I had already attempted to stand up with successful results once before (well kind of successful). So I tried to focus on keeping the HR low. I managed to do ok, but there was still some more room for improvement.

Interval #3 was the one that I was finally able to conquer the task at hand. Hooray for me! I know this might seem silly to a lot of you, but it felt good to figure out what the best way to do the drill was.

After the workout, I showered, got Megan ready for school and after a protein drink and a banana we all left for the day. Work was work, long day and sort of frustrating; but you learn to deal. It is now 9 pm and I am ready for bed!

I have a swim scheduled for tomorrow, and wednesday and masters on thursday (my first time attending. Coach wants me to swim all strokes and I only know 2 or 3. Should be interesting) I will let you know how sore my arms are on friday.

Once again Congrats to IRONMEG!!!!!! You rock!

Creative weekend.

This weekend I got to attend an event based around my other passion: papercrafting/art. It was 2 days full of trying new things and meeting new people. It was also the opportunity to meet some of the people that inspire me in a creative way. I totally went into the event with the mindset of not being a groupie of any of these amazing ladies, and I managed to do just great until I landed into the workshop of the lady I admire the most, Kal Bartesky. She  is an amazing artist, full of creativity, talent and the most rocking awesome attitude. She calls it "Bulletproof positive attitude" and I am a believer. 

The concept is simple... you learn to not listen to what other people say and you do not let anybody bring you down. Easy to say, and not so easy to do. You basically become your very own #1 fan, and you talk yourself into felling like a rockstar. Well, for someone with not so high self esteem this can be a very tough task. I am proud to say I worked on it this weekend.  I worked on becoming my number one fan and more than anything in believing that what I do is good. I focused on creating art (my own special way) without looking at other people's work for comparison. Inspiration? Yes. Comparison? No. And it felt good. 

It felt good to let go of my own mental limitations and just let myself create to my heart's content. It was just the little bit of creative time I needed.  Two of the projects I worked on were related to triathlon. I put together a small book where I plan to put a couple of pictures from each race this year to document my season. The other project was kind of liberating. I used the phrase "I tri" and then let the "reasons" why I do it flow to my head as I wrote them down. The biggest one.. "because it became a part of who I am". And I thought WOW. That made my day.

Training was good this week/weekend. Today was a day off and I have been glued to the computer watching Ironmanlive... Addictive! I am thinking 2010 will be my ironman year... I need to get a couple of HalfIM's under my belt before I feel comfortable enough to tackle the long distance. I am not ready yet, but I will be. My "Bulletproof positive Attitude" will be with me the whole way... Thanks Kal for the inspiration, to make art and to not let anyone shoot me down. Not even myself.

I CAN do this

So today I had yet another swim workout. For someone who does not like swimming I have the impression that I will be visiting the pool quite frequently during this training adventure.

The warm up was uneventful; I was trying to focus on form and controlling my breathing, which is where I need the most work. You see, I tend to kind of freak out when swimming. Think that my lungs won’t be able to keep up with the pace and all of the sudden the thought of not being able to breathe whenever I want (when I have my face in the water) starts to creep in. I keep having to remind myself that while I am at the pool I can always stand up and be just fine. Stupid. Yes I know. I don’t consider myself afraid of the water but it definitely plays tricks with my mind and it is my “weakest link”.

My main set had a continuous swim for a number of yards I have not swam continuously in a very long while, followed by a set of 75’s where I was supposed to alternate between going easy and fast, ending with the last two being all fast. It was hard! In the middle of my first “fast” (note the quotation marks, as I did not feel like I was moving fast at all) I really wanted to stop and call the segment quits. I didn’t. I finished the best I could, and had to take a longer rest than the one “prescribed” by my coach. I tackled the second one. I was determined to swim it continuously. I was only able to do it for 50 yards, I had to take a small 3 second rest before the last 25 to regroup and somehow get my stroke back together. I kept telling myself: remember to roll and feel the slide. So I did. It wasn’t any easier as I was getting tired and my breathing was still messed up, but I got through it.

What followed was relatively easier than the set I had just completed, so I faced it with a more “relaxed” mind. And then the cool down. I had completed the workout, all 2200 yards.

For the record, that is the longest I have EVER swum, and you know what, it wasn’t that terrible. I know I have a really long way to go, to really become comfortable in the water; but it is little accomplishments like this that make me think… you know what? I CAN do it.

The training week in review

Well, this was my first week of training under Liz's guidance. I can't tell you how much difference having a plan, a goal make when thinking about training. All of the sudden this week I found myself full of energy, and willing to get up extra early in the morning, just so that I could get some quality workouts in. I was even looking forward to going to the pool! Now that's strange!

On tuesday after getting everything ironed out, my coach gave me my workouts for the rest of the week.  I was so excited about seeing the schedule! For the longest time I had been working out just to work out and was getting kind of burnt out; and seeing the variety on the calendar made my heart start pumping extra hard :) (in a good way).

Wednesday morning I got up and headed to the gym for my 45 min run. It was an easy run with some 30 sec pick ups mixed in. I woke up with a really sour stomach that morning (something I ate the night before was just sitting way wrong with me) and that mixed in with the pickups made for a challenging 45 mins. I also think that I got a little too carried away with the pick ups and be the time I hit the last one I was ready to be done. Not because I was extremely exhausted, but because my insides were screaming for me to run to the bathroom! HA!

On thursday I had the dreaded swim test. Now, to be perfectly honest... I do NOT like swimming, not a single bit. Maybe it's because I am not good at it, maybe it's because I keep thinking that I will not be able to take the next breath and that scares me, maybe it's because it is extremely hard...Well, maybe it's a combination of the three... Anyhow, I planned on doing this test during my lunch break at work. I went to work and the clock kept ticking slowly...Finally at 11:30 I thought: I might as well get there and get this over with. So I headed out... It is a 5 minute walk from my building to the gym, and I can not tell you how nervous I got during that 5 minute walk! I thought I was going to barf! I got to the pool and there was an open lane. Bingo! I warmed up as suggested... 500 yards that seemed to take forever! And then i got ready for my timed 500.  I was highly doubting myself here. I tried to keep a somewhat fast pace, but I don't think I have a somewhat fast pace, so I just swam the best I could. And you know what? I managed to finish the set! And I wasn't as slow as I thought I was going to be... It was definitely an ego booster. It gave me what I needed: knowing that I COULD do it.  Thursday evening I did some core work and I was done for the day.

Friday I had my run test. I like running, I am fairly decent at it. I have done a couple of 1/2 marathons and I have enjoyed the training process. The hard part for me here was going to be finding the right pace. See, I tend to go really fast during my first mile and then progressively slow down. I needed to find a pace that I could keep for a while, something that would make me work, but would not leave me totally breathless. I think I managed to do it fairly well, but I could have gone a bit faster perhaps. There is always next time.

Today, I had another swim workout. This time I was to swim a total of 2000 yards. I have NEVER swam that long this early in the season. Last year, my first couple of workouts were at the most 1200 yards... that is a bit of a difference, don't you think? The main set was the most intimidating of them all. Some 4x300's. I had to talk myself into just focusing on the task at hand... Tackle each 300 just thinking about that 300, forgetting about anything else. I was surprised at how well it worked! I was able to finish the sets just fine. I was a little tired towards the end, and I definitely felt my stroke deteriorate; but I thought it was a great workout. I got out of the pool feeling confident, chest puffed out and a big grin on my face.  I am pretty sure the people swimming masters in the contiguous lanes stared at me kind of funny, but I don't care. After the pool I did an easy spin on one of the indoor bikes and headed home.

This was my first week, and I can already feel the difference. Not in my level of tiredness, but in my sense of purpose.

 This is going to be a great year...

Meet my coach ....

Well, it is official. I start training with a coach tomorrow. 

I am both nervous and excited. It is a huge step on my commitment to the sport and I am so very ready to take this step. It is also different from everything I have done before. I used to train with a group, I used to rely on others to pull me through tough workouts. And now, even though I will have my coach (the E.L.F.)to provide the guidance I need;  I will only have myself to get me through the training hours. That is exciting and scary all at once. But my mind is ready. My body is ready. I have been doing the same "routine" at the gym week after week for the whole winter. All because I had no plan. Now I have a plan. And I have goals (note the s at the end of the word to denote plural). I also have a few races in mind, and other fun events. I will post the links to those races later on, as I have not finalized the schedule yet. But I will tell you that I will be attempting to go long...  How long?

After thinking about it thoroughly, I have decided that this is the year I will do a Half IM. It seems like a natural progression. My first season I did a sprint, my second season I did a sprint and an Oly... My third season I will do a bunch of sprints, an Oly and a Half IM.  Seems only natural, right?