April Showers Bring May Mud

A few posts ago I mentioned that I was going to a triathlon session at a local bike shop.  And I was nervous.  I showed up on time and got my nametag, a seat, and an informational packet. The itinerary was something like

-Food and social interaction
-Presentation by triathlete/triathlon coach
-Shopping
-Door prizes

Let's be honest.  I knew I was going when I saw "door prizes".  I am usually good at winning stuff.

It was a little awkward at first but I had conversations with a couple of people who were also looking into doing their first triathlon.  It feels weird to say, but it was comforting knowing that there were others with the same fears!  


The event was free so I was surprised by the amount of food!  Subway sandwiches, fruit platters, trail mix, cookies, and drinks.  Oh my!  I had already had many (3!) sweets that day, so I had to pass on the cookies even though they looked great.  During this time, we also put our tickets into the prizes baskets for the drawing.  You had one ticket and could enter it for one specific prize (out of about 6 or 7).  There were some cool things, which I knew would get a lot of ticket entries.  I put mine into one for something less exciting...Camelbak Elixir in "lemon lime" flavor.

I believe the presentation was a half hour.  If you're talking about triathlons, specifically training and races and transitions, a half hour isn't a whole lot of time.  The information wasn't anything earth shattering to me, but it did make me nervous!  :)  There's just a lot that goes in to a triathlon.  Something I hadn't thought a lot about before was the amount of training you should invest into each of the three sports.  He said to focus on your weaknesses or if you're pretty even, then train for each sport based on the percentage it takes of the triathlon.

Oh, fart.  That probably means I am swimming too much (is there such a thing?!?) and cycling and running too little.  That is definitely something I did not like, but I started to warm to the idea.

After the presentation was "shopping" where they gave us a discount coupon and set us free in the store.  I talked to a salesman about his triathlon experience and then rummaged through the discount bin (which I later found out was not included w/the coupon, boo!) while chatting with my Trifit teammate, Rob.  Then it was time for the prizes.  My prize was third to be picked and my number was called! Holla!

I chatted with Rob and the organizer of the event for a little bit and then found a new friend named Melody (If you're reading this, HI MELODY!).  I almost  told her about my blog in person, but I was too freaking shy about it.  Story of my life!  Also, I haven't told anyone in real life about my blog :)  But she gave me her email, so in the end, I did let her know!

So all of that gave me a little bit more motivation to kick it in gear this week.  Here's the rundown!

Monday:  Bike repair workshop with Trifit. Coach Jeff brought his bike in and showed us how to do tire repairs and some other basic things.  Basically, I will pray I never get a flat, but carry the tools with me to fix it!  After that I ran on the treadmill with 0.25 warm up and cool downs and a mile at 4.3 in the middle.  It felt pretty hard, but I stuck it out.  I am having issues with my feet, the arches specifically.  It is nothing I can't workout through, but while cycling or running, about a mile in, my arches cramp up for a while, and then it goes away.  Just annoying, but I wonder if I need new shoes, etc. (I'm hoping I don't need new shoes, I have spent WAAAY too much $ on cycling!).  After that I hit up the beginner spin class.

Tuesday:  Went to Yoga and we had 9 people which is a lot for that class :)  Most of us are beginners and there is one lady who is way more advanced, but it is fun to watch her sometimes.  Then I took my bike into the shop, like I detailed in my last post.

Wednesday:  I had to work at the church, but I wanted to get a run in beforehand, like last month.  It was 80, so it was pretty warm.  Luckily, the nature preserve had blossomed gloriously :) and it was gorgeous.  It was much muddier than I expected.  I guess that record breaking precipitation in April had really gotten the best of the nature preserve.  It made me laugh to think that last summer we had a drought and most of the creek beds and paths were bone dry and the earth was cracked then, but now the creeks were very high, the paths were muddy in spots, and the "swamp" that was not there last year was recognizably swampy today.  My legs felt very tired on this run and I totally doubted any physical fitness I think that I might possess.  However, I remembered in May/June last year, I was ecstatic to run the swamp loop (about 4 minutes) without stopping.  It was quick, about 24 minutes total.  I drove over to my fave froyo place for dinner :) and then hurried on to the church.  I had the 1-2 year olds, and they were a little nuts.  I drove home and I knew I HAD to get my bike out.  It was about 9:30 at this point, but I needed some more practice!  I played around with the gears and was unsuccessful at getting both feet in the pedals, but eh, such is life.  I did tip over but catch myself before falling.  Apparently the gears scratched my leg and I was bleeding a little.  Still felt pretty badass showering off the mud and blood at the end of the day.  Plus, it felt great to be outside so much.  I really missed it over the winter.

Thursday:  I had a choice:  ride my bike outside or go to spin class.  The day, again, was gorgeous.  I knew I wanted a good workout, but would probably make a fool of myself if I rode on the main trail in town.  The last thing I need is trying to watch out for tons of other cyclists, walkers, runners, people and their dogs, and kids.  I chose the spin class.  One at YMCA C was at 6:30 and YMCA B was at 5:45.  I had been getting home so late for the past couple of weeks, I just wanted to be done and get home early (really my room is such a pit!).  So I went to the class at YMCA B.  I hadn't done one here before, but I sucked it up and went.  I walked into the room, which is a multipurpose room, housing a bunch of other things.  The handlebars on the bikes were different than the other YMCA, so that was weird.  The instructor turned off the lights and turned on a strand of rope lights that went around the room.  She pumped up the music and we were off!  I've done one other full hour spin class before, and it was hard, but it wasn't impossible.  This one, it was hard!  Rests between intervals weren't sitting down at a lower resistance, they were out of the saddle aka standing and peddling.  Oh my legs were so tired so quickly!  If it had been my first spin class, I might have walked out crying in the middle!  I worked much harder than I ever had before and close to the end, the sweat was streaming down my arm ( I could feel it drip-dripping off!).  At the end of the class, when the lights were turned back on, I could see all the salt residue where my hands had gripped the handlebars during the class.  Felt hardcore.  Well, until the instructor told us that she wouldn't be there next week because she was pregnant and going for her first sonogram.  LOL that pregnant lady just OWNED me! 

I was so excited to get home by 7!  Oh the things I was going to do! Clean, shave my legs, maybe eat sitting down.  It's the little things in life!  SwimSis was at a different YMCA when I got home, and Coach wanted to know if I could watch SwimTot while he met his friends for a beer.  Yeah, that is fine, you know I love my SwimTot.  She wanted to ride her bike outside and I wanted to check out this lake a little ways down the road that I always see when I drive by.  I ate (standing in the kitchen!) while she rode her bike around the kitchen, lol.  We set off and lake was very pretty.  We talked about a lot of things like what happens when you mail a letter, what our favorite colors were, "outside restrooms"aka port o pottys.  haha!  I didn't know exactly when the turn around would be, but the lake doesn't look very big from the road, so we just kept going.  And going.  And going.   By the time we got the far side of the lake, SwimTot was saying she was tired!  And let's be honest, I was too!   I had been running/walking with her on this trip.  After a discussion about "bad words", she tells me "we don't say kill".  Then like 5 minutes later she says the word "murderer".  What?!?  Kid doesn't even know what that means, but I told her and hopefully she doesn't say it again.  She did reprimand me earlier in the evening because I said "that spin class almost killed me!" :)  Long ride short, I had to call SwimSis to come pick us up.  The "small" lake is bigger than I anticipated.  We went 3 miles, which is exactly 2 miles longer than I anticipated!

The accidental route. Can you envision how small it looks from the main road there at the top?

Friday:  Beautiful, glorious rest day.

Saturday:  There was a very large half marathon happening in town, so SwimSis and I were both babysitting for people who were running/their family was running.  I made it to 40 minutes of Pilates class.  In the afternoon, I decided I need more of a ride on my bike that I had been doing around the apartment complex.  I am very, very lucky that my neighborhood has bike lanes on the main roads and the adjacent subdivision is part of a designated "biking greenway", so people are pretty aware of cyclists and vice versa.  That, however, does not mean that it is not terrifying to ride in the bike lane on the main road.  Holy crap I was freaking out inside!  I was thinking "I only have a helmet?!?  I need full armor!".  I was only on the main road for less thatn 1/10th of a mile before I turned into the subdivision :)  The ride in the subdivision was pretty uneventful.  I practiced my hand signals for turning and felt a little silly and uncoordinated.  I was tired, so I called it a short ride at 3-3 1/2 miles.  The only thing was that I had to turn out of the subdivision onto the main road to go back home.  I knew what I had to do in my head.  Right foot at about 3 o'clock, push off with the left, get my rear in the seat, and pedal furiously all the way home.  Well....getting my rear in the seat didn't go as planned.  My rear is pretty flat and sometimes my clothing has extra fabric in that area.  When I went to put my rear on the seat, that fabric got caught underneath, not allowing me to put my rear on the seat at all.  So I fell over.  I couldn't get my right foot out of the toe cage in time, so I put my hands down (thank you Jesus for cycling gloves!) and hit my knee and hip a little.  As I was pretty embarrassed, I said a choice word, picked myself up, took a minute to get my footing and get situated again before trying.  Second time was a success.  I was shaky till I turned into the apt complex, but hey, I embarrass myself on the regular, so this wasn't such a big deal.  First fall on the bike...check!

Do I look like a real cyclist? haha!

New scratch from gears next to old scratch from gears.

Wee bit 'o road rash

Tried out these tri shorts

They feel too small in the stomach

Basically, I would like them to cover my love handles better!

I did go to Dick's Sporting Goods and found 2 pairs of bike shorts that should work.  Should being the key word.  I picked up some other stuff for my bike (water bottle cage, lights). I tried on a couple of clearance pairs of women's athletic shorts.  But they really all had like 3.5 inch inseam.  3.5 inch inseam is a frightening thing!

In other news:  My eating has been a little out of hand on the weekends and it makes my healthy eating, or attempts at it during the week pretty miserable.  I feel like I'm grasping at straws as to healthy things I want to eat.  Blerg.

Weight is still going down, but slowly.  233 this week.

Work is becoming stressful as I'm taking a lil trip to see some friends this next weekend (cramming a week's worth into a couple of days) and one of my coworkers is very pregnant.  I asked her when her last day was.  She said "whenever my water breaks".  Uh, Imma all be acting like a man if that happens at work.  Or everytime I interact with her, I'll feel like walking away slowly as to not disrupt the earth's balance and I will speak in quiet tones.

I went to a service at the church that I work at today and it was about worrying vs being joyful.  Definitely feeling more of the worry than I should :/  Going into another week, gonna make it a good one.  Hope you all do too!

Any embarrassing workout stories from anyone else on the interwebs this week?

Is there anything making you worry this week?

Did anyone realize I haven't swam in over a week?  Maybe that will ease my anxiety :)