It felt great to get back into structured training last week. I was a bit nervous for my long ride on Friday (4.5 hours) as it was my first outdoor ride since IM Canada so I recruited my friend/athlete Al to join me for company since Karel is out of town. Karel was in Mont Tremblant supporting our athletes who were racing there (both did amazingly great!). I've also been recruiting my swim partner Kristen for my swims - on Thursday we had a toughy of a workout. The main set was 4000 (after a 500 warm-up) and the workout was a lot of building, pacing and specific intervals to hit. Our arms were super tired at the end!
Although I'm still not run training yet, I did my first run (on the treadmill) this morning - yay! Celebrating the small milestones.
While I've never had a bone related injury, I'm well familiar with soft-tissue injuries and the biggest thing stopping me from running over the past few weeks was the tugging and tightness that I was feeling. While not true pain, it was not comfortable so I didn't want to risk running through it. And I'm not talking about normal muscle soreness uncomfortable but the uncomfortable where I would have to change my gait and put all my attention into my leg/back instead of truly enjoying the run. However, over the past few weeks, I am spending time in the pool with deep water jogging with an aquabelt. I find it helpful to maintain my run fitness but also for neuromuscular control to keep the running movement going. Thankfully I can still bear weight so I am still loading my bones with walking. I feel like I'm making some great progress with me weaknesses - which involve turning off my hamstrings and lower back and learning how to better active my glutes. I've been working with a movement specialist and it's tough stuff! My glutes have been on fire! Although I've wanted to give up on my return to running many times over the past few weeks, I know this is part of being an athlete. Rather than thinking about this process as a return back to running, I see it as a great opportunity to learn more about my body.
Total workout stats last week:
Swim: 19500 yards
Bike: 9:57 hours
Run (water jogging): 2:17
Strength: 90 minutes (not include PT sessions)
It can be tough to stay dedicated to training when you are dealing with a setback but time is going to pass by anyways so you may as well focus on what you can do in the moment so you maintain fitness and strength and build confidence for race day. Plus, training is also exercise (and stress relief) for me and I still find great joy in moving and using my body so I want to dedicate time to myself everyday, doing what I love with my body.
Since it's just been me and the Campster since Wednesday, we have been spending some quality time outside each day. Alongside marketing my second book, I have my next book (third book) deadline approaching so much of my day has been spent writing, writing and writing. I feel like writing a book is a lot like training for an Ironman. It has its highs and lows, there are moments when you can't wait to do another and then you never want to do it again. But someone, you keep going back for more. Yep, that's a lot like writing a book.
My scratch cornea is finally healed and I've made up for lost time by taking Campy for lots of walks and doing lots of snuggling (careful as to not scratch my eye again :)
