Orca but no whale...

So whacked after my first triathlon club session that I chose not to do anything exercise-wise on Monday. My calf muscles felt a bit achey-breaky and I didn't want to risk any sort of injury. Aid's sprained ankle has kept him from exercising for about a month now!

Tuesday was my first run of the week. I ran my 'Run 2' route in the rain. My new cap worked just fine in keeping the rain out of my eyes and face. Really am starting to look proper geeky.

Wednesday was a nice cycle commute. Felt kinda weird to be back on my cyclo-cross 'commute' bike as my cycling has reduced a little since my 'other activities' have increased and have used alternate bikes on my last couple of adventures. A burnt out mobility scooter was passed in both directions of my commute. That's got to be the first time I have seen such a burnt out vehicle on the no.5 cycle route. Hooligans!

Wanted to do a long run on Thursday and SJ had prepared me a nice (hmm) 8 mile loop. Sadly it was raining hard and I played the fair weather runner card. Instead of running, I went for a swim. This swim was just a whole bunch of lengths in the pool. I was sporting goggles and a swimming cap which made for an altogether different experience. The goggles certainly prevented me from getting sore eyes (but became misty quite frequently, despite being 'anti-fog'). The swimming cap worked ace. I had never worn such a geeky cap before and didn't know what to expect. Once in the pool, all thought of myself wearing a cap disappeared (bet I looked a sight though). Once out of the pool, I removed my cap and wow, my hair was dry! It might sound obvious, but I wasn't expecting that! Ha!

At this juncture I must point out that Lin had gotten me the swimming cap - in fact she has gotten me 3! Thanks Lin. Lin also won a whole bunch of triathlon gear in a raffle (book, floats, my goggles, etc, etc) and kindly gave all that stuff to me. How awesome! Better yet, SJ got me a rather funky Orca RS1 Killa tri-suit. This suit looks amazing and gets great reviews. Again, not what I expected at all - it is wafer thin, weighs nothing and can squashed into a little bundle that would fit into your hand (I thought it would have been more like a wetsuit or material like swimming trunks or something). I wanted to wear it today, on my Thursday swim. I thought better of it, and figured it would have to wait until triathlon club day.

Friday saw me complete another bicycle commute. Just for fun I cycled an alternate route to my norm in both directions. I passed the burnt out scooter landmark though and was surprised it still remained.

Saturday was Parkrun. It was nice to see Phil B there again. Neither of us achieved a PB. This was my 7th Parkrun to date and I finished in 61st place out of a field of 338 runners. My official time was 22:27. I guess being a 'good samaritan' and helping a fallen runner up at the start didn't do my time wonders. The guy I helped out didn't express any thanks, he just said 'well there goes my chance of a good time', I replied 'same here'. This was probably the most congested I have seen Parkrun and the start line was moved due to a local fair.  Up until this Parkrun, my times had improved on each successive run.

Sunday was 'tri-club'. This week we swam for an hour and then ran straight after. The swim was great because a chap called Lee (I think) really 'looked after' myself and 2 others - 'the impossibles'. I am really not a great swimmer. Lee was getting us to complete a number of 'drills' to help us improve technique. We would have to lift our elbows high and tap our shoulders on each stroke, then brush our thumbs alongside our thighs and all sorts of other wonderfully weird stuff during different lengths. Sometimes we used floats and sometimes not. The session finished with me performing my first water somersault 'thing' and then kicking off the wall as I turned. I have little idea what the other triathletes were doing.

The tri-suit SJ had gotten me was awesome and made it's debut during my swim. It's quite a trick zipping it up/down though and I usually need help. I kept the suit on for the run session that followed.

Only 6 of us attended the running session as a number of folk had participated in events earlier in the day. The session took the form of 'hill repeats', which was a new concept for me. We took a gentle jog to the foot of a hill and then ran up and down it, about 1k each way. I stuck with the fastest runner and chatted till I was out of puff. On the run down, I felt obliged to copy this faster runner and 'high 5' each runner we passed - this appeared to be the normal thing to do amongst the others (on 2 occasions I completely missed the hand). At the foot we rested until we were all grouped together. Then we ran again (hence the 'repeat'), only this time we all agreed to race (except 1 who was whacked). I followed the fast chap to the top and ran past him to the finish! I'm sure he could have beaten me if he so wished, but hey, I came first! I was ready to run a third repeat (as was one other) but it was decided we best jog back to the start. Am enjoying this tri-lark.