Battling the Beast! (Week 12)

My work buddy and friend Flair complained about the lazy lapsydaisy blog posts from the last couple of weeks, so I have taken the time to add more drivel and hopefully capture more of my thoughts and feelings in this post. All this on top of my demanding training and beast battling schedule. Oh the toil and labour!  

My week started with a 10k run into work. Interval style. Voices in my head were reminding me that the following Monday I would be running in the Milton Keynes marathon.  

Tuesday was a tough day. My poor wife had a bout of food poisoning so we all had a naffs night sleep before this day began. I had originally planned to go open water swimming but figured I'd stay home and look after my wife in the evening. Changed my original plan of running into work for a cycle commute instead. My mind seemed to be in a state of mindfulness as I cycled today and the ripples of water in the canal just grabbed my attention as I cycled the tow path. The ripples of water became an oil painting on a long spread out canvas, just so beautiful. The painting I could see before my eyes became 3-D as a rope swing was past hanging from a tree. Oh what fun could be had and what fun I was experiencing.

The cycle back was more interesting than usual too. A chap cycled up to me and started chatting. He had cycle envy and was telling me I had the bike he wanted. We were both cycling a Genesis Day One single-speed steed, the only difference being that mine had disc brakes and a Brooks saddle. This guy had noticed both and made much comment. His bike looked funky, it was bright orange and reminded me of my buddy Chris Hodge. I made mention to the funky colour of his bike, he replied stating that he thought all bikes should be black (but liked the military green of my bike). We spoke about cycling and his plans to ride LEL (he was impressed I had cycled same). In fact we chatted lots about Steve Abraham, PBP, routes and general cycling nonsense. We went separate ways at Kings Heath (I kinda hope we bump into each other again). As I continued my commute it started snowing and was quite heavy too. Snowing in April, how nuts! I later found out that open water swimming was cancelled tonight so didn't lose out there. Maybe I should have pushed myself and gone for a run. I didn't but had a lovely night fighting monsters with Lunar and Melody and taking refuge in our tent instead.  

A funky coloured bicycle indeed!

As an aside, I recall a conversation I had on another recent commute. Myself and 2 other cyclists were stopped at traffic lights and I noticed they both had lovely machines in a beautiful colour blue that matched my Cannondale road bike. I lost my mind at this point and thought I was cycling my said Cannondale. I commented to them both "wow, how awesome we all riding bikes this lovely exact same colour blue". I then looked down admiringly at my blue Cannondale frame to realise I was in fact cycling my military green Genesis. D'oh!  

On Wednesday, I took the opportunity to go swimming prior to my urgent care meeting. Had hoped to swim long and far (in light of the fact that I didn't open water swim the previous day). My pool based swim felt long and far but I only managed 2,500m in the space of about an hour and a half. When I swim, I pretend I am in the lake during my pending Ironman event - perhaps I shouldn't do this because I only really ever cover the equivalent of 1 lake lap and am aware on the day I have to complete 2! And in under 2 hours 20 minutes.  

Thursday was another bike commute to work and back. My head was filled with thoughts of beast slaying on the way into work. Each time my eye caught a glimpse of the disc rotor on my front wheel my mind pictured an ancient chariot wheel with spikes.

On my return route there was no time to think. All my concentration was required to stay on my bike as a horrific wind was trying to throw me off my steed! Such menace!

Friday was planned to be my most intensive training day of the week and I guess it was. I didn't really push myself and only trained 2 disciplines of my planned 3. I think the pending MK marathon gave me excuse enough to not push myself too hard. My day started with with a cycle to Broadway Tower and back. It took me sometime to decide on which bike to ride - I rightly chose my IM bike. Saintbury Hill was my hill of choice to get me near Broadway Tower and I think this was the fist time I used Kay-O to cycle up it. Flew down Fish Hill at about 60 kph but my bike was making a strange whistling sound. Stopped at the bottom and inspected my bike - a brake block had come loose but thankfully hadn't come right off. A quick stop, tighten with Allen key (multi-tool) and off I went heading for home. Route there and back was in a challenging side wind. About 15 minutes before reaching home, the heavens opened and threw hail at me. The roads were wet and that meant that I got wet, especially my backside, Grr!

Once off the bike, I slowly changed into my running gear and went for a wee brick. My run was just a trek through my village running as many different roads as my legs would allow. It made a kinda pretty pattern once uploaded onto Strava.

Was going to finish the day with a swim but ended up watching 'The Durrells' on catch up instead.   

Saturday was a weird day. Motivation and fear were playing havoc with my mind space. I wanted to swim but couldn't decide which pool to use (and times were limited on a Saturday) and ended up not heading to one. Wanted to run but wasn't sure if I should in the 48 hours before my planned marathon. Is hard to explain the feelings of guilt that I feel when I don't train and the fear that my Ironman will be a disaster.

Facebook informed that it was 5 years since SJ's first 10k race - she hasn't run in a while. Am hoping she'll join tri-club soon and get her running legs back and try some other sports too. Am sure she'd like it. 

SJ's first 10k race, (27/12/2011)

Sunday was a day spent fretting about the MK marathon. Should I run or swim today or shouldn't I? I didn't. I took my own monsters out with a plan to complete a gentle walk and find some blue-bells, we found no flowers but found a Maccy D's. 

A couple of my monsters, blue-bell hunting apparently?!

So at the conclusion of this week, I was a tad disappointed with my training. I had cycled long and far enough - just didn't complete a super long single distance run. Only swam about half the time I had planned for (and no open water swimming). Hardly ran at all, hope this was a wise move with the MK marathon being tomorrow.

Pay day has been and gone. If anyone has a few spare gold nuggets left, please consider sponsoring one of my following charities: CMaD or Macmillan. Thank you :)