It’s been an interesting couple of weeks. I was in Albany last week, which threw my training schedule a little off but also gave me a chance to shift the emphasis of my training a little. That was a welcome change.
For whatever reason, I’ve felt better this week, the week of October 20th, than I have in months. I’ve been out of the hospital now for eight weeks, and after yesterday’s run, I finally feel very much like I’m rounding back into my pre-infection form.
I feel good. For the most part I feel like myself out there. It’s been a while since I could say that.
Swim
I’ve talked about the specifics of what I did in the pool last week other places, so I’ll spare you the workout write-ups here. You can find them in the past week’s posts if you really want to see them.
Strategically, the goal this week was to shift emphasis. I was out of town, which killed my regular commute rides, but that left me with enough aerobic points to put in two full swim workouts without worrying about systemic exhaustion. I therefore totaled 6200 yards in the pool last week, and if none of those yards was particularly good, they weren’t terrible, either.
My best set was probably my last one, 5 x 100 pull @ 1:30, holding right at 1:15 for each rep. I’ve not let myself work uptempo in the pool in months, but I finally cut loose a little at the end of my Saturday swim, and it was glorious.
Swimming Total: 2 x swim workouts (3100, 3100); 62 points
Bike
I didn’t ride last week.
Run
Even though I wasn’t home, I still managed to put in three runs. None of them was particularly long, and I at no point pushed the pace, but I’m out there consistently, and that’s starting to show up in my results.
I ran a little more than four miles on Tuesday before getting in my car for the drive up to Albany. I ran again on Wednesday afternoon, and if any of the week’s runs was fast, it was Wednesday’s run. That one turned out to be just under three miles, with the upshot being that the last half-mile or so was up a pretty steep little climb. As usual, part of me wanted to push the pace and attack the hill, but I kept it light. I’m sure I was outside my aerobic heart rate range towards the end, but I doubt I was over 160 beats/minute, and I was hardly exhausted by the effort. I then ran again on Saturday after my swim. That run was a good bit shorter than I intended and a little bit faster, but I was running short on time, so truth be told, it was a little victory just getting out there.
Running Total: 3 x short run (4, 2.7, 2.3 miles); 36 points
Triathlon Training Total: 98 points
Looking Forward
I ran again yesterday, and that was the best piece of running I’ve done in months. I haven’t felt like that in a long, long time. I ran 2.8 miles at 8:45/mile, and when I took my heart rate at the end, it was hovering right at an easy 145 beats/minute. I could actually feel my body settling into its lactate threshold pace, and it was felt amazing. I could have run that pace for another hour—and would have if I hadn’t needed to come back to the office for the rest of the afternoon’s work. Afterwards, I had one of the greatest runner’s highs I’ve ever experienced.
I plan to run again Thursday, and then I have my first race in over a year on Saturday in Riverside Park. That race is a 5k—not my best distance, nor have I done much training at 5k pace in recent weeks—but I’m still curious to see what I can do. If I can go under 24:00, I suppose I’ll be happy. It’s funny because I’m pretty sure I could go under 50:00 in a 10k right now, but I’m legitimately concerned about going under 24:00 on Saturday. Meanwhile, I think pretty much anyone would tell you that 50:00 is a decent time for a 10k whereas 24:00 is slow as shit for half that distance. And yet here we are.
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