Long Training Days

Tuesday: 42 mile ride
Wednesday: 10 mile run

I asked not to taper this week before Steamboat this coming weekend since it seems to be throwing me off. So instead I get distance and intensity throw at me. Just like I asked for.

I was supposed to do 50 yesterday, but that's nearly impossible to get in after a full day of work this time of the year. There's just not enough daylight left. I tried to leave work early, but still didn't get out until about 25 minutes after I had planned. My main set was 11.5 miles Z3, recover, 7 miles Z3, recover, 4 miles Z3. I had written down the distances on my hand. I know, I know. I usually will write it on a small piece of paper and tape it to my stem, but that takes too much time and time is a precious commodity these days. I know, I know. I should have done it the night before. But I didn't. Anyhow, once I got started, I immediately couldn't remember if I was supposed to do Z3 or Z4. It turned out that I really didn't need the distances written on my hand as I immediately committed them to memory. I instead should have written the intensity. I was wavering between the following: it's probably Z3 because I have Steamboat this weekend and Z4 seems like it's maybe too much right before a race OR Z4 sort of makes more sense because he usually breaks up the Z4 sets into smaller blocks and the Z3 sets are more like do 23 miles. So I compromised and did high Z3/low Z4. It was close enough.

In addition to going harder than I was supposed to, I also chose a slightly more challenging course for myself which included 2 times on the Rollers of 63rd, the hill heading east on Nelson between 63rd and 36, and the gradual climb heading east on St Vrain between 75th and 65th. It was a bit more climbing than I usually do. But I guess I knew I wasn't going to get 50 miles in, so I might as well make what I could do count. I tried to plan it so that each interval would have a good combination of up and down, but ended up completely miscalculating on the second one. This one pretty much seemed to be all uphill. I averaged somewhere in the 16s for this uphill interval, which I'm happy with - I'm usually in the single digits climbing. Overall I was able to average low 17s, which I rarely am able to do during a training ride. Go me!

I was very hesitant setting my alarm for 4:30 this morning. I was going to attempt a 12 mile run just a mere hours after my hilly ride. I figured it would be interesting. But it wasn't. I woke up at 4:30 with a killer headache that's been bothering me on and off over the past few days. It was the sort of headache that was not going to help with the run. I quickly figured out if I could rearrange my day and move the run to the evening. I didn't really have a choice though because there was no way I was going to get anything resembling a good run with a pounding head. I went back to sleep and woke up 2 hours later feeling quite a bit better. But it was going to be a struggle to get the run in. I'm having people over tomorrow so the plan was to clean tonight and by clean I mean vacuum the endless amounts of dog hair that just instantly reappears. It's like spontaneous generation. I don't know why, but it takes me an hour to vacuum just the upstairs (which is where we spend most of our time). I have a system too, there's just a lot of hair. Anyhow, I decided it would be a late-ish night and I would vacuum after the run. As if running 10 miles at the end of a long day isn't bad enough, but to add vacuuming on top of this...could I have a more fun evening? This is why I need a personal assistant. Or I guess a maid would work as well. I heard recently on one of the NPR game shows about a survey where they asked women if they could have 2 service-type people available to them, what would they pick. A large majority said a handy-man and a maid. They asked the same of men and surprisingly they answered the same.

Back to the run. I was supposed to do 12 miles, with 6 in Z3. And yes, it was supposed to be Z3 this time. It started off fine but when I went to start the Z3 segment, I found that I was still in Z2. Hmm, tried again. Nothing. Then some cramps started popping up. I wasn't sure if I just hadn't timed my afternoon snack right (I did feel rather full, but I've been starving the last 2 weeks or so) or if it was hydration. I decided to stick with Z2. There was just no forcing the Z3. I turned around after 5 miles since vacuuming was looming in the back of my mind. I'm not sure that I would have been able to do 12 - I was pretty dead after 10. 10 would have to suffice. And considering the problems I was having, it turned out to not be a bad run for Z2. Certainly not my finest run by any means. But for an evening run, it certainly wasn't my worst run either.

I got home and guess what I did? I vacuumed. Wow! It was so much fun. I won't go into detail. You're not missing much. But that was about all I was able to get through. The rest of the tidying up will have to wait until tomorrow where I'll somehow find time to squeeze it in.