Week 15 - Boise 1/2IM Training

April 27, 2009 - REST

April 28, 2009 - REST

April 29, 2009 - RUN
90 min with 1 mile intervals - I started running and felt fantastic until my back started spasming after 20 min. Wisely (I think) I stopped, headed home and stretched and took a muscle relaxant. I stretched every 15 min all day. I think it worked!

April 30, 2009 - BIKE
I wasn't sure how this bike workout was going to go. It was my 20 min lactate intervals which are tough and I wasn't sure if my back would handle being on the bike. However, the workout was awesome and my back felt fabulous when I got off the bike!

May 1, 2009 - RUN
30 min. easy run - I decided to try out several running paces during this run to see how my back felt. I could feel that it was tight but there was no pain at all, so I guess we'll see how it holds out for Indy.

May 2, 2009 - INDY MINI MARATHON + SWIM
2500 yd.

May 3, 2009 - SWIM
2000 yd.

Week 14 Training - Boise 1/2IM

April 20, 2009 - SWIM
2800 yds. pyramid - I felt great when I got to the pool, but not so great in the pool. I'm not sure what happened, but I felt like it was just really really hard to swim today. I'm not sure if my form was off or what, but it was not a pretty swim.

April 21, 2009 - BIKE
1:34 LT ride - This was a hard frustrating workout. I couldn't get my HR up and I felt like I was working super hard. However, with the help of James Bond, I managed to get through it and even sort of hit my intervals.

April 22, 2009 - SWIM
2150 yds. variable 200s - This swim was awesome. I felt great in the water and was even complimented on my speed. Apparently I'm fast when compared to white haired people.

April 23, 2009 - RUN+SWIM
40 min. tempo - I was lazy last night and didn't run after work, so I woke up early and was running by 4:45am. *yawn* I had a really hard time getting my HR up again. I can't decide if I'm being lazy or what. It was nice to have a short quick run though.
2800 yds. aerobic intervals - This workout went great. My 300s felt strong and were consistent. Kicking for 300 yds takes me a long time. I think I might be a lazy kicker. My lats and triceps are tight so I need to remember to stretch them tonight.

April 24, 2009 - RUN
1:45 long steady run - I really struggled with this workout. I was lazy on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon and didn't do it then, so I decided it would happen this morning. I woke up feeling super tired and had to talk myself into heading out. I've had a little bit of tendinitis in my left shin and was sore, but knew it would feel better while I was running. I started running and just couldn't get going. My legs didn't want to work and mentally I was just tired. When I decided to stop, I felt relief and actually smiled. Not sure if I should have kept going or not, but oh well...

April 25, 2009 - BRICK
2:30 ride+20 min. run - This workout did not go as planned. Sherry and I were going to meet up at Raab and ride out to the lake for a few loops. However, when we noticed the weather and the thunderstorms heading directly for us, we decided to hit the trainers in her basement. We watched "Casino Royale" and actually made it through the entire 2:30 and then headed out with Howard for a 20 min run in the hot humid weather. Definitely not what was planned, but it got done and I completed my 13th week of no missed workouts.

April 26, 2009 - REST

Triathlon Dreams Have Begun

Apparently, tri season is almost here because I have started dreaming about races. Last night I had my first triathlon dream. It was somewhat amusing so I thought I would share. It was the first race of the season and I was standing at the water's edge dreading going into the cold. I was thinking of all of Chris' advice and how I needed to get in and warm up, but I didn't want to. I wasn't wearing my wetsuit, who knows why not. All of these thoughts were rolling through my head about how the race was going to go and if it would be a good experience or what.

Anyways, the race started and into the water I went. The funny thing was that the water wasn't cold. It was very pleasant, so I started swimming and feeling good. I got out to the turnaround point and all of these people were just standing in the water. I couldn't believe they could stand up, so I stopped and asked them why they stopped. One woman said she was resting for 2 minutes. I looked at them like they were crazy and just kept swimming. I made the turn and headed back to the exit.

I was the first one out of the water! I couldn't believe it! I kept wondering how in the world I was so fast, but then I remembered that a bunch of people were just standing around the turnaround instead of swimming, so I ran up to the transition area and realized that I had NO idea where my bike was. I didn't remember setting up my transition area. I searched around until I found Oscar and then realized that my backpack was packed and I didn't know where anything was. Yikes!

So, I started tearing everything out of the pack looking for my bike shoes. They were nowhere to be found. I couldn't believe I forgot them. I seriously looked through the backpack over and over again trying to find them. There were three pair across from my bike, but none of them were mine. What the heck?! Why don't I have shoes?

Then, I started looking for my running shoes and helmet and stuff and I didn't have any of my tri stuff. I'm sitting next to my bike, with a tri backpack filled with nothing but useless junk. There is nothing in there that I can use to do my race. I didn't know what to do. I just kept rummaging (my tri bag is big) and searching through this bag and was getting really frustrated. I looked up and realized that I had been sitting in transition for over 30 minutes and there were no other bikes around.

At this point, I decided to just call it a day. There was no way I was riding my bike or running with no shoes. I started shoving everything back into my backpack and grabbed Oscar and marched off to my car. I couldn't believe that I was the first person out of the water (like that would ever happen) and then couldn't finish the race because I didn't prepare my transition area or even bring the right stuff with me to the race.

Then, I woke up... So, yes, apparently racing season is coming soon. I'll be on the lookout for more crazy dreams about my races.

Happy Easter! Part 2

Yesterday was Easter Sunday. I was looking forward to a sunny day that would include Reese's peanut butter eggs (my very most fav candy), church, some laying on the couch movie watching, dinner with friends, and The Amazing Race. I should know not to expect my days to turn out as planned...especially since I seriously have the best luck in the world.

I woke up around 7am, made my spinach artichoke dip for dinner, grabbed a shower and got ready for church. I usually enjoy church on Easter so I was looking forward to going and I was also glad that it was warm enough to wear my spring-y skirts. I headed out the door and drove over to the church only to discover there was no one there. What the heck!? No church? Then I remembered it was stake conference and that it was starting later...like when I had made plans to eat dinner with friends. Darn it...no Easter church... So, I headed home.

I arrived home and changed clothes and spent some time on the couch with a book. I cooked my spinach artichoke dip, considered cutting up my strawberries and veggies, but instead proceeded to eat lots and lots of Reese's peanut butter eggs. I decided to just finish off the bag because I certainly don't need them lying around the house. I also ate some turkey jerky to offset the sweetness of the eggs. Anyways, it was time to head over to the McLoda's for Easter dinner, so I loaded up my 7 layer dip, chips, and spinach artichoke dip and headed out.

While I was on my way there, I noticed I had a voice mail, so I listened and it was from Casey's Flower Shop. They wanted to deliver me some flowers. I was totally puzzled...who would send me flowers? Why would anyone send me flowers? Really?! So, I drove over to Casey's to pick up my flowers and I also called my mom to see if she by chance sent me flowers. Of course not... I arrived at Casey's and asked who they were from. They said they were from me. Me? Why would I order myself a huge vase full of long stemmed roses and baby's breath (I hate baby's breath)? Why would I do that? So, I asked where the order came from and they said FTD. I asked them to call and see if they could find out who ordered the flowers. They asked if I had a secret admirer. I looked at them with my did you really just say that face. I said, "Well, I hope not because secret admirers are just creepy." They asked if I had a special someone who would send me flowers and of course got the same look. Me...yeah...right. They did and discovered that I had ordered the flowers. I explained that I had not, in fact, ordered myself flowers so after a long discussion with FTD, they said it was a fraudulent order.

Great...that's just great. Someone has my credit card and is ordering flowers. So, I call my mom back and tell her who sent me flowers. I headed over to the McLodas and oh by the way, did I mention that I'm now transporting a huge vase full of a dozen long stemmed roses. My car smells like spinach and artichoke dip and roses. I arrive at the McLodas and haul in the stupid flowers and then go back out to get the food. Everyone is like "Wow...where did you get the flowers?" Of course, I'm totally cranky at this point because I have to call my credit card companies and find out what's going on. Ha ha... Happy Easter AJ!

Now, I should mention that some how, last week, I ended up on a call list. I have been getting at least 20 phone calls a day from all over the country asking me about health insurance and alarm systems and all sorts of random stuff. The best call was someone calling to confirm my order of a 6'5" 210 lb military man. Yes, apparently you can in fact order a man over the internet. Who knew?! I had no idea you could make a specific checklist and then order this man online.

Well, I called my credit card company and a woman said, "Well, it looks like there's been some fraudulent activity on your account." Really? I had no idea. I said, "Yes, I would like to cancel my card." She proceeded to talk to me about all of the random charges that had showed up, like say, ordering a man for instance. We got all of that straightened out and I have a new card on the way to me and a dozen red long stemmed roses. Yeah...welcome to my life.

Of course, this couldn't be the end of my Easter adventures. I headed back in to the house and we all laughed about AJ's funny life. Hey, maybe I should write a book about this. Well, it was time to start cooking. We were having filets, cheesy potatoes, fried okra, banana cream pie, and some other random stuff. The steaks were on the grill, the potatoes and rolls were in the oven, the oil was heating up for the okra. The okra was poured in to the oil. The oil overflowed all over the stove and down the stove door, and on to the floor and just kept flowing and flowing out of the pan. I decided to leave the room at this point...came back in, there was a fire, left again...and then came back after the kitchen fire was out. Yes, there was actually fire! On Easter!

So, now we have peanut oil everywhere, smoke, steaks overcooking on the grill, and I can't stop laughing. Welcome to my life...why! We ate dinner and decided that perhaps the next holiday that I'm at their house, we should order pizza. I should mention that my 7 layer dip and other food turned out great! Dinner was delicious...even if the steaks were a bit overcooked, but only because I like my steaks nice and bloody (thanks Dad!).

Yes, this is how I spent my Easter...dealing with credit card fraud, stupid roses, kitchen fires, and good fun! I wonder what will happen at the birthday party next week.

Week 13 Training - Boise 1/2IM

April 13, 2009 - REST
This turned into an unplanned rest day. I had my swim bag ready to go, but when I got to work it was raining and blowing so hard that when I pulled out the umbrella, it blew inside out three times before I walked away from the car. The umbrella almost got thrown. Anyways, I decided that I was not going to get soaked, fighting an umbrella and walking across campus to the pool.


April 14, 2009 -SWIM + BIKE
2800 yds. - This swim was tough. The warm up took 20 minutes and I felt like I was swimming in mud. It was lots of intervals and sprints and I never did get feeling good in the water. Oh well...it's done.
1:20 LT ride - This was a hot, hard, sweaty, challenging workout. 15 min. at lactate threshold is hard. Doing it three times is even harder. However, knowing that I'll be ready for Boise makes this workout well worth doing.

April 15, 2009 - SWIM + YOGA
2000 yds. - It was so nice to have a shorter swim workout today. I was done in 48 min and that was with lots of drills so yay! My legs are definitely tired today, but no worries. I sure hope that I get to ride outside tomorrow.
Yoga was tough last night. I was tired and I struggled from the very beginning. My body is definitely tight and in need of some bodywork. The balance poses were very funny because mostly I just watched.
**I found out today that my iron levels are low...maybe that's why I've been dragging.

April 16, 2009 - SWIM + BRICK
2700 yds. - This workout went really well. I was definitely tired in the pool, but the water finally felt slippery and I felt like I was moving quickly. I did the workout in 56:57, so I'll take it. I'm really looking forward to riding outside today.
2:30 ride with big gear work + 30 min. easy run - I was so excited to be able to ride outside today. I actually left work early so that I could enjoy the sunshine. I rode for 2:35, but didn't really mess with the big gear work because I was dealing with a nasty crosswind and headwind sometimes. After my ride, I racked my bike and changed my shoes and was out for my 30 min. run. It was a great way to spend the afternoon.

April 17, 2009 - REST
This was not a planned rest day, but apparently my brick workout took more out of me than expected. I was super tired all day at work and had a really great headache going on when I got home, so I spent the evening relaxing instead of doing my long run.

April 18, 2009 - RUN
90 min run with long intervals - I still wasn't feeling great for this workout, but decided I would run with the team and at least get my 45 min run done. However, once I got going I gradually started feeling better. I ran out for 50 min and then headed back in for a 6 min. negative split. By the time I finished I was feeling really good.

April 19, 2009 - RUN
45 min. run - I sort of had to talk myself into this run mostly because it was raining outside, but I guess I picked the right time to go because it only misted for the first half and then rained lightly for the second half of the run. So, I finished my 12 week of not missing any workouts. I wonder how long this will last.

Happy Easter!

The other day, someone asked me if I had any Easter traditions in my family. I thought about it and couldn't really think of any traditions, but I did remember a childhood experience that definitely needs to be recorded for posterity.

When I was a little tiny kid, sometime the week before Easter, my dad told my brothers and I that he could lay eggs. Of course, we believed him because we were really young and we thought that we might have the coolest dad ever. Who has a dad that can lay eggs? He told us that he would work on "making" some eggs over the course of the week and that they would be ready to go by Easter. In order for this to happen though, we had to build him a nest.

Now, my dad is a big man...like 6'7" 250+ lbs big, so we had to come up with some sort of nest that would be big enough for him to be comfortable enough to lay his eggs. My mom helped us out and we ended up with a big box that we could use. Someone cut out the front of the box and we proceeded to build a nest for Dad's Easter eggs.

The next required much work from us. Each day we would plan and build this nest. We would discuss which blankets and pillows were the softest and how to place them in the box so that the nest would be comfortable and cozy. When my dad got home at night, he would come downstairs and check out the nest. He gave us all sorts of tips on how to build the nest and what he would like and what would be the best sort of nest for his eggs. The next morning, my brothers and I would talk about how to use these tips to make the nest better.

The nest building went on for several days and my dad repeatedly told us about his eggs and how they were coming along. We wondered how many eggs dad would lay. We wondered if they would be special colored Easter eggs or if they would look like chicken eggs. Would they be big eggs or small eggs? I'm pretty sure that these discussions must have been hysterically funny to hear because there were three little kids talking about the eggs their dad was going to lay.

Anyways, Easter arrived. We were very excited, probably more excited for dad to lay his eggs than for the Easter bunny to come. We asked my dad if he was ready and he told us yes, so we all ran down to the basement (I'm sure my parents were cracking up) and gathered around the nest. My dad climbed into the nest and started making the funniest chicken noises. If you know my dad, you can probably imagine this. If you don't, imagine the most absurd cartoon chicken noises you've ever heard. He was clucking and moving around in the nest and he kept telling us how hard it was to lay eggs.

Finally, an egg appeared in the nest. It just looked like a regular white chicken egg, but we were SO impressed. He continued to lay eggs and while I don't remember how many eggs my dad laid that Sunday morning, I do remember thinking that I had the coolest dad in the world! My dad could lay eggs!

Well, after the egg laying episode, it was time for church, so off we went. Of course, we were telling everyone we knew that our dad could lay eggs and no one believed us. How could this be? We all saw my dad lay the eggs and we knew that he could do it. We even made a nest for him. Well, we continued to believe that my dad could lay eggs for awhile and to this day I still think that while my dad doesn't lay eggs (thank goodness!) he is still the coolest dad in the world!

Hope you all have a great Easter weekend!

Week 12 Training - Boise 1/2IM

This week is a swim focus week so I get to do one run and one bike and lots of swimming.

April 6, 2009 - SWIM
2600 yds. - This swim went really well. I finished in an hour, even with 600 yds of drills and kicking. The water even felt slippery. One down, four to go.

April 7, 2009 - SWIM
2700 yds. - Last night was one of those hey, let's skip sleeping nights, so I really didn't want to get up to go to the pool this morning. I did, and when I arrived I realized I forgot my watch, so I had to use the clock for my workout, which was fine except it was on the other end of the pool. The workout went fine. I feel like my swim fitness is coming along quite nicely. Two down, three to go.

April 8, 2009 - SWIM + BIKE
2700 yds - My swim today went surprisingly well. It had 1000 yds of drills which was tough. I don't think I know enough drills to fill that much distance. However, even with all of the drilling I finished only 4 min. longer than my last 2700 yd swim. Maybe I'm getting faster...
1:25 LT ride - This was a hard sweaty tough long workout. It's really hard to ride all out in a big gear for 12 min. I had 4 puddles of sweat on my mat under my trainer when I finished. Definitely a tough workout, but I finished...with the help of Planet Earth.

April 9, 2009 - SWIM
2700 yds - I was tired this morning and my arms were tired and sore and I wasn't sure how this workout would go, especially since it was my first time doing 200 intervals. It took about 600 yds before my shoulders started feeling not tight and my intervals went great. All of them were under 3:45 and one was 3:34. My last interval ended up being 250 yds because I sort of lost count of where I was. Anyways, the workout is done and now I'm enjoying some turkey jerky for breakfast. Four done, one to go.

April 10, 2009 - SWIM
2850 yds - This swim went great. I can't believe that I swam 13550 yds this week. My shoulders are tired and a little sore, but no tendinitis pain and I'm definitely not exhausted. It will be interesting to see the results of this swim focus week. Oh, and I'm finally feeling like I'm sort of fast in the water.

April 11, 2009 - RUN
90 min. long run - I had a great long run on Saturday morning and ended up running a 3 min. negative split. I'll definitely take it.

April 12, 2009 - REST

Jet Propulsion on a Bike

Maybe I should try this to get faster on the bike???