TandemHearts

Last weekend I was poking around at the Barb’s Race website looking to confirm what the weight restriction was for the Athena Division.  I couldn’t find it, so I e mailed them.  The reply I received on Monday said that they were not going to have an Athena Division.  There just hasn’t been enough participation to make it worthwhile.  I was seriously depressed.  It is so not fair.   I had been thinking that I could have a faster time this year than last year’s Athena winner.  Yes, I know, it’s not about placing, it’s about doing better myself.  However, thinking I could take 37 minutes off my time  and possibly win was motivational.   But when I looked at where I would place in my age group with that time, I didn’t like it and got even more depressed.  The top 5 finishers in my age group all finished in under 6 hours.  With the time I was thinking of, I’d be in the bottom third.  Reminder to self – It’s not about where you place, it’s about doing better yourself.

Monday afternoon is one of my days with the trainer and this particular day was a Weigh & Measure Day.  As my trainer, Shawna, was measuring my body fat with calipers, I was telling her about how I would now have to race against the wisps and the twigs.  She finished all the measurements, did the math and my Body Fat percentage is 26%.  The lowest it has been in the last few years was 23%, last September when I weighed 148.  Since late December my weight has been fluctuating between 154 and 156, and it sure isn’t from increased muscle mass.  My lean body mass (116 pounds) is more than what some of these women weigh in total.  It is so not fair.  We talked a little bit about changes I could make in my diet (yeah, right!) and then went off to work out.

I started doing the math during my workout and came to the conclusion that if I lost 13 pounds of fat, I ‘d have 18 percent body fat.  That’s what I had in college.  The actual number is 14 pounds of fat.  I did some rounding in my head I guess.    Somehow that just galvanized me into action.  Thirteen pounds of fat, that’s more than a gallon and a half of milk.   EWWWW!   Tuesday I started revamping my diet.  On Wednesday, Shawna and I talked more about nutrition and I’m making some serious changes.  I’ve cut my calories to 1500/day and I’m keeping track of fats, carbohydrates and protein.    My target is no more than 40 grams of fat, 173 grams of carbohydrates and 100 grams of protein per day.  I’m having a hard time keeping the fat down and I’m seriously under proteined.

These changes have really got me thinking about what people eat.  It’s no wonder Americans are so fat!  I love to eat at Jack in the Box.    It’s where we usually go after a long bike ride.  My favorite meal there has 1800 calories and 93 grams of fat!  And that’s just for a (big) burger and a (big) shake.   Imagine eating there all the time and never working out.  Shawna told me that it’s a good thing I do so much cardio because with the way I have been eating, I would be seriously soft.

Thursday I had to choose between the peanut butter for my apple or my chocolate chip cookie.  Naturally, the cookie won.    But at 11 grams of fat, that one item has more  1/4 of my fat grams.  I know people, myself included, who will eat many of these cookies in one day.  They are very tasty, but nutritionally they are worthless.   On Friday our PTA had a movie themed spread for the teachers – pop corn, soda, Kit Kats, Twizzlers, Whoppers,  but worst of all… Reeses Peanut Butter cups – my favorite candy bar!

I ate my apple slices. I figure I need to get as wispy as possible if I want to finish in the top half of my age group.

This week’s training has been a mixed bag.  We’ve needed to do a lot around the house lately so last Sunday became a chore day and that’s what today (Saturday) is shaping up to be.   This week I had my two trainer sessions, biked once, ran twice and did two yoga sessions.

I did both of my runs on Wednesday and it felt so good.  Wednesday morning I went out before work with the intent of just doing two miles.  But I got into such a nice groove I did four miles instead.    Wednesday afternoon before working with my trainer, I did a two mile interval run.  That also felt really good.   Unfortunately, I woke up Thursday with an odd pain in my right hip.  I did yoga and really tried to stretch it out.  It almost feels like a cramp, but not quite as sharp.  I don’t know if it was a result of running or the weight work I did on Wednesday, or just from getting old .   In any case, I won’t be running today.   I haven’t tried biking with it yet.

If it doesn’t get better, I guess I’ll be hitting the pool next week.

Every weekend I write out a very ambitious training plan for the week with workouts both before and after work.  The plan has at least  two days of running, two days of biking, one day of swimming, 3 days of yoga and two days with my personal trainer.  That’s 10 workouts Monday through Friday.  Weekends I use for a longer ride with Thom and a longer run.  My training week runs Sunday to Saturday.  Monday and Tuesday I generally follow the plan.    Life tends to kick in by Wednesday and  Wednesday through Friday generally turn into just one workout a day or sometimes none.

Why do I write such ambitious plans?

Well… there are three disciplines to triathlon and I’m really good at only one of them.  Because I am a mediocre, at best, runner, it takes priority.   Between runs I always schedule in a yoga session.  I think the thirty minutes of stretching I get between runs helps to keep me injury free.   I haven’t gotten an injury yet, so that must be true. Now  I hope I haven’t jinxed myself.

I love/hate my personal trainer sessions.  The best part of working with a trainer is that we never do the same thing.  She changes it up every time.   That’s also the worst part; it’s never easy.  About twenty minutes of every session is spent on Core work – abs and lower back.   The rest of the time varies, lower body, upper body, agility… She is always thinking of new ways to torment me.    I don’t know how much it actually helps with my racing, but I enjoy it and I love having muscles.

You would think cycling would be what I’m best at;  but it’s not.  Last year at Barb’s Race, I came in third overall, about 4 minutes behind second.  My swim, second transition and run were all faster than the second place finisher.  She beat me on the bike and in the first transition.  I can say that placing isn’t all that important; but it is fun and I’m a competitive person.  The thing about biking is it’s easy for me to go out and just ride.  I can do it for a long time (remember the double centuries)  and not work very hard at it.  But that is not how you get faster at biking.   Intervals are what make you faster.  I don’t like to do intervals.  I especially don’t like to do intervals  outside.  Outside, I want to just ride.   That’s where Coach Troy and his magic Spinervals DVDs come in.   I try to do two of those a week – typically one I like and one I don’t.  The DVDs I don’t like usually involve shorter sets at a super high intensity – kind of like sprinting.  I am not a sprinter.  I prefer the videos where the sets are longer.   The intensity may get just as high, but I have longer to get there.

Then there’s the swimming.  In college I was not a super fast swimmer and I’m still not a super fast swimmer.   Realistically,  I could take three to five minutes off my swim time from last year’s race if I set aside the time to really train for swimming.  But that’s just not a big enough gain in overall race time for the effort I would need to put in to achieve it.  If I can actually run the entire 13 miles this year, I could take off FORTY minutes or more from my overall race time.  It doesn’t help that the pool chemicals bother my sinuses for a few days after each swim either.

So every weekend I write out  the ambitious plan.  If I can’t follow it, swimming is the first thing to go, followed by biking.   Everything else, I try very hard to stick to.  Without the plan it would be too easy for me to just do the bits I like and that are easy.

How did I do this week?

Three runs, 2 outside and one on the treadmill, 2 yoga sessions, 1 hour with the trainer – she was sick the day of my second session,  and 4 bike rides, but three were outside.  The weather was just too nice this week to want to ride the bike in the trainer.  I had one day when I did nothing.

I wonder what next week will bring.