Bike to Beat Cancer

For the most part I have continued to feel better mentally and emotionally since pulling out of IMLOU, however, last weekend my depression came back for a few days and it was pretty tough to find the motivation to do much of anything. I missed yet another race, the OKHT bike ride for which I had planned to complete the 50-mile route. I had good intentions as I loaded up the bike the night before, laid out all my clothing, and went to bed at a decent hour in preparation. Unfortunately, morning came and I couldn’t muster up the emotional strength to get myself out of bed. The fact that it was seriously chilly out as well (50-something degrees) didn’t make it any more appealing. Of course, as usual, I felt uber-guilty for having missed it and seeing everyone’s pictures on FB only fed into these feelings.

BUT…..

Over the past week I seem to have redeemed myself a bit and am feeling better than I have in a long time. I managed a 15-mile bike ride AFTER my 60 minute OTF session on Monday, followed by another OTF workout on Tuesday. The 5-mile run I did on Wednesday was the best I’d had in a while, which was followed up by yet another OTF session on Thursday. Friday was supposed to be more of the same, but since I had to pick up my packet for the Bike to Beat Cancer dead smack in the middle of rush-hour, I opted to save my time and energy for today’s bike ride instead.

It was perfect weather for the bike, which was a great surprise since they had been calling for a 30% chance of rain all week. We took off about 8:15 a.m. and I had truly planned on this being a nice, leisurely little pedal throughout the city – not only because I didn’t mind taking it easy, but because the start of the ride was pretty congested and I ended up finishing that first 5 miles in about 23 minutes. Once it broke up however, my mind and body had a different plan and I started to push my pace a little bit.

It was a fairly scenic ride for the most part, with a few rolling hills during the first half of the course that called for some quad engagement. Once we got into The Parklands I was surprised to see that I had finished that first 15 miles in under an hour – I must’ve been hauling butt for the previous 10 miles! Unfortunately, in order to leave the park we had to go up one monster of a hill, and I wondered if I would have to get off and walk the bike up (fortunately, I did not).

Not far ahead I came upon a woman who had JUST went down on some gravel. Me and some other cyclists stopped to help her out, and it appeared that she had knocked the breath out of herself as she complained about not being able to breath. Fortunately, her husband wasn’t far behind and he was able to take over and comfort her as they waited for professional help to arrive. Luckily she didn’t look to be too bad off, but it still reminded me to take it easy and watch myself on some of the more treacherous parts of the course. Away I went once again, and a few more rolling hills lead me to the third SAG stop where the 65 and 100 mile folks split off.

Up until the first 20 miles or so I had considered doing the 65-miler instead of the 35. I told myself leading up to the ride that I would wait to see how I felt half-way in to make a decision. Since my legs were already starting to feel it, and it looked like some clouds were rolling in, I decided on the 35 mile-only route and headed off with a small group of guys for the last 10 miles.

We stuck together for a bit until one guy had to stop to fix his chain. Not wanting to be “beat,” by these men during the last portion of the ride, I left them behind and kept a pretty decent pace for the remaining 8 miles or so - ending up with a 15.6 mph moving average – my fastest pace ever besides Muncie in July. I must say, I was super surprised by this considering Monday's ride was a mere 14.2 mph. But, I guess the adrenaline as well as the competition (at least, in my mind) gave me enough “umph” to get it done as quickly as I did.

I would definitely suggest this race to others. It was very well organized, the feeling in the air was extremely positive and supportive, and the SAG stops were wonderful. The pretty scenery was a definite plus, and the course itself was just challenging enough that you felt like you were accomplishing something, but not unbearable enough that you're hating life. I've already signed up for next year when, hopefully, I can step it up to at least that 65-mile route. Next up - Harvest Homecoming 25-mile ride next weekend.

Life Without Ironman

It’s been three weeks since I decided to pull out of Ironman and, I must admit, I neither miss the training nor do I regret making the decision to skip the race. The last 21 days have actually been the most relaxed and happiest I’ve felt in months – this is very telling about just how miserable I was during my training process.

I was initially concerned that I wouldn’t be able to go on Facebook and risk seeing everyone talk about their training, uploading workouts, post things about how they’re feeling, what their nutrition struggles are, and the like; worrying that I would get down and regretful about my decision. But after a few days I found that I was actually relieved that it wasn’t ME out there doing a 7 hour bike or getting up at 6:00 a.m. on a Saturday to run 18 miles. I’m still not quite sure what it was/is about the training or the race in general that was just too much for me this year. Maybe it’s not anything about either of those things in particular, but more so that my heart just wasn’t in it for whatever reason, and that’s okay too.

But…. enough about that. As I said in my previous post regarding pulling out of the race, I definitely want to keep up with the running/swimming/biking in order not to lose what I’ve gained. So far I’ve been able to do this pretty consistently. I’ve been trying to get out for a few rides a week, making sure that they’re at least 20+ miles or so as not to slack on my endurance. I still plan on doing the OKHT and Bike to Beat Cancer coming up the next two weekends, but instead of doing the full century rides as I had previous planned, I’m completing the 50-milers – enough to make me feel like I’m doing something, but not enough that I’m hating life.

The swimming has been harder to keep up just because it’s so tedious and boring. I find it REALLY difficult to get out of bed during the week to go for a swim before work – it’s not my favorite leg of the triathlon. However, since I’m not overly concerned with improving my swim or getting significantly faster, I figure I can pick this back up when I’m training for an actual tri next year.

The running has re-established itself as the sport I spend most of my time on, for two reasons. One is that I started back with Orange Theory Fitness, which is probably my most favorite workout regime of all time. I had to stop my membership in April when Ironman training intensified since I wouldn’t have time to do the OTF workouts PLUS my tri training. Second, my oldest niece has decided to try her hand (or feet and legs) at running and is training for her first race, the Great Pumpkin 10k in October. I’m so proud of her and since I love running I volunteered to help her train for the event. We’re trying to get together 2-3 times a week to do our runs together, which gives me more miles than I would get doing OTF alone. It’s a win-win.

One thing that I did have to change when I quit training was stuffing my face as much! It’s easy to eat a lot of food when you’re burning so many calories, but I noticed during my first week without all the tri training that I was still eating as if I just completed a 60 mile bike ride – not good. So, I’ve had to start watching my calorie consumption - taking into consideration that an hour of OTF still burns less calories (about 550) than a 90 minute bike ride (about 800). One thing that I was not expecting, however, was a change in my bathroom habits….

DISCLOSURE: THIS NEXT SECTION IS ABOUT POOPING.

So yeah, obviously the more you workout the more your body is going to “move things along,” hence you’re going to poop more often and more regularly. Sometimes up to three times a day in my case. This was an awesome side effect of my tri training as I love a good poop, not gonna lie or even try to sugar coat it. But…now that I’m not working out AS intensively, the bowel train seems to take its own sweet time pulling out of the station. No longer am I a “go every morning,” girl, but more of a “go whenever the mood strikes,” woman. Not a fan of this change, I must say. 

Regardless of this lack-of-poo fiasco however, I feel great – both mentally and physically. I feel like I’m at a really good place in my life right now as my practice is going extremely well, I’m looking forward to a vacation with my family in a month, and I’m branching out socially to make sure I get a good balance. I’ve decided to put dating on the back burner for the foreseeable future, which is the first time in a LONG TIME that I’ve actually been okay with not looking for a mate and just enjoying my singlehood. As they say, “I just wanna do me for a while.”

As for my triathlon future, I definitely still want to compete and am interested in returning to Muncie next year to see what I can really do when I don’t have the weight of a full Ironman resting on my shoulders. Until then, it’ll be more running, biking, OTF, spending time with my friends and family, cuddling with the pup, and enjoying some reading and Netflix as we make our way into Fall.