Master plan gone sour

Sometimes training is hard, and it’s not when you’d expect it. I have no trouble gearing up and busting ass (literally) for a long ride or for intervals. My long run never gets skipped, and I not only show up to key pool sessions, I mentally prepare for them as well. There are 5 workouts I never miss: the long ride, bike intervals/spinning, the long run, real intervals, and speedwork in the pool.

Don’t think I only work out 5 times a week, though that’d be cool. It’s just that a lot of the rest of the stuff in my schedule feels like filler. It’s the sessions I call “working out” instead of “training” that I never want to get in. Long swims feel sooo much longer than they actually are, especially considering they’re usually shorter total yardage than other workouts. It’s just swimming 45 minutes straight is boring (at least for the first 10 minutes… and isn’t that the most important hurdle anyway?) Bike for 90 minutes on Tuesday? WHY? To eat up my social life and make me want to shoot myself in the face? Eek! Don’t get me wrong—even the filler workouts have a purpose and help prepare me for my race. I just have a tendency to miss about one a week.

Such a miss occurred yesterday. I had a master plan for the day: swim in the morning, lift at lunch, go home and mop/clean kitchen/maybe get upstairs ready for guests, go to a volunteer meeting, go spin for 90 mins (since it would be almost 9 before I got to the Y), come home, go to sleep, wake up Wednesday and get in a 4000 before getting to work early, go home early and meet the friend who’d just gotten into town. It was genius. Genius until it was raining til after 7 PM yesterday. I lifted at lunch, made it home to clean and realized our kitchen was really dirty. I reasoned that a meeting announced on Monday for a race a month away wasn’t high on the priority list (the real reason I wanted to go was because there was free Star Pizza. Good stuff.) and continued cleaning til I’d finished the kitchen and the floors. By then it was 7:30 and I decided I’d take a quick nap.

I could finish there, but what’s the fun in that? My 30 minute nap extended to almost two hours, despite my boyfriend trying to get me up every 15 minutes or so. Try as he might, he couldn’t rouse me from a dream I never remembered. Finally, when I got up there would only be time for 30 minutes on the bike, and I gave up on my workout. I decided I could get up early easily for a long swim today.

I woke up at 5:50 to rain and laziness. My plan for the day was shot, so I just went to work early (after a stop at the Y to pick up my bag from last night). In retrospect I realize I shouldn’t have even tried to go to the meeting; instead, I should have just gone straight to work out, then home to clean. I probably would have gone to bed early and, well, still gotten up to rain. But still—what if my being lazy this morning actually caused the rain? One never really knows.

Normally this break in the schedule would cause me to leave work early or something else drastic to keep me from “making up” the workouts this weekend, but it’s a recovery week. I should be resting, stretching, and preparing for the hardest month of my training. Instead, I’ve been sore and achy all week; I never fully “recovered” from my brick on Sunday before lifting Monday and doing some quality bike intervals Tuesday. As if to hit this point home even harder, I couldn’t give blood Tuesday because my iron was too low. What? Aren’t I the epitome of cardiovascular health? How could I possibly be low in iron? Maybe my body actually needs to recover during recovery week… I’m taking a couple days off (to entertain my guests!) to follow the lead.

Next week is a new month, and somehow the change in the calendar works wonders on my desire to train. I’m pretty stoked that the end is in sight—til after “the end” when I recover from Wisconsin and start training for Ironstar. Still, there’s an end to the 17+ mile runs, the many hours in the saddle over Texas (mole)hills. There’s a purpose to what I’m doing. Despite my having my longest hours ahead of me, I’m relieved it’ll soon be August and the race is so close at hand.

Now I’m going to go “recover” with my college roommates who are coming to visit. :)