Pretty good run

I had a pretty good run last night. It was with Texas Iron. The run was a 45min fartlek run with intervals of 5,4,3,2,1min with 2min easy in between. I got in close to 5.5 miles in about 44:45 which is a pace of about 8:10/mile. My knees were really creaky at the beginning but they warmed up and then my IT band on my right was hurting a bit. Nothing cool to note besides I was running on the trail and a black lab was coming straight at me. I stopped and yelled at the dog and scared the crap out of it and the owners of the dog were laughing. It was just a good run. Oh, I ran in my orthodics and they were fine.

I weighed in at 183.5 this morning so I have this yoyo thing going on again. I'm going to go to yoga tonight because I haven't gone in awhile and I just need to try something different that I haven't done in awhile.

New Balance mileage: 72 miles
Nike mileage: 76 miles

3900yds

I swam 3900 yards this morning. It was a tough workout because I didn't swim but 1200 yards last week. It's weird that skipping a week of swimming because it feels almost the same as skipping swimming for 3 months. This was a tough workout as well. We usually do 3200-3400 yards but this morning we did 3900 yards. We were doing sprints and intervals all the way to the end, too. I know that is where you really get faster so I stuck it out even though I was stinking it up. I feel good that I finished it completely, though.

Eh, just a ride

After resting since around noon on Saturday until 6pm tonight, I did a workout on the spin bike at the gym at work. I could've rode outside, but I've found it to be tough to get good intervals in on the road. If I want to get a good workout in and follow what my coach tells me, then I do it on the spin bike. If I just need to get outside, I'll go outside. The workout was a 75min spin with 2x(4x4min fast, 2 min easy). Man, I'm feel like I'm getting out of shape a bit on the bike, but that is expected with me concentrating on running and then swimming more. I'll bounce back pretty quickly though.

Cool website

Not much to add besides the fact that I found this website which I think is pretty good for the amateur nutritionists out there:

http://www.nutritiondata.com/

Also, my weight this morning was 186.5. This was to be expected after I had a decent amount of beer this weekend and I also went on a calorie replenishing weekend as well.

Sunday run on Saturday

Yeah, I did my long run on Saturday today. For some odd reason that I have no clue why, I seemed to have a better run than when I do a long bike and a brick run the day before. I did 13.1 miles in about 2:03. It was humid again and my body felt fine. I felt my hip a bit, but just a little bit and it didn't really bother me. I then went and swam 1200yds in Deep Eddy. I would've swam more, but I was starting to cramp. Also, I did drink the pool water this time.

New Balance mileage: 72 miles
Nike mileage: 70.5 miles
Weekly run milage: 24.5 miles

Ouch

You know that "recovery" ride that I did on Wednesday? That ride completely toasted me. I did a brick workout on Thursday with Texas Iron. We were suppose to do 2-4 loops of a hilly 4 mile bike and then a 1 mile run. I did only 2 of them. Even on the warmup one, my legs were on fire and then on the one that I was suppose to go harder, I couldn't go. I called it quits and realized that I needed recovery. Because of that, I also skipped my swim workout this morning as well. I just needed sleep and rest because I haven't been doing much of either lately. Also, I weighed in at 185 this morning. What the hell? My plans this weekend are to do my long run tomorrow instead of Sunday. Sunday is the Couples Triathlon and I'm volunteering for it. I probably won't get a chance to work out that day because I have some people coming over to finish up my bathroom so I can finally get that done.

New Balance shoe mileage: 59 miles
Nike mileage: 70.5 miles

Hard ride with guys from work

Ok, they really aren't from work, but we used to be part of the same company. I rode during lunch today with some guys from AMD. They usually have group rides during lunch 3-4 days a week and today was the first time I rode with them. We left at 11:30. The pace at first was a little too slow for me. We also had a group of about 8 of us of differing abilities. Once we got out onto the open roads, it was 5 of us in the front group. Man, those guys made me work today. My problem is that I would get dropped on hills or right after I would pull. Not fun and my heart rate was nearly pegged. I had a total time of 1 hour 30 minutes on the road so I probably had about 1:20 of ride time.

I was going to point out about how rainy and cloudy it has been lately because I don't have the nice triathlete tan lines. You know what I'm talking about. The outline from the sleeveless jersey and the sharp lines from tri shorts on the legs. Well, I developed the sleeveless jersey tan lines today. I put sunscreen on my face and my tattoo but didn't put on the arms or legs. I usually get these tan lines in March or April if that's any indication of how it's been here lately.

21.5 miles in 60 hours

Well, I did somewhat of a track workout tonight. Did 15min for warmup and then 6x1 mile repeats. The odd ones were around a track and the even ones were around the trail. I did them in about 7:45 which is about half marathon pace for me which is what was on my workout. Then, did 10 minute cool down. This was about a total of 9 miles or so. I did 12.5 miles on Sunday so this was 21.5 miles in about 60 hours. How do I feel? I feel fantastic. Nothing hurts or aches really badly. Right now, I don't feel like I just ran 9 miles. My knees aren't aching at all. I think the strategy this year of ramping up very slowly is working great. My body is getting used to the increased load and I'm increasing it at a pace that my body can handle. It's working out for me and I'm happy about it.

New Balance mileage: 59 miles
Nike mileage: 68.5 miles

Wart Update

You remember the bane of my existence last year which caused me to have 4 injuries last year? If not, here is the before picture.



Well, I've been going to the doc for almost a year now, actually over a year, to get rid of this fucking thing. Well, I think it's dead now. My doc has been treating it with Bleomycin and it appears to be working. Here is a picture of this fucker from 2 days ago.



Ah, much better! I have hopefully the final checkup on this guy in 2 weeks and I'll be done with this damn thing.

I can't sleep but I have to be up at 5:30 to do a track workout. Blegh. I weighed in at 183.5 yesterday. The cycleof 183.5 on Friday/186.5 on Monday has been broken! Woohoo! We'll see how this week goes but I'm starting to feel thin again.

I was so thirsty that I drank the pool water and it was good!

Yes, I drank the pool water today. On purpose. And it was very, very refreshing. But let's back up a bit. This morning was my usual long run. I was suppose to 1:45 today and I did about that. It was closer to 1:50 or so. I stopped my watch at one point and forgot to start it again. Either way, it was my longest run since IMFL. I did a total of 12.3 miles as well. It was hot and I tried to stay on top of my hydration, but I only peed once during the run. On a good note, nothing really hurt during the run so my hip issues are going away. I felt them a bit, but not much. While I was running, I realized that I've done only 5 runs that have been a half marathon or more. I did two half marathons last year, a half Ironman, a 14.5 mile training run, and then Ironman Florida. Wow, that's really not that many long runs. I started thinking about this because I know that I have a 2 hour run next Sunday which will put me over 13.1 miles. Also, I run so much faster in a race than I do on my training runs because my heart rate was really high again today, but I was able to keep moving today. Also, I've been running relatively injury free for 6 months now. That is the longest injury free stretch that I've had in my entire life. I'm quite happy about that.

OK, that go way off track. I did a 12.3 mile run today and I was suppose to do a recovery swim of 60 minutes afterwards. I wasn't going to swim 60 minutes, but I'll still do a swim. I headed over to Deep Eddy, showered off the sweat and jumped in. Like I've said before, it's a spring fed pool that is about 68-70 degrees. I'm not used to cold water but this water felt so good after the heat of Austin. I just did 6x200yds and called it quits. On the first lap, I was dying of thirst from the run. I was completely tired and hot and dehydrated. The water was very cool and refreshing. So, I opened my mouth and swallowed a gulp. Oh, it tasted so good. It was as refreshing in my mouth as it was swimming. I just needed a drink of water pretty badly and the pool water was just wonderful. Yes, I know that it's disgusting and people pee in it and all that stuff, but I needed water at that point and I was surrounded by it. I probably wouldn't have done it in a chlorinated pool but this fresh water pool was just what I needed. I finished my very easy 1200 yards and now I'm home. I'm exhausted and I don't want to move for the rest of the day, but I know that I'll have to.

Ok, some random thoughts now. My injuries are clearing up it seems. I've been injury free for about 6+ months now. There were a ton of women not wearing bras at Town Lake today. Town Lake looked like a fast moving river with some rapids in a few parts because of the flooding. I have a blister on my big toe on my right foot that every pair of shoes gives me. I need to start putting Body Glide on my crotch when I do long runs. I think my form is getting better and it's getting more natural so that I maintain my form when I get tired.

New Balance mileage: 59 miles
Nike mileage: 59.5 miles
Weekly run mileage: 16.5 miles

Horrible brick workout

Man, I just had an absolutely horrible brick workout today. Let's begin with the beginning first, though. I got up early to ride and as soon as I walked outside, I say some dark gray clouds to the south of my house. Unfortunately, that was the direction that I was planning on riding today. I went back inside and got on the trainer. Man, that's boring. After about 35 minutes, I couldn't stand it anymore. I looked outside and it looked pretty decent. Then, I checked the weather and there wasn't any rain to the west. Screw the training, I'm going outside! I went outside and rode for another 2 hours and 25 minutes. I did 2x30min at race pace with 15min easy in between. Nothing special there but I'm glad I rode because the sun starting coming out after the clouds cleared up. That was the nice part of my workout.

Now, the hellish brick run. I don't whether I was dehydrated, bonking, not use to the heat, not well rested, or whatever, but that run completely sucked. I couldn't breathe very well. My heart rate was sky high as well. I felt like I was running really easily but I would look down and my heart rate would be at 170bpm. What the hell? I ended up getting just over 4 miles in about 42 minutes so I was S-L-O-W. Hopefully, my long run tomorrow will be a lot better. I just can't figure out what happened to me. It definitely wasn't mental alone because my heart rate was so high. It had to be dehydration. I usually drink a liter of water in the morning before I work out, especially when it's hot, but I didn't do that today. I also lost 4 pounds of weight while I drank 4 liters during all of my workouts. It had to be dehydration, possibly with a bit of bonking.

New Balance mileage: 46.5 miles
Nike mileage: 59.5 miles

Why do I do what I do?

This thread is just a brief reason why I do triathlons. Seeing that many people turn their lives around is just wonderful to see. It's just amazing some of the before and after pics. I'm sort of jealous because I can't ever say that I've lost 100 pounds. My the lowest I've ever been since I started college was 168 and the highest was about 202 so that's only a 34 pound range. Ok, enough of me. These people are truly inspiring.

Rain sucks

Man, if you pitiful non-Texans, ;-), haven't been reading the news lately, Texas has been getting dumped on with rain. Seriously, we have more rain so far this year than all of last year and all of the year before that. It's good because I haven't had to water my grass so far. The bad thing is that I've had 2 workouts canceled this week because of the rain. And it's a crap shoot whenever I try to go for a long ride on the weekends. I'm taking Fiona, the Fuji beater bike, out for a ride on Saturday and I don't care if I get wet.

This morning was a swim of about 3300 yards. Not bad. Yesterday was a missed brick workout because of the rain. That's my update since Wednesday. I do wish my swim workouts started a little later in the morning. Right now, they start at 5:30 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and at 5:45 on Tuesday and Thursday. That's just really early to get up and if I want to get 8 hours of sleep the night before, I have to go to bed at around 8:30 which just seems lame. It's what I choose to do though.

I weighed in at 183.5 this morning. I seem to be in a pattern where I weigh 183.5 on Friday and then 186.5 on Monday for the last few weeks. I have to break that pattern. The good thing is that the bane of my existence is gone now. There was this lady at work who kept a candy jar full of chocolate, my weakness, about 9 feet from my cube. Now, she's left the company and her candy jar is gone, too. Woohoo! My goal is to be at 180 by the end of the month and I think I can do it.

Also, does anyone want to see anything else on my blog? Do you want to see more of a mental aspect of the struggles that I face sometimes? Do you want to see my thoughts on the triathlon community because I have a lot of thoughts about triathletes and the triathlon community that are positive and negative? I'm trying to see what people want to see because I don't mind sharing but I'm wondering how deep people want me to go.

July 4th Update

Well, it appears that my coach has a mini swim block for me. Today was my third swim in 4 days and I have a total of 5 swim workouts in 8 days. Sunday was about 3200 meters. Monday was a rest day. Tuesday was another 3300 meters with a track workout that didn't happen because of the rain. Wednesday was about 3000 yards with 75 minute easy spin later in the day. Oh, the weather was pretty damn nice today. About 80, mostly cloudy, and not that humid. Windy though since it is Texas. The swim this morning was a horrible swim. Not horrible but I was fatigued from yesterday's workout. It's amazing how having a rest day in between workouts will help you heal and how much you can noticed it when you do back to back days with the same discipline. Oh, on the Tuesday workout we did 6x100m sprint. I lead the first 4 and that was fucking tough. I was tired, but I kept pushing because I wanted to work. Another dude went on the 5th one and he was behind me on the previous 4. Afterwards, he said he burned himself out on that one that he lead. I told him it wasn't so easy in the front and he agreed. We then had Nellie go on the 6th one and once again, she said it was so much harder not drafting off anyone. And that's why I like to go first; it's harder in the front and it'll make me a faster swimmer. Oh, and Maurice is saying that my stroke rebuilding is coming along nicely. There are some things that are quite different than when I first learned how to swim so it's a little difficult to adjust. What else? Oh, I weighed in at 186 on Monday.

Weekly update

I've been busy lately. I've given up on my tile job in my bathroom and I'm paying someone to do it. I just don't want to do it anymore. I'm also trying to study more for the medical terminology class that I'm taking right now.

Ok, enough personal stuff. Wednesday was a 3500yd swim. Not much to write about there. Actually, when I'm in a lane, I usually lead on the swim sets. For paddle and fin sets, I'm at the end because I suck at them. However, Maurice let me borrow some other fins. Wow, I'm fast! I need to get some longer fins. I ended up leading the last few intervals of the fins.

Thursday was a brick workout with Texas Iron. It was a bunch of mini duathlons. After the warm up of a 3 mile loop on the bike and a 1 mile run, we did 3 intervals of 1/4 mile run, 3 mile bike, 1 mile run. These were suppose to be hard intervals and I really pushed myself. Of course the last one was the fastest for me. I held off Fast Freddy on the last one because he beat me the first two 1 mile runs. Woohoo! Oh, and I completely embarrassed Betsey because I told her that her shorts were worn out and I could see the crack of her ass. That was funny.

Friday was a crappy day. I skipped my swim workout because I just wasn't feeling it.

This morning was a 60 min run. I ended up getting 6.5 miles in today. I was also dehydrated because I got up, ate a Clif Bar, and pretty much without drinking any fluids. Once I hit about 35 minutes into the run, my heart rate started to skyrocket and I was going SLOW. It felt really slow even though I was going downhill. I came home and used MapMyRun and found out that the course I ran had an elevation gain of about 150 feet over the 3.25 miles. That's not much but it isn't insignificant either. Even going downhill on the way back, I was still slower with a higher heart rate. I came home and drink the first liter of water in 3 gulps and about 3 seconds and drank the second liter in about 3 minutes after that. Wow, that felt good. I also developed chaffed nipples again which are annoyingly painful.

After doing some yard work and studying (I got through another 1.5 chapters), I went on an easy bike ride. It was hot but started cooling off a bit. I took it nice and easy and it was a pretty good ride. Also, I had a courteous driver! I was riding along and there was an SUV that passed me and was turning right. Instead of cutting me off and turning right in front of me, they stopped until I passed. That made my entire ride!

Oh, I weighed 183.5 yesterday. And I finally got over 20 run miles in this week and this week was a recovery week, too.

New Balance mileage: 46.5 miles
Nike mileage: 55 miles
Weekly run mileage: 20.5 miles

Bittersweet

I wanted this to be a great post. I try to be very positive, but I know that I tend to be negative sometimes and bitch a lot. I had a great morning this morning until I learned about a piece of bad news. I really needed a totally great day, but today wasn't it. However, I'm going to try to have the enthusiasm that I wanted to put in this morning before I found out the news.

First of all, congrats to Jodi who kicked ass on her first Ironman.

My weight check in yesterday was 184.5. Today was 186 but I'll get to that in a minute.

This morning, I went on a run. I thought I had a fairly short run, but my coach wanted me to a 15min warmup, then (6) 1 mile repeats with 2 minutes rest with increasing effort each interval, and then 10 min cooldown. I left my house at around 6:00 and was back by 7:30. The first mile repeat was 8:13 with 146bpm. Second was 8:42 with 154bpm. I noticed that this was a lot slower because this is uphill and the rest of the splits show it. 7:49 with 160bpm, 8:12 with 167bpm, 7:32 with 169bpm, and finally 7:54 with 173bpm. Now, here is what made me so happy. On that last interval, I really pushed it. I mean REALLY pushed it. I wanted to get my heart rate up as high as possible. Why? Why not? Towards the end of my interval, I kept pushing and pushing to see how high I could go. I saw 180. Then 183. I felt like I had more so I put my head down and kept going. I reached the end of my interval, stopped my watch, and saw 189bpm on my HRM. I yelled "Fuck yeah! Woohoo!". Man, I'm stoked about this. My previous max HRM since I left college on the run was 183. I've seen 184 on the bike in the last 3 months and 188 in the last 2 years. I've always wondered why the max HRM on the bike was higher than the run when it should be the other way around. Well, I found out that I kept pussing out. Now, I know that when I push myself, how much more that I can go. Even hitting 189 today, I felt like I could've gotten it higher to 190 or even 192. This was just a huge mental boost that I needed for my running. It felt great, too! I did my cool down and had a smoothie. I've been using OJ instead of chocolate milk and it's good.

Oh, one more thing. I weighed 186 this morning before my run. During the run, it felt more like a swim than a run; it was just damn humid. I didn't drink anything during the run so I got back and weighed myself. 182. I dropped 4 pounds of fluid during the run. And I was completely soaked in sweat and it was only 75 degrees outside.

Now, the bad news. I got to work and went to Slowtwitch. I found out that Doug Stern passed away yesterday. Talk about a total buzzkill since I was in such a good mood this morning. Doug posted on ST a few months ago about his battle with cancer. I didn't follow it that closely, unfortunately. He was oldish, around 62 or so, but he definitely didn't look that old. He didn't act that old either. He's been swimming for something like 40 years too. He's just a great guy with a lot of character. He was able to put complex techniques of swimming into simple terms that people could identify with. I owe him a lot of my swim stroke since I was a fan of his theories of swimming. I even met him at a clinic that he taught in November of 2005. I was also looking forward to going on one of his amazing training vacations that he puts on in Curacao. He used to have 1 per year, but it gained in such popularity that he was going to offer 2 of them. I was always waiting until I met him again. Like I said, he's a great guy, very wise, and someone that you could look up to. This is really important for me since I'm not close to my family and don't really have a strong father figure. Well, I didn't realize that our first meeting would also be the last. There's not much else I can say about this. I'm deeply saddened by it. Once I found out about his death, I close the window to ST because I just didn't want to mourn this today. Rest in peace, Doug.

Now, after something like that, I don't really want to write more, but I need to. I went to see my PT today for the first time in like 8 months. I had to get my PF, TFL, and IT band issues looked at. Well, I do have some PF going on. I also have some TFL and IT band issues like I thought. Found out that my hips are super duper weak. I have some exercises to get them strong again. I also took my running shoes in there as well. She pretty much confirmed what I thought. My New Balance shoes are better for my feet than my Nike shoes. I actually look better in the New Balance without my orthodcis than in my Nikes with orthodics. Also, nothing about me is simple. When I'm standing, she was more worried about my lef foot because it tends to pronate naturally and fall in more. Also, it isn't as stable on the ground as my right foot is. However, in my shoes, my right foot falls in more. It's more prevalant on the Nikes, too. They've been bothering my feet a bit, too. Once they are worn out, I won't buy that model again. So, I'm in my orthodics every day now. Also, the Nikes are limited to short runs now with orthodics. New Balance are short runs with orthodics and long runs without until I get used to them. I have to do some ball on the foot, rocking back on the heels stretches, and calf stretches for the PF. for the TFL and IT band, I need to do 2 different exercises for my hips. Other than that, I'm doing good. I needed to go in and have her yell at me a bit to get me back on track and it worked.

That's my story for this bittersweet day today. Like I said, I really wanted a great, upbeat day all day long, but that didn't happen.

New Balance mileage: 41.5 miles
Nike mileage: 48.5 miles

3 minutes

3 minutes is the time from when I left my house yesterday morning on the bike until the time I was almost taken out by a car. I was just riding through my neighborhood and some !%&$# in a car cut my off by turning right in front of me. It wasn't that close, but she still came within 6' of my front tire. When I'm going 16mph, 6' really isn't that much distance.

I continued on my ride and I was just going easy. I'm still feeling sick from last week. Not really sick, but I don't have my full strength back yet, I'm always tired, I have a bit of a sore throat still, and I've had a mild headache since Wednesday. I kept going and the skies started getting gray. I turned around since my bike was nice and pretty from getting the new aerobars put on. I kept riding towards home and felt something strange on my skin. Is that, is that cool air? What? This is Texas in June. It should be at least 90 degrees now. What is this feeling of coolness? Apparently, I just crossed over a cold front. And what happens around cold fronts? Rain. It started raining, not hard, but I still got wet. I kept riding and then I heard the PSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHH! I flatted. I had a big piece of glass in my tire. I found it almost immediately. I pulled it and started changing my tire. About half way through changing the tire, it started raining. Really raining. I was about 3 miles from my house so I just rode home and dried off. That was my workout on Saturday: a 55 minute bike ride with a flat, some rain, and a near run in with a car.

Sunday was my long run. I started out and I just didn't feel good. I was tired and my headache was weird. I would get jabbing pains about every other heel strike on the right side of my head. It also felt like I had fluid sloshing around in my head. Just weird. I was suppose to do a 90min run with 30 easy, 40 tempo, 20 easy. Since I was sick last week and not feeling great, I was only going to do 4.5 miles. I stopped at that point and sat down for a few minutes. I realized that I actually felt a lot better than when I started running. So, I did another 4.5 miles. I'm actually pretty glad that I kept going. I had already quit running for the day after my first lap, but I decided to keep going. I'm glad that I did. Like I said, I was SLOW today. Usually, I can run 8.2 miles in 1:12 or something like that. Today, I ran 9 miles in 1:28. You could say that it took me 16 minutes to run that extra 0.8 miles or I was just a slug butt (for me) today. I vote for the slug butt. I went to run a mile barefoot around the track, but I just didn't have it in me today.

Also, my right IT band and TFL were acting up again. My PF was bothering me a bit as well. I think it's time to go in and see my PT just to get checked up a bit and get these lingering problems taken care of before they get worse.

New Balance mileage: 32.5 miles
Nike mileage: 48.5 miles
Weekly run mileage: 14 miles

The flu weight loss plan!

Hey, having the flu is great for weight loss! I was down to 183.5 today. I took a sick day from work yesterday. Most of the time when I do, I feel like crap in the morning but get better throughout the day to the point where I can do stuff later in the day. Yesterday, I was on the couch all day long. I felt horrible. I had a fever and I had no strength at all. I'm much better today though and I'm back at work.

Getting sick happens, but I'm really pissed that it happened this week. I was on pace to run 25 miles this week and that isn't going to happen now. I did 5 Tuesday and on Thursday, I was suppose to run another 6-7 miles. A brick run on Saturday would have put me at 5 more and then I expected to do 10-11 on Sunday. That would have been 27 actually. Now, I didn't get the Thursday run in and Saturday's brick run probably won't be that long. Sunday I should be good enough to do 10 miles so I'll still get in 18 or so. Next week is a recovery week so maybe the week after I'll get 20+ miles in.

By popular demand, the Sunday Smoothie

Well, here it is:

1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1 cup fat free vanilla yogurt
1 handful frozen raspberries or mixed berries
2 handfuls frozen strawberries
1/2 cup lowfat chocolate milk
1 dab of peanut butter

Throw it in a blender, mix it up, and enjoy. It's very delicious. I think the touches that make it great are the chocolate milk and the dab of PB. Yummy.

I skipped my workouts today. I'm feeling sick today so I skipped them and I'm trying to get a lot of sleep tonight. I don't know what caused this, though. It seems that I get a bit ill whenever the temp gets really high the first time each summer. It may have been because I'm a little worn out from the run on Sunday and the workouts on Tuesday and my body isn't happy. It also could have been all the crap that I breathed in last week working on my bathroom. Either way, I need some rest.

Also, I think I got a touch of poison ivy from my run on Sunday. I have a bit on the inside of my right arm. It's probably the smallest case I've ever had though. I have bandaids on it because it's kind of funny. If I don't see it, it doesn't itch as bad. If it's exposed, it itches like crazy. I'm pretty sure I got it on Sunday because there is all kinds of poison ivy around Town Lake trail. The next time I run, I just have to make sure to not touch anything green.

Sternocleidomastoid muscle!

That's the muscle that I learned when reading my medical terminology book the other day. I like it because it's a long word and I can remember it. BTW, this medical terminology stuff is cool to learn. I didn't know that the skull has 20 bones in it. Also, the human body has 206 bones in it. Now, let's take away the hands and feet which have over a 100 bones between them. Then, you have roughly 27 vertebrae (that's a rough estimate off the top of my head). Now, we are already up to 150 bones and that's not counting the pelvis, ribs, arms, or legs. Anyways, that's just cool.

Monday was a rest day, but I did weigh in at 185. I think work is causing me to gain weight because they day that I come back to work, I have a brownie, some cookies, a Snickers bar, a piece of lemon cake, and a Dr. Pepper. That's all crap. I know that it's my own will power and discipline (or lack of) that is making me eat these things but I still like to complain about the environment that I'm in here.

Tuesday was a 2700m swim. I cut it short because we had a fin set at the end and it was causing all kinds of issues with my calves and feet. Also, I hadn't swam in a week so I wanted to take it a bit easy. I was leading my lane as well. Maurice actually asked if I wanted to be in a quicker lane and I said no. If I'm in a quicker lane, all I want to do is to go faster. Right now, I'm trying to rebuild my stroke and I can't rebuild my stroke and go fast at the same time. As long as I lead my lane, I'll be fine because I usually get stuck behind others and I just can't swim in a smooth fashion because I'm delegated by as fast as the person in front of me. I'll be up in the next faster lane in a month or two, though.

Last night was a run. A hot run. The temp was around 98 degrees or so according to my car. After a 20 minute warmup, I did 4x1/2 mile repeats. I wasn't able to hold the intervals with times of 2:54, 2:48, 3:01, 3:11. I just fell apart at the end with my side cramping and I couldn't breathe. Maybe I ate too much before the workout. I didn't feel dehydrated though because I had at least 4 liters of water before the workout last night. Eh, oh well. I just need to get over this heat. I don't think it's a physical thing as much as it is a mental thing.

New Balance mileage: 32.5 miles
Nike mileage: 39.5 miles