I'm back!

And less than thrilled about it... A short post tonight just to get back into the flow.

Puerto Rico was awesome. Maddy and I had a great time. The weather was great. We ate amazing food. I'm running out of positive adjectives to describe just how wonderful it was. I even got a couple very nice open water swims in during the week.

On the downside, I didn't do any of the bike or run...  I also ate my weight in cookies while I was down there. I'll chalk it up to being on vacation. And now that I'm back, I'm fully charged and ready to go.

I put down 2:45 on the trainer today followed by a :30 run. It beat up my legs pretty hard. I hate the trainer with every ounce of my being. Going from 70-80 degrees sunny and breezy in Puerto Rico to 38 degrees in Philadelphia wasn't exactly the welcome back I was hoping for either. I thought I would be able to throw the trainer in the closet for the winter. Not yet....ugh.

High expectations for this week. Since I still have another week of spring break ahead it's time for my CRASH! I'm going to try and ramp up the training volume as much as possible without getting hurt. My goal is to put in about 20-22 hours this week and then keep it up above 18 next week also. I've never done that much training so we'll see how I handle it.

Time for bed.
Thanks for reading.

A blog worthy dinner!

Portabella burger with some leafy greens, tomato, onion, goat cheese (my personal favorite), a side of curly fries, and a yuengling light.

Maddy was the mastermind behind this amazing dish. She's become a "pescatarian" - vegetarian + fish - so she's been looking for meat substitutes. Great work! I'll take credit for the curly fries though.

Oh yeah- a pretty good day training too. Up early for a morning swim, work, baseball practice, then a :45/:30 brick once I got home.

Happy hump day, and thanks for reading.
PW

A few adjustments and a solid weekend

As the title clearly states, I made some alterations to my bike set up. I feel like I finally got it ready for outdoor rides. After reading an article on Joe Friel's blog, I adjusted the cleats on my shoes to a mid-sole position, I raised the seat about half an inch and slid it about a quarter inch forward. I also had to straighten out my aerobars, I put on a new rear tire, and I tried to get my speedometer working (although it still doesn't). Then I hit the roads Saturday for a 3 hour ride. It felt good. I wouldn't mind if it warmed up about another 5-10 degrees because by the time I got back I was pretty chilly (actually I was almost numb), but I'll take that over a ride on the trainer ANY day. Although a 15 min transition run was planned after the bike, I canned because we were headed to a graduation party and I was running late.

Sunday I hit the roads for 1:40. My legs actually felt pretty good. I'm starting to feel confident about my running again. It's always been my strength, but I feel the effects of workouts very quickly. I've finally been getting my interval workouts going about once per week again, and they really help. Friday I did 6x800, then this morning I was out the door at 5am to do 4x5min in zone 4/5 with 2 min recovery. I'm feeling good.

I also had a successful smoothie experience today! First off, I made it last night. Also, I added much more liquid, and I used vanilla flavored whey protein powder instead of chocolate/chalk flavored hemp protein.

I ended last week with 11.5 hours training. All S/B/R. I want to end with over 12 this week and include some core and strength work. Getting out the door by 5am four times this week will be tough, although today is done so only 3 more.

Some VERY good news! Saturday starts spring break at the school where I work. 2 weeks off!! Gotta love private schools. Maddy and I are headed to San Juan, PR from 3/20-25. Something crazy that I just saw after booking the tickets is that on 3/19 (the day before I get there!) they are having the San Juan IM 70.3! I would have LOVED to get down there and watch it! AND my hotel is less than a mile from the swim! Which is awesome because I'll be swimming the course almost every morning. I hope they leave the buoys out for a few days... Even if they don't, it will be fun getting out in the open water. The water temp is 77 degrees, so no need to pack the wetsuit. Probably better to train without it anyway.

Ok - that's enough for today. I'm a little all over the place because I started this post yesterday, but didn't finish it. One more goal for the week is to put up a really good/interesting post before I leave.

Do great work!

A failed smoothie experiment

I was up at 5:25 this morning to make a quick breakfast and coffee then head to the pool. I decided a couple days ago I want to start making smoothies. They seem easy, tasty, and easy to make and transport. I figured I could whip one up, throw it in a mug and pack it in the car to drink on my drive to work after a morning swim. Perfect, right?

Well I set out or got ready all the ingredients last night -  frozen berries, banana, peanut butter, hemp protein powder and spinach leaves - plus ice and milk. I don't know how or why I thought this would taste good. As I started the blender with all the ingredients in there, it wasn't mixing... I had to repeatedly pack it down with a spoon and take the top off so that the mixture would get sucked down. After about 10 minutes of using the blender, and not realizing how obnoxiously loud it was, Maddy finally yelled down to me:

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Sorry I'm making a smoothie"

"What's in it? Gravel?"

Hahahaha... Our other roommate popped his head out of the bedroom right next to the kitchen a minute or two later and asked if I was grinding diamonds. Believe it or not, I was totally oblivious to the god awful noise it was making - and the fact that it was 5:35am.

Then about an hour later, when Maddy actually had to be awake and downstairs, I got a picture message saying "remnants of gravel smoothie on the kitchen ceiling"

So a failure 2x for this smoothie. It tasted like butt, and it was not pleasant to make.

The noisy and messy part I can fix. I think I'll start making the smoothies the night before from now on. But the taste is something I will need to work on... I really want something that a) doesn't taste like butt, b) gives me lots of good nutrients for after a morning workout (stuff like fruit, protein, iron, etc.), and c) I'd really love a shake with caffeine in it too so I don't have to drink cold coffee after my workout. Any good recipes out there?

I used to think 6am was early

Today my alarm went off at 4:40am. If I told my collegiate self that I would be getting up at this time to get in a workout BEFORE going to work, and that I would be working out AGAIN in the evening, I'm pretty sure he would kick the crap out of me. He could do it too. I was about 30 lbs heavier in college, and I devoted all my time "exercising" to pumping weights.

Anyway, in the wee hours of the morning I did an easy 60 minute spin on the trainer - high rpm, low resistance. Trying to flush the legs out from Tuesday's run and yesterday's brick. I'll do an hour in the pool tonight - about 3000yds with a good number of drills. My routine is going pretty well, although it's about to get a lot tougher. Baseball season just started March 1, and I am the assistant varsity coach at the high school where I teach. I love baseball, and I'm excited about the team this year. I'm not thrilled about losing 2.5 hours everyday. But I'll learn to be efficient. I have a solid base right now and I'll keep building - maybe just not at the same rate. Swimming will have to take a backseat for a couple weeks because the hours at my pool make it difficult to swim around my schedule. I'll be lucky to get in there 3x per week. I'll really pick things up over the summer. It's more important that I keep my bike/run strong.

The last thing I'll leave with is a couple interesting recipes that I found. Matt over at No Meat Athlete is a big fan of incorporating chia seeds and pinole - both ingredients were raved about in Born to Run by Christopher McDougall. A couple things I'm thinking about trying are the chia-energy-bars, pinole-waffles, and the homemade-energy-gel with chia. There are a slew of other recipes if you snoop around long enough.

¡Buen provecho!