As the seconds tick closer to race day...

I'm trying not to doubt the training.  I put in months of training...its all there.  Keeping the legs fresh, not over-doing it.

Saturday, its on...

This'll open your eyes

I'm stealing this from Coach Cane, who got the tip from Deanna.  Watching this makes me feel like such a piece of crap for ever complaining about lack of motivation.  It makes me feel like a piece of crap for whining about my shoes being dead...and being bored of running the same routes all the time.

This makes me want to box up all my running gear and send it to these guys.

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Take a Seat

I stumbled upon this Docu-series on Universal Sports tonight after my run.  Oddly enough, when I texted Katie to turn it on, she was already watching.  The series is about a guy who cycles across the country on a tandem bike and gives 10 different people with disabilities a chance to ride along.  Tonight's episode was about a guy with Parkinson's.

You can watch episodes online here.  I highly recommend it, even after only seeing on episode.

Revisiting My First Marathon

"You have successfully submitted your registration for the 2012 Chevron Houston Marathon."

Goodwater Loop - Georgetown Lake

Katie and I went out for a 16 mile trail run today.  The goal, get in the miles, keep the pace easy.  Knowing that its going to be hot on race day, I decided to head out when it was still a little hot out.  We should have been more prepared with hydration, as we ran out of water.  We were able to stop and refill eventually, but there were a number of miles run without water.

There's not a lot of elevation change out there, but the footing is fairly technical in places.  I'll definitely be utilizing this trail a lot while training for Cactus Rose.  I look forward to exploring the rest of the trail.  I've only covered about 8 miles of the trail, so there's another ~18 miles out there that my feet need to find.

The work is done, now its maintenance

I got up this morning at 5 am and did my last long ride, as prescribed by the one and only Mr. Cane.

1 hour easy
2 hours at IM race speed (i might have pushed it a little harder...)
1 hour easy

So that's it.  There's nothing I can do to really improve my fitness in the next two weeks, but there's a lot I can do to screw it up, so I've gotta be careful.

Its rides like today that make me feel like I'd be a much better cyclist than I am a runner.  I always feel like I can push and sustain much harder and longer on the bike than I can when running, which I guess makes ultra cycling a potentially scary combo for me.  Anyway, its just interesting to see what I can sustain, especially seeing as how I'm not even in cycling shape, I'm in decent triathlon shape.  Makes me wonder what I could do if I set aside some time and concentrated on the bike.

but for now...IMTX, we have a date...

Swim/Bike/Run

20 min EASY swim

2.5 hours on the bike

20 min EASY run

Ride

Hit WRL for 90 minutes tonight.  Felt pretty good.

New swim distance PR

Nature didn't seem to want me to ride today, posting severe thunderstorm warnings pretty much all day long.  I probably could have made it out, but I was afraid of getting stuck in a hail and/or lightning storm.  I figured instead of missing out on training completely to go hit the pool.  When I initially got in, I had a goal of swimming 2 miles, with at least a mile of that continuous.  Well, as my swim progressed, I felt strong and decided to keep going.  I ended up swimming 5K (3.1 miles) with the last 1.1 miles continues and another stretch of 3/4 of a mile continuous.  The breaks between the other sections were pretty minimal.  I could have used a long ride, but this was a HUGE confidence builder for the race.  I'm ready for the swim and yesterday proved that I'm ready for the run.