Training Update

I thought I was being awesome this week with the training schedule until it turned out ... I wasn't. Dave was sick Wednesday and .. um .. I can't remember what happened with Thursday, but exercising didn't go down. I had planned to swim AND bike on Wednesday, but no dice. And Thursday I had planned a run, but again ... didn't happen.

So what I DID do: 15 miles of running, 3 miles of swimming and 17 miles of biking Saturday to Saturday. That's not really that much, but it's better than nothing. So I'm counting it a "win."

This week was also majorly awesome for the information side of things. Friday night we got to meet with a personal trainer and running couch at the Run to Remember dinner. She was awesome and gave lots of pointers for food before and after workouts/races and stretching advice that I've already started implementing. One word: yoga.

I had planned all week to make today a big day gear wise. With low 60-degree temperatures in the lake we'll be swimming at, I need to have a triathlon wetsuit. But of course no one down where we are sells them (stupid) and so a trip to Seattle was in order.

I made some phone calls yesterday to find a shop that had multiple brands (even though I was pretty sure which kind I would want/need). As it turned out one of these shops was holding a demo day and swim clinic TODAY. Excellent!

So we trotted up to Lake Washington this morning (even though it was FREEZING COLD, around 50 degrees with a stiff breeze outside) so I could try on and then swim in a triathlon wetsuit.

And thus:

Now, let's talk about how bad I look.

I figure, hey, people are going to see me in this so I might as well just come out of the closet now. But if there was ever a time that I was certain that "oh yes, I AM pear shaped." Meh.

But this sucker is AMAZING, folks. Even though the 57 degree water was so cold that as soon as I put my face in the water I got a full on brain freeze, I could tell that this thing is going to make a HUGE difference in my speed. And while I didn't swim long in it (CAN YOU BLAME ME?!), they tell me you don't even really have to kick your legs while doing tri swim because the suit makes you float so much! It's like it SWIMS FOR YOU. Bonus!

And here is really the most exciting part about this. This is the suit I got. It's listed here on sale for $224. And that really is about the cheapest I've seen for this sort of thing. But today we got it for $150.

Woohoo!!! And you know how much I loooooove a bargain.

Now here are some more pictures of me freezing my tail end off. Seriously, it was So. Cold. I couldn't feel my chin.

At the moment this photo was taken I was thinking "wow. I can't feel my ears."

And here I'm thinking "I want to die. Someone come warm me." Also, please note how much skinnier I look in this photo. That's because of all the weight I lost keeping myself warm for five minutes.