If I had a super power...

I decided not long ago that if I had a superpower as an adult it would be to have an extra hour in the day that no one else has... I say as an adult because I'm well aware this isn't the most exciting superpower, it's very adult like and boring. Because I'm not talking about an hour where everyone else is frozen and I go around changing things, putting things right etc. I'm talking about an extra hour to squeeze in unfinished work, chores, uni reading, training or even, gasp sleep! 

That's just about the sum of why my blogging has slipped and why this will be relatively short. This wouldn't always have been my superpower, funnily enough as a kid I wished and wished that I could get a pair of imaginary flippers to wear to the school swimming sports so I could blitz, make the school team and score myself a pair of the illustrious blue, red and gold togs. Oh to have a pair of those for swimming and not just the plain navy ones...! 

Alas not much else seems to have changed in the swimming stakes, must just not have it in my jeans. Seems very unfair given the amount of my youth spent cutting laps in the pool. So in an effort to improve have started some stroke correction, watch this space, old habits are hard to break. But I will give it my all. 

In other training news I've hit my longest run for ages, 24km, and didn't I know it. Haven't felt that running pain for ages, kind of good but kind of a wake up too, I will blame a small part of it on having to run in old runners. Managed 90km on Monday today, felt the thrill and the pain of riding in a pack. The great ease of sitting on the back and the helplessness of falling off the back of it. Must keep resilience building! 

Bed post all that training calls... My aim this week is to fit that illusive ninth session in...if only I had an extra hour in the day!

Get a grip

Took a few days before I could write this. But I am a firm believer in the healing powers of time. The thing about this mission and training regime of mine is that at times I feel so strong and then at others I feel so weak. I don't think anyone can debate the fact that I am fit at the moment, granted one can always be fitter, but in a likert scale I'm ranking myself in the upper echelons. Anyway clearly fit doesn't equate to strength. Despite a weekly weights regime I had the most grounding, earth shattering, resilience testing moment when I failed a grip strength test on the weekend.

Now I am what one calls a 'preparer'. Casing point one, my training program. But this work fitness test, I just thought I had in the bag. Turns out I was wrong. My plate is pretty full at the moment and I just didn't factor this as a concern. Now kicking myself. But in terms of getting a grip, despite having a testified good handshake, I am determined to get a grip.

Now back to training proper, did a kick arse (feeling wise) tempo run on Tuesday and slogged out a 2.4km swim this morning. Must stop eating whatever I feel like soon though!

The corner of Blackburn Road and Burwood Highway

Long rides and getting kms in my legs is the hardest part of this training malarkey I reckon. So it's the small things that I cling on to - the corner of Blackburn Road and Burwood Highway is proving to be one of these! 

Discovering long rides beyond the Kew Boulevard has been really enjoyable and I sadistically actually love the 1 in 20 section of the Mt Dandenong ride. TP1 co and I have tackled this a couple of times in recent weeks and this morning Monday (my beautiful new bike)  got her longest ride yet. Finishing up the 70km circuit (not that long in the scheme of things I know - but Monday is still pretty new) 'the corner' did not fail to disappoint. Normally it's a local starting their day with a cheeky JD can or someone looking like they are off to Kmart to test security measures. Today I got the hugest belly laugh when I saw this lady's innovative transport method for her newly acquired tree. After numerous travels to South East Asia this really didn't surprise me - photo isn't the best but check out the use of the pram to balance the tree! 

Ps I did all of this on an almighty hangover - it was an uncle v v moment which hasn't been experienced since the Oxford days.

My running pals

Was just lamenting on my long run today that this is the first time I'm blogging my training, with probably the least exciting terrain to blog about. In comparison to my marathon training for Lochness and Helsinki, which managed to include runs far and wide, from the banks of the Hudson River, throughout the country side of France, heavily hungover in Amsterdam to cobbled streets of Eastern Europe. Anyway just as I was sighing about lost photo opps and tracking of exciting km on my iPhone I stumbled across this and felt pretty satisfied to be home:

Quotable quote

"Swimming is the necessary evil before the ride and the run leg"

A chook day

I'm a firm believer that everyday is a school day, or as renamed by predictive text a 'chook' day. This week has been no different and I would say this journey will be full of chook days. Enter lessons learnt 1&2.

Lesson 1 - training programs hold you accountable, it's just that life gets in the way sometimes. The real lesson I learnt this week isn't so much that training always comes first, but that others don't put work first and I have to remember this frustration when adapting my training program. Bottom line, don't adapt training for work unless it is for my benefit. Giving up my Wednesday morning swim to prepare for a cancelled meeting was not a satisfying outcome.

Lesson 2 was much more practical and a no brainier in hindsight. Don't cut the dead skin off your toes, which has clearly been serving a buffering purpose, right before a run, ouch! 

Otherwise progressing. Have to say it is week one, but really nothing different from a normal training week, I suspect week 3-4 is where I will feel a change. 

Saw Tegan the magician as she will now be known, but only 24 hours after the fact. Because eight hours after the fact she is more Tegan the inflicter. A bit of an overdue tune up.