Week Four

Just finished up week four of training which happened to be a rest week. It was a good week overall, I don't feel like I had any reduced amount of volume though. I actually increased my FTP by 10% because I felt like it wasn't challenging enough. I think I made some pretty significant gains on the bike in the last four weeks. Overall, I feel pretty tired. But I am excited for the next block. I think my training has been pretty consistent. Any workouts that I have missed I have made up. So, onto the bigger and more difficult issue of my diet. I am currently not doing a very good job of controlling what I am eating. So, I am currently tracking my calories for on the Lose It! app. I am working on portions and meal prep so that I am not over eating. Hopefully it goes well! I will be tracking my weight daily and see if it makes a difference over the next four weeks. Fingers crossed. I would love to lose some weight and pick up some speed in the process.

                                                      Swim date with Kelsey this week!

                                                      Bike Workout in the Pain cave/loft

Week Two

Week two was less of a banner week. I missed a few workouts and am trying not to beat myself up about it. I was good until Thursday and then worked all night Thursday and Friday night which meant I took Friday during the day off (planned) and then also took of Saturday (unplanned). I went out Saturday night and stayed up too late and didn't have a very productive Sunday. I did get a 1:15 bike in so that helped slightly but I missed two swims, the end of a brick, and bike workout. So, I am going to try to get back on track this week. I am a little disappointed in myself because I am only on week 2 but am trying to cut myself some slack and realize that life also gets in the way sometimes. Alex is out of town all week so I am hoping I can get my diet and workout schedule done well this week. I have to work Wednesday and Friday which always throws a wrench in my workouts/recovery but I will have to just gut it out for a few more weeks.

My legs felt heavy this past week and the runs I had to do were slow and difficult. I am not happy with it but I have to remind myself that this is only week 2 and I have taken a significant amount of time off and I am not going to be where I want to be right away. I need to refocus on my diet and prioritize rest and recovery for the next two weeks while I am still working. My schedule will have so much more structure once I am done with my job!

Week One

As my first official blog post, I feel like my day should have been more exciting. But, as I am currently recovering from what I can only assume is a bad case of bronchitis and coming off of three back to back night shifts, I spent about 10 hours today sleeping.

It has been a pretty successful first week of official training for the 70.3 Costa Rica race on June 18th. I am pretty excited about the idea of this trip and one of my main goals this year is just to arrive at the start line and not think, "I should have actually trained for this", which has historically been the case. :)

This year, Alex and I are also training for the 70.3 Ohio and Age Group Nationals (olympic distance) races in July and August. We will probably throw in a few shorter distance local sprints because they are fun and we can work on transitions. Plus, we like coming in first place even when its a field of three people in our age group. ;)

I am currently following the Trainer Road half ironman distance training plans and doing the mid volume plan. I just did my first week of base and the cycling was tough! Also got in a few swims and a few runs even though it was so cold outside that my phone turned off whenever I took it out to change the music/podcast.

I did my first FTP test at the beginning of last week and my FTP was a whopping 151. Not good. But, I have also not trained for the last four months so not entirely unexpected. I am hoping to make some big gains in the next eight weeks through this block. After the FTP test, my workouts were super challenging having me ride anywhere between 80-94% of threshold. Tough.

This week I listened to Rich Roll's podcast (as always) but listen to David Goggins and it was incredible. Very inspirational guy. Alex and I both have read the book about him written by Jesse Itzler and we were cracking up the entire time. Also, loving listening to the Trainer Road Podcast, those guys are awesome.

Books I have read the last two weeks: Relentless Spirit by Missy Franklin and finishing up The Road to Sparta by Dan Karnazes. I really enjoyed both of them and they are getting me psyched for training. Although, graduate school starts back up tomorrow and I have to spend a lot of time studying for boards the next few months so not sure I will have much more time for recreational reading!

In other random news, Alex and I got Blue Apron for Christmas and have had two of our three meals so far this week and they are awesome! Definitely will probably keep this going. We had spaghetti squash bolognese tonight and it was amazzzingggggg.

I will have to post a picture of our kick ass pain cave (we need a more creative name for it) once Alex finally (if ever) hangs the tvs. We now have to Wahoo Kickrs which is crazy but awesome and too many bikes up there but Alex insists that the perfect amount of bikes is N+1.

The Ohio State University Rec Pool--My new swim spot. 

Super excited to start week 2 of training tomorrow!