Been There Done That

Today I finally pulled my triathlon bike out, dusted it off, oiled the chain and changed the wheels to get it ready to ride.

This weekend?

Maybe!

I haven't been on the bike since the Alabama Coastal triathlon (Here) last September so it still had the racing wheels on it. I changed them out and aired them up and now the poor neglected bike is ready to ride.

Since September I've been either on the exercise bike at the gym or on my bike trainer at home. I don't like riding outside in weather under 75 degrees F, or in the rain, or on bad air days so I don't mind the indoor training at all. In the past when I was a little more obsessive about training I rode in the rain, in the freezing cold, in the dark at 5a.m. and in the dark at 7p.m and on days when air was so bad I coughed for days afterwards.

I don't do that anymore. Been there, done that!

I will say, however, that for the first time since training for Ironman Canada 2010 that I'm actually motivated and excited about getting back out on the roads. With all this indoor training I've been doing for two years, I am fully caught up on reading my stack of People magazines, I've seen an embarrassing number of episodes of Hoarders and Toddlers and Tiaras and I know more about Kim and Kourtney's taking of Miami than any normal person should.

It's time to take it outside before I lose my tentative grip on reality.

And I love to bike! Really, I do! I just don't love the traffic or the distracted drivers or the lack of adequate bike trails/lanes in this city. There's some folks around here that just don't like cyclists taking up space on their roads not one bit and they're not afraid to let you know it.

And I'm not just talking about my brother.

I use to ride with the bike club, now the triathlon club every Tuesday night during the spring and summer. I rarely missed a Tuesday night ride ever and if I did I felt bad. Nowadays, I rarely make it to a Tuesday night ride and I never regret it. Last year I did make it to a couple of Wednesday night rides at Oak Mountain State Park with a group of cyclists that's a little less competitive than the Tuesday night group and really enjoyed the more laid back ride.

When I showed up for the first ride, someone asked me where I'd been riding because I guess nobody had seen me out riding in awhile. I didn't no how to answer because there was where I had been riding. It was my first ride since Santa Rosa Triathlon (Here) seven months earlier and the only reason I was out riding that evening was because I had signed up to do a race that weekend and I wanted to make sure I could still ride without training wheels.

That was last year. This year it's going to different. This year I'm riding my bike and not just during races. I don't know when I'll add swim training to my schedule, but I am biking. There was a time back in the day when I actually got up and was at the Y as soon as they opened so I could swim a mile before work. For extra motivation to make sure I got up to swim, I would sleep in my swim suit. When 4:30 am rolled around, I woke up ready to go.

I don't know who that person was but I can almost promise I will NEVER do that again. Been there done that! And it was insane!!

I'll swim once or twice before the races I do this summer to make sure I still can. In the meantime, I'll do "dry land" training and no sleeping in swim suits!

It Was The Tequila That Screwed Up My Training Plan

This week starts my taper for the Mercedes marathon which is coming up this Sunday.  I'm doing the half marathon, not the whole, but I'm still going to cut back on my volume of training this week.  Last week was a big training week for me.  I've started putting more time either on the spin bike or my bike trainer and still doing the same amount of running and weights.

My long run is usually on Sunday, but this past weekend I decided to run with the group on Saturday morning instead since the Murph and I were going out with friends Saturday night and that would involve adult beverages.

 I still tentatively planned to do a short run with L and M on Sunday morning too, but the longer run was Saturday so I didn't have to worry about what I ate or drank (or so I thought!).  The only problem was that I got up in the freezing cold Saturday morning, ran 8 miles with the group, then went to the gym with the Murph and put some time in on the exercise bike, then got on the bike trainer at home for another hour and a half and THEN back to the gym for weights.

I guess I didn't eat enough during the day Saturday or before I got the drinks because after about three frozen margarita's later, I suddenly wasn't feeling very good.  And the drinks were only about this size.

photo from foodio54.com

The Murph said I didn't eat enough, but I was shoving chips and salsa down the entire night.  This reminded me of that time last March when we were in New Orleans doing the Rock and Roll New Orleans marathon and I got a little ill. ( New Orleans Blog Post)

All I remember is I was feeling really good and having a great time and we were about to get burgers at midnight in Harrah's casino and then BAM!  It hit me out of the blue.  And I can usually hold my liquor, especially tequila.  No problemo!

This was me right before the fun stopped.  Never before published picture.  As you can see I am already looking a little pale.

And then things started spinning and I got really, really sick.   It's all fun and games until you get on that merry-go-round from hell that just won't stop.  That wasn't a fun night.  I vowed to never, ever drink tequila again.  EVER!  Okay, well at least not on the day I run a marathon.

It was almost the same feeling Saturday night.  I was feeling great and not even that hungry, but I did eat anyway and only had those three very, very small margaritas.  Needless to say, by the time I got home I was hugging the toilet and the room was spinning.  Cadence, my cat was looking at me like, "geez, mom's got a hair ball too!  I can so relate!"

 The Murph missed all of it because he was downstairs eating a roast beef sandwich, but knew something was wrong when I didn't want anything else to eat and he had gone through Arby's drive thru to get some more food.  (at least I think it was Arby's)

The cat followed me to bed and The Murph tucked us in.  I didn't make it to run with L and M like I had planned, but at least I had already done my long run for the week and now it's taper time.  I'm going to have to take tequila off the list of safe foods/drinks during my intense training weeks/days.  Maybe forever.  I know, I've said that before!

Sunday morning I woke up to find the Murph standing over me and Cadence, my cat, saying, "Oh, what do we have here?  The VomiTER (that would be me) and the VomiTEEE!  (that would be Cadence because he's usually the one doing all the vomiting).

My training plan wasn't too screwed up Sunday though.  I still made it to the gym later to do 30 minutes on the exercise bike.  The Murph thought I was too sick to do doubles at the gym yesterday so he was a little surprised when I did 40 more minutes on my bike trainer and then 1/2 mile on the treadmill while I watched Honey Boo Boo's Christmas special last night.  I think he got a little upset that he missed his workout because of me and then I ended up doing doubles anyway, just not at the gym.

I've tried to explain that a little vomit doesn't stop workouts.  It can just delay them or make them less intense.  I mean how many times have I felt like throwing up after a race.  I can't count the number of times.  A 5k race has more throw up potential than a full marathon does for me.

I can't blame that on the tequila though.