Tri Dreaming

If the weather continues on the way has been, I'm going to be one hurting unit come September 12th. Rain, rain and more rain... with a little wind on the side. Lovely- this weekend was no different. To keep the complaining to a minimum... I took the most beautiful day we've had so far off to get ready for the weekend... woke up to rain on Saturday but was able to deal with that because I knew I'd have a long run on Sunday that I could afford to be fresh for, but did manage to get in for a swim. Did 2500 yds (focusing on longer distances than drills) before I was suddenly starving! It was so bad that I couldn't even continue swimming... that hasn't happened in a long time but the swim was decent...

Saturday some work was done on getting our Janus Charity Challenge promotional material ready which I'm happy about... I think it will help a lot. We made a poster and some cards that can be handed out as reminders to how to reach us and our website to either contribute or learn more about what we are doing. Some final touches need to be done, but overall I think they look very cool. Otherwise, waited for all our runners to show up from out of town before heading down to registration. Managed to walk away from there with $36 worth of socks. I think I'm obsessed... they're just so fun!! They were considerably cheaper than other vendors so I didn't feel toooo bad about buying them. They make me look cool right? :)

Anyway, the run went well... very wet, but fun. There were so many people around that I truly didn't even realize that I ran for almost 2 hours and my longest distance so far. My knees, mainly my IT bands were a little tight, but stuck it out to the end so I was happy. I made sure to drink at least a gulp of water at pretty much each water table too hoping that my stomach wouldn't blow up on me like usual. Luckily, that managed to hold off as well, but I paid for it later, and unfortunately, it is still unhappy with me. I don't know how to fix it and it's incredibly frustrating! Back to the run though... I have a tendency to start off too fast so I was pleased to see that my first mile split was 9 minutes on the dot. Went through the next 2 miles right on time so at least i was being consistant, albeit slow. The weather was nice... cloudy, cooler and not too humid. around mile 4 it started to rain pretty hard, but that felt great. I love to run in the rain. I even wore my hat to keep the forcasted hail out of my eyes... I realized I love my hat. The rain cooled me down and cut any humidity that was there... I think my pace actually sped up a bit. The rain eventually stopped and I could tell it started to get a little more humid as I dried off. Those miles were a little tougher, but not too bad. I was still at a decent pace, although I think around mile 8 my knees were hurting a little bit more and my pace struggled. I think it was around mile 10 that it started raining again and it completely opened up at 11. The wind picked up too and I managed to lose one of my contacts. That was fun since I had just put in a new pair that morning but oh well. Anyway, I sped up at mile 11, pushed even harder at 12 and actually managed a sprint finish to the end. That felt good as I ran down the shoot in the torential downpour, but I was slightly upset that I had that much energy at the end meaning I could obviously have pushed harder throughout the entire course. I guess it wasn't bad though considering I had gone out there with the point of a long training run and not really knowing what to expect. I was happy breaking 2 hours and ending with a chip time of 1:56:44. I could have definitely run further, which in the long run, is what I'm aiming for I guess.

Wow, what a long paragraph... are you bored yet? Otherwise, not much is new. Still don't have a bike, but everyone keeps saying how sweet this custom one is going to be when I get it... I wish there was more action and less talking... I'm getting nervous.

100 mile up this weekend... Hopefully the rainn can hold off for one day. I'm taking a couple easier days (Monday and today) because I think I got sick from waiting around in the pouring rain on Sunday while waiting for the Marathon relay team to come in. Everyone was very cold after the race and I think I used up all the hot water in the state of WI in my shower. Needless to say, I start a coughing fit everytime I take a breath anything deeper than "shallow". Good times. I tried swimming yesterday and made it about 100 yards. It was nice. I'm too impatient for this to pass. We'll see what happens.

Happy training to all... sorry for all the babbling!