Lost In The Crowd

Call me crazy, but do you think the Northeast has had enough rain? I mean, I thoroughly enjoy the sound of the raindrops falling on my roof every morning - it makes me want to sleep in and cozy up in the deep currents of my down comforter - but seriously now... I'd like to get off the trainer and out of the house one of these days!

Granted, gray and rainy days completely compliment any good cup of coffee, but getting the workouts in this week has been challenging with the weather. I can't complain, however, as I've managed to dodge the damp and tolerate the trainer when necessary in order to see my week through. Details on the workouts: this week's key workouts were a 90 minute bike on Tuesday consisting of long TT pieces, followed immediately by a 10 minute run at 5k race pace and then slowing it down to marathon pace for the remainder. Wednesday brought a strong 2500m swim consisting of lots of kick work and a proud 1000m TT in the middle.

Today was Thursday, which translates to "Track Day" or "Day of the workout where you'd rather be lying on a bed of nails and run over by a steam roller". The key run this week, performed today, were mile repeats. But because I'm racing on Sunday, I've started a mini-taper, and so today's speed workout was cut by 50%. This translated to only three one-mile repeats separated by 400m recovery as opposed to the usual 6. And though a bit slow during my warm-up, I was happy to be turning out sub 6:20s on the mile repeats and feeling fresh after the workout.

Tomorrow and Saturday, I'll be closing things out with a very brief but somewhat intense ride, followed by an equally brief run. Sunday, as many of you know, is the Shamrock Duathlon - my first significant race of the year. Three days out, and I'm feeling very calm, and extremely motivated. My mantra this year has been to go harder on my hard training days than I anticipate having to go on race day, and I'm sure having done so, this has helped keep the confidence high. Sunday I'll be very happy if I can hit my target paces in the 5ks and on the bike, and will be ecstatic to break into the top 3. With a 4th and a tie for 3rd in my Shamrock history, I'm going into this 2006 season opener hungry.

On a final note, you may be wondering about the Penguins. I love Penguins, you see, and every time I race, I think of the Emperor Penguins all lined up, shoulder to shoulder - just like those surreal seconds before the gun goes off; racers all lined up behind the line, shoulder to shoulder. Anyways, that tidbit is just to satisfy those inquiring minds out there wondering what goes through my head with 5-seconds to start.

As always, thanks for reading, and I'll be looking forward to writing this weekend's race report.