Tuesday/Wednesday

Two mornings in a row (yesterday and today) I've decided I'm going to skip my a.m. workout and sleep in only to find myself in my gear and ready to go twenty minutes later. I guess force of habit is stronger than laziness!

Tuesday a.m. Run

A nice slow run. No crazy weather (snow, frost, etc.) to distract me but still a nice run. I ended up doing a bit of zig-zagging at the end as I'd misplotted my route and got back too soon (I don't want to go too far and be late for work).

Tuesday p.m. Spin

Andrew was away so Alan was the guest coach.

10(ish?) min warm up

Cadence build in 1 min segments - 1 min at 80, 1 min at 90, etc. up to 120.

I had difficulty keeping 110 and, as usual, could barely get anywhere near 120.

SLD's (Single Leg Drills)
40 seconds one leg, 50 seconds both, repeat on other side.
Each leg three times.

Group hill climbing:
We were put into groups of four and one person had to "climb" while the other three cheered them on. The climber went hard for 1 min then as soon as they were done the next climber took over, everyone went three times then the whole group went hard together for 1min.

I was with Karen, Owen and Benny. Benny is awesome as a cheerleader - I'd like to take him with me on my races!

7 min cool down, followed by a 15min easy run.

Wednesday a.m. Swim
Benchmark Day
1 hr
1,600m

I was dreading this but it wasn't as bad as I'd expected. My fatigue didn't slow me down too much, at least not physically. I had intense difficulty figuring out my time (if I started on the red 5 and finished on the red 55 did I take 1:55 or 1:50?), I guess an inability to do basic math is a fatigue indicator.

warm up:
200m steady

4 x 50m:
25m - scull25m - free

6 x 25m
odd non free
even free

Something else

Time Trials:
25m Butterfly - 32 seconds (horrible kick technique!)
75m easy

3 x 100m free on 1min rest
1:50
1:55?
1:50

50m kickboard - 1:10
50m easy

3 x 100m free on 1.5min rest
1:50
1:50
1:45
50m easy

We were also supposed to do a 25m time trial but ran out of time.

As a comparison, my December benchmarks were almost exactly the same as the above. Butterfly was 32, my 100m free were all 1:48 - 1:50 (so I beat that on my last 100 today), the only real difference was the kickboard, which I beat by five seconds. Considering that 1) I'm at the start of my season and 2) I'm in the middle of my big week, I'm happy with these times.

Tonight is a spin at home, an episode of Band of Brothers, some Pilates and a good, long stretch.