Week Six of Off Season!

Sailing right along in this off season thing! I've made a firm decision this week in regards to swimming and took a foot off in terms of cycling, but I still managed to fit in what I wanted.

In terms of swimming, I had originally planned to get to the 9pm lane swim on Thursday nights. After four weeks of thinking that this would happen and not, I decided that the stress and guilt of planning for this swim time wasn't worth it. I will likely NEVER make it to a 9pm anything on a week night. Let's face it, in order to get a good 7 hours sleep, I will need to be in bed most nights by 930pm at the latest. That swim time just doesn't fit with my lifestyle. And I'm not even training for a triathlon. Letting that go and realizing that I may only make a swim time once a week if I'm lucky really gave me some extra energy to go and attack things again. In the end, I swam on both Saturday and Sunday as my sons both had hockey schedules which cooperated with the lane swim times. The thing is, when I swim, I really enjoy it.

In terms of cycling, this was the final week of my sweet spot base building plan and I decided to skip the final 90 minute spin. I just wasn't feeling it and I wanted to take some extra time back for myself (and sleep, let's be honest). In the end, this was the right decision as I was able to attack my long run on Saturday and due to running with some speedier friends, the back half of the run was rather quick!

Here is how week six shook out:

Monday: TR Black - a consistent effort for an hour. Not all out, but no lovely 60% breaks either

Tuesday: Rest

Wednesday: Slept in. Ran 7k at the gym at lunch with 5x2 mins fast, 2 mins slow (Coach Phaedra special), this felt great! In the evening, I was supposed to repeat TR Black, but instead I used my home selector weights to fit in my strength training.

Thursday: 8k early AM run before meeting friends/colleagues for breakfast prior to work. My stomach was slouchy like I had drank too much so I kept it easy.

Seriously, this weather is awesome!

Friday: After work, I hit the trainer for the second Black session of the week. This time, I was prepared and it felt better. Then, I met up with a whole bunch of my running friends for dinner and left with a sweet pair of #runnerd socks (no photo, sorry)

Once I retake the FTP test, something tells me I won't be so off target

Saturday: Long run day! While I was supposed to meet up with Sam, Ivanka, and Amy at my place at 7, only Ivanka showed as the others were not feeling well. We left right at 7am and ran about 5k to Kelly's place (fellow hockey mum), where she joined in. Around 10k, Henro joined us and the foursome was complete. Once we met up with Henro, our pace dropped to about 5:30/km, but it felt good and we kept up the conversation. I love running with people it makes the time fly. Ivanka and I ran 20k total with Kelly putting in her longest run ever at 15k and Henro continued past my house and home to his own place for 14k. Great day (no photos! - that was Sam's job!).

After I got home and showered, I noted that Alasdair's hockey practice and lane swim time were at the same time, same place! With no time to spare, I made the decision to go swimming. This worked out well and I swam for 1,000m - feeling good the entire time.

Lying swim cap

Sunday: The day started slow when I turned off my alarm and decided not to run. HAHA. I knew I wanted to get back to lunch lane swim, so I ate a bigger than normal breakfast and then headed out to church and to get groceries with Fergus while my husband took Alasdair to hockey. After everyone was home, it was time to swim. I planned to be in the pool for an hour and I did. I managed to swim 50m at a time (HUGE!) and ended up with 1,200m.

I got home in time to dry off and eat before changing again into running gear. I ended up getting my run in, taking the long way to Fergus' 2:30pm hockey game. YAY for fitting everything in!!! And we put up our Christmas tree!

Total distance for the week: 84.96k, lower than "usual" this off season, but I skipped about 45k on the bike (two rides) and that was the right thing for me.

Total time: 7h16m59s - YAY for fitting it all in!

This week should be interesting. I need to decide if I'm going to take another easy bike week or re-take my FTP test (which is highly anticipated among my pushy triathlete friends). Seeing as longer mid-week runs will start in two weeks, I should likely up my run distance as well in individual runs. Finally, I would love to get back in the pool twice. Oh, and strength training. Ya. I guess I shouldn't forget about that.

Have a great week!