I went for my first swim since The World’s Toughest in May.  Before that I hadn’t swum since the Vineman last year.  Anyway, I went to Ives Pool in Slowblastapple.  I swam 4000 yards, and felt okay.  I had a hard time getting my heart rate up because of my lack of upper body strength.  Every time I tried to go hard, my arms would get tired.  Otherwise I felt fine.  I timed myself for a 100 yards somewhere in the middle of my workout.  I did a 1:20.  It is hard to believe that I used to swim 25 seconds faster than that during practice, and that was when we were doing 20 or 30 of those.  I did a set of 50’s at the end that felt pretty good.  Tomorrow morning I will try to get out for a run.  I will need to figure out when I can get back on the bike.

I went out this morning and ran 12 miles.  I tried to take it pretty easy and just concentrated on getting some time in on my feet.  Here is a link to the route.  It took me an hour and 45 minutes.  I felt pretty good the whole time.  I was still a little tired from my ride yesterday, but I felt like I could keep running if I had needed to.  Claire and I went out and rode our favorite route afterwards.  It was a little windy out there, but we both had a pretty good time.  I need to find some time to swim.  

Well, I have one month to get myself ready for the Vineman.  It has not been the year I had hoped for as far as my training went.  The bike shop has been busier than years past, which has kept me off the bike more than I have wanted to be.  I have also had the nagging calf injury that kept me from training at all for almost a month.  I have accepted all of this, and I am not worried about my overall time for the Vineman this year, but I would at least like to finish it again.  So, with this in mind, I hope to dedicate one good month to training.  I feel like I have a pretty solid base just from my years of training, so it is just a matter of getting myself ready for a longer race.  I started yesterday with a 64 mile bike ride over most of the cycling course.  It was my first long ride with aerobars, and I was more comfortable than I had expected to be.  I felt pretty beat up by the end of the ride, but I had put some effort into it.  My heart rate was over 170 for an hour and 20 minutes, it was in my zone for 2 hours, and it was below 130 for 6 minutes.  I don’t have an average heart rate on my cycling computer, so I don’t know what that was.  Today I plan on going out for a long run around here.  Let’s see how that goes.

I went for an awesome run yesterday in Cape Perpetua.  I ended up running for 1 hour and 50 minutes.  I felt great the entire time and did not feel the need to stop at the end, except that I had to stop sometime.  My 15 year old nephew, Ryan, even ran the last two miles with me.  It was quite a hilly run, so I don’t think my distance was too long, but time is always more important than distance.  The area there is so lush that I felt like I was running in Nerf world for the most part.  

I haven’t written in a while.  I think it was a couple of Mondays ago that I did my last bike ride.  I went out with a couple of guys from the shop.  I had a tough time of it.  I rode from Forestville to the shop, and then we went over Sonoma Mountain.  From there we went up Cavedale, which I haven’t done in years.  It was really hot outside and I had to call Claire from Cotati and beg her to come pick me up.  I was planning on doing 120 miles, but instead only did 70.  It was not one of my finer rides.  I have sold my Death Ride ticket, so I don’t have to worry about that.  I have been doing plenty of running, and feeling quite good.  I have had a couple of two hour runs recently and didn’t experience any pains.  Yesterday I ran 10 miles including some running on the beach.  I felt great the entire time and could have kept going except that I didn’t want my family to think I was neglecting them.  This run took place up in Oregon as we are up here for a couple of days visiting my parents.  It is only 42 days till the Vineman.  I don’t see myself having the time to really train especially for the riding part.  That is the tough part to running a seasonal business.  Claire likes to point out that I should be doing my triathlons during the winter when I have more time to train.  I will try to do some swimming starting next week.  Hopefully I will be able to get out on a long run tomorrow, maybe around Cape Perpetua, which is right down the road from us.

I went out yesterday morning and ran for an hour and a half.  It was a great run.  I ran down to our regional park and then ran the perimeter 7 times.  I felt really good the entire time with only a couple of pains in my calf.  I felt like I could have kept going if I had wanted to.

I got up early on Wednesday morning and ran the scenic loop before heading in to work.   I was very excited to be practically pain free the whole run.  This was the first time in a while that I felt that good running.  I am not going to get too excited until it happens again, but lately my legs have been feeling better.  I haven’t been able to ride my bike as much as I should be, and that might make things tough during the Death Ride.  Claire came out and rode her mountain bike while I did my running.  I didn’t do anything today, I just wish I could get in better cycling shape by doing all those tune-ups.

Went out yesterday morning with plans to do the Sweetwater Loop multiple times.  I rode the first loop with Eric the Fireman.  After dropping him off on Grays Ct., I went out for my second loop.  About 3 miles down River Road, I had my first flat in a very long time.  In fact, it had been such a long time that when I pulled my pump off my bike, my pump had frozen up and wouldn’t work at all.  I tried pulling the pump apart, but everything was stuck.  Anyway, I walked across the road and stuck out my thumb.  After about 5 minutes of selective hitch-hiking, I saw a pickup truck heading towards me with a tandem on its roof.  They stopped for me and gave me a ride back to my front door.  It was a couple from the city who were up staying in Guerneville at their parents rental cabin.  They were going to go out and explore Westside Road a bit.  They had very good energy and it would have been nice if we could have talked more.  I probably should have fixed my flat and headed back out, but instead I put on my running shoes and went out for an 11 mile run.  I did a new loop, which I think will become one of my favorites.  I did the usual Martinelli loop, and then combined my favorite Scenic loop.  I had some tightness in my right calf, so I didn’t run as far as I wanted, but my legs felt great otherwise.  I’m down to about 13.1 stone at this point.  I would like to get down to between 12.5 and 12.8 stone.  I also really need to do some more stretching because I am still having the calf issues that have plagued me all year.

Claire dropped me off at Ragle Park in Slowblastapple and I ran home from there.  Again, it is tough to go out there after an 8 hour day of standing in the work area, but I have to consider it cross training.  After all, I will have to run 26 miles after cycling 112 miles.  Anyway, there was still some soreness in my thighs, which I can live with, and I had a couple of nice stabbing pains in my calf, but they disappeared as I got farther into the run.  My total time was 1:27 and my average heart rate was 146.  I was doing just under 8 minute miles for the whole thing.  Claire suggested that I ride in to work this morning, but since we are taking our son and daughter-in-law out tonight, I thought it would be better to save the ride for tomorrow.  I also plan on going out and riding long and hilly on Monday.  My weight is getting better, only about a third stone left to lose. I have not been drinking any alcohol for the last 3 weeks or so, which has helped, but I do have that weakness for Necco Wafers.  I am limiting myself to one package a day.  I had an echocardiogram done the other day, and the doc says that everything looks fine.  That was an interesting experience, getting to see an ultrasound image of my heart at rest and at play.  My resting heart rate was 42 and my playing heart rate was 192.

I ran the Scenic loop last night after work.  It was tough getting out there, and my legs felt a little sluggish from the work day, but I only had one twinge of pain at the very beginning.  It was quite exciting.  I ran a 1:02 with a double loop of Canyon.  My average heart rate was 142.