26...

Just 26 days that is and I'll be right in the middle of Ironman 70.3 Chattanooga! I know - it's unusual for a second post so soon after the last on April 4! But Since my last post a few things have happened.

First, I basically skipped the Super Saturday in Pittsburgh. It's not that I skipped going to the Pittsburgh area, but I decided I'd rather spend quality time with my family. So I did. It was a great weekend! It included celebrating my uncle's 75th birthday, watching my cousin's son play basketball, and a nice hilly run. Well there was one long downhill and a subsequent uphill.

Second, I successfully completed the 100 100s! Last year I had not been swimming much (hardly at all) and had to modify by using swim toys like fins and paddles and still was only able to swim 8650 total. This year I did the entire 100x100 plus 3 extra 100s at the end since in 2014 I did 100x100=1x100 and in 2015 I went 100x100+2x100. Next year I'll have to do 4 extra 100s!

Finally, this past Saturday I raced the Richmond Tri Club Sprint Triathlon! It was a fun event in a great venue with an indoor 'open water swim'! That's right - it was held in an Olympic size pool and it was a snake swim, but instead of turning at the wall, there was a buoy to go around. In fact, if you pushed off the wall you'd be DQd! They had weighted the end of the lane line down and attached the buoy. It was very cool!

This was a fun swim course!

Anyway, I had a great race but my run could still use some work. However, I did actually run the entire 5k. The best part and surprise was snagging a spot on the age group podium!

I'm always thrilled to snag a podium spot!

So this weekend is the highly anticipated uphill race, the Mt. Summit Challenge! My goals other than to finish smiling, is to first try to improve on the time from last year, and second, to run more of it. Bottom line is if I run more of it I should have a better time!

So 26 days out, and I'm getting very excited about racing 70.3 Choo!

Ultra Training Kickoff Weekend...

...check!

It was actually somewhat of an official kickoff weekend as I just so happened to have back to back races. I had already planned to run the Monument Ave 10K for the fifth time, when I got an opportunity to run the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler, which I had not run since 2013. It could have been a bit more than I could handle, but I reasoned that my last several weekends of training that included a run on Saturday followed by a bike ride on Sunday would get me through it. I thought if I raced smart I knew that (1) I could do it, and (2) it would be a good training weekend.

And it did! I'd been doing a lot of hill training for this uphill 3.5 miler I have at the end of April and for Chattanooga 70.3 which is not flat. I've done two three hour bike trainer sessions as well as a couple of hill rides. I figured Sundays CB10 was my bike ride substitute last weekend. Though I do plan to ride or train hills tomorrow night. 

As for this little thing called ultra training, I am now officially registered for the High Bridge Ultra 50K on October 7! Carol and Sally had registered for that last year, and I think Pam as well, when they got the opportunity to run another ultra they had been waited listed for. So they deferred High Bridge to this year. Last year I thought it sounded like such a fun race it was nice to have the opportunity to run it this year.

Anyway, April started off with a bang, race-wise. And it is going to finish with one as well! I have a busy month of races and training still to come:

• 04/08 - Super Saturday (A fun day of fitness in Pittsburgh!)
• 04/15 - 100 100s (It's tradition - a month early!)
• 04/22 - Richmond Tri Club Sprint (My warm-up triathlon!)
• 04/30 - Mt. Summit Challenge

May will be a bit more laid back, schedule-wise, but still busy:

• 05/13 - Cap2Cap 50 (A nice training day)
• 05/21 - Ironman 70.3 Chattanooga (My Spring A-race!)

Happy and Healthy Training!