Weekend home, TGP ride, end of August

 Sunday RUN 4 miles in ~41 mins. HR Ave 153, Ave Cad 168

Monday BIKE 20 miles in TGP, 17.5 mins/interval. HR 126-136.

COMMUTE 9.2 miles, unless I get my extra 0.8 on the way home. See if it's raining first. 

I left Friday afternoon for home, didn't arrive until kinda late and didn't get to bed until late. Saturday was a rest day hanging out at the bakery then putting together a little party dinner for LA. Another late night to bed and this one with upset stomach. Sunday was better, didn't screw up my stomach and went for my run, before having K's Communion Dinner and driving back to StL. And another late night to bed.

Sleep is an issue for me lately, and this weekend didn't help it any. Ugh. 

The weekend went fast and I'm happy I stuck to some goals I had. I almost skipped my run but and realized that NOT running was more stressful than running. Yeah, I know. 

I told LA today, that I feel like a rock skipping across the water. I have superficial interactions and things I do, but I don't feel settled in or relaxed or like I'm enjoying it. Looking back, it feels like I didn't even spend time with LA. I got to see my sis at the bakery but I was mentally distracted by some unknown. My dad was quiet and seemed on his own. Mom and I talked, but not like we wanted to. Sugar was in pain and unhappy, this was a distraction for me, but that couldn't have been all of it?

The bike today was great! EW went down on her bike over the weekend (no more details yet) so just me and BE. Three intervals, I was more quiet and slow than usual (or BE just rode a little faster, haha!). 

It's the end of August! This month and Labor Day weekend still remind me of events two years ago. How far behind I've fallen since then, how things haven't changed since then. How they have. And how they will this next year. My mind sits unsettled on silly things like that. 

But looking ahead - I still want to do the Virtual St Louis Tri on Labor Day weekend, maybe with LA. The pool reservations open for booking tomorrow. 

Speaking of pools -- I reserved time at the YMCA this Wednesday 7am!!! Go me!

NUMERICS: for last week

SWIM 0

BIKE 40.2 miles

RUN 14 miles, as per goal, as 3.5 + 6. 5+ 4

COMMUTE 33.2 miles 

Friday solo TGP ride, faster today

 BIKE 20 miles in just under 1:20: 17:30, 16:56, 17:10

I slept in until 6 knowing I was riding alone and needed sleep, did it help, I dunno. But by delaying all the other park users were also out of bed with their doggies and shitheadedness, so to the lady who was walking 5+dog abreast socially distanced, towards me on the wrong side of the entire fucking road, fuck you. I'm not sorry you had to jump into the grass because you weren't paying attention. Between my red jersey and headlight, what more do you need to look ahead every now and then to know what's coming towards you? An airhorn? Jeezus woman, we coulda hit head on, I was on the brakes and slowing, I wasn't going to hit you, but the fuck does it take to get people to pay more attention? 

That's kinda how the ride went. I really don't mind sharing the park, really, but when you want right out in front of me without even checking, well, you're gonna get a fly-by. 

Another great morning, sun and no rain or wind. My chest is still feeling odd, and still my throat. Again, like a sore throat. Even sitting here typing I can feel it. It seems to coincide with the full body edema-swelling I had (forgot to mention that yesterday) but I don't know if there's a connection.

Faster today, I wasn't watching the lap times as I rode because my goal was short <30 second rest between intervals (we are usually 90 seconds) and I wanted a more continuous ride. So I'm happy to see a sub-17 interval! I wore my HRM again, the HR wasn't high so the feeling in my chest is not from an overworked heart. It's just a feeling I can't explain.

I started writing up yet another log book to track my heart rate, mileages, cadence, paces, speeds. But stopped after on page, I just don't need yet another thing to take care of.

I leave for home soon! To see my family and LA, and have his little white coat ceremony picnic. I gotta buy filet mignon!

2nd full FoPa Loop, wiped me out for the day

 RUN 6.5 miles in about 1:07, me and BE

No COMMUTE

Great morning for a run, if you're willing to ignore the near-stifling humidity and warmth. I am. BE, EW, and EW's friend Tony joined. We started off talking about Tony's garage fire!! Then we split into two groups right away. 

I wore my HRM today, the real one so no wrist data. It's one of my 9 Things to do if I'm going to prep for racing again. Maybe it wasn't the best day to look at HR, the humidity and stuffiness drives up the HR. Right away I was in the high 150s and telling myself to slow down. But habits are habits and when you're mind says "slow down"  the rest of me says "fuck you and shut the fuck up". Ah, me. 

But it's one of those days that my chest was hurting. Chest. I didn't say heart. My chest, on the upper half, sorta right of sternum midline. This isn't new, it comes and goes, it wasn't there last week. Along with it is some throat pain, like I'm getting a sore throat or an ear ache. I know how this sounds. Trust me, I was there, I know what this sounds like. But all my tests come back negative for any issues. So fuck you and shut the fuck up. I'm running. 

BE slows for me, I say aloud my goal to finish with 100% run and that I'll pace this to finish that. He slows, runs backwards a little, pulls ahead and falls behind, but always there. I can remember running with someone slower than I was, and I know I was happier to wait and dance around than I was to drop and pull ahead. And I've been running with BE for years, he knows I can run the park and he doesn't judge or doubt or push for me. (Well he might doubt if I said my chest hurt...). So I comfortably settle into a "easy" 10:30-ish pace and decline when he offers to walk a hill by the zoo. 

Of course I finish, my gut is the only part of me unhappy so I get home to that, and from there my day went downhill. No motivation. No oomph. No focus or drive, just stress and anxiety. Hits of what feels like adrenaline, butterfly-y stomach, head spinny. I know this is stress, it's not my heart. But when you're stressed and your chest hurts and you're stressed they're like a positive feedback look.

I decide to delay going to work and get stuff done. I know the unfinished items on my to-do list are part of my stress. So off to Global Foods, Fresh Thyme, Restaurant Depot, Schnucks, and in that loop I get kbac and cok for LA, jarrow and PB2 for me, fish and eggs, dog food and multivitamins. Bing, done. 

Once home, I decide work ain't gonna happen, I'm feeling worse. So I get onto the food prep: all the salmon bento boxes. Hard boiled eggs. Chicken legs and an egg pizza for the freezer. Nibbles aliquoted and chopped. Bang, done. 

More to do, I've had cleaning the car and truck on my list for ..... months. The truck hasn't been washed at all this year! So scrub-a-dub both are washed, but I'm out of spray wax. Vacuum, windex, tidy. Boom, done.

Back into the house, LA calls, it gets late, and I get back to the master bedroom window project. Last night I pulled the upper sash and re-glazed it, and painted the lower sash. Today I evaluate - the upper sash has a full crack across one of the panes (fuck) and the lower sash gets another coat of paint. They are talking rain and I have much trim pulled out to repair and remove these sashes. I work on this, but not done yet. 

I still feel pretty stressed. Maybe it's the lack of sleep, the change in living patterns, the compressed week without weekends to get things done, the stress of work and upcoming stuff there. But today was a day off work, I took a benedryl to sleep, I got LOTS done and opened up my weekend. 

I still need to get stuff done better, streamline all the things I think I need to do, and remove a few things I don't need to do. This has got to change. It's only been 6 weeks. 

Easy track run; am I really passive, and why?

RUN 3.5 miles easy on track with BE

COMMUTE about 14 miles, to track and to work

Oh and I get to edit yesterday -  I did do the longer ride home to get my even-steven 10 miles. Distance Whore. 

Above are my numbers-to-date for 2020 and 2019. I didn't realize I'd bike so much last year! I did some 50-60 milers, I did Mondays in TGP all season, but wow. And lookit them commute numbers!

What happened this year!? Aside from the swim - (another aside -- is my pool open?......YES!! if I reserve a time!) - I can be forgiven for not swimming when the pools are closed. The bike and commute - I didn't do those so much with LA around. Not that it was his fault, more that I lost the habit and/or got a ride from him. Knowing the time was limited, I chose the ride when I could. As for running, Ugh, I missed running and it's been an up/down roller coaster to get back into it. 

Ran a little in Jan and Feb, sick in March and most of April, started again May and June but limited to 10 miles a week due to sick/fatigue, finally in July and August I hit a build I could hold on to. Then in August I wrote up a training plan for a 100-miler. If my blog accepted emojis, the one to put right here would be the laughing until crying. Wait....😂 Jeezus this new blogger format has emojis?! Oh JFC I wonder if they print in the book! hahahahaha!

Well anyway, the run. I'd considered pulling out a swim workout and modifying it for the track. A ladder or loco, for example. Turns out, BE also thought about a swim-mod, this time a SKD (swim-kick-drill) mod but we decided after a few laps of easy jogging to leave it for next week. Weird that we both turned to swimming for track inspo. We did 4 miles total, walked 2x200 and 1x400 intervals for a sum total of 3.5 miles running. 

The college track teams were back, this time more of them. Masked while in their groups and even sometimes while running drills. Changed days. 

I'd thought about getting into something I was thinking about this morning -- about being a passive person -- but I'm losing motivation for it after sitting here typing a few minutes. It relates to this blog in that while I'm an apparently passive and apathetic person otherwise, when it comes to triathlon and training and even commuting to work I'm NOT a passive person. Is that why I like it so much? I find 'myself' in it? Similarly, I'm not competitive and driven otherwise, but put me in a training or race even and I'm no longer happy taking a back seat and I'll drive right into the ground trying to get ahead of my own self.

The last few years - maybe since the heart attack, no, since the hip injury/surgery - have shattered the person I used to be. I used to *want* to be afraid of what I was doing, I loved finding out that I was capable of more than I realized. 10x-10 mile days. Triple Bricks. 30+20 weekends. Gone. Gone where?

I don't trust myself anymore. Back to back injuries sucked the inner confidence dry. Now I run and wonder how long I can go before I break again, instead of wondering where the next turn will take me. 

I think part of my need to get back into a race mentality - to train and plan and scheme and experience the fear and doubt of a hard run or long race - is because that's where I find my inner self being strong and decisive. I'll push and drive and suffer to find what I'm capable of doing out there. 

While I type this, running at Lost Valley comes to mind. The swiss-cheese rocks. The overlooks, the U-turns and drops. The broken bridge. These are the images that haunt my mind. On the commute in, I thought about Berryman, 25 miles of rugged trail that go by so fast and I know I have to run that again before I can leave St Louis. I used to be able to run that. I want to run that again. I need it. 

I need to know I can do it. 

EW joined our ride!

 RIDE 20 miles in about 90 mins, slower than usual but fun

COMMUTE 9.2 miles, unless I do the extra 0.8 needed for the round up, we'll see

EW made it today! It's another gorgeous morning, so calm and warm, the sunrise closer to 6:20 but we had enough light by start time. Good thing, because my front light was weak on charge. I'm not doing well with bike maintenance, as evidenced by the creaky drive train. Add that to my list of things to do, the things that accumulate that I need to do, and the list that just carries over into next week perpetually. 

There's really not enough room for 3 riders across in TGP. So I pulled ahead just a little thinking BE and EW would stay right behind me. But they lagged back a little, chatting about a musical they both enjoyed. I don't know the musical (imagine that) so I wouldn't contribute much anyway. So for most of the ride I was just ahead of them, I could hear much of the convo but not enough to follow a conversation. 

This gave me time to think. Just what I need! I'm still thinking about my secrecy regarding H100. I have the urge to tell people - yay I want to do this thing! But the fear of failing and being seen as a failure hold me back. I'll come back to this below. I'm thinking too that I should have a list of goals and benchmarks to hit as I start training. Like wearing my heart rate monitor, like stretching and strength training, like getting my diet out of a phase of eggs and hot dogs (really, that's what my proteins look like). Putting myself on a run race training schedule is like the best and worst thing I can do to myself. On one hand, I'll pay more attention to diet and cross training, sleep and strength, and I'll have motivations and goals. But on the other, I'll pay more attention to miles and minutes, I'm a slave to a training plan!

So I started a list in my head of 9 Things I'll To Do For Myself for if I plan to start training for the H100. Why 9? Why not. There where 9 in the Fellowship. Sounds good to me.

1. Get 10K steps in to increase activity, excludes running so stay active all day
2. Include 5 minute each WU and CD per run; 
3. Include 8 mins daily of stretch flex plyo or strength
4. Don't use sugars below 10 mile runs 
5. Wear the HRM
6. Read up on Maffetone 
7. Get hills and trails in for variety and specificity 
8. Shower first before a post meal, really, your gut begs you to do this
9. Stay on top of medical issues and don't ignore them

Later at work I tweaked the training plan I started last week, after having all weekend and all the driving to think on it. I broke the Pre Race Training Phase into 3 sections:

Phase 1: 9 weeks long, now until October 18. Build up to 20 miles a week, a solid 20 miles so it feels easy. Have 3 runs a week with one long run. Building the long run is really the goal for this phase. Start looks like 3+7+4. Peak looks like 3+7+12. 

Phase 2.  11 weeks long, October 19 until January 3rd. (wow, into 2021!). Build to a solid 30 miles a week. Slowly add 2 more days of running with short 2-4 milers. This will look like the training plan schedule at first, except the B-2-B-2-B will have a super short middle run. Start looks like 3+2+7 and 10+0. Peak looks like 3+8+7+and 12+0. 

Phase 3. 13 weeks long, January 4th until April 4th. Build to a solid, like really solid, 40 miles a week. I want 40 to feel like a nothing week. Be running 5 days a week but bring the B-2-B-2-B sequence up so it's longer in the middle run. This will peak with a 4+6+4 and a 20+10. By this time, I want all systems Go and Functional.

Race Phase: starts April 5th, I'll follow the same UltraLadies plan as before. It's described as a First Timers Plan, so what. I'm still new to this. 

I'd mentioned earlier that I was afraid to mention this to anyone yet. Not even LA. Why? Because look at all the investment so far I've put into this mere seed of an idea for running a 100. I could run the 50K or the 50M or the 100K. But no, I'm shooting for the Full Monty, all 100 miles. People will easily think I'm nuts, and I'm likely to fall off this wagon - just like I did in 2019 after Badger.  

There's so much to go wrong, from injury to schedule to just not being ready to run this far. But that's WHY I love doing this! The strategizing, the goals, the reasons to wake up -- all pull me forward.

I honestly think I'm nuts. I have brief moments of "ugh no, I can't do this again".

But it's countered and outnumbered by that pull, that call I get from a quiet morning during sunrise when it's so still and only the birds are with me, like from the Dark2Dawn run of 2019. The dark expanse of sky over head with a distant train, like from R2T in 2016. The creeks trickling in Farmdale 2016. The sun falling into red sky feeling of Badger 2019. The misty rain of Kettle in 2015, behind TV and hurting all over but feeling so damned alive. 

I get these feelings when I drive in the country. When I think of a trail run. When I think of night running. When I see a line of trees and think what it would be like to run under them. When I see a sunset fade into night or a sunrise bloom into a new day. 

Some people talk about the call of the mountains or the water. I feel the call of the trail and rock, of the pain and self discovery, the alone-ness and the feeling yet so connected. 

But first I have to connect the dots of short runs, of managing a tight schedule, of fixing some lingering (probably imaginary) health stuff. And I have to get out of this chair, sitting too long! 

It's time to let go and to sacrifice who you are for who you could become

 Jordan B Peterson. Who else?!

On the long drive back to STL I listened to JBP and the Abrahamic lectures. I really should know more about the Abraham stories, maybe someday between home repairs, a job, russian studies, running, and spending weekends with LA I'll find the time. Ha!

Anyway, the lectures centered around the idea of sacrifice. Thankfully I can find transcripts of these lectures because I couldn't paraphrase them well enough here. 

In the Abrahamic stories, one of the things that maintains Abraham’s covenant with God is his continual willingness to sacrifice. That sacrificial issue is so important: you are not committed to something unless you are willing to sacrifice for it. Commitment and sacrifice are the same thing. It borders on miraculous that those concepts are embedded into this narrative at the level of dramatic actions, instead of abstract explanation. People are acting this out. The fundamental conception is so profound; it’s quite awe-inspiring. It’s breathtaking, really, when you understand what message is trying to be conveyed. You have to make sacrifices. What do you have to sacrifice? You have to sacrifice that which is most valuable to you, currently, that’s stopping you. God only knows what that is—it’s certainly the worst of you. It’s certainly that. God only knows to what degree you’re in love with the worst of you.

Abraham sacrifices a life to his vow. So what do you do? Well, you don’t sacrifice an animal. You don’t make a blood sacrifice; you do it psychologically. You say, I’m going to sacrifice my life to this aim. That’s what you do, if you’re serious. What do I do next? Well, I’m going to sacrifice my life to this aim. What is it that I should do that’s worth sacrificing my life to? That’s a serious question. Maybe that’s the sort of question that people don’t ask, because they’re afraid of the seriousness of the question and the potential magnitude of the answer. Do you really want to know what you should do that would be worth sacrificing your life to? Well, the answer is yes, because it’s worth it. But the answer is also no, because it’s your life, you know? What if you’re wrong? And you’re probably wrong. But maybe that doesn’t matter. Maybe the rightness is in the process, and not in the decision. It’s the beginning of a sequence of decisions, as we’ve already pointed out.

I could copy quotes out all day, I don't have all day. I just have a few minutes here at work between other things going on. 

The point is - If I want to transform, if I want to make the changes I want to make, then I have to sacrifice a part of me. I need to sacrifice the time in Moria and the M and instead leave those comforts and habits behind to fix what needs to be fixed. Go for a walk or paint the wall or cut glass. 

It's all so clear when JBP says it. When I say it, it just sounds lame, haha.

Stress-ball run in AA

 RUN 3.5 miles in 35 mins

Ugh, I don't understand my head sometimes, grasping for ....? I don't know. I stressed myself out this morning and hate that I did it. But instead of beating myself up over it, figure it out and move on.

I don't do well with unstructured waiting. When something is expected to happen 'shortly' I feel like I'm knocked out of gear and just spinning. This usually happens when I'm waiting on someone. After living alone for 5 years I became adapted to living on my schedule. Now that I live 'with' LA (last fall and now weekends) I'm subject to someone else's schedule. He'll hurry me up then change gears and I have to wait. It's not something he's doing on purpose, it's just how it seems to me. I get ready to run, he wants to look at the deck, then he comes back to apartment, then he has breakfast, then he gets ready to leave for hardware store. In the meantime, I'm not eating or drinking and I'm on the edge of my seat waiting to run. I don't start anything, I feel like I'm wasting time. 

OK so like he said, I should just go run. But instead I get micro-managy about the dog, who was going with him to the store. This concerned me, I didn't want her to stay in the apartment alone (strange place for her), I didn't want her to stay in the truck (too hot), and she'd have to come in the store. He knew this, and he tried to tell me, but all I heard was "babe relax quit worrying so much". Gawd that's like the worst thing to say to someone who's anxious. Relax. Ugh. It's dismissive. It makes me feel like you're not listening, really listening. It only makes it worse. I'd rather hear "OK, I'll keep that in mind, go run". It's equally dismissive but at least it's reassuring. But telling him that only means I'm micro-managing him. 

He's not doing this on purpose. He's right -- I needed to relax. Ugh. 

So I start the run with the fear in the back of my mind that I should have stayed home with the dog for the errand. I should have run earlier so I could go with him. I should I should I should...

I calmed down around mile 2. The plan was 2.5 miles but the stress pushed me up to wanting 4. I started to mentally negotiate for 3, then realized 3.5 would give me an even 13 for the week. So 3.5 it was. Felt great, no after-effects of a "long week".