Baby It's Cold Outside!

Most days of the year, south Mississippi is the perfect place to live and train. Our winters are mild; layer well & biking is manageable. Our summers are hot; but who doesn't mind a little sweat? The only real downfall is the humidity, which makes the hot seem hotter and the cold seem colder, but a little discomfort is a small price to pay for four seasons of training. 

View from the house this morning. Notice the pond is icing over... brrr!

As I write, the "deep south" is in the middle of the snow-pocalypse. Relatively speaking, of course. South Mississippi is not accustomed to wintery conditions, so freezing temps, "wintery mix" precipitation, and 2 inches of white slush are a big deal. The roads are icy and our transportation services (and, drivers!) aren't equipped to deal with such rare occasions. 

This has obviously put a damper on training. For 48 hours, the roads are expected do be iced over & therefore not run-able or ride-able. Perhaps spend some extra time in the pool? NOPE! When schools close down, the pools do, too. 

Today's schedule called for 90 minutes of running, 40 minute tempo bike, & a short swim. The run was out, and treadmills are miserable, so we improvised with the following workout.

Indoor Training Session

15 min warm up

30 min. tempo Bike- 20K effort

1K on Treadmill - 8-9 mph

check heart-rate

5 min recovery spin

repeat tempo bike & run

15 min cool-down

total time=2hrs

Since I just did a 10K on Sunday & Brinn has a 1/2 marathon this weekend, cutting the long run actually worked out. We're both training for Olympic Distance races, but we've got some sprints along the way. The goal of this session was to come off of a hard bike and be able to hit quick paces and maintain with tired legs. 

We both did well- pushed the bikes & were hitting 5K goal paces on the treadmill. Even though we weren't able to get our prescribed workouts in, we were able to make the best out of our workout time. SO, don't let the wintery blues interrupt your training. Jump on the trainer & treadmill & get some quality work in. Train hard and stay warm!

W is for Winter... & WORK... and eventually, Winning!

A lot of triathletes take the winter months off to recuperate from the previous season and prepare for the coming months of training & racing. The terms off-season and pre-season may sound familiar. My personal favorite is "hibernation".

NOT US!

We swim. HARD. Then we enter swim meets and show down with the real swimmers. The benefits of this are two-fold.

• 1. We compete against people who are former swim studs. Collegiate swimmers, regional champs, national champs, whatever. It's quite humbling to get lapped. It's also humbling to exit the water hyperventilating but pleased with your 1:05 best time for 100 free, then watch the next heat & the guy swimming a 100 fly swims 10 seconds faster. "Hey, just in case you forgot, 'pretty fast for a triathlete' is actually not all that fast". HUMILITY.
• 2. In order to swim fast for the long stuff, you have to swim fast for the short stuff. My priority for swim meets is to swim a distance event and get a time. We work harder and perform better in race situations, but we also have people to swim against. If there's someone moderately close in speed, it's a race. COMPETITION.

At the University of New Orleans Short Course Meters Southeastern Championship. I'm in lane 5; first in the water! Not bad for a newbie swimmer. Teammate Elizabeth is next to me in lane 4. Apparently coach Kyle does a nice job of teaching Hub Fins Masters to have quick reaction times!

We don't swim hard everyday in training. But we are in the water 5 days a week and each day is focused on some important aspect of training. Stroke technique; long aerobic sets; fast, hard threshold training. Swimming is by far the most technical sport in triathlon, and it takes YEARS to master it, so we don't take any rest time & our fitness carries over & improves between race seasons.

We bike. Outside as much as possible, but we're sometimes forced to the misery of trainer sessions. We have our weekend long rides, our weekday short rides, and our interval days depending on what training phase we're in. Some days it's cold, some days it's pleasant (we're in MISSISSIPPI, so there are the occasional 70' sunny afternoons in January), but we always get the work done. Winter is the PERFECT time to build up the base phase and prepare for fine-tuning the speed and power once the weather is more consistently cheery before the early season races.

We run. The volume and intensity would be unimpressive to the elite runner. Again, this is a base building period to prepare the body for the speed it will be going through in the coming months. The long runs feel less agonizing, the 'moderate' pace begins to feel easier, the once 5K race pace feels like it could endure twice the distance. Quite simply, running feels less miserable, and I love it!


Tri season is approaching. QUICKLY. I am only 11 weeks out from my season opener, the Nautica South Beach Tri. 11 weeks seems like a long time... heck, that's almost 3 months! Well, it's not! I have full confidence that I could go out and complete an Olympic Distance with a halfway decent time right now, probably even on par with last season. BUT I don't want to be on par with last season, I want to be faster than last season. The huge gains I'm chasing need to happen now (in the winter). There's just not enough time to use the race season to get faster. Why? Because we're racing! Summer is a time for sharpening. There's no better feeling than having a successful summer and knowing that the winter work you put in on those cold days and nights paid off. Work now, race with the big girls (or boys) later.

Looking forward to 2014

2013 is in the books. It was a roller coaster. I've got my sights on 2014, but I feel it's necessary to reflect on the past year before I put it behind me completely. I made mistakes & learned tough lessons, but I also did a few things right. You take the good and learn from the bad; overall it was a successful year.

Accomplishments (in chronological order)

• 1st overall at West Point Lakes Draft Legal Triathlon
• 3rd overall (& prize $$) at Girl Power Triathlon
• 2nd overall at Crawfishman Triathlon
• 4th overall (& prize $$) at Indian Creek Triathlon
• 1st overall at Sunfish Triathlon
• 5th overall & age group win at Music City Triathlon (Olympic Distance 2:25:15)
• Re-Organized the Team H.A.M.R. Triathlon Club thanks to a gentle shove from Ginger Spansel :)
• Competed in the open division at Rocketman Triathlon (Olympic Distance 2:33:57)
• 2nd overall (& prize $$) at Girl Power Triathlon; shed 2 minutes from my spring time
• 1st Elite Amateur at Lifetime Fitness Tri U.S. Open in Dallas
• 1st overall at Mighty Magnolia Triathlon; shed 3.5 minutes from last year
• Top 10 1500m time for women 25-29 in US Masters Swimming National Rankings (21:57)
• Helped A LOT of people reach their fitness goals through leadership in training programs (2x5K, 10K, 1/2 marathon, & triathlon)
• Co-organized monthly women's only group ride in Hattiesburg- The Monthly Cycle- with Brinn Strange

Ladies of Hub City Velo & Team H.A.M.R. get together for the December Monthly Cycle.

Lessons Learned

Awards ceremony at the
Lifetime Fitness Tri in Dallas.
Biggest and best race for 2013,
spontaneity means no pressure!

• A race is just a race. As a former competitive cheerleader, I've grown accustomed to the concept that one performance determines whether the year was a success or a failure. As a result I've built up goal races in my head and create unnecessary pressure; and this is a recipe for disaster. Races shouldn't be a source of anxiety. They're an opportunity to let the hard work come together and finally work for you, and that's FUN. Races are never perfect, and things don't always work out the way you want them too. That's ok, because there's always another race, and if you've put the work in, success will follow. 

Ginger, me, & Brinn in Sumrall for one of last group rides.

• I get by with a little help from my friends.  A LOT of goodbyes were said in 2013, but I'm still surrounded by many really great ones. Some of them simply put a smile on my face, but some of them get me through the training. If it were not for my training buddies, I would really struggle through a large percentage of my workouts. The hours spent pounding the pavement, spinning the wheels, and surviving the water are where true friends are made! I'm so grateful to the people who accompany me and get me through the workouts. It makes the training fun.
• I can't control how other behave, only how I react. I've come to the sad realization that not everyone shares my moral standards. I can't control, or even understand, why some people choose to behave the way they do.  Responding to negativity is a waste of energy, and will only result in bitterness. Instead, keep an eye on the goals at hand and focus on what is RIGHT. And very reverently, CHOOSE YOUR BATTLES.
• Attitude is everything. I know this is silly, but sometimes I view workouts as punishments. This usually occurs at the peak of a hard training block, when I'm mentally and physically exhausted. I sometimes pout and act pathetic, hoping that Kyle will take sympathy on me and back off on the training load. This rarely happens, though, because he and I both know I need to suck it up and get to work. Consequently, I often approach workouts reluctantly and in a negative mental state. Bottom line- the work needs to get done, I'm need to do it, so approach it with a better attitude and life will be happier.

Goals for 2014

• Keep getting faster (duh!)
• Eat healthier (My new nutri-bullet should help)
• Go to bed earlier (8:30-9p.m. will put me around 7.5-8 hrs a night)
• Limit media time (I LOVE to veg out on occasion and just be entertained... but this is time I COULD spend sleeping...)
• Read for education (how about, for every book I read for pleasure, read another for education)
• Blog more (because everyone wants to know what's on my mind...)
• Use my degrees- research and report (because this is actually a talent of mine, and I'd LOVE to do it professionally one day)