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!