My schedule has picked up a lot since Ironman training started. I am in my third week of training. I don't have a job right now, but I do go to school full-time, so this training plan is really testing my time management skills.
My ITBS seems to have improved dramatically, but now I hurt my shoulder with my crappy, poor formed swimming. I am trying icing and stretching. I couldn't finish my lifting session last night because when trying to use the bench press machine, I experienced excruciating pain trying to do one rep. I don't have another swim workout until Monday, so I'm hoping a few days of resting my shoulder will fix it. It feels like a strain.
I am very worried about my husband Joel. His unit gets more and more ridiculous every day. I am not sure who is reading this, so I will spare the details. I am worried about him because he is very depressed, and I can't lift him out of it. He is hard working, and does everything he is told, and exceeds all the standards, but somehow he gets knocked down every day and comes home in a bad mood. His biggest gripe is at work he has to literally "babysit" grown men, and hold their hand to do simple tasks and spoon feed them even the smallest bit of instruction. I can see how this would wear a person down day after day. The stuff soldiers in his unit get away with, I would not have even dreamed of doing when I was in the Army. If I had, I would have been PT'ed to death, then my corpse would have to clean and scrub buildings until all my blood was drained while wearing full dress uniform, and then just for good measures I would have had to go out back behind a building and dig a 30 foot deep hole with my entrenching tool ( a very small shovel, roughly the size of a gardening spade). Now, soldiers can really f**k up and the leader gets in trouble, so what stops them from doing the right thing? Because if they f**k up, they don't get in trouble, their leader does.
I have been trying to cheer Joel up, but he doesn't even have an interest in doing the things he usually loves to do. For a brief instant we saw a glimmer of hope that we might be able to relocate, but his unit put a quick stop to that. For the few days we had this glimmer, Joel was a lot happier, and cheerful and just hoping it would become a reality, but right now it looks like its not happening, and he is back to being depressed. I wish there was something I could do to help him.
The next triathlon is on May 7th, its an intermediate distance, so its a 1000M swim,18 mile bike, and 4.6 mile run. Its a trail run so I will not be able to wear my zoots, and I'm also going to have to put on socks in T2, I will have to practice that this week. I finally received my Pell Grant from school so I ordered a set of Sram S80 wheels. I am (not) patiently waiting for the man in brown (UPS) to bring them to my door. If they get here before the 7th, I hope I can get in at least one practice bike ride with the wheels. I had a lot of trouble deciding between the two Sram S80s and the S80/S60 setup. I finally gave up trying to find an answer and went with the 2 S80s. Since I am considered to be on the heavy side for a female triathlete (145 pounds at 5'6) I don't think I'll have too much trouble with a deep carbon rim on the front, but I really won't know until I hit the road with them.
The title of this post, I really am trying to see past the now. I am worn out from trying to get used to this heavy training plan. I am upset that Joel is so depressed right now and I can't help him. I too, am not happy living here in South GA right now. In time I know my body will adjust, and hopefully work starts going better for Joel, and maybe we will get to relocated, but for right now, I need to stay positive and look past the current obstacles. I have my Ironman training plan thumb tacked to the wall next to my bed, it looks like a calendar and all the days are numbered up until the day of the Ironman on August 28th. I look at it constantly, when you look at it, the whole thing, it really does look overwhelming, a lot of hours, a lot of miles, a lot of meters. When I look at it, I only focus on what I am doing today, and what I am doing tomorrow, when you take it one day at a time, life seems more manageable, and just like in my training plan, I will do it one day at a time.
I'm Jillian,this is my journey from a morbidly obese woman to endurance athlete
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Friday, April 15, 2011
Check Out My Foam Roller
I have been rolling like crazy since January, now that I have been rolling my IT bands using all my weight, it is warped. I probably need a new one, but this is one pricy piece of foam.
Started the Journey to Ironman and Other Musings
I know, the jouney to Ironman started way back in December when I registered for the race, but now that I am wrapping up week 1 of a 20-week training plan, it feels real now. The training was as tough as I have been training since I started training for and racing triathlons........in cycling and running, but now the swimming has dramatically ramped up. I did more swimming this week than I did all last month. Cycling and running come so natural to me, but swimming doesn't, at all. My ITBS has improved dramatically, in February I couldn't even run a mile without being in excruciating pain, now I am up to 6 miles, and could probably go further. The next 19 weeks of training is going to be tough, but I know I have it in me.
Something I have been struggling with mentally is wondering if I am really any good at this tri thing, or if all my placings in races have been a fluke. I don't know what justifies someone being a good athlete. I train hard and give it 100%, and I race hard, but I don't know if I am any "good".
I tend not to get into eating and food consumption much, even though this blog originally started as documenting my life as a gastric bypass patient, but gradually turned into my life doing races. Anyway, the more I train, the more hungry I am. I have stayed 5 pounds or more under goal weight for 5 months now, even with increased food consumption from tough training. My original goal weight was 150, but I've been between 142-145 since November. My extra consumption is always healthy stuff, but as you know, it is possible to overeat healthy food. When the hunger hits hard and its not meal time yet, I will usually go for a protein shake or string cheese, high protein to help rebuild my muscles. The good thing about using protein shakes as extra consumption is that when I am not in heavy training mode, its easier to drop an extra protein shake than an extra meal. I know my hunger is not common in gastric bypass patients, but I really think it comes from consistently training 7-10 a week for the past 7 months.
Something else had me thinking the other day. My daughters, who are 2 and 4, want to be like me. My older one will flop on the floor and make swimming motions and say "look mama, I'm swimming just like you" and my youngest will join her on the floor doing the same thing. Anytime she sees someone on a bike she says "look mama, they want to be like you." She will run all over the house and outside, and say "I want to run like you mama, you are fast!"My youngest will follow her around running too. I bought them plastic medals from party city, they wear them after running around, and the oldest will say "I got the medal running in the race, just like you mama."It makes me proud, to finally be a mom my kids can look up to and admire, a year and a half ago, if my kids said they wanted to be like me, it probably would have made me sad, I don't want that kind of life, morbidly obese and miserable, for anyone, especially my kids. My kids are young, so growing up they won't know the morbidly obese mom, all they will know is that their mom has always been active and fit, and has always done races, they won't know any different. That's a great feeling, especially when I think of the time when they will be young women, meeting young men, and what they will say about me when answering the question: what are you parents like?
Something I have been struggling with mentally is wondering if I am really any good at this tri thing, or if all my placings in races have been a fluke. I don't know what justifies someone being a good athlete. I train hard and give it 100%, and I race hard, but I don't know if I am any "good".
I tend not to get into eating and food consumption much, even though this blog originally started as documenting my life as a gastric bypass patient, but gradually turned into my life doing races. Anyway, the more I train, the more hungry I am. I have stayed 5 pounds or more under goal weight for 5 months now, even with increased food consumption from tough training. My original goal weight was 150, but I've been between 142-145 since November. My extra consumption is always healthy stuff, but as you know, it is possible to overeat healthy food. When the hunger hits hard and its not meal time yet, I will usually go for a protein shake or string cheese, high protein to help rebuild my muscles. The good thing about using protein shakes as extra consumption is that when I am not in heavy training mode, its easier to drop an extra protein shake than an extra meal. I know my hunger is not common in gastric bypass patients, but I really think it comes from consistently training 7-10 a week for the past 7 months.
Something else had me thinking the other day. My daughters, who are 2 and 4, want to be like me. My older one will flop on the floor and make swimming motions and say "look mama, I'm swimming just like you" and my youngest will join her on the floor doing the same thing. Anytime she sees someone on a bike she says "look mama, they want to be like you." She will run all over the house and outside, and say "I want to run like you mama, you are fast!"My youngest will follow her around running too. I bought them plastic medals from party city, they wear them after running around, and the oldest will say "I got the medal running in the race, just like you mama."It makes me proud, to finally be a mom my kids can look up to and admire, a year and a half ago, if my kids said they wanted to be like me, it probably would have made me sad, I don't want that kind of life, morbidly obese and miserable, for anyone, especially my kids. My kids are young, so growing up they won't know the morbidly obese mom, all they will know is that their mom has always been active and fit, and has always done races, they won't know any different. That's a great feeling, especially when I think of the time when they will be young women, meeting young men, and what they will say about me when answering the question: what are you parents like?
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Race Report-Savannah Sprint Triathlon #2 April 9, 2011
500M/13.1mile bike/3 mile run
Woke up 4 am Saturday morning. Had some coffee and breakfast. I was nervous going into the race, the night before after packet pick-up, me and Loraine went to the race site and drove the bike course, and I saw some questionable looking houses. I am still shaken up over the pit bull incident last month, so I slept horribly, and was even considering dropping out of the race out of pure fear. I really wish I could get past this vicious dog thing, it has really affected me. To make me feel better, Loraine looked up dog ordinaces in Savannah and told me dog law are really strict in Savannah, and since police were going to be on the roads during the race, potential rule-breaker might be keeping their dogs inside for the morning.
Left at 5:30 am for the hour drive to the race site. Set up transition and waited for the race to start at 8 am. It was wetsuit legal and I squeezed into mine about 10 minutes before my wave start. The swim was in a murky looking lake, but only a 500M swim so hopefully I wouldn't have to be in it very long. Our gun went off 3 minutes after the men's wave and we were off, the first 200 M or so I was doing great, my strokes were smooth and I was going at a good pace. Suddenly I looked up and realized I was swimming perfectly straight, but the buoy was way to my left, so I had to turn and swim toward the buoy, after that I was so concerned about making that mistake again I couldn't get back into a rhythm, so the rest of my swim was lousy. I finally made it back to shore and ran into transition while peeling off half my wetsuit. Swim time including run into transition :9:06
T1 struggled to get my wetsuit off,even with layers and layers of body glide on. Put on helmet, took a big swig of G2, put garmin on my wrist, put on cycling shoes without socks (my cycling shoes are actually tri shoes) grabbed my bike and ran off. I don't do flying mounts, so I stopped at the mount line, got on and clipped in, T1 time: 1:21
The bike was 13.1 miles, I felt confident heading out onto the bike course since I was among about 7 other racers. The dog incident happened when I was all alone, so currently being all alone on the bike freaks me out, because of this I felt like I had to keep up with everyone. I followed the rule of staying at least 2 bike lengths behind the racer in front of me. I kept up with the 7, within the first 3 miles I passed 4 of them. I was getting nervous passing a few houses, but I kept reassuring myself that I am not alone today, and that everything is going to be okay. I saw a rottweiler and a pit bull in one front yard, but it was a fenced in front yard. I tried hard to pass a girl on a sweet Cervelo P3 with zipp wheels. I passed her at the 7 mile mark, but she passed me back a half mile later, for the rest of the bike I stayed 2 bike lengths behind her. I wasn't holding anything back for this race, and I rode at a pace faster than I was comfortable with, but I am extremely happy with my bike split, I think all the interval workouts on the trainer are really paying off. Bike time was 36:13
T2 racked bike, took off helmet, took off bike shoes and put on my new zoots without socks, they slid right on. Headed out onto the 2 loop run course. T2 time was :53
The run, I forgot to switch my garmin to run mode, so instead I just ran as hard as I could. I could tell at this point I really gassed it on the bike, but that's why they call it a sprint triathlon right? The run was 3 mile exactly, it was 2 loops around the lake we swam in. Joel,Loraine,and our youngest daughter Miley were cheering me on. As always, it was great seeing them on the course and hearing their cheers gave me a much needed boost. After the first loop I really picked up the pace, I crossed the finish line and got hugs from everyone. Run time was 22:52
Total race time was 1:10:28
After the race I had some food, cheered for and rang my cowbell for racers still on the run course, and talked to some fellow racers. Met a lot of great people after the race, including someone from Brunswick who reads my blog, which absolutely flattered me to the point of speechlessness. There were quite a few "big girls" on the course, I didn't know any of them, but I was so proud of them just for getting out there and tri-ing, I really know how hard it is, I was still a big girl when I did my first 5k. We waited for the awards ceremony, I placed 3rd female overall, and got a nice plaque and medal. Here are some pics
Woke up 4 am Saturday morning. Had some coffee and breakfast. I was nervous going into the race, the night before after packet pick-up, me and Loraine went to the race site and drove the bike course, and I saw some questionable looking houses. I am still shaken up over the pit bull incident last month, so I slept horribly, and was even considering dropping out of the race out of pure fear. I really wish I could get past this vicious dog thing, it has really affected me. To make me feel better, Loraine looked up dog ordinaces in Savannah and told me dog law are really strict in Savannah, and since police were going to be on the roads during the race, potential rule-breaker might be keeping their dogs inside for the morning.
Left at 5:30 am for the hour drive to the race site. Set up transition and waited for the race to start at 8 am. It was wetsuit legal and I squeezed into mine about 10 minutes before my wave start. The swim was in a murky looking lake, but only a 500M swim so hopefully I wouldn't have to be in it very long. Our gun went off 3 minutes after the men's wave and we were off, the first 200 M or so I was doing great, my strokes were smooth and I was going at a good pace. Suddenly I looked up and realized I was swimming perfectly straight, but the buoy was way to my left, so I had to turn and swim toward the buoy, after that I was so concerned about making that mistake again I couldn't get back into a rhythm, so the rest of my swim was lousy. I finally made it back to shore and ran into transition while peeling off half my wetsuit. Swim time including run into transition :9:06
T1 struggled to get my wetsuit off,even with layers and layers of body glide on. Put on helmet, took a big swig of G2, put garmin on my wrist, put on cycling shoes without socks (my cycling shoes are actually tri shoes) grabbed my bike and ran off. I don't do flying mounts, so I stopped at the mount line, got on and clipped in, T1 time: 1:21
The bike was 13.1 miles, I felt confident heading out onto the bike course since I was among about 7 other racers. The dog incident happened when I was all alone, so currently being all alone on the bike freaks me out, because of this I felt like I had to keep up with everyone. I followed the rule of staying at least 2 bike lengths behind the racer in front of me. I kept up with the 7, within the first 3 miles I passed 4 of them. I was getting nervous passing a few houses, but I kept reassuring myself that I am not alone today, and that everything is going to be okay. I saw a rottweiler and a pit bull in one front yard, but it was a fenced in front yard. I tried hard to pass a girl on a sweet Cervelo P3 with zipp wheels. I passed her at the 7 mile mark, but she passed me back a half mile later, for the rest of the bike I stayed 2 bike lengths behind her. I wasn't holding anything back for this race, and I rode at a pace faster than I was comfortable with, but I am extremely happy with my bike split, I think all the interval workouts on the trainer are really paying off. Bike time was 36:13
T2 racked bike, took off helmet, took off bike shoes and put on my new zoots without socks, they slid right on. Headed out onto the 2 loop run course. T2 time was :53
The run, I forgot to switch my garmin to run mode, so instead I just ran as hard as I could. I could tell at this point I really gassed it on the bike, but that's why they call it a sprint triathlon right? The run was 3 mile exactly, it was 2 loops around the lake we swam in. Joel,Loraine,and our youngest daughter Miley were cheering me on. As always, it was great seeing them on the course and hearing their cheers gave me a much needed boost. After the first loop I really picked up the pace, I crossed the finish line and got hugs from everyone. Run time was 22:52
Total race time was 1:10:28
After the race I had some food, cheered for and rang my cowbell for racers still on the run course, and talked to some fellow racers. Met a lot of great people after the race, including someone from Brunswick who reads my blog, which absolutely flattered me to the point of speechlessness. There were quite a few "big girls" on the course, I didn't know any of them, but I was so proud of them just for getting out there and tri-ing, I really know how hard it is, I was still a big girl when I did my first 5k. We waited for the awards ceremony, I placed 3rd female overall, and got a nice plaque and medal. Here are some pics
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
My First Gear Review-Zoot Ultra Tempo 3.0
I am doing my first ever tri gear review, mostly because I actually bought something really cool, and something that not everyone owns. I had a birthday a few weeks ago, and with the money my parents sent me I wanted a piece of gear that might save me a few seconds in sprint triathlons, so I picked these shoes.
In my sprint triathlons I save a few seconds by not wearing socks. I wear tri bike shoes, so they are designed to wear without socks, so never had a problem there. Shoes on the other hand, I would wear my regular running shoes without socks for the run, and after the race my feet would be covered in blisters, and the run portion of a sprint tri isn't even that long.
What attracted me to these Zoots was the sockliner with a pull loop on each side. They are designed to wear without socks and not get blisters. In transition you can simply flick off your bike shoes (because I won't even attempt a flying dismount) grab the pull loops and slip the shoe on like a sock. They come with quick laces built in, with one hand you can pull out and up on the quick laces and they lock in, and they you are ready to take off.
The first thing I notices about these shoes out of the box is they are not shaped like traditional running shoes. The toe reminds me of a skate shoe, but just the appearance. These shoes are ultra lightweight, I think the wool socks I had to wear in the Army weighed more than these shoes. Right out of the box I tried them on without socks, since that is how I intend to race in them. They are super comfy and soft, and pretty cool looking.
Unfortunately because of weather, my first run in these was on a treadmill. They felt good, I felt like I had a nice spring in my step on the treadmill, but I knew the real test was going to be on the road. Sunday I did a brick workout, I did a 21.5 mile bike, them did a quick mock transition, getting into these shoes was much quicker, them I headed out for a 4 mile run. The first thing I noticed on the road is that these shoes forced me to heel strike less. I could feel the road more in these shoes, and was keeping a pace I was happy with. If you run regularly run in trial shoes like I do, the weight difference is huge, they are so lightweight. I maintained a 8:10-8:24 pace through this 4 mile run. After the run my big test came, the blister check.........no blisters! I did have a raw area on the back on my left heal from the back loop rubbing, but I will alleviate this problem with some body glide next time I run in them.
Overall, I am very happy with these shoes, I am doing a sprint triathlon on Saturday, and am very excited to use these shoes in the race. I am still not sure if I will use these shoes for longer distances, but it is worth a shot to try them in at least one 7+ mile run. Here are some more specs of the shoes from Zoot's website http://zootsports.com/spring2010/product/w-ultra-tempo-3
In my sprint triathlons I save a few seconds by not wearing socks. I wear tri bike shoes, so they are designed to wear without socks, so never had a problem there. Shoes on the other hand, I would wear my regular running shoes without socks for the run, and after the race my feet would be covered in blisters, and the run portion of a sprint tri isn't even that long.What attracted me to these Zoots was the sockliner with a pull loop on each side. They are designed to wear without socks and not get blisters. In transition you can simply flick off your bike shoes (because I won't even attempt a flying dismount) grab the pull loops and slip the shoe on like a sock. They come with quick laces built in, with one hand you can pull out and up on the quick laces and they lock in, and they you are ready to take off.
The first thing I notices about these shoes out of the box is they are not shaped like traditional running shoes. The toe reminds me of a skate shoe, but just the appearance. These shoes are ultra lightweight, I think the wool socks I had to wear in the Army weighed more than these shoes. Right out of the box I tried them on without socks, since that is how I intend to race in them. They are super comfy and soft, and pretty cool looking.
Unfortunately because of weather, my first run in these was on a treadmill. They felt good, I felt like I had a nice spring in my step on the treadmill, but I knew the real test was going to be on the road. Sunday I did a brick workout, I did a 21.5 mile bike, them did a quick mock transition, getting into these shoes was much quicker, them I headed out for a 4 mile run. The first thing I noticed on the road is that these shoes forced me to heel strike less. I could feel the road more in these shoes, and was keeping a pace I was happy with. If you run regularly run in trial shoes like I do, the weight difference is huge, they are so lightweight. I maintained a 8:10-8:24 pace through this 4 mile run. After the run my big test came, the blister check.........no blisters! I did have a raw area on the back on my left heal from the back loop rubbing, but I will alleviate this problem with some body glide next time I run in them.
Overall, I am very happy with these shoes, I am doing a sprint triathlon on Saturday, and am very excited to use these shoes in the race. I am still not sure if I will use these shoes for longer distances, but it is worth a shot to try them in at least one 7+ mile run. Here are some more specs of the shoes from Zoot's website http://zootsports.com/spring2010/product/w-ultra-tempo-3
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