Ideally they should have been there mid-may and without fail I need them to have them done by the tax deadline of July 1st. So yesterday was the dad. No more procrastination.
I'm normally not a procrastinator and I am conditioned to keep every receipt and when I do deep dive into it I go until I'm done. That's what happened yesterday. I started at 10:30 am and didn't finish until 7:30 pm with no breaks, other than a few Salmon Social related calls. It was still all work all day.
By the time I was done it was a mix of happiness and being mentally drained. It was the first moment that I felt a beer after completing would have been a nice reward.
It kind of got me thinking "why would such an event cause me to want to have a beer?". Yes I've quit and have no plans on drinking a beer, I was just self-aware and wondering why?
I wondered if it was my way knowing having some beers will relax me afterwards and revive me from being mentally drained? Was it that I really hate paperwork and it would be a reward if I finished? I'm sure I could come up with more potential reasons over a long bike ride or run.
What I do know is how I resisted the urge. I realized that if I had that beer it would lead to short term gain and long term pain. What would happen is I'd have one beer, then two, then 10. By that time I'd be uninhibited and hungry and grab primarily junk food and eat it before I go to bed and if it's chocolate I also eat it in bed. Then I'd wake up in the morning all groggy, probably with a high level of anxiety and be upset with myself and defocussed about my training.
Then I'd have to start all over again, regain my bearings, refocus after the guilt and lack of motivation and get back at it. Not just the training but the mental work tasks I have to complete.
When I looked at it for what it was or would be the decision was fairly easy. Yet I was still intrigued by why I felt I needed or wanted it. It's one of those questions I'm definitely going to figure out somewhere along the line in my training.
There was also another win I had. From the mental exhaustion and not really eating I was on the verge of ordering a pizza. Very close. I almost talked myself into it thinking that this weekend is my long bike ride and run and it's Carbo Loading.
Then I asked myself the question, "why am I wanting to order a pizza?" Which I know is very high calories and I'll over eat. It will then sabotage my efforts.
I'm proud to say I didn't order the pizza.
One reason I do know why I didn't want the beer and the pizza was I've been working too hard to get Ironman Boulder ready and I don't want to sabotage my efforts. It's going to be painful enough as it is. I don't need to make it more challenging.
I'm not saying I was perfect. I did have some pretzels and a small amount of ice cream. Not perfect but it could have been much worse.
My training plan yesterday was to do a speed run. I made the commitment to myself I would not train until I got all my paper work done. I'd been reversing it up and in the past would put the training in front of the paperwork.
I was really tired and it was cool outside and I just wasn't up to it. I didn't want to do a speed run and not be able to give everything I have. I decided to rest for the rest of the night and make my training run a first thing in the morning priority. Which I did.
This morning I woke up at 6:30 am and I have no idea why. I just did. Then I tried to sleep a little longer. Then to try and put me to sleep I started watching about the KGB and then North Korea. I've pretty much exhausted every Hitler, Mafia and Serial Killer videos on You Tube and now I'm into communist leadership. Didn't work. I actually found the Kim Jong il video pretty interesting.
When I did get out of bed it was now about 8:15 am, before I went downstairs I got into my running clothes. It's a technique I've learned over the years helps keep you focused on making sure you do it now. Fully running dressed it was downstairs to my morning ritual of coffee, check emails, check facebook and check out twitter. I really like twitter because there is always some good links to read.
I guess yesterday did knock me out a bit. I woke up with a cough and can feel I'm starting to get sick. I may also be catching it from Alyssa who's been sick for near two weeks.
There was two things running through my mind, the first was I have training to do and being sick is not an option to stop and the second was I'd rather get sick now and not the week or day of the Ironman.
My planned training session was speed work around the track. I pulled an audible and decided to just do one fast run for 11 km straight. Basically I ran at about 90% of race pace.
Many people would have preferred doing the track speed work intervals. It would have been about 4 or 5 km's fast and the other half slow resting.
As strange as this sounds I like it reversed. The stop and go at the track I find harder. I'd rather just get in the pain locker zone, tune out the pain and go. Which I did today.
Don't get me wrong, I was not looking forward to today's run. I was hoping I would be able to go as hard as I could and not mail it in. I knew it would be painful. That's a given. I just didn't want to mail it in.
I didn't.
Out of the house within 1 minute I was running faster than I have in a long time. Once I see that fast per km average I run out of fear that I'll slow down and see a slower average. My goal is now just to see how far I can go and keep the pace up. The pace I was trying to keep up was a 4:48 per km or 7:45 per mile pace.
The more ground you cover the more pressure there is to keep the pace up. It's a game of constantly looking at my watch to make sure I keep at or below the 4:48 threshold.
My first win was to make it to the 5 km point at 24:12, that's a respectable 5 km run. Even more impressive at 203 lbs.
Now I had this pressure and goal to keep the pace up and see if I could get to the 10 km point without slowing down. My heart rate at this point was around 160 bpm which is high for me as I train at low heart rate. If I was a normal, non low heart rate training person it would have been about 180 bpm plus.
I was not mailing it in. I could feel the pump. My left thigh was so pumped I could feel the lactic acid building. I love that feeling. The right thigh was not as pumped. Yet my right Achilles was tender. I could tell my running style was off balance. All I could do was keep my fingers crossed and preserve and hope I didn't pull anything.
At the 10 km mark I was at 48:10, it was actually a 4 seconds faster than the first 5 km. Negative splits. Yes! Then I had another km to go and up a slight uphill. I'm good at running uphill and into the wind without loosing speed. It wasn't easy and I had to work at it but I didn't lose speed. I made it home and my average was 4:49 per km / 7:45 per mile. YES!!!
It was my fastest run in a long time and more importantly my legs felt like they got one heck of a speed work session. When you do 11 km at 90% race pace over 54 minutes it's like the equivalent of running 2 hours plus slow to get the same benefit.
The strangest sensation I had when I got home was my legs did feel like I did a 2 hour plus run. They were sore. It was sore to walk up and down stairs. That's what's most scary to me. How can sore legs for such a short run happen? It's never happened before. Heck, I've been training now about 6 or 7 weeks pretty aggressively. There should be no reason I have sore legs.
When I got home I was coughing. I wasn't sure how much of it was from a cold coming on and how much of it was from coughing up a lung. As the day went on I think 90% of it is the cold.
After the run I did a little work before having to go to the auto shop. There was a light on in Reid's car. The one he bought 4 days ago. I have a great and though mechanic and against my better judgement didn't have him check the car out before buying it. Reid's friend, who is a student mechanic did and gave it the thumbs up.
Turns out that the light was just the beginning. There was so much wrong with the car that to get it all fixed it would cost $4500. We bought the car for $4000. Much of the problems should have been caught by the safety and our mechanic said he would go after the garage that signed the safety. They could get in big trouble with the province and lose there license.
Needless to say the decision was made to sell the car as is. When we got back home Reid put the car online for sale. As Is and for only $3000. Looks like if we are lucky we are at minimum going to take a $1000 hair cut. I can tell you that the next car we will definitely have our mechanic check it out and not Reid's friend.
This was definitely a good learning experience for Reid. Emotional learning that you can feel the pain is the best. It never leaves you.
Rest of my night is going to be spent relaxing. Watch my favourite show, "Shark Tank" and hopefully I won't feel sicker tomorrow. We did go shopping earlier today so I need to behave on the food snacking, although I could say to myself I need to Carbo Load. I have a long ride tomorrow.
Today's highlight - my legs have been sore all day - love it. That's the feeling of "progress".
Speed Run - 53:54 / 11.18 km
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment