Two Weeks to Tri

Brown County Indiana State Park - on a hike around Ogle Lake.

The countdown is on! The triathlon in is two weeks and I can't believe it! May has been a nutty month for me, with lots of festivities going on including the wedding (and corresponding fun activities like the Bachelorette Party) of one of my closest friends and a lovely trip to Brown County, Indiana with my mom, sisters, aunt and cousins. While festivities are great and all, it makes it hard to stay on track with training and healthy eating. I've done pretty well, though, all told. I am still down from my initial weight when I started back to Weight Watchers at the end of April (3 pounds total) and have managed to maintain a steady workout schedule which included a spectacular hike in the Brown County Indiana State Park. While not as stringent as I'd have liked it to be, I did my best. And that's what I plan to do on June 12...my best.

These next two weeks are dedicated to brick training (refresher course on brick training, which is doing two of the three triathlon activities in a row like biking to running or swimming to biking) and organizing my gear for the day of the race. I've taste-tested some gels and chews for energy for the day of and have decided on Gu Chomps in the Orange flavor. I have a weird texture thing with some foods and the gels are too gooey for me and sorta make me gag (pleasant, eh?) and the Jelly Bean ones I tried made me choke, plus they had a nasty aftertaste. The Gu Chomps are chewy, but not too chewy and are pretty tasty with no yucky aftertaste. I'm going to need all of the help I can get that day and finding the right energy boost is essential (not choking or gagging is helpful, too). They say you need an energy boost for every hour of continuous exercise. I really have no idea how long the triathlon is going to take me so I am going to be sure to stock up.

My best estimation on my times for the race is that the swim will probably take me 20 minutes since there will be a lot of people swimming in a smaller space than I'm used to. The bike will likely take me an hour and a half or so. My pace is about a five minute-mile on the bike but I am rounding up to six minutes to work in recovery time from the swim and depending on the heat of the day. We start super early, so hopefully it won't be one of those scorcher days. Then the dreaded run...well, who knows? I'll probably walk a good portion of it but can hope to do it in an hour-ish. Work in 5 minutes or so for transition times (two transitions between the swim and the bike and the bike and the run), possibly longer if my legs get wobbly, and we're looking at three hours plus.

Three hours; whew, that's long. There's not much I like doing for three hours straight, least of all exercise, but I'm getting pretty pumped about the actual race. I'm not an overly competitive person, so I can't count on the thrill of competition to get my blood pumping so I'm going to focus on all of the people out there who think they can't do something because they think they're too fat, or old, or young, or because someone told them they couldn't. I'll remember the people who looked at me like I was kidding when I told them I was doing a triathlon, or who acted like I didn't belong in a sports store, or who are doubting that I can (or will) actually do it. It may not be fast, it may not be pretty, but I'll do it and while I'm soaring away on my bike, or huffing and puffing on the run, I'll be thinking about all of you, my cheerleaders, and planning my next race.