July Training Update

It is crazy how quickly June flew by and how we've now found ourselves well into July.  Philip and I have been diligently training for our half-ironman (HIM) and our marathon.  Although we have been doing quite a bit of our training during the afternoon, we have really lucked out and gotten some pretty decent weather to train in. Here is a breakdown of what is going on:

HIM-
We have been doing brick workouts every other week since the third week in May.  Our first brick on May 19th was a 21 mile bike ride followed by a 3 mile run.  Last night, we completed our longest workout to date, 50 miles...a 40 mile bike ride followed by a 10 mile run.  Our HIM distance is a 1.2 mile swim, 56 bike, and 13.1 run, so it was a pretty good training distance for us.  We have been trying to figure out our nutrition during training and for the big day, and while I have discovered that eating two lunches the day of a workout works well, Philip and I haven't really perfected getting calories in during the actual workout.  (We made the very rookie mistake of not taking any water/gatorade with us on the run...we ended up having to change our route so we'd run by a grocery store to get some water.)  Other that the fact that we finished the last three miles during a thunderstorm, we made it through the workout in one piece.  We finished up the evening with some steak pizza (Philip's choice...clearly) and each took an ice bath.

Marathon-
This week called for a 10 mile run (step-down week), so instead of doing two separate workouts, we just combined it with our HIM brick.  Our longest run in this training cycle is 13 miles, which was last week.  Philip and I both got up early, with him leaving for a brick and me doing my work on the treadmill as the boys slept. To those of you who can do long runs on the treadmill...you are awesome! I barely made it through my 13 miles on it.  Sheesh, that takes some willpower.  The next three weeks call for 14, 15, and 17 mile long runs, which are going to be a challenge to schedule as we have events for the next three Sundays (Lincoln Mile, Omaha Tri, and CSG Tri).  Philip and I have briefly talked about putting marathon training aside until we have completed the HIM, BUT if it's possible I'd like to stick to schedule.

Things I really need to work on-
To begin, I have not been doing a very good job of getting to the pool for triathlon training.  Why not? With my swimming background, it has been pretty easy in the past to do minimal work in the water and still do okay on the swim.  Two years ago, I think that I went to the pool once before my olympic distance tri.  I am not a very natural biker, so I have chosen to dedicate more of  my time to that.  (Moreover, you spend quite a bit more time on the bike that in the water.)  At the same time, I have never swum the HIM distance, so really need to make sure that I put in some time in the water during the next few weeks.
Next, Both Philip and myself need to really get our nutrition needs dialed in.  We have two "practice" events beforehand, but it's hard to compare calorie requirements when those triathlons are so much shorter.
Finally, I need to get some speed work in on the run.  I haven't done anything substantial in the last few weeks.  Yes, things have been incredibly busy with Anders' surgery and recovery, my sister's wedding, and life in general, BUT I am not going to say that I couldn't have gotten the work in.  Our children usually sleep until at least 6:30am, so could easily get the work in if I got up at 5am...I just haven't been doing this.

That should be it for now...happy running!