Three days out and I just completed my final workout this morning. This week has been unusally light, training wise. I won't bore you with the details but days off and low mileage are making me feel lazy. Tomorrow is usually a rest day and Saturday will be the same this week with the triathlon on Sunday morning.
Swim -
I have better form than ever. I have gotten more open water swim practice this year... I should be better off mentally this year since last year was my first year. The problem is that I'm not a lap after lap after lap type swimmer, yet. So, I didn't really practice like that this Spring. I tend to dissect my stroke and try to fix it after a lap or two. That's the first problem. The second is that I get caught up in "going fast" that I don't breathe as often as I should and then get into an oxygen deprivation state. Anyway, I hope to go further than last year without stopping to rest. I hope to stop less and therefore have a better time, even if it's a small improvement. I'm not stressing it, I know for me it's going to be the hardest part of the entire day. Happy Father's Day to me, yay! NOT! :-)
My bike leg last year at the DC Tri wasn't bad at all. I trained by riding into work sporadically, so not much high intensity there. My time was good and I averaged 18.7 mph and that's even good by today's standards... I think. Fast forward to today, I have a new bike, it's lighter, I just threw on some aerobars so I can slip through the wind like a fat ninja, and I have been "training" a lot more. Mostly run training but some good bike time lately. I feel stronger than last year but of course I have a horrible memory so who knows. Also, this year I'm going sockless! It takes time to put socks on wet or damp feet and then put on the shoes, let alone running in biking shoes. This year I'm going to run or stumble into transition from the swim, take off my wetsuit, put on my helmet, grab my bike and run out. When I get the "mount" line (which means you can now get on your bike) I plan on running and jumping on it, pedaling up to speed, and THEN putting my feet in the shoes and velcroing them up. Just like the pro's! That's the plan at least. I have practiced it a few times and haven't hit anything yet. I do swerve a bit so hopefully the other riders are paying attention.
My run last year was piss poor by my standards. Granted this was my first triathlon, I struggle with the swim, I laid down a respectable bike time, so I think I was wiped out, still shocked that I made it out of the water, or just content with the day. Normally, when triathletes really hammer out a good bike time their run time suffers. The legs are just too tired to run "normal" run times. Either way, last year I averaged a 9:05 pace per mile which is bad for me. This year I'd like to average closer to 8:00 pace per mile which will be much more taxing but this is a race, right? The run is longer this year and I have dreams of averaging 20 mph on the bike so we'll see if my legs cooperate.
The bottom line is that I would like to drop 10 minutes off last year's time. Since the run is about a half mile longer this year the drop won't be perfectly relational so I'll compare times in all the segments and let you know how I did after the race.
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