Race Simulation

When I start getting close to a big race, or when I'm losing that triathlon fever in the dead of winter and start wondering why the hell I would ever want to get in the water again, I do a race simulation at the gym at lunch.

This involves swimming 10 laps in the pool, changing in the looker room, doing 15 minutes in the aerobic spinning room on a bike I've already set up, and then running 15 minutes either on the treadmill or outside.

Wednesday, I hopped in the pool and had at it. I swam 10 laps in 9:30. That might be an indication for most of you to give the sport up as a bad job, however, for me this was a real breakthrough. I've never broken 10 minutes for 10 laps in the pool. In fact, I've never done 10 X 50 on 1 minute successfully. I even split it pretty evenly- 4:41-4:49. What's even more amazing is that I finally figured out how I could actually catch the splits while swimming.

I had a really good spin. High cadence and steady, to get ready for Florida. The spin is always the best part of the workout- I make sure the fans are off in the room and build up a good sweat.

I ran outside and ran well, but my left ankle felt pretty bad at first. It takes the ankle a long time to warm up. Having had a serious high ankle sprain (soccer) makes this a lot easier to deal with. I negative split the run by 30 seconds

Of course a workout at the gum that's 40 minutes long is not going to get you ready for an Ironman, but a little of all three sports never hurts to keep that triathlon fire burning.