With exactly 4 weeks to go before my half Ironman in Austin, I tried out another self guided triathlon today.  It is time to seriously make sure I am in the zone as there is very little time to make adjustments for an endurance sport such as this.

The two goals for the day were to increase the miles on the bike from the last trial tri, and also see if I could slightly improve the speed of the run.  The run has been particularly challenging as I am still getting used to the feeling of running after riding and the fact that my running legs were lost somewhere back in March before my injury to my foot.  The transition from the bike to the asphalt combined with a lack of running muscles is a wierd feeling.  It’s like my legs are the legs of a child.  They aren’t quite connected to my brain yet.  I keep telling them what to do, but they don’t seem to always listen.

The swim dialed in nicely today under 49 minutes.  Boxed checked.

I increased the bike mileage from the 20 miles recorded during the last trial-tri.  This time I rode 30 miles to up the challenge past the half way point of the 56 mile distance in Austin.  Keep in mind that this was also following a hard 57 mile ride I did yesterday.  In other words, my riding legs were not completely fresh, but I was pleasanlty suprised at the ease of peddling today.  I did change my eating plan to include more carbs yesterday (Some rice dishes and some pasta) for some extra gas in the tank today.  It seemed to work.

 

With that, the 6 mile run was before me.  I made sure to drink three full bottles of my :GO Far Endurance Fuel durig the bike to be fully hydrated and fueled going into the run.  I also packed two GU Chocolate Peanut Butter Energy Gels into my running shorts for additional nutrition.   In total, an additional 1,000+ calories to help the cause.

The plan worked well enough.  The run was comfortable and I improved my per minute mile pace by :30 seconds compared to the last time I did this route last week.  A giant leap forward from pathetic to crawling toward being average.  The last time I ran the route it was a run by itself without the swim and bike before it.  Therefore the :30 second per mile improvement provided even more glory to my aging psyche.  Plus, it was a very comfortable run.  I could have kept that pace for much longer than 6 miles.

With a better nutrition plan that left me with excess at the end of the day, and a very comfortable run, the confidence tank once again was generously filled at the four weeks and counting milestone!