Saturday May 29th - Aquathlon Series Race 2

Another one of these... they're pretty good actually, it's nice to throw in a short sprint in to the mix to keep things moving and remind my legs what they used to be fairly good at. I've not managed to do any interval training really until yesterday.

Ever since the time off I've been forced to take i've been feeling more and more unfit, running fitness is such a different thing to anything else, i feel heavy and sluggish so last night I had scheduled some intervals - partly to check if I should even  bother with todays Sprint!

So went to the track (which was locked up) so did laps round the outside of the running track, through the carpark which i've had to refer back to previous times doing this (many months ago!) which is measured at 840ish meters. I was going to do 800s so this was perfect. Did 5 reps off 5 mins (3:15 for each 800 and rest up to 5 mins)

Last time I did this I was doing 3:05 - 3:15 and  yesterday i was realy struggling to do 3:15s - I didnt reach puke speed I just didnt feel great. The only good thing about it was my recovery was better than ever, my HR dropping to the 80s by the end of the rest period even though when i was running I was well in my LT zone.

I send my mate "Mike the running/traflon guru" a whining text, asking what the hells happened to me, why have i got so shit and will i be able to get it baack in 6 weeks before i have to taper for the big event!?
As always he gave me some sound advice and put my head in a better place so slaped myself round the face a bit and accepted that the above times were perfectly acceptable to do a semi decent 5k time today.

Todays race then:

I talked my mate Mark into doing this too (it didnt take much as he's easily lead) we've been doing a lot of training together as he only lives round the corner and he suggested we cycled there, its only about 15 miles and since we're donig an ironman todays distances were nothing compared to the miles we've been putting in on the bike and in the lake lately.

We left and it was drizzling a bit, by the time we arrived it was drizzling a lot. We signed in, got numbered up and milled about til race off time. Being a funny fucker, i had sent Marks entry in with his age as 64 so he was down as M60s age group :D  He's a much quicker swimmer than me so was in the second wave, i would have preferred him to be the same wave so I could overtake him on the run :)

The swim was as always 400m - 16 lenghts of the pool, i was feeling strong and covering the water well I felt. After half way, i steady up my stroke and tried to cover the same distance in the same time with less effort and this seeemed to work fine. I got to what i thought was length 12 and i touched the wall to turn and my hand met a float (they stick a float in the water when you've got 2 lenghts to go)

I got all confused, and paused a bit, and then carred back on. I got back to the other end, and said i hadnt done enouhg? but got out and checked my watch which said 7 something... i was still confused but got out and  ran on out into the car park, and then realised I'd miscounted my lengths and had donea pretty decent time. Officially 7:56 - if i'd been concentrating i could have got this down a bit. But still under 8 mins which is fucking awesome for me beings such a shit swimmer.

Transition was a bit of a pickle, it was pissing down, i'd put my trainers in a carrie bag to keep them dry which was stupid, and my socks wer all wet and hard to put on, i finally wriggled into them and ran out of the car park putting on my race belt as i ran. Transition was about 1:15! really Anna you need to sort this out  - its fair enough in long distnace but sprints arent for fannying about!

The run was 5k as always, I started off with a high cadence covereing the ground fairly well, i passed a couple of people who had got out of the swim before me, follwed the course onwards and got into a rhythm. Iwasnt going flat out but i was pushing on, I got round the next corner and overtook some more folks, and got onto the straight to see that there was noone else in front of me.

I kept on til the turnaround point and checked my watch 10:30 for the first half, I pulled back the pace a little (not deliberately really) but slowed my cadence and increased my stride length. the people behind were now heading towards me going for the turnaround and about half way back the second wave of ridiculoulsly fast swimmers and runners were heading my way too. rounding the last kilometer or so, i spotted mak coming my way and we high 5'd I came back into the car park with a total time of 30:40 making my run time about 21:30 - not too shabby, but I dont know if i'll ever nail a negative split!

I was first lady again - best 3 times of the 5 series wins prizes, so i'm still in the lead. Next race is 19th June and I'm hopefully going to have put in some proper run training by then so am really going to try and push under 30 mins. :)