Hump day...

I was really concerned about my Achilles hurting during my run today, so I warmed up a little longer than normal. My warm up was a 6 hour bike ride. I didn't want to risk it, better safe than sorry.

It was the first time I did a long ride on a weekday. I worked the morning and started at noon. I felt like one of those executives who leave work early to golf the afternoon away.

The day started off nice, I was hoping it was going to get warmer, but it didn't. The wind picked up and it felt like I was either riding into the wind, or up a hill, or both, all day long.

My coach said I should do 5 hours. I couldn't. Instead I made a compromise. I decided to do 5 hours or 180 km, whichever came last. I also did a brick run, I hadn't run since last Friday and wanted to test out my Achilles.

I normally do my long rides and runs on the weekend. Unfortunately, I had to miss last weekend due to injury and fatigue. With only 16 days to IMSG, I felt doing my long bike and run today would make up for last weekend and put the proper stress on my body before I begin my taper next week. Another reason was I wanted to see how my legs and body would feel afterwards.

It was a bit of a mental challenge to do the 180 km. In the back of my head I had this "little devil" telling me, "you don't need to do 6 plus hours, your coach says you should only do 5 hours, why don't you listen to him and just ride back home so you can relax".

About 3 hours into my ride, the battery on my iPhone died and I couldn't listen to anything while I rode. For those last 3 hours I was alone in my thoughts. At first it was a little depressing, I was giving myself negative self talk. Once I became aware of it, I started to change the way I was thinking.

I changed my focus to optimistic and positive thoughts. It's amazing how quickly my demeanor changed. The moment I started thinking differently, I started to enjoy the ride and feel powerful. I was surprised how my speed increased and I was seeing joy in everything.

As I was getting home from the ride, that "little devil" showed up again and said, "why don't you just finish your ride and forget about doing a brick run, you weren't scheduled to do one, you've already got a good workout in and did more than you had to, it's cool and windy, your iPhone can't play music, your hungry, why don't you just eat dinner and relax".

I blew the "little devil" off once more and did the run. My legs needed a run and I was curious how the Achilles was going to respond. I also wanted to see how my legs would feel during and afterwards.

For both workouts, I focused on heart rate. My standing heart rate is much higher than normal and I need to do a "crash course" and try and get it down. There was NO way I was going to go too high today, it was "fat burning" all the way.

I left my ego on the kitchen table before I left the house and all things considered, I had a good training day. My legs got a good workout and I was able to blow some of the smoke, from those 7 cigars in 5 days, out of my lungs.

Most importantly, my Achilles was workable. I tried to run very relaxed and changed my running style to put less stress on it. Then I had a good stretch afterwards. I'm also using "the stick" to massage my calves throughout the day.

My theory is that my Achilles irritation was caused by dehydration from beer. When I drink excessive alcohol, my calves are prone to cramping or injury because of it.

One last thing. Yesterday I was looking at the Ironman.com website and noticed that they added the finishers results for every Ironman since day one. They are REALLY cool to look at, especially the first few years. Very grassroots and the pdf's of the results are scans of the original finishers handouts, pre-Internet.

They had mine from 1988 and I was curious to see my splits. Needless to say, living in Winnipeg and training for an October race, I wasn't in the best of shape. Although, it didn't matter, to this day I don't think of my finishing time or splits, I just think of how great it was to do and the finishing experience.

I still remember running, walking and talking with a guy who engineered Paramount weightlifting equipment. We must have spent 16 or more miles together.

1988 Ironman World Championship

Swim - 1:23:55

Bike - 6:44:45

Run - 5:15:02

Total - 13:23:43

Long Bike - 6:12:22 / 181.27 km / 29.2 kph / 134 avg hr / 3,142 ft or 958 meters of climbing

Brick Run - 31:22 / 5.87 km / 5:20 pace / 138 avg hr