Using training intuition...

My Achilles is feeling slightly better. It's still sore, but no longer as sensitive to the touch.

My training schedule has been turned upside down. I'm moving workouts around based on my injury, burnout and even the weather. No more cold weather rides for me, I've surpassed my yearly quota already.

My objective is to get in all my necessary workouts and show up to IMSG ready to do the race. I'm still following the MAO program, but making my own adjustments; like doing my long bike and run during the week.

I felt this past week of training was successful. I can feel my mental and body strength returning. Since China, I've been on a real roller coaster and things are seeming to level out to pre-China levels.

If I look forward to swimming, or at least not dreading it, it's a sign I'm not burnt out. Yesterday was the first time in a long time that I was wanting to hit the pool. Today I decided to swim again. My plan has always been to "cram" most of my swims into the last two weeks before IMSG.

I had another good swim. I was consistently in the 1:35 - 1:41 per 100's. My original plan was to do 4000 meters. It took me until the 1 hour mark to commit to doing the full 4000 meters. That "little devil" was telling me it wasn't necessary to do the full 4000 meters. Heck, I had done 3000 yesterday.

My Achilles was hurting a lot less during today's swim. Which is a good sign. After the swim, I pushed myself to do weights. With less running and biking, I "felt" I needed to do weights to keep my leg strength up. Building my upper body strength also helps with my swimming power.

Right now I'm navigating through a training quagmire. I took no off-season break from last year to this year and China was mentally and physically debilitating. Due to lack of time, I wasn't able to follow a complete program for IMSG and it will be the same for IMLP. My goal is to get through this year injury and burnout free. The only way I see being able to it, is to add some FUN into my training.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with Kevin at the pool. He said not to overdue it at IMSG and I agreed. Then he made a interesting comment, he said, "it's not like you do Ironman's for a living". For some reason those words resonated. It got me remembering that Ironman is a lifestyle, not a destination and I need to keep my training as enjoyable as possible.

For the rest of the season, I'm not going to be afraid to make changes to my training schedule based on how I feel. A little experimentation doesn't hurt. I'm also going to go off the program slightly and add a fun training weekend. I've already committed to go with Doru and do the Epic Man Training Camp at Lake Placid on June 10th.

The camp is free, anyone can just show up. It is a 3 km swim, 180 km bike and a 21 km run. It's the entire route of the IMLP course. I'm doing it for two reasons, it's a great social event, which I haven't done many over the last three years, and it will give me a great feel for the course.

Reid also got some more exercise today. He rode his bike beside Nazaire as he did an 11 km run. The route was through the hilly escarpment and Reid had to stop a few times, then catch back up to Nazaire. Reid was dead when he got home and was ready to bonk. As his eyes were rolling into the back of his head from exhaustion, I told him all he needs to do is a run and he's just done a triathlon. He was too tired to even respond.

Mod Swim - 1:31:02 / 4000 meters

Weights Chisel - 30 minutes

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