This was a trying week.

It highlighted the powerful effect of emotional stress on critical inputs to training: sleep, nutrition, and motivation.

The week started off fairly well with the day off for a national holiday.  I made good use of the time off and honored my resolution to get into the city, and I still had time to chip away at things around the house.  Tuesday back at work yielded unneeded stress when a colleague struck a nerve for the last time that I could tolerate.  Thankfully I stewed on it while making dinner for the week and over an hour of masters swim, so not only did I contribute toward my goals, but I felt a wee more grounded by bedtime. Wednesday was a travel day and I ate the catered lunch.  Including an only marginally satisfying brownie and too much chicken marsala.  That was a little disappointing considering that my cravings had mostly dropped off.  I was exhausted when I got home and napped for 2 hours (!!) squandering a majority of the evening; I DID get on my bike for a little bit, though, out of guilt.  Unfortunately while on the bike I saw several news stories of the devastating fire that pummeled a community a mile north, and the empath in me couldn't tear away until well past bed-time.  Then I couldn't sleep because I was fretting over the families, the destruction, and the “oh crap I don’t have an emergency action plan” thought train racing through my mind.

By Thursday the proverbial wheels were wobbling their way off.  The time I would normally spend preparing for the day’s meetings was replaced with time spent gathering and dropping off donations for the fire victims – a good deed, but poorly timed.  I felt unprepared and rushed all day, and then I gathered more donations at work and went to drop them off only to get deferred to another location (for which I would have taken a less traffic-jammed route) AND I got blocked into the parking lot by the governor’s media entourage.  So frustrating.  An hour and a half had passed by the time I dropped off the donations and got home, and by then my motivation and emotions were shot and I was a vegetable for the night.  I had the time to get to masters, get on my bike, do anything.  I also couldn't bat away this craving for carbs, so I blew my nutrition targets when I buckled for some chocolate zucchini bread that’s been in my freezer since August.  It was delicious.  And then I was tired but didn't go to bed at a reasonable time (doing nothing important) and then couldn't sleep.   There went my chances at making masters in the morning. 

Tally it up and you find three decisions that I could control to keep myself on track and I (very stubbornly) chose not to.

Friday was a wash – I was officially out of steam.  Saturday was better, marginally.  Made it to the pool and nutrition was somewhat reasonable save the post-swim nachos at the movie theater.  Did not need those in my life, but I was famished.  Lesson here is to pound a little more protein before leaving the house.

So what did we learn?

• ALWAYS have high protein snacks on hand (not just most of the time).
  
• These are the times to test your willpower.   Put motto of the year #1 into action: just do it.
  
• Recognize when your emotions are driving your decision-making and overcome your stubborn, emotionally crazed b-word.
  
• Keep after your consistency goal.  Timing of meals, initiating bedtime routine, etc.  Forcing these habits will make it harder to let the B win.
  

Next week is a travel week, so it will be another test.  We’re also expecting a blizzard – a further complication! - so this week’s goals are to: 1) stop crashing! Fix the sleep/nutrition problems and 2) maintain focus while traveling (i.e. be creative with your training and nutrition schemes).

 A lot of interesting things happened this week.  So many it's hard to remember them all!

First, we are officially signed up for our PR 70.3 relay!  I absolutely cannot wait.  I've never been to PR, and I'm excited to go with David and to meet his family there and to take a vacation in such a talked-about location!  I haven't been out of the contiguous United States since July 2013 - way too long - and I've technically never been to the Caribbean (although Belize kinda counts...). 

This means I officially HAVE to start getting to the pool at least twice a week between now and mid-March.

Second, since so many friends and teammates are doing big races this year, there's a lot of buzz over Facebook, text, and email which has been incredibly helpful in the motivation department.  Thanks to Diane, Lisa, Nicole, David and Theresa for fueling my effort this week.  More than once I was ready to bag the workout when I received a message from one of them discussing some training-related topic that spurred my self-driven guilt for even considering bailing on my training commitments.  That left me with two runs, a big swim, and two strength sessions under my belt.  Now we’re talkin’!

Third, last weekend I read out loud two of my favorite blog posts with family, and reading aloud made me pause to think about what the topic really means in my own life. You see, David and I are polar opposites in how we approach training.  We both start by doing our research, but I tend to fret over every last detail - in a nearly debilitating way - whereas he just goes and does whatever new thing he is trying.  We even chatted about this before I had to fly home from the holidays.  This is a common theme among the athletes or role models in my memory bank, so my new mantras for this season will be the Nike cliché: "Just do it." and "Act like an Ironman today!".  For some reason the second one seems to be a powerful reminder of the challenge ahead and the impact of the possible choices in a day, and the Nike cliché shuts down the voice of doubt in my mind.

 Thank you my love for helping me see the crippling effect of this particular personality trait!!!

 Finally, and most interestingly, the nutrition experiment yielded surprising results this week.  Near the end of last week my energy levels started sky-rocketing, an effect I noticed when I started paleo last January.  My energy continued to soar this week at work.  It’s fantastic and I want it in my life.  The other effect wasn’t quite so positive.  By Thursday I couldn’t kick an extreme craving for salt and carbs despite doing so well the rest of the week – I buckled and hoovered two Belvita breakfast bars (after my clean din of sweet potato/kale salad with steak). It was a bit disappointing after the discipline of the last 11 days.  I found the anser the MyFitnessPal nutrition log.  The paleo diet’s key principle is to minimize consumption of acid-producing foods, in particular grains, dairy, sugar, and legumes – our standard carbohydrate sources.  I’ve been eating SO cleanly that my carb levels have hit an all-time low regardless of the 3 – 4 servings of vegetables across my meals.  Meanwhile my proteins & fats are on target by weight, but completely out of proportion  with the carbs being so low.  Sodium and potassium are also only half what they should be.  OK, now we’re getting somewhere!  The question is – how to fix it?

This coming week brings more focus to: getting to the pool at least twice.  Getting on the bike at least twice, ideally three times.  And adding another veg or fruit per day.

Alright!  Week 1 wasn't tooooo bad.  My primary goals were to start waking up early and to get my eating back on track following a bit of holiday gluttony.  I'd say this week's goals were mostly met!  A lingering cold was a bit cumbersome in the early morning, and it keeps trying to break through so this notion may need to be dialed back until I'm 100% healthy again.
Since training wasn't the key objective, I only got in two runs but that's one more run than I squeezed in last week - baby steps!  The long run didn't feel fantastic but it also didn't kill me so I suppose I just need to get out and get going.
Meanwhile I have my meals planned and prepped for the upcoming week and every day has been logged - I really hope I can keep this up.  The nutrition log is already showing some interesting trends and I'm anxious to see how they relate to training performance.

Yesterday I decided to count the UCAN nutrition talk as the kick-off to the season since I found the environment so inspiring.

A fellow club member and nutritionist by trade shared some details around metabolic efficiency (ME) training - a topic I'm loosely interested in - and I'm going to try to capture the take-aways before I forget:

• ME attempts to train the body to consume fat over carbs via the macronutrient profile.  (Friel's books have discussed this and it's great to hear it reinforced)
• This is achieved by activating fat-burning through the right food choices & the right timing with respect to exercise (also discussed in Friel's books).
• Consume protein with every carb!
• When fat is the primary energy source (vs carbs or protein - muscle), less fueling is required during activity.  This also means less consumption of muscle = quicker recovery.
• UCAN is a strong compliment to ME due to the slow-burning super-starch carbohydrate (vs maltodextrin found in my current nutrition-of-choice) -- this mix allowed Matt to complete IMMD on 94 cal/hour ----- holy smokes

Since I already eat paleo I think it's just a matter of getting the macro ratios right and finding the right balance of fuel/electrolyte for training.  Last year during long rides I was using Hammer Perform and occasionally supplementing with my old go-tos (Stinger waffles or Stinger/Gu fruity snacks - love those), but I would occasionally wind up crashing after the 3-hour mark and then cramping/bloating on the run when I tried to shoot a Hammer gel, so I definitely didn't have it right.

This reflection will surface again later; until then, let's continue.

The greatest inspiration of the day came from Matt Bach, IMMD 1st overall finisher and fellow club member.  Matt shared the key changes that helped him nail his IMMD victory, and it was relieving to learn he had implemented the same principles that I would like to implement this year:

• Training with a power meter to optimize the output on the bike to the race distance
• Consistency

• Completing "critical workouts" - the workouts that push you out of your comfort zone
• Strength training in the off-season
• Improved nutrition (he did it via metabolic efficiency training and using UCAN nutrition)

This was inspiring.  This reinforced that I do indeed know what I need to do, now I just need to GO DO IT!


This week's objectives will be to continue what I started in week 1 and now to try to get in a little training when I wake up in the morning.  Check back again next week to see how I fare!

Alright party people - time to buckle down!  Starting next week.  After all, we're still on vacation. Today marks the inception of this site and mine and David's baby step toward our first Ironman (we're training for it together - precious, right??).  We started off 2015 with a light run around his park.  It was a rude reminder that we've been enjoying the holidays cozy-style for the last two weeks and haven't placed a toe in our running shoes (or any other athletic gear, for that matter) since last Friday.

Naturally I've been coping with the anxiety of starting after this beast trying to organize my life around Ironman training.  I stayed up NYE not partying, no, but furiously plotting out my typical training week, grasping for a visual of how I can best manage my time including training, eating well, sleeping enough, actively recovering, and somehow still maintaining my home, hygiene, and relationships.

It included a chores tracker to keep me honest about the "maintenance", a financial health check plan to keep my Iron-gear desires at bay, and Google reminders to....remind....me to be human and keep in touch with friends and family.  And to wake up for workouts.

For more on the type-A freak-out planning bonanza, check out the "Coping with Ironman Insanity" and "Musings" pages.  Meanwhile I'll wrap things up here by stating how excited I am to be finishing up this 17-day visit with a raucous game of D&D tomorrow before returning to the East Coast and jumping right into the IronPlan.

Last night to stay up late drinking and socializing for awhile - better enjoy it!