What's this? Two blog entries in ONE day? Well, I'm making a conscious effort to be more diligent about certain things and this is one of them. My Calendar says today is the day for a Discipline in Focus post and this is the time for me to do it, so here it is.
My swim has been struggling a lot lately, but I'm optimistice that my struggles are resulting in me becoming a better, more balanced swimmer. How? Here's how.
For quite a while I was experiencing soreness and tiredness in my left shoulder that was disprportionate to my right. It's one thing to be beat from a swim, quite another to be struggling, and very frustrated, because one arm is overtired. I got to dread my swims. After some discussions with Mark that mostly involved him knocking a little common sense into me...
Mark: You're icing your shoulder when it's sore, right?
Me: Uhm....
My swimming got cut WAY back and I started from scratch with learning to breathe on my right while swimming. I always breathed on my left before. We're still bringing my yardage back up to where it was before, but now it's with me breathing on both sides (though not bilaterally yet) and with the apparently tricky advice that if my shoulder bothers me, I'll ice it. It's a good thing Captain Obvious has a coach or he might forget to bring his bike to the race one of these days.
I'm not nearly as coordinated breathing on my right as on my left, but it's improving a lot and my shoulder feels fine.
Monday, June 01, 2009
IDT Bike Course
I'm back east for a few days visiting my family, most importantly my brand new niece, Bella.
While I'm out here though I decided it would be a good idea to ride the bike course for the IDT. The course is primarily 4 loops within Myles Standish State Forest, a place wher I actually worked for one summer after I graduated High School, so I knew roughly what to expect. A scenic forext bike ride, some small rollers, no big hills and some stretches with absolutely no shade. That's pretty much what I found during our single loop ride (my friend Nicole joined me). We took a few wrong turns early on and had to stop to check the map throughout.
The roads have no shoulder whatsoever, but traffic is so sparse, that shouldn't be a problem. There is a fair amount of sand on the course in some spots, hopefully they'll have the sense to streetsweep it the day before. There are also a lot of bumps in the road due to the trees in the area, though very few potholes (a common problem in New England). There were very few hills worth mentioning, certainly nothing worth noting compared to the rollers on 36 on the 5430 bike course, not by a long shot. There will be several pretty sharp turns on the course each lap, three turns along the course of more than 90 degrees and two out & back turnarounds.
I felt really good on the ride, we took our time, partly because I kept dropping Nicole whenever I really got into the ride. I really felt great, and could definitely feel the altitude advantage.
All told, the course should be fairly easy, the hills are pretty minor, but I'll have to stay alert and watch the road the entire time watching for bumps.
While I'm out here though I decided it would be a good idea to ride the bike course for the IDT. The course is primarily 4 loops within Myles Standish State Forest, a place wher I actually worked for one summer after I graduated High School, so I knew roughly what to expect. A scenic forext bike ride, some small rollers, no big hills and some stretches with absolutely no shade. That's pretty much what I found during our single loop ride (my friend Nicole joined me). We took a few wrong turns early on and had to stop to check the map throughout.
The roads have no shoulder whatsoever, but traffic is so sparse, that shouldn't be a problem. There is a fair amount of sand on the course in some spots, hopefully they'll have the sense to streetsweep it the day before. There are also a lot of bumps in the road due to the trees in the area, though very few potholes (a common problem in New England). There were very few hills worth mentioning, certainly nothing worth noting compared to the rollers on 36 on the 5430 bike course, not by a long shot. There will be several pretty sharp turns on the course each lap, three turns along the course of more than 90 degrees and two out & back turnarounds.
I felt really good on the ride, we took our time, partly because I kept dropping Nicole whenever I really got into the ride. I really felt great, and could definitely feel the altitude advantage.
All told, the course should be fairly easy, the hills are pretty minor, but I'll have to stay alert and watch the road the entire time watching for bumps.
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