Some days are tough, some days make you tough..

It's been a busy week. Getting back into the swing of training camps always takes me a bit of time to adjust. Different schedule, different training grounds, different (but great!) training partners, different weather (-25 to +25 degrees., wind & rain), new bike and actual pavement to ride on, different bed to sleep in, different birds to wake me up....the list goes on! While adjusting to the new surroundings and environments there have been some tough workouts to get through too. As I like to tell myself when the going gets tough in a workout...Love IT!!

Here is our ghetto-fabulous pad...it looks worse from the outside, quite cozy on the inside:

Many of our bike/run workouts have been in the rain and wind lately. The picture below pretty much summarizes the weather the last few days (note the bending of the palm trees). I can't complain though, at least I'm not wearing 3 layers of clothing while training!

Saturday had me and Heather G. doing a separate workout from the group (sniff, sniff, but I'm here to train and coach knows best...I think..). We battled the elements on the bike, altering our TT route so that we rode into the gale force wind for a portion of it so we didn't get home in 5mins with the crazy strong tail wind! I thought we might miss the rain but it got us on the last 15min...so close!! Then we ditched the bike and set off for an hour run at 70.3 pace, we ended up running pretty much the entire thing uphill, into the wind on a dusty gravel road, but miraculously the clouds went away and sun came out to make it just a little tougher! The wind gods were out to get us but I wouldn't give them the satisfaction, they even put in a little extra effort on my last minute of running up a steep hill--I leaned into it and ran a little extra over the top just to show them I won!

The rainbow at end of the day after our swim: Now, Sunday was a different story. It was supposed to be a 4.5hour hilly bike ride. We woke up to pouring rain and of course the wind. Being my usual thorough self, I found a weather radar site for Hawaii and saw that we were just on the edge of the storm and thought if we rode East, we'd be out of it pretty quick. We sucked it up and set out in the drizzle. It was a little slick on the roads, so I was riding pretty slow, then I rounded a corner and came upon a mud-slick and before I knew it, me and my new bike hit the pavement! Ouch! I made Heather turn back and I limped my way home. Here's the aftermath, could have been worse if I had time to put my hands out!Today, we're at Monday, recovery day. It involved a sleep in (7am), a chai tea in Paia, a splash in the ocean, a whole lot of driving around doing errands and a b-day party for Coach Lance's son. Now I am getting the gear ready for tomorrow--we have a couple big days ahead....wish me luck! I'll update if I survive them!! Hopefully I stay upright on my bike!
Cheers,
LM