The Wheel in the Sky Keeps on Turnin'

Me, Bree, and Katya in our spiffy race suits care of Travis and Splish! Thanks Travis!!

So I found out that when you swim the Ironman course (and then some) and follow that up with some TT & interval bike work, the next day bike a volcano and run 800 intervals after that, follow that up the next day with another hard open water swim session and then run MOST of the Ironman course (30km) that afternoon, then wake up the next day and jump into the early morning masters swim session and go ride 80% of the Ironman bike course (in crazy gusty winds...I have a new respect for the bike course here!), then take one day of 'rest' and do a race on Sunday....your legs won't really like you after!! I had to take a nap mid-way just typing what we have done this week!

After a few monster weeks of training out in Hawaii, the Lifesport crew capped it off with the Lavaman Olympic distance triathlon. I've done this race twice before and it's always a blast. This is by far the most exhausted I've been before a race though! I was a little apprehensive about how I might perform on race day, but decided to embrace it for what it was, a great race, in a great place, and a great opportunity to fine-tune my race skills. Turns out that since I haven't raced since that fateful day in August, I had some kinks to work out!

I'll spare you most of the details but here is a race summary;

• The game plan: solid fast swim, swim with the boys. Bike moderate but strong, run fast and test the legs off the bike.

• The actual outcome: Wasn't very alert at the swim start, missed the draft and swam without a draft the whole way, down 1min from where I should have been. Bike, just did what I could do to keep the wheels turning, tried not to be too disappointed when my teammates Magali & Bree (both amazing cyclists!) blew by me and my legs were screaming! The run, actually felt ok, was down about 2 min out of T2, so I had to push hard to pass Bree about 3 miles in. Ran 36.36 on a course that has lava rocks, sharp coral and deep sand for the last 2 miles! Finished off with the win.

• Overall; considering how tired my entire body is, not a bad day, happy with how my running is progressing and just love this race. How often do you get to finish a race on the beach?

A Lifesport podium sweep!!

After the race was the epic Journey concert!! It turned out to be a fun night and ended at my bedtime...9:30pm!!

Now it's a couple more days in Waikaloa then over to California for the Oceanside 70.3 race on April 4th. Hopefully the legs will be ready to perform by then! As Coach Paul says, "it's overload and then recover".....come on legs, recover!!!

Cheers,

Lisa