Ironman Canada - 24 weeks out

	IMC: 24 weeks to go (Feb 9-15)	Challenge: 24 weeks to go (Mar 3-9)
Total training hours	12:31	15:28
Swim	3:06 / 6350m	2:49 / 5650m
Bike	1:00 (15.4 km on the trainer)	4:33 (trainer + spin class + 24.9 km outside)
Run	6:25 / 61 km	4:20 / 54.59 km
Strength training		1:45
Yoga	2:00	2:00
SBR Total	10:31	11:43

Since Monday was Family Day, I put in a request that it NOT be a rest day. Who wants to spend an extra weekend day laying around doing nothing? Yeah… not me! Coach made a comment about risk vs rest given the heavy previous week, and the particularly full previous day (Run. Bike. Run. Yoga.) but compromised with an easy swim and a light yoga class. CCAC was doing a ladies-only swim in the morning so I went thinking it would be less crowded. Half the genders, half the swimmers? Yeah, no. It started off weird seeing that they had hung curtains over the lobby windows so men couldn’t even see in to the pool… OK… and wow, once in the pool… a whole lot of diversity going on. I’ve never swum with people fully clothed in pants and long-sleeved shirts. Uh huh. Weird.

I came home, tired, and fighting a killer carb craving. The previous day, I’d been about 1500 calories under what I should have been taking in for my activity level which might have played in to what happened next… After 7 weeks or so of saintly eating, I succumbed to that killer carb craving and ate my body weight in tortilla chips and fresh salsa. Then promptly fell asleep on the couch. Who wants to spend an extra weekend day laying around doing nothing? Me, apparently.

Tuesday I had a great swim – I had 16 x 100 to do for my main set and decided to target 2:30.  I managed that for almost half, then slowed to 2:35 for a bit, a couple of 2:40, then I don’t even know – I was tired and the math got hard! The swim-high was tempered by a ridiculously boring zone 1 (zone 1!) 1 hour spin on the bike. To add insult to injury, I was watching what may be the most boring episode of the Breaking Bad series (let’s hope) where the entire hour was about killing a fly.

Wednesday I reluctantly dragged my ass to the track. Oh, how I hate track-work. It’s just so… hard. I had 6 x 600m hard assigned and I ran them at a faster clip than I was running the week before, running the first one at a 4:17/km pace. Yeah, I was pretty happy with that. However true to form, I ran the rest slower and inconsistent (4:23, 4:31, 4:27, 4:33, 4:35). BUT… I did them. Which [spoiler alert] is more than I will be able to say when I post the next week’s training!

Sunday was my last long run before Napa and far, far shorter than I usually take my long run to pre-marathon. For my previous 4 open marathons, my long run has peaked at 35-37 km. This week I peaked at 26 km. My overall mileage this time is much higher. In the 5 weeks up to and including Sunday, I’ve run 296 km. For my first marathon (Seattle Rock’n’Roll), my 5-week pre-taper mileage was just 117 km! For my last marathon (Whidbey Island), it was 216. I’m a little uneasy about having such a short long run but I trust my coach. In order to manage the inner gremlins, I’ve been doing some reading about accumulated fatigue in endurance training, as well as the notion that there’s not much fitness to be gained on the really long runs, and that the impacts to recovery and subsequent workouts hinder improvements in running performance.  I know I will need to keep returning to these sources over the week leading up to my race so that when I’m tiring on race day after that 26 km mark, I can counter those gremlins that may whisper I’m not prepared to run longer.

This is how the week played out:

Monday	1900m swim Hatha Yoga Class
Tuesday	2600m swim before work 1 hr zone 1 spin on the trainer after work
Wednesday	10 km run – speed work at the track after work
Thursday	SFA – and for once I was grateful for it!
Friday	8.4 km run at lunch
Saturday	1850m PRM swim 11.6 km run
Sunday	26 km run in the morning 5 km recovery shuffle late afternoon Gentle Hatha Yoga Class post-run