Busy Buzzee Bisseyyy

Do you ever say a word over and over and it starts to not sound like a real word? Just had to throw that out there ;-)

First off: I have to give a shout out to Andy Bailey, who I train at Sport Performance Insititute. Andy is a below-the-knee amputee and wears a prothetic leg (See his story here). You may recognize him from CAF. Well, Andy's a rockstar: This weekend he's doing the swim portion of the Malibu Triathlon as part of a relay team! I'm so excited for him. He's been working super hard and is very fit... I have no doubt he'll do great. Plus, he'll have his loving wife, Jeri, right there cheering him on. She's by far the most supportive spouse I've ever met. Words cannot express how devoted she is to her husband. I'm lucky to know both of them.

Now for a little on my status as of late.

Time off from training certainly did help--physically and mentally--although it was not easy to be virtually sedentary for four days; a light ride around town just doesn't cut it. As of day 3 of no training I was super antsy to get in a real workout but I resisted the urge. Finally Monday came and I got back to it; I decided to ease into things (with much hesitation as the SD Palomar group ride was tempting) and stick to a swim and t-run. I think that was a good call because this week is continuing to kick my ars with the workouts on tap and all my non-training responsibilities at school and work.

One thing I am thoroughly enjoying (despite how hard it is to get my butt out of bed to do so) is riding the Felt to swim instead of driving the 8 miles. It's a trip to be on my bike in pitch dark decked out in flashing lights with a backpack 'o swim gear and not having to deal with cars on the road; not to mention it's a great warmup for the inevitably hard swim that awaits me. Although, I think my coach now considers me officially crazy. If he only knew that after swim I voluntarily take "the long way home" so I get in at least 20 miles of riding. Ha.

The kicker in all this is that from my house to swim it's a VERY hilly ride, and even more hilly on my long way home. I have to be honest, though, when it starts getting reaaaally cold and/or rainy, and after Clearwater/before CA 70.3 training starts, I don't know if this routine will continue. Still, it's nice to have a solid workout done with by 8 a.m.

Besides training, I feel like there's a million other things going on and my schedule is packed down to the minute, jumping from one thing to the next. But that's totally OK, I thrive of having a mega to-do list, especially when I'm enjoying it all. Grad school has quickly worked its way up to the top of my list of priorities and I couldn't be more thrilled. My classes rock: Sports Nutrition, Environmental Exercise Physiology and Stats for Kinesiology, and it's refreshing to make friends with college students who are like me... we talk about our favorite bars to snack on rather than bars to drink in.

Last night in EnvironExerPhys the lecture was on "acute responses to heat during exercise." Three hours never flew by so quickly. Loved it. Obviously, a super relevant topic for those heading into Kona, or any hot race for that matter, and I must say it's amazing to know the science of what heat does to us physiologically during endurance activities. I could write a whole blog on what I learned, but I'll spare you the nerdy details.

Other than that, life's great and I got some fun fun stuff coming up! More to come soon.

K, gotta go. Time to swim.