Tri Tuesday- Only 2 Weeks Until MTWomensTri!

Wow, you guys... the race is coming up FAST!

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I missed last week's Tri Tuesday post (and failed to do any other posts, besides!) but I'm here today with an update on my training. I've been sticking pretty close to my training plan, which included its toughest week of training last week and the week before. Now, I'm already beginning my taper as I lead up to Race Day on July 17! 

Brick workouts continue to be the most physically demanding. Yesterday, I had a really great confidence-boosting bike/run combo, however. Jeff had asked me to ride my bike over to our other farm yard to pick up a vehicle we had over there and drive it back home. Excited about the prospect of a not-often-used training route, I planned my brick to workout so that it would end at that yard. I biked ten miles of net uphill, trying to work my legs really hard, actually, so that I'd get the feeling of what it might be like on race day. Then, I stashed my bike by the side of the road and ran the last 2.5 miles to the yard to collect the vehicle. 

Again, I tried to push it pretty hard on the run. Typically, I ease up a bit on the run portion of a brick workout, but I wanted to see what my legs had in them. I was pleasantly surprised when I checked my Strava when I finished up and saw that my pace was very close to my normal 5K pace. I had expected it to be much slower. I am really happy with how I felt throughout the whole workout and how it seemed like my legs knew what to do and were flying on the run. 

The best part of this brick workout? Running by this patriotic barn on the 4th of July! 

I came back later, after retrieving the pickup and loading up my bike, for some photos...

Swimming workouts continue to go well, too. I've been working on increasing my yardage, and also on decreasing my 500 swim time. The first timed 500 I swam earlier this summer was 11:40 or so. Now, I'm down to 10:15. So, I've cut a lot of time, and I'm really happy with my progress there. I'd really like to be under 10 minutes on race day, but we'll see. I don't really know what to expect because the pool itself is completely different from any pool I've swam in before. All the same, the time estimate I entered for myself was 12 minutes, so I feel pretty confident I can be under that on race day. 

As far as gear goes, I'm pretty close to set. At a recent Bangs family reunion, one of Jeff's family members (who bikes A LOT) suggested I look into getting some skinnier tires for my mountain bike for race day. Great idea, and waaaaaay cheaper than buying a road bike or tri bike. Also, I had asked around and posted on Facebook looking for a road bike I could borrow and had no luck. So, the narrow tires mounted on my current bike might be the way to go. I could shave a little time off, anyway. I know my bike is a good bike, but it's not made for competitive road racing, and I think at this point the bike will be my weakest leg of the race because of this. So anyway, I should be able to take my bike in to the local bike shop in Havre and get this done later this week. Exciting!

At this point, I'm starting to get pretty excited about the race. I'm actually feeling less nervous now than I did a few weeks ago, and I think that's because I've felt strong during and after tough workouts, and it's building my confidence for race day.