Week Nine, Day Two: Swim Lessons + 30 Minutes Trainer

**If you haven't registered to win the 24-Pk of Chocolate #9 Agave Energy Gel Click Here **

Okay, time to get back to the workouts.  On Sunday it was 18 miles on the bike and then I visited my old buddy Tony Horton and he led me through 16 grueling minutes of Ab Ripper X.  I forgot just how darn hard ARX can be.  I made it through every rep - had to stop at 40 on the mason twists.  Not too happy about that (wanted to do 50) but the vomit coming up my throat made me stop (you are welcome for that visual).

Monday morning was an hour and five minutes on the bike which was 19.5 miles.  It was a hard effort but I was feeling great afterwords.  After work Annie and I got into our run gear and ready to walk out the door and realized the sky looked like a heck of a storm was on the way.  I jumped on weather.com and not only was the radar map covered in red and yellow we had tornado and flood warnings - not exactly ideal running weather!  But not to deterred, we went to the gym (different gyms - long story).  I ended up doing 5.6 miles on the treadmill (yuk) in 50 minutes which is an easy 8:56 pace.  Another Good Day!

That brings us to today:  MY FIRST EVER SWIMMING LESSONS!  So, I am going to a place called FINS in The Woodlands.  I set up an individual lesson with the owner, Liam.  He has worked with Triathletes in the past.  We got started and he had me swim a few laps so he could see what he had to work with!  The good news was that he said I had a good base and really didn't need much work.  This to me was also the bad news because I am slow and in my mind if he didn't need to tweak too much than I might just be destined to always be slow!

After working on a few drills I was starting to feel rather "slippery" in the water.  By the end of the lesson I was feeling downright confident. He gave me some catchup drills to work on but really I just need to focus on my pull and keeping my elbows high. When this was done correctly I felt like a different swimmer - this is very exciting.  I'm going to alter my 1/2 IM Training Program and add a few extra swim workouts in to beat in the new muscle memory.  I am going back to see Liam at FINS again in 2 weeks to assess where I am and where I need to be. 

Also this evening while watching Lost I jumped on the trainer and rode for an easy 30 minutes.  My legs were feeling a little heavy after all the volume from the last couple of days and a light trainer ride always loosen me up.  Another solid day of working out!

• FatCyclist.com is an excellent blog that has raised tons of $$$ for Cancer research.  Aside from that herculean effort it is also a very funny and informative read.  Mr. FatCyclist has decided to venture into the multi-sport universe and do an Ironman.  If you are a pure runner, swimmer, or cyclist and do not do Triathlon you probably think us Triathletes are an odd bunch of people. And Elden writes a pretty funny post describing how he is going to have to modify his behavior to become like us -- Good Stuff -- Click Here.
• On Sunday my wife Annie is running her 1st Marathon in Austin.  I am doing the half and will be her Sherpa/pacer for the 2nd half (Yes, I am an awesome husband).  And if we are lucky we may get our first Guest Blogger here at the Carrot - she has agreed to post her race report.
• Here is how the conversation just went:
• Jeff - "Do you want to post a race report on my blog?" 
• Annie - "I guess, will you help me?"  
• Jeff - "Yes." 
• Annie - ".... on her laptop.....long pause....I WANT a CHUG!!! ..... inaudible squeal"

• What the heck is a Chug?  A cross between A Pug and A Chihuahua, yes, really!

We are not getting a CHUG.

Tomorrow is a 30 minute morning run and then an hour at the pool.

Thanks for Reading,

Jeff