So today makes 5 for 5: 5 mornings in a row of Full Throttle Endurance--my New Year's resolution--at least for Week #1.
I feel like the new kid on the block even though I joined FTE in June; until this week, I was training with the team only on the Tuesday and Thursday morning rides in Central Park. But that experience was so positive in every way, for 2010 I decided to take it up a notch--a few notches, actually. So here I am, waking up at 4:45 a.m. weekdays, slipping out of my Upper West Side apartment a little after 5:00, taking the 1 train to 14th Street at such an ungodly hour, I usually don't see a single soul on my walk to Chelsea Piers.
Getting out of bed and getting launched from my apartment are the toughest aspects of this training for me so far. I actually enjoy the early morning walk and I love training with the team. But those first two hurdles are still hurdles for me.
Today's swim workout felt harder than this week's previous two, but I'm not sure it actually was harder. Until Monday, I hadn't been in the water since the Nautica NYC Triathlon, so my lack of a swim base could be catching up with me. (I switched to training exclusively for the Duathlon Worlds immediately after the NYC Tri so I had no need to swim after that point). But when the going gets tough it's easy for the would-be tough to keep going when there are so many friendly/tough people in her lane. I love the supportive camaraderie. It's worth getting up early just for that. I was pleased to be able to keep up with my lane #3 teammates, especially since I found this workout to be harder than the others. Had only one minor mishap when my leg cramped badly--oddly enough during one of the "pull" laps, just after I pushed off the wall. Loved the quick group dip in the hot tub--I'd been eyeing it Monday and Wednesday but there never seemed to be time.
I can't say I don't like the Chelsea Piers track since I haven't actually run a lap on it, but I'm pretty convinced I don't like it. I prefer the treadmill. It keeps me honest as far as pace goes; it also keeps me going progressively faster through my run. After today's swim workout I did 5 miles averaging about 8:20 pace--slower than my other runs this week but I was feeling tired.
I'm looking forward to next week's sessions but plan to go only 4 days. I'll skip Thursday's long run; it will be easier for me to do it on my own in Central Park. No commuting time, no lugging three changes of clothes downtown.
I'm sure I'll continue to figure out this whole scheduling thing in the weeks/months to come. I have a seven-year-old son Kieran who's in second grade and a newish job as a publisher of an imprint at Simon & Schuster, so my responsibilities are a bit to juggle against the early-to-bed-early-to-rise-early-out-the-door lifestyle mandated by true citizenship in the Full Throttle Nation. But having deliberately traded in my green card, I feel ready for the challenge.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
What is mainly wrong with the CP track is that it has sacrificed most of its inner lanes to the build-over of the bball courts and cardio area. In theory they have a 200 and a 400 track, but they are really more like 230 and 450. Very few people at CPiers are concerned about this oddball measurement. A couple of years ago we had a mile race there and the employees measured out what they thought was a mile but it was really 1.15...8.5 times around the 200 track rather than 7.5 which would have been right.
ReplyDelete