Soooooooo Tired!!!

I am completely exhausted! These 5:00AM mornings are very difficult, very difficult. Let me explain....I have a one month free membership at the Hunterdon YMCA, which I joined so that I have a place to swim as I train for Ironman Arizona. The only time that I can get a swim workout in is early in the morning (before work) or late at night after the kids are in bed (after say 7:30 - 8:00PM). That translates to me getting up at 5:00AM, getting dressed and arriving at the "Y" around 5:45 - 6:00AM and then hopping into the pool. Oh yeah, and the fact that I am not a strong swimming and am not in anything resembling swimming shape doesn't make life any easier.

So what did I do this morning? I got in the pool at 6:00AM, swam a bunch of 100's, then attempted a 200, which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I put in a total of 750M and was happy with it. It is funny for me to think back to September when I was in the middle of triathlon training and I was doing 300 - 500yd warm-ups followed by 200yd intervals and a 250yd cool down. Oh how things change! Lastly, as one might expect, my 100 split as horrendous, hovering just above 2:00 per 100.

On a more positive note, I ran my second race for my running clubs Winter Series yesterday, an advertised 5.2 mile run (I clocked it at 5 miles). I believe the temperature at the start of the race was 18F, so yes it was cold. Before I go on I have to say a thing or two about Tyler State Park in Newtown, PA. Our club holds every race of its Winter Series at that park and it is a beautiful place to run, with paved paths through out, beautiful scenery and the worst hills one could imagine. The one thing that I guarantee to take from these races every year is that I am in great shape heading into Spring. There is not one race that one would call flat or even gentle rolling hills. The start to every race but maybe one begins with an uphill. And in most cases, the first mile or mile and a half is going to be a pretty major climb...oh, and even when you think you are at the top and you start descending, well there is inevitably another climb.

So Sunday's race was a "Meet & Greet 5.2 Mile", and everyone was wearing name tags throughout the entire race, should you want to meet someone new....I am a bit shy, I didn't meet anyone new. The start was a bit chaotic as somehow I was in the middle of the pack of runners (a record 204), rather than near the front (but not at the very front), so I spent the first 3/4 of a mile trying to just get past people and find my right pace. I finally found a solid rhythm and proceeded to chug along. Everything was going well until I got to the "redesigned" portion of the course, where we had to descend the "Covered Bridge 5K" hill and then run back up it. I wish that I had a picture of an elevation chart to show it, it is really a beast, especially since the climb up it occurred around mile 3.5. I managed to make it up the hill without walking (I was very close to caving in and doing so), and finished pretty strong. My time was 35:53 (6:54/mile) and I came in 37th out of 204 runners.

After the race I ran into my sports doctor, Johnny King-Marino, the man who talked me into doing Ironman Arizona. I thanked him for fixing me last year and told him that I signed up for Ironman Arizona....which consequently he is going to be doing also since he wasn't able to do it this year (he was in a biking accident and broke his shoulder). All in all a good day.

That is about it for now, I have to get some work done. Hope to have some pictures up soon from races, new purchases (K-Swiss running shoes), and everything else (just ordered a Nkion Digital SLR!).

Cheers!