Alarm Clock Illiterate

I am having some major issues with my alarm clock this week, well at least the past two days.  I use my iPod Touch as my alarm clock.  Why?  Because it isn't as disruptive as your typical alarm clock, which usually wakes a sleeping person with a loud buzzer or blaring music.  Instead I have it play some gentle guitar at a nice modest volume that doesn't wake the rest of my house (wife and two daughters) at 4:30AM.

So what happened yesterday?  Well, I was supposed to get up at 5:00AM and get in my 45 min ride and 15 run in before work (I had daughter duty, basically getting my one daughter on the bus and the other over to Pre-K).  Well, apparently when I was setting the alarm for "Wedneday" morning, I mistakenly set it for "Tuesday", thus there was no gentle guitar to wake me from my slumber.  Instead I didn't wake up until around 6:00AM which was just a bit too late to get in my work out (DAMN!!!).

As for my workout, I had to do it last night after the girls went to bed.  I hoped on my bike (on my trainer in the basement) and started pedaling away while watching the 70.3 World Championships from Clearwater, FL.  I felt really good on the bike, averaging around 100 RPM while pedaling in my 39/13 gears for my 45 minute ride.  Immediately after I finished riding I was out for my 15 minute run, an out and back....and wow did I feel good!  After shaking off my biking-legs I got into a rhythm and was just cruising along.  The first mile, I ran in 7:57 (heart rate around 142 BPM) and the second I was just floating.  I ran the second in 7:08, yes, 7:08 and I wasn't hurting at all, my max heart rate for the entire run was 160 BPM.  I just felt so good and I could have kept going if I needed to. 

Now, as for this morning, ugh, I don't know why but I was awoken by my 5 year old who came shuffling into our room at 5:10AM.  DAMN, DAMN, DAMN!!!  What happened to 4:30AM?  Well, I checked my iPod Touch and it seems that I didn't raise the volume on the darn thing and it wasn't that the alarm didn't go off, it was that I had the volume all the way down, thus no soothing guitar to wake me from my slumber.  Aaaarrrrghhhhh!

I jumped out of bed, got changed and took off to the pool.  Because I arrived there so late, I only managed about 1,600M because I needed to get into the office.  I'm not too concerned about my lack of pool time since I am sure I will be in the water down in Lavallette sometime this weekend, possibly for an open water swim on Saturday afternoon. 

*I did my one hour ride (actually 58:30) at lunch and it was a tough one.  I didn't realize that it was going to be uphill for the entire outbound leg.  Whew, it was slow going but the whole time I was looking forward to the return (downhill, with the wind mostly at my back).  I think I averaged around 14.5 MPH on the way out and ended up around with an average of about 18 MPH total for the ride....so I must have been flying on the way back.  It is a beautiful day out there and I thoroughly enjoyed getting outside for a ride.  Have a great day out there people, it is gorgeous and summer is only a few days away!  Adios!