Hours and the rest (post from last week)

It´s been a while, it´s been busy.

I had a bad 3-week traveling period, leading to very low training volume, and usually little sleep.

So I had to resume training, in a still busy environment, without breaking the machine. Corporate meeting times, school board and executive visits challenged that a bit in the last 3 weeks...

It´s just a fact, nothing more I could do within acceptable sleeping hours and family tolerance threshold… Even Tony begs for more running!

That´s funny and sad though. When I gear up for biking or running, Tony knows. He gets all excited and jumps all over the place. But when it´s biking or long runs, he stays home. Sad.
So this morning, before flying away (again), I took him for the warm-up, and brough him home before I started the second loop of the long run. Happy boy.

So where do I stand?

Weekly hours of training = Do you see a trend? Down is not so good...

-        Swimming. Not too concerned there obviously, but quite frustrated with a lagging shoulder pain. It´s getting better through therapy, but I coudn´t get an appointment w/a specialist yet. I oscillate between easy swimming, and 1 arm sessions… Note that kicking sessions are real leg killers…

-        Bike. It´s like Curitiba landscape: up and down. Good days, bad days. Little consistency. Bad days means sub-30 kph rides (cold and windy feel). Good days, alone or in peloton, it´s 35 kph like a charm (well, most of the time).
The noticeable thing is the hardware. My training bike is in bad condition, not so fun to ride. On the race one, I change the saddle to relieve some pain. Plus some minor adjustments. The real thing was yesterday. The very long ride (170 km planed) turned just long (120km) when my front wheel broke! Riding at 35kph+, we heard a big bang – just as trucks were passing us. I didn´t know what happened until I felt the steering shaking. My front tire seemed to have exploded. I managed to stop without falling: the rim flange actually did burst out due to brake pad wear. I machined them through the years to the point of mechanical failure (sounds pretty cool).
I now have a good excuse to buy a new set of training wheels! And I need to consider it too for the training road bike.

-        Running. Hmm, a bit similar to biking. Some good, and some not as good. It´s already good as I can run, injury free. Just that is a good news. The other good news is that I can manage some good running with friends. In Sao Paulo or in Barigui, I can keep up and get some good splits. But alone, or on longer distance, it´s still a bit flaky. The 1h37 half marathon in Sao Jose dos Pinhais is a good illustration. 1h37 is the time of my ½ marathon in my ½ ironman… So not that great when that was the only sport on that day, even if the course was a bit challenging.

So? Well, a bit of mixture of panic feeling (not trained enough) and serenity (my weight is fine, I do the best I can)