Beautiful British Columbia!!!

I love being home - I am a true BC girl through and through. It's been a whirlwind last few days - hence no blog posts- with lots of work, training and visiting family, but I'm loving every minute of it.

On Saturday I managed to get out for a looooong run. I needed to work off Mom's birthday dinner and the yummy wine we had the night before! The run was my longest of the year so far - of course I know there will be even longer runs in my future... I ran along the river through the trees and along the dike.

Things were going quite well until about the 1:20 hour mark. That's when I started feeling it. I managed to hang in there though and at about 1:35 got a bounce back in my step. It was likely because I stopped to pet a few dogs along the way - one of my favourite things to do when running. I met two great danes, a few heinz 57 mixes, a glorious little bulldog and a couple of Japanese dogs! Or maybe it was because I heard footsteps behind me and decided the two gals running behind me weren't going to pass me! Ha! I was in heaven - again. My total run time was 1:48 hours. When I walked in the door my loving father said 'Oh, you're home already??' Of course he had a devilish smile while saying that.

On Sunday I was on the the bike/trainer for a solid two hours. Admittedly around the 1:10 hour mark I started to fade. I guess I didn't eat enough the day before to have some energy that early in the morning?? Likely it was the effects of the run too, I really have to move my long run to Wednesdays!! I was folded over my aerobars at one point and for a nanosecond thought of getting off the bike. Then I realized how much of a mental game this is and challenged myself to push through it.

I needed one thing and one thing only to get through this - Buddha Mind! With no tv or radio to distract me I set about clearing my mind and focussing on my pedaling. I finished my LCS sets and started my 6/4 steady sets. I only had to get through two of them. The first one was tough, but I put my Buddha Mind to work. Then came the last set...I got to about the 5 minute mark and said to myself, 'I could give up now...or I could hold on and do a full 10 minutes.' Because I can be a sick little puppy, even though I was tired and wanted to quite, I held strong for 10 minutes. It was awesome!! I felt great after the ride!

Monday was gym day with my Dad. We were going to work out then meet the Dudes (my Dads' gym buddies who give him heck if he comes to the gym without me when I'm visiting) for tea.

Dad found out that the pool at the gym was 20 yards. My first question, uh, how far is that in meters?? My workout was 2200 m and dad calculated that to be 121 laps. If I had been smart I would have figured out how many laps my workout was in meters. But I didn't...

So I started off on my swim. The warmup was 600 m. The main part was sets of 200 m at alternating pace. I knew that 5 sets along with the warmup and cooldown was 2200 m, but that was in a 25 m pool.

I finished about 4 sets when I decided I should try and figure out how many lengths I'd done. Not an easy task for an engineer who is dependent on calculators and spreadsheets! I had thought I had it figured out. I would do 10 sets of '200', or four laps, and that should cover it.

I had started in the far lane, but an LOD (little ol' dear) asked if I could move over so she could be at the pool edge - she was a bit nervous in the water. I had no problem with this so moved over and continued on. Surprisingly I didn't lose track of my laps at this point.

Then came Noodle Man...

I was swimming along my merry way when I almost swam straight into a fellow with a noodle between his legs. Now, now...keep those dirty minds in check! He had a pool noodle and was running through the water. However, he didn't seem to realize that this was my lane - that or he didn't care. There are no lane ropes in this pool so people just kind of go willy nilly everywhere.

I moved over another lane and kept swimming. And that's when I realized I had lost track of how many sets of 200/4 laps I had done. Rats. Okay, I want to get in 2200 m of swimming...I need to do at least 10 sets...I have either done 6 or 8 sets.... sigh...I'm going to have to keep swimming and do another four sets, just to make sure.

When my dad got to the pool I was almost done either my 10th or 12th set. He asked how many laps I'd done and when I told him the range he just said 'holy shite!'.

When I finally finished my swim I looked at the clock...I'd been in the pool for 1:20 hour. At the mall while we had tea I set about trying to calculate laps and distances etc. After careful calculation and reasonable deduction based on swim times I realized I had swum 2600 m! Holy hannah!! The swim itself felt great and I wasn't super tired, which was good.

Today was an easier day - I had a high cadence spin on the bike then Mom and I were off for a mother-daughter spa day!! One word sums up our time 'aaaaaaaaaahhh'. It was a great afternoon with giggles, tears from giggling so much, relaxation and wonderful girl time.

Tomorrow will be a long training day so I'm going to kick back and continue my path of relaxation for the day.

I'd rub it in how beautiful it has been out here, but I'm not that mean. Suffice it to say it's sunny, warm and I saw a gorgeous sunset at the beach the other day. I love it here!!

Peace out my glorious friends!