Fresh Legs? Lessons learned?

I rolled out of bed on Thursday morning for the group ride. It was still a little dark when I left the house at 5:30AM. Already the days are getting shorter. Pretty soon the group ride will not get started until 6:00AM. My legs felt great. They were completely refreshed – and they should be – I have been off of them for 3 days.

There were just a few of us for the group ride. I started to pick the pace up early on and knew that my legs were still tired – this was disappointing. I would not be able to hang with a really fast group ride. I did, however, attack Keith and Lance a few times. Keith is in top form right now and Lance and I just had to let him go – we stayed back and had a nice medium effort ride. Keith made the comment that he had just over 100 miles on the bike last week – all I could think was that that I had that many on Sunday. We are training for different distances so I cannot argue with Keith’s training – the guy is just getting faster.

Since I was planning on a trifecta day – bike / swim / run – I rode the bike to the house and drove to work. I got in a good swim session in at lunch even though I left for the gym late – I had been planning on 12 x 250 on 4:10. In the past I have always done these intervals on 4:15 – just trying to mix it up a little bit. The swim went great but do to starting just a little late I had to cut the last interval. Even though I missed the last set I was able to easily keep up with the times that I set. The first 8 sets were all within a second or two of each other then they started to creep up. All in all I felt it was a good 2750 yard effort.

In the evening I was planning on doing some speed work out at the track. Robin was out for vacation but Lance had agreed to take the helm. Robin had left him the workout – 10 x 400’s. This would be a tough workout in the evening heat. At about 4PM I started to have some kind of strange allergy attack and the sneezing would continue until about 6 o’clock. I have suffered from some allergies since I moved to Mississippi but nothing like this – I mean, the sneezing and runny nose literally left me exhausted. It was a tough workout. I was still planning on the speed session and then, thankfully, the skies opened up and the rain started to pour. This was a true WIN / WIN – we really need the rain and I skipped the speed session.

I have been on the fence about the Heart O’Dixie race next weekend. I looked the registration page up last weekend prior to the Sunfish and the dang race had sold out. Last year I entered it the week of the race. It is a great race – a little bit of a pain because it is a point to point to point – you end up 34 miles from the start of the swim but still a great race.

Also, I am a little unsure of how a maximum effort race will fit into my ironman training plan. The race would be 5 weeks prior to IMKY and would be my last high intensity all out effort. However, I saw how my body reacted to the race last week – I got worn out. However, I actually do not think that the all out effort of the Sunfish is what got me – it was the 100+ mile bike ride and the 5 mile brick the following day that put me over the edge. Well, they have re-opened registration - so, you experienced ironmen – Let me know what you think. Should I do the race?