This year promises to be an interesting one with the my journey towards completing my first Half-Ironman at Ironman Pocono Mountains 70.3. On a positive note, I was able to pick-up where I left off in the pool after 2 months off. My fear was that I would be starting from scratch, but I really felt great and my distances were better than what I had been doing prior to my September Olympic-distance Quakerman triathlon. I usually feel really good the first time back at any discipline after taking time off and then the next time back is back to reality, but this lasted over a month. I feeling a little struggle now in the pool, but I have also increased my workout distance(and time) by 600yds.
I am hoping to get a lot of open water time this summer with the season pass to Dutch Springs I purchased. It is quite a deal at $100 considering going there ad-hoc is ~$25. $25 is a bit steep to ow swim for an hour, so if I can get over there 10 times this summer it should be a worthwhile purchase. I swam there once last summer and it is so nice. Clean water, and plenty of liquid real estate with bouys placed around for a true tri swim experience. The other benefits are that it is much closer than going up to Beltzville S.P. with less crowds too. Beltzville is a bit annoying having to swim back and forth in the sectioned off swim area dodging people along the way. Sometimes I feel like I am swallowing gas and oil too from all boats.
So now the negative news, although it is starting to look better now, is a sharp pain occurring in my right calve. It happened to me last year but in my left calve. It just occurs out of the blue and feels like someone is stabbing with a knife there. This time it happened at 6 miles on my run. It stunk because I still had to limp over a mile to get home.
On a positive note, this week seems to be turning around a bit. I got on the treadmill earlier in the week and was able to do 3.5 miles without issue using my Five Fingers. Yesterday I met with my new chiropractor, Dr. Drew, who worked on it a bit and it is really feeling better today. Plan on getting out for a run today so we will see how that goes!
Next up on my agenda is to plan out my other races for this season in addition to my “A” race, Ironman Pocono Mountains. Doing a trip to Peru for two weeks in prime tri season is putting a wrench in my typical schedule, but that will be well worth that. More on that trip in my Travel section.
