March 2012 ~ Ironman Brazil 2013

So here I am in Melbourne Australia counting down to another Ironman race day (the count is at 2 days) I am sitting in the kitchen at Luke and Meg Gillmer's place (best people ever, BTW) eating a cinnamon bun (because Peter Reid said to eat whatever you want on the Friday before race day, so best not to argue) and drinking a very good long black (an awesome coffee drink in which you run an espresso through the machine but keep it running until the cup is full... like an americano, but better). (Peter Reid also said not to drink coffee for a couple weeks until race day, but whatever.)

The time since my last race has passed very quickly and is easily divided in my mind between 3 distinct training blocks. The first started just before Christmas and involved about 20h/week of base volume with nothing too hard or specific. The highlight was all the mountain biking and cross country skiing I did in Ontario. The second block started with Houshang's bike camp (see previous blog) and included 2 long rides a week with his group, often in the pissing rain. I also started doing weights again, which i love! The third block is the most recent. In mid-February I packed up my baby girl and Shelley (my volunteer-nanny and swim-training partner) packed up her dog and we all travelled to Tucson for some warmer and drier times.

The Tucson camp was an especially good one for me on many levels. I started to see good times in the pool, good watts on the bike and good average paces on the garmin. I got fitter. It was also a time when many friendships were created or made deeper and many laughs were had. I am especially grateful for the support of Shelley, Clint and Pearl who all helped take care of my baby girl while i trained. I was also very lucky to have a strong group of girls to swim, bike and run with; Rachel, Julie, Shelley, Marilyn and Linsey, thank you all. For anyone who hasn't seen Julie's fun little video of our trip, here it is;