Muscle and water…..

that is my story and I am sticking to it!  The cause for the scale debacle of course.  I am choosing to use the scale data as purely trivial information, especially after this past week.  Things are starting to “click” for me workout wise.  This week brought great runs, strong swims and the virgin voyage outside on the bike.

The three runs this week (one more to do today) felt super.  Tuesday called for a 3o minute run, so I went with my daughter (quite the speedster).  I let her set the pace and it did feel fast, but certainly manageable….. averaged an 8:18 pace.  So, with an hour to run on Wednesday I decided to just run what felt strong, without feeling stressed.  An hour later I felt great and had averaged an 8:38 pace.  Friday called for a 45 minute run and I decided to challenge myself route wise.  IM Wisconsin is not a flat course by any means, so I included a viaduct, rolling hills along the base of the bluff, and Ebner coulee (a one mile steady incline going up).  Again, my average was well below a nine minute pace (8:35) with my last mile being the fastest.

Saturday was a big day in terms of minutes working out.  Paul and I headed to the YMCA north to do the swim as we had decided to venture the outdoors on our bikes.  The workout called for 1.5 hours of swimming to include 2 x 30 minute swims.  We decided to count how far we got in 30 minutes, take a short break and then try to repeat the distance or better it.  I managed to get a mile in with each 30 minute set, all the while feeling very efficient and not in extensive cardiovascular stress.

Onto the virgin voyage.  I had emailed Maggie for a route that would get us 2.75 hours.  She must have been in her glory as she quickly responded with a route. I had Paul print it out before we left his house yesterday morning.  He took a quick look and commented “oh my, we have some climbs.”  I have not biked out north much in the last couple of years, so my inexperience caused there to be a lack of recognition of these climbs.  It did feel fabulous to be outdoors on the bike, and I think Paul is learning my method of “talking” to the hills in a welcoming manner.  See, I figure if you hit it with a welcoming, positive attitude, it will be less painful.  We managed just fine – even screaming at charging dogs (apparently I am much more scary than Paul), and Paul feeling as if his legs were                    _ _ _ _ ed (insert 4 letter word here) at the end of the last climb.  Oh, and Mike…. we totally feel your z4-z5 pain 🙂

Now…. back to my philosophy of the scale data being totally insignificant.  After this kick butt week of successful training (and about 15 hours I might add)  I have managed to GAIN a pound.  So…… I think the scale can  _ _ _ _ _ ; insert any word you feel is appropriate!