Linda says the nicest things.

Remember those old Jenny Craig ads, where they have someone holding their old pants waaaay out to the side to show how much weight they have lost? This is the closest I have to it, and the closest I'm likely to get to a Jenna shot. These are the biggest pants I ever bought.


This is just a small example of why I had to shovel out my garage. Now picture the entire wheel well full of this crap - that's happened a bunch of times.


Here's the bottom of the driveway as it's been for several weeks. The hole in the ridge is just big enough to get the car through, and it's high enough that the bottom of the car scrapes going over it, unless I'm really careful.


And here it is after about an hours work with a pick and shovel.


Now to business. My bike plan was 5/3, with 30 min run off bike. Friday I was supposed to do 30 min easy, but life got complicated before and after work, and a run didn't work for Sat. So here we go!

Warmed up, and did some one leg drill. I won't say this is getting easier, but at least my legs aren't falling off after 15 seconds anymore. Accelerations.
5 min fast, 2 min hard, 3 min easy pedal
5 min hard, 2 min fast, 3 min easy pedal
5 min fast, 2 min hard, 3 min easy pedal
5 min hard, 2 min fast, 3 min easy pedal
5 min fast, 2 min hard, 3 min easy pedal
5 min hard, 2 min fast, 3 min easy pedal
More one leg drill with accelerations.
A little bit of cool down, but not much, since I was going for a run.

Today is beautiful out, nice and warm, about 0 C I guess, since things are melting slightly. There's a brisk wind, and I was planning to run in some exposed areas (not *with* exposed areas - perverts!) so I took a minute to dry off a bit and put on fresh clothes.

I ran this route; it's about 7.75 Km. I needed to make up for the run I didn't do on Fri, so I went for an hour long route. There was a time not so long a go that even an all out effort running wouldn't get me around that route and back to the house in an hour. Today was nice and easy run, heart rate in mid zone 2 till the bottom of the hill. Lots of snow on the paths still, and the Yak Traks make the footing *much* more secure. (Thanks Julie!) But I had never realized how much running in snow is like running in soft sand. There were a few places where it was a real struggle to keep the momentum going.

Still, taking it easy, no last minute burst to make it under the wire, I got back home well under the hour, almost 2 minutes in hand, so I jogged slow a little bit more to make the hour, then walked a bit. As soon as I got in the house I snarfed a restorative Nutella peanut butter banana and cookie with milk. Still in my very sweaty workout gear, minus shoes and outside layers, of course.

Linda was also getting something out of the fridge, and says, "Do you know what you smell like?" I flashed on any number of disgusting things I've had to deal with, and was prepared for something witty like 'the child of rotten seaweed and a blocked u joint conceived in an uncleaned male locker room', and I was totally ready with "You married it!". But what does she actually say? "Fresh air. You brought in fresh air with you on your jersey." I was tempted to go for another run and bring more in. Instead I went downstairs and did a bunch of stretching.

121 bpm Avg heart rate over the whole period.
151 peak hr
2485 calories
1.75 hrs on the bike, at 114 bpm average (which seems a little bit low, but there were all those 3 min rests in there, and I don't need three min to get my heart rate back down into zone one again.
101 bpm during 4:23 transition
135 bpm average over 1 hr run. (Last half is *much* harder than the first half. Maybe I should run it in the other direction.)

Weekly totals
swim 2.0 hrs
bike 5.25 hrs
run 3.0 hrs
Total 10.25 hrs