I will try and keep this one short as I have embarrassingly little to say! Somehow an intended 3 days off has stretched to 5. Don’t ask me exactly how I did plan to do some training the last day or two, but kept switching things round. On the other hand the fridge is fully stocked and I have new race shoes for the season. It’s not been entirely unproductive even if I haven’t done any swim, bike or run.

Partly I can blame some travel and partly I can blame a little pain in my side. As the days go on though the pain feels more like an excuse. It’s there, but aside from sleeping it’s not that bad. I’m not sure why it’s worse when I’m trying to sleep, but it is. Once I wake in the early hours of the morning I can look forward to the discomfort disturbing me pretty much hourly. Of course worse is when you’re having a strange lucid dream of bike riding and you find yourself moving in your sleep. That just sets it off even more!

This morning I added a cramp in my left calf to the mix. Not had that in a while, but post Epic I occasionally wake to muscle spasms too. I really need my masseur to get over his gastro and get to work on my legs. I think I’ll also hit some electrolyte drink over the next few days. I don’t typically cramp much and last time I was having this problem I found a good dose of electrolytes over a few days fixed things up.

Other than spending my nights twitching in pain I’ve certainly felt pretty tired. Sleeping heavily when I do, catching a nap in the middle of the day. I think those 60 hours of training hit me pretty hard in the end! Who’d have thought? I can’t feel bad about 5 days off as I think my body needed it, but there’s a little guilt there as it’s so lazy. I’m reminded of Bevan’s question in the podcast about how I found off days as a full time athlete. I’ll reiterate on that one – very boring!

The Gold Coast is currently more like the Grey Coast unfortunately. It’s been a little cold today and very wet. It didn’t help encourage me to go for an easy spin. Instead I popped up to Brisbane to sort out some new race shoes. It proved to be a much quicker experience than I expected. I went to a specialist running shop with the intention of trying a few racing flats. A young, unenthusiastic assistant killed that one off. After a brief discussion I tried some Adidas shoes and the Saucony FastTwitch 3. I’ve been using Saucony for a while and the latter were perfect for me. So with little input from the assistant I opted to go for them. In the end I know Saucony works for me and that’s the most important thing. Also they come in a brilliant orange colour and I got some matching elastic laces! Still a disappointing reminder of the quality of some running shop staff.

What’s more disappointing is that’s the highlight of my week so far! It’s no wonder I feel it’s time to get back into it again. The next week or so is about getting back into training, then I’m off down to Geelong for some proper training. That leaves only a couple more weeks before I’ll be tapering. So one four week block of solid training to go and a final chance to build a little more fitness before the next Ironman. There’s going to be a big push on the swimming front. Plenty more of the biking with a bit more intensity worked in. Lots of running and again a bit more intensity thrown in along with some proper long runs.

I promise to try and have done something for the next post. Even if it’s proved Yoga is a dumb idea with a sore rib!

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