Thanks to the rare bout of rain we were having here in KC - I was forced to go to the gym instead of putting my miles in on the road. After yesterday’s intense swim workout, I committed myself to keep pushing what I’d done so far, and I’m pretty happy with the results.

Last year, even at race time, I still found 1.5 miles at a 5.5mph (around 11 min mile) pace hard to handle on the treadmill. Today, I was thrilled to throw down my first 1.5 mile effort on the treadmill with little to no strain on anything other than the usual ankle/knee aches that come with running on that contraption. Even those weren’t too bad. Then, I jumped over to the exercise bike for 40 minutes of hard pedaling - which was pretty much a breeze. My heart rate actually dropped from the time I started to the time I finished, probably as a result of all the miles I logged in the trainer this winter.

Then, I lucked into an open treadmill (the gym was really crowded by that time), and logged my next 1.5 miles at 5.5mph. I won’t say it was a breeze…in fact, about .6miles into it, my legs started to feel pretty dead. Instead of the usual (last summer, I’d have slowed down), I turned up Craig’s IPOD, and gutted it out.

I’m still not sure what’s going on, but I’m a lot stronger this summer than last.

Anyway - some random thoughts:
- have a training partner is great, even when they’re not working out with you. You don’t want to lose step, so you push yourself harder.
- I need to get an IPOD
- I’d like to get a road bike too, but that may be out of the question before the OHT
- I got a new computer for my bike, since my old one died, but the rain kept me from putting it through its paces tonight. Hopefully, I can take a little ride tommorrow.
- I plan on doing the swim workout again tommorrow - this time I’ll be on my own. I’m more than a little nervous about it, to be honest.