So this last weekend I did my last two big training days before the triathlon this weekend. Saturday I did a brick day of a mile open water swim, a quick four mile bike (I had meant to do a little more, but I ran into a big run on the lake path and had a time-constraint of getting down to Indiana for Jase's wedding*), and then a five mile run.
Sunday I did 30 miles on the bike. This was the opposite of Saturday—I had meant to just to do 25 miles, but it was so slow getting through the Belmont-Ohio Street stretch that I wanted to stretch my legs a little when I finally got down to the nice, clear south side. Also, I thought I was really in a groove because the whole ride felt really easy, but it turned out it was just a tail wind, which turned into a head wind when I headed back north. Ugh.
Last year I did my first triathlon and my only goal was to finish. I did that, and was proudly the 61st slowest person of 4243 people who finished the full Olympic-length triathlon. I did, however, finish in pain and so my goal for this year was not to really work on improving my time or anything, but to finish pain-free. I didn't, however, really apply any scientific training to that goal. The main difference was that I didn't quit training right after the triathlon last year—when I finished my most-of-a-marathon three years ago, I immediately stopped running, so when I took up triathlon training last year I was mostly starting from scratch. This time I kept swimming mostly weekly and signed up for a bunch of 5Ks, to guarantee that I would at least run that much, and I actually ran quite a bit over the winter and managed to (slowly) do 10 miles in May. Biking, which previously had been my strong suit, is probably my weakest area this year. I got a indoor-trainer-mount for my bike in February, but only did a few sessions on it before it warmed up enough that I felt like I should be outside on the bike, so I took it off the mount, but then didn't really do a lot of riding. I got some probably-too-fancy-for-what-I-need biking shoes that clip into pedals, but then fell over a couple times, banging up my knees pretty good, and got spooked a little and stayed off the bike for a while. But I finally got a bike computer hooked up on my road bike (I do well with numeric feedback) and discovered Cyclemeter for the iPhone just as I finally got a GPS-capable iPhone.
So, that's all to say, I'm feeling reasonably confident about achieving my goal this year.
And THEN, however the race turns out, I've got my standup class graduation show that night at 9:30 pm. It's free, and you're invited, if you like. I've done standup before**, but lately I've been feeling like I needed some structure and so I decided to take the standup class at Second City***, which happens to be taught by my friend Bryan Bowden. I've gotten the deadlines I kinda need to produce new material, and it's also been a great analytical approach to standup that's been really valuable to me.
And before all that I have to get through a week where I've got some big stuff at work AND another shoot for a video gig that I think I'm all NDAed about. Whew.
* Congrats!
** Heck, I've been paid to do standup.
*** My first Second City class, ever. I moved to Chicago eleven years ago to do comedy and never got around to taking a class at the largest comedy training center in the world.
