Base Training

It's really 2012 already? My pregnant brain is slipping away and I had to ask Jeremy yesterday if it was New Year's Eve. I didn't mean to wait until a whole new year to blog again. The past few weeks just got so darn busy with Christmas shopping, Christmas present-making, and traveling back to the southeast. It was a great holiday to conclude a great 2011.

I painted two pages from the future classic Little Blue Truck  for Megan

I made a big photo monogram for Jenny

 

Now it's time to recap the year and focus on goals for the new one. Except that there's not much for me to sum up in the triathlon world. Maybe a couple of overall wins while pregnant to be excited about. I didn't even muster up enough long distance motivation to do a half Ironman this year, for the first time in 10 years. Instead, I did what I felt like doing at the time, which was riding my bike in the mountains and learning to really like running again. And I guess I started learning a little about pregnancy.

The first three months of 2012 I have covered as far as goals are concerned. This specific training leads to a culmination in the form of an ultra-endurance event, the likes of which I've never experienced before. The fun part is that I don't even know the exact date. How do you taper for that?

For now it's all about the base training. I'm not using a heart rate monitor for exercise these days. Dr. Clapp says it's pretty much useless; your HR will vary tremendously just given the stage of pregnancy. I have considered using it just because I'm curious what my heart rate is while panting up a small incline at a 10+ minute pace. Plus, one extra strap cutting off my lung flow shouldn't matter when my sports bra is squeezing my poor expanded rib cage while the belly band is mashing my bladder. It's really comfortable.

As soon as I hit publish on my last post, my running pace took a drastic turn for the worse. I have a hard time keeping a 9 min average now, even though I still warm up and start feeling pretty good about 25 minutes in. Returning to sea level for 11 days made me feel super fast, despite the Little Rock inclines and the stomach bug I picked up from the family (Jeremy got it too, as did about 14 other people to date). I didn't gain as much weight as I had thought I would thanks to the late night puking, but I continue to reach new highs on the scale. I'm up about 13-14 pounds from my low point now.

So it's all about the slow and steady. I really like zone 2, which I've determined, based on my RPE, I spend most of my exercise time in, and when I get a little antsy to go faster or harder, I get a quick reminder from my poor rectus abdominus why that is a bad idea.

Never before have I seen ripped abs in a magazine and been envious. I'm not sure I've even really noticed them before, but suddenly I find my attention caught by those damn Victoria's Secret commercials with their flat (and in comparison to mine, super defined) abs, and I wonder if mine will ever again resemble anything other than their current bowl full of jelly. No really, my stomach jiggles like Jello when the baby starts doing his flips.

Honestly I'm really enjoying the base training. I love not worrying about time and knowing that I'll get even slower yet. Plus I figure with a good 8 or 9 months of it, followed by a slow return to normal exercise, I should be ready to race some long stuff in the fall. I hope I'm not overly optimistic in thinking I'll be ready for a half Ironman in September, because I'm getting the fever.

 I did some recruiting for my 27 week picture

Happy New Year!