Yaaaay...Jerry got it open!

The difficult part of the week is over. I finished the last of my 3 challenging runs this morning...120 minutes at 11-15% incline on the treadmill for a total of 10.1 miles. As physically challenging as it was, the mental aspect of this was even worse. One thing that is exciting though is the fact that I had not even put any thought into how much this was equivalent to in terms of ascent. Upon arriving at work, I grabbed my Wizard...10.1 miles times the sine of 11 times 5280 ft/mile = 10175'. What?! Certainly I must have calculated that incorrectly. Nope, it's correct. Cool! The most challenging day of the race is going to be ~22-26 miles with 6000-7000' of elevation change. Yes, running on the treadmill is only a weak surrogate for running on trails, I'm not at altitude, and I'm also not pounding the crap out of my quads on the downhills, but at this point, just two weeks in, I'm thinking that I'm progressing better than I had hoped.

But what I'm most excited about, shockingly, is my swimming. I had my second lesson on Tuesday. After the first lesson and two subsequent swims on my own, it was time to try to start breathing. Never has something so simple and natural like taking a breath posed such a challenge. But by the end of the lesson, I was able to swim the entire length of the pool while breathing properly. (Of course, properly is used very loosely here. My form that I have worked on for the past three sessions has completely gone to shit. If Lloyd Christmas were ever to swim, I'm pretty sure we'd look quite similar.) Thursday night was supposed to be my 3rd lesson but my instructor was a no-show. I still swam. I did a total of 11oo yards in 25 to 50 yard intervals with ~60 seconds respites. Yes! 50 yard intervals! After a about ten 25 yard repeats, a couple of changes to my technique, and some timing changes, I was feeling optimistic and invigorated (though at the start of practice I was pissed and ready to go home because I was doing so poorly). So I decided to try a 50 yard lap without stopping to rest. Success! I was definitely excited at this point but also said to myself "La Di F-ing Da. Just do that about 50 more times and you're up to the distance you'll need for the triathlon. Now stop getting excited about something stupid and get back to work." I did 50 yard repeats the rest of the session and even succeeded in doing 75 yards at the end. There were problems along the way like crashing into the rope, swallowing what seemed like a few gallons of water, the occasional snort of water up my nose (I don't even breathe through my nose, how the F did I get water up there!?!?!), but it was a success nonetheless. I'm sure Helen would be very impressed, too.