Sunday, July 31, 2011

Weekend Wrap Up...

I hate that the weekend is almost over. Bummer!

Lots of training happening over here this weekend. Well, that and clothes washing. Neither one seem to ever end! I slept in late yesterday and opted to do my run at high noon. Not the best idea I ever had but I really did enjoy sleeping in... Not gonna lie, those 15 miles were tough. I didn't even get the usual runner's high from the mileage. All I could do was come home and take a nap.

Today's scheduled training was a big ole brick workout (56 mile ride, 30 minute run and 1600 meter swim). I met up with a couple of friends for the bike ride. I have decided that I must mentally block out any and all hills as I frequently describe the course as "light rolling hills" and then we'll have a new person show up and I will be reminded it is anything but "light and rolling". Oops! I guess the hills are good for you, right?

Today's mileage was the longest we have ridden to date. I am not sure if it was the heat or the increase in mileage but had to talk one of my friends out of bailing at mile 50. (the downside of riding by your car - it can be too tempting to pack it in). Luckily we were able to persuade her to stick with it. I would have hated to see her bail with only 6 miles to go. I mean, 56 miles is the race distance for our half iron so mentally it is huge to know you can cover that distance.

On last week's ride, I had a Santa sighting. He was out getting his run on in an Atlanta Track Club singlet. This week, I saw him again in the same area. He gave me a little wave and a "ho ho ho". It was the highlight of the ride!

After we knocked out the miles on the bike we were scheduled for a 30 minute run. Sadly, there was no shade to be found so that and a strong desire to get into an air conditioned vehicle made us cut the run short after about 2 miles. Totally fine by me!

We packed it all up and parted ways and I headed to Lifetime to get in a 1600 meter swim. The water was nice and cool and had never felt better! It was quite the long workout day but great to get it all in. It was quite the confidence booster.

Yesterday in my farmer's bag, I got purple peppers! You know, the kind that Peter Piper picks... I had never seen them before. Kind of cool.



In other farmer news, I found a use for okra that I actually like. I am not all that into frying up a batch which is the southern way and I wasn't a big fan of eating it raw. This recipe turned out really nice. Basically, it is just turkey sausage, okra, green beans, tomatoes, onion, green pepper and corn sauteed up for about 10 minutes. I ate it hot last night but I think you are supposed to eat it cold. Pretty darn good!

10 comments:

ajh said...

That sounds very hard. Hot and far distances. Good job on the 56 miles. How do you get past how much your butt hurts? Mine still bothers me. Seems like it should be toughening up.

Jennifer said...

Amazing workout. And congrats on your long ride. I can see your confidence is getting stronger and stronger (and you legs too)!

Amanda said...

Awesome workout!!! So glad you got a confidence boost by finishing the 56 miles - I always like to know I can go the distance too.

Glad you found something to do with the okra too :).

Unknown said...

Great job Karen... getting those miles in has to be such a confidence booster!

Purple peppers, huh? :)

Tina @GottaRunNow said...

Yay for riding 56 miles - can't imagine such a long ride in the heat!

Null said...

Whoa, 15 miles int he mid-day heat? This time of year, that probably felt like running 30 miles. Way to get it done.

So what do you think about the purple pepper? I have one sitting in my fridge right now too, but haven't figured out what to do with it yet.

Kurt @ Becoming An Ironman said...

Purple Peppers?! I grew up with Peter Piper picking PICKLED peppers, though now that I think of it, peppers wouldn't really GROW pickled. They'd have to be picked first and then pickled. Interesting. I might have to look some of those up.

Jim ... 50after40 said...

I've never seen a pepper that color either - was it sweet like a red pepper, I'm assuming so.

Kate Geisen said...

Wow, tough workout. Way to push through it.

I was right with you on Peter's peppers until Kurt got the line right. :)

Jill said...

I'm not sure how you don't melt to the pavement running at noon in Atlanta. Heck, I'm not sure how you don't melt running at 5am! Great job on the 15er...may not have been a huge high but you got 'er done!

Did the purple pepper taset any different than other peppers?