Learning Lessons

So Saturday we did the National Capital Olympic Tri at home, for Neale it was his first one, for me it was a chance to see how much I had improved from last year.  I was happy with my bike time, I took 12 mins off my time from last year but I was slower everywhere else.  My swim was slower but I will take it but my run was terrible, the negative thoughts flooded in and I gave into the dark side.   Neale was not happy with his time either, especially on the bike but he finished 14 mins ahead of me.  Neale is great at climbing hills and not as great on flats, I am the reverse.  Last year, I hit almost every race goal and this year I hit only two.  I know you can not always get a PB and I am trying to stay focused on moving forward, I am trying to learn from each experience and I know it will make me stronger in the long run but it sure sucks at the time.

Today we had a 65K bike ride and 6K run on the schedule, we were going to go to Mont Tremblant for a change but forecasted thunderstorms keep us closer to home.  We have a great park about 45 mins from home and we bike there most weekends and sometimes through the week.  It is a great place to bike, lots of hills to climb and downhills to speed down.  For some reason I did not want to do this workout,  I knew it was going to be a challenging day when I had to use my climbing ring on a hill I usually don't have too.  I kept pedaling and when we got to the lookout I noticed I was 2 mins faster then any other climb.  We kept going and at the end of the 42K loop I wanted to stop, I was so done.  I knew I could not stop, nothing hurts more then giving up so I headed out again and once again the first hill seemed so much harder then it should have been.  Did I mention that my hubby likes to climb hills, I have a love/hate thing going on watching him climb hills, he makes it look so easy and I am envious but at the same time I am so proud of him. 

So I guess I read my schedule wrong, I thought I had to do a 6K tempo run after the bike, it just said 6K, oops.  Neale racks the bikes and I start to run, he is a much faster runner then me so I get a head start and he usually passes me before the turn around.  Today, I just wanted to be finished, I put my music on, and set up runkeeper to record my run (I forgot my watch).  I headed out and it is uphill to start, did I mention I hate hills, but I kept moving forward, determined to do the best I could.  I had never used runkeeper before and I did not know it announced your ave pace and distance every 5 mins.  The first time it announced my pace I was like, OK you suck girl and you are never going to hit your tempo pace but I kept running.  The next time I was surprised, I was speeding up, yeah me!  At 15 mins I was at the same pace and no where near where I needed to be so I stepped it up a gear and I made it to the turn around and Neale had still not caught up to me, yeah me again.  Every 5 mins my ave pace kept getting closer to my tempo pace and I kept moving forward and at the 35 mins mark it announced my pace was better them my tempo pace, OMG, I was there now keep running and don't slow down. I managed to hold my pace and finished strong and still ahead of Neale...OMG!!!!!

So this weekend I learned a few important lessons, I was reminded what I wanted and how badly I wanted it, I don't want to just finish my IM, I want to do it to the best of my abilities. I learned to keep going even though you want to stop and most importantly I learned if I want something enough, I CAN DO IT!