Thursday, January 8, 2009

Aloha from Kapolei!

Happy 2009! This week marks the beginning of a new year and new goal for me: the triathlon! Not the serious long one, but rather the sprint triathlon. (I want to survive the experience.) So, as part of my training, I added swimming this week. I also traveled to Oahu for a couple of weeks of vacation! Since arriving, I have been out twice to do some open water swims. The lagoons here at Ko'Olina are perfect. About 200 yards across with good breakwaters and underwater nets to screen out sharks. I sucked lots of salt water on my first effort to swim for twenty minutes and managed around 800 yards, slowly. On my second attempt I decided to breath more often (every other stroke versus after every fourth stroke). That went much better! I completed a faster 400. Oh the joys of being a beginner at my age!

I am also still learning my legs. The newest challenge has been a nerve impingement in my right leg and trying to free that up. (My right foot wasn't working exactly right which made running an interesting challenge, especially in the snow back in my home state). My CTS coach keeps reminding me that rest is a good thing; that it is January and some time off does not mean much when the season is so far away.

As a beginner I am in constant fear of de-conditioning, gaining back the weight I lost, and losing the progress toward meeting my fitness goals. On the other hand, it was great to lay around in the sun and sweat, without doing any workout.

Goals for 2009: sprint triathlon and half marathon.