A long-winded post for a long-winded training day

It was difficult for me to think up a title for this post and I don't think any Blogland friends in their right mind are going to read this post in its entirety; however, I need to write it all down.  If you live where even your warmest summer months still find you waking to temps in the 60s, you are probably going to find it difficult to relate to this post at all.  However, if you live/train in extreme environmental conditions, well then maybe you should grab some coffee and have a good read.  And if you do live in these conditions and you blog, please let me know.  I would love to follow you.  This is tough stuff!

When I woke up yesterday morning I was hoping to blog about what an awesome prep day I had yesterday, how I had nailed everything and had completely dialed in my pacing.  Unfortunately, some training sessions just don't work out the way that we plan, even when confidence is super high going it to it.

SUNDAY, 6AM
I was up and at 'em.  Riding the high from watching Blogland friends (Bob & Arnie, Rachel, Beth) cross the finish line at IMSG.  Sleep hours were on the low side of things b/c of obsessive addiction to IM coverage, but in my mind that just made yesterday feel more like race day!

I had prepped all of our bottles and my CamelBak the night before, so I went about my normal daily tasks of taking care of the fuzzles, cleaning up the house, dropping in on Facebook and putting on a crock-pot for later in the day.

9AM
Scott arrived home from work and we went about our busy-bee, load the Element with all of our crap routine.  During the summer months, he always brings a huge cooler full of ice home from work for these longer training days.  At the last minute I decided that I wanted to pack damp sponges and some neck rags to simulate the sponges used at FL 70.3 on the run course.  I've been told to grab two of them from the get-go and then never let them go.  Evidently they are precious commodities during the "Walk of the Dead" half marathon.

9:30AM
It's been pretty hot down here over the past couple of weeks with temps always in the 80s and the heat index much higher than that.  My friend, Sondra, told me that May is traditionally a very uncomfortable month because we don't see any of the rain that helps cool things off a bit like we do in the summer months.  I hadn't considered this fact before, but looking back... yes, May does tend to feel more like September (when the rains start dying down again) than April.

This past weekend was due to be the hottest yet for 2010 with the heat index nearing 100F both Saturday and Sunday.  Knowing this, I wanted Scott and I to weigh ourselves before and after the workout.  So right before leaving we marched into the bathroom, stripped, hopped on the Tanita scale and wrote down our starting weight.  From that point on, we calculated every ounce of fluid that we took in.

Mentally, I felt as prepared as ever.  Everything was planned out.  This was to be the last longer block of training before the race and I was ready to get going and tackle the heat!

9:45AM
We arrived at our favorite little training loop only to realize that somehow my helmet and bike shoes never made it into the car.  Normally I would have had a blow-out about this, but I didn't let it get to me. I just drove the 10 minute round-trip back home and grabbed the gear.

10AM
And we're off!  On the agenda: 50 mile ride/4 mile t-run.

The heat index was already at 90F when we started the ride (I love wunderground.com for checking this kind of stuff out. They provide history with hourly readings).  Winds were steady at 13mph with 23mph gusts.  The wind was coming from the SSE... very warm wind.  Have you ever felt damp,warm wind?  It's such an oddity.

I had everything that I needed for the 50 mile ride on my bike (which I estimated would take about 2:45 going at near or slightly under race pace) and there would be no 'pit stops'.  On my person, I had approximately 82oz of fluid in total, 792 calories and some salt supplements.  The cooler back at the car held my nutrition needs for the run portion and the ice cold sponges.

All smiles and ready to nail the last big brick!
(note: there are gators in that little pond behind me... big, fat ones!)

THE RIDE
The first 35 miles felt really good.  I was spinning my smaller gears into the wind when I needed to and then I pushed some large gears with the tail wind (being careful not to push too hard; pacing!).  I tried to keep the RPE on both ends the same and I think I did this fairly well.  My nutrition was going down nicely.  I was instinctually timing my intake perfectly, so that was pretty neat.  As the miles wore on though, I could really feel that sun beating down on my back and the heat radiating up from the pavement.  It was getting HOT!  The heat index was up near 95F at this point.

Around mile 40 I began to really notice my thirst, but my stomach also felt like it was at its limit in terms of being able to consume additional liquid- 27oz an hour is a lot to assimilate for many people and I'm thankful that I can get that down.  Pushing over that 30oz mark is sure to end in a sloshy stomach.  Also my gears kept slipping and it was starting to drive me nuts.  I actually didn't have my 'sweet' gear at all yesterday and probably would have thrown my bike to the alligators on any other day.

THE LAST 5 MILES
Oh dear.  I probably should preface that riding 50 miles is not a 'long' ride for me.  I actually consider rides of 30-40 miles in length 'short' rides.  So, 50 milers are just a touch above that.  Long would be 70 and on up.  It never even occurred to me before I left the house that something would go wrong with this brick.  After all, it was just 50 miles.  Yes it was super hot out, but I did longer brick workouts last summer in similar heat and although I always ended up walk/running the t-run, not once did I feel I couldn't go on at 50 miles.

At mile 45 of this ride, something snapped.  I became hyper aware of the heat, my positioning on the bike, and the warmth and taste of my drink.  I wanted off the bike.  I wanted to start the run.  At mile 48, I actually whimpered for about 3 seconds.  Yes, whimpered.  At mile 50, I finally saw the Element.  Scott was already there waiting for me so that we could start our t-run.  The heat index was now close to 100F.

MY EMOTIONAL BREAKDOWN
I pulled up to the Element and calmly dismounted my bike.  I didn't say a word.  Scott asked me, "what's wrong?"  And here is where I cried like a baby for the first time in God knows how long.

I stammered, "something's wrong and I don't know what it is." I went on and on about how, "I'm just not cut out for the heat, I can't train for long course down here, I'll never be an Ironman," and on, and on, and on.  All of this while sobbing like a 12-year-old.

This is where it's nice to have someone who actually works in emergency medicine living & training with you.  My husband, who was seriously hot and uncomfortable himself, proceeded to place all of the ice cold sponges under my tank top.  Cold rags were shoved under my armpits, ice cubes were pitched into my sport's bra.  The cold was absolutely shocking!  Holy cow!  But after a few seconds it felt soooo darn good.

While the sponges, rags and ice were doing their magic I continued to vent to Scott; trying so hard not to cry again.  I said to him, "Do you know how hard it is for me to want to do something so badly, to have the will and desire to do something, but then my body places limitations on me and poof... it's over right then and there?"

In hind site I feel like a complete idiot for even saying this.  There are tons of physically challenged athletes out there who are able to overcome their challenge and DO everything that I said I (a completely able bodied person, minus a bit of a heavy sweat rate and intolerance for heat) couldn't do.  However, since I was in the throws of completely overheating at the time that I thought all of those things, I'll give myself a little wiggle room.

My life saving icy cold sponges and rags!

COMPOSURE
I must have sat on the tailgate for at least 10 minutes or more.  Scott wanted to call it a day and go home, but even after all of this, I was still hell-bent on running.  However, 4 miles was no longer in the plan... any amount of running would do.  He agreed that we could do half mile loops in order to stay close to the car (and the cooler) and this way if we needed to stop, we would be right there and could just go on home.  I ran a total of 1 mile at an energy-sapped 11 min/mile pace before calling it quits for the day.

I had salt crystals like this all over me.  Both arms, my legs, my face! Ugh!

Definitely not the same happy camper, but still itching to 'try' to run.

REFLECTIONS ON THE HEAT

Fluid intake over 3 hours:  91 ounces
Net pounds fluid lost:  3.2 (2.6% of body weight).
** It's kind of scary to think that if I hadn't taken in those 91ounces, I would have lost 8.8 pounds of fluid in a 3 hour time span.  Good grief!

For the remainder of the day yesterday I tried not to think too much about what took place.  I solicited a bit of advice about nutrition and nobody could find much wrong with my calorie intake, but there was some thought that my sodium/fluid balance might have been off (1623 mg for the entire ride which is actually A LOT less than what I used last summer).  So, the advice was to try less sodium next time.  Honestly, I don't know if nutrition played a part in this at all.  What I think happened was that I overheated.  Not necessarily seriously dehydrated, just overheated.  The interesting thing about Florida (or any other very humid climate where you have a dew point that remains over 70F) is that sweat doesn't really evaporate down here.  The air is already saturated.  Sweat pretty much has no where to go.  It just runs off the body in small rivers and collects in puddles on your back.  Core temp begins to rise and that's when heat exhaustion and heat stroke come in to play.  Yesterday's conditions had me in both the 'heat exhaustion' and 'heat stroke' possible zones based on my handy chart.

I can't do anything about the heat.  I live where I live.  I will continue to have this same problem year after year whenever the heat index gets near 90F.  I'm convinced that no amount of training, heat acclimation, etc... is going to magically solve this.  Some people's bods just do not fare well in the heat.  "My name is Sherry and I'm heat intolerant."

As of this morning I am still down 1.5 pounds, so I've changed my training schedule around so that I can focus on rehydration today.  I'm going to hit a yoga class with Sondra this evening in lieu of my 'regularly scheduled program'.  I LOVE yoga but don't get to do it enough, so I am very excited.

LOOKING AHEAD TO FL 70.3 and FINDING MEANING
I can moan and groan about the heat down here, but I obviously love endurance sports or I would have never signed up for this race.  Seriously, who signs up for something like FL 70.3?  Temps reach 90F during the run portion (with heat index closer to 100F).  The run is 1/2 trail run, 1/2 pavement.  There is hardly any shade on the course.  The bike is flat-ish (but there are some Orange County hills in there) so I'm thinking that most folks sign up to rock their bike time, but what use is that if you have to then join everyone else in the 'Walk of Dead' afterwards?

So why did I sign up?  I really have no clue.  I guess it was just the 'bug' calling my name.  It certainly wasn't to rock any times since my time at Augusta is ridiculously skewed b/c of the super fast current in the river (meaning I will be slower at FL 70.3, there is no question) and it wasn't so that I could get a free IV post-race.  Granted, had I done better 'pre-registration scouting' I would have known that the run was more than 1/2 dirt/grass and probably wouldn't have signed up.  However, I've known about this grass/dirt thing for months now... and I could have backed out because of it, but I chose not to.

So what does this race mean to me?  I need meaning.  I can't just go out there and say, "Oh, I'm doing this 70.3 for exercise."  If I wanted to just exercise, I would happily run on my own for 2+ hours.  No, I need something deeper than that.

Enter my arch nemesis... the Florida heat.  I refuse to let this heat beat me down with a stick every single time I'm out there.  I am going to beat this damn thing and I'm going to do it at this race!  If this means that I have to back off my cycling by 2mph, then that's what I'll do.  If I have to get off of my bike at an aid station to stretch, then that's what I'll do.  If I need to spend 5 minutes in transition to compose myself, then that's what I'll do.  If I need to go into the run with a Galloway plan in my head, then that's what I'm going to do.  But darn it, I am going to thrash, stomp, pummel and clobber this dang heat!

And then I'm going to sit back and enjoy the Florida summer with lots of long bike rides (and LOTS of frequent rest stops) and dream of a crisp, cool Beach 2 Battleship HIM in November.

IN OTHER NEWS:
I signed up for my first marathon!  I'll make the journey on February 13, 2011 in Jacksonville, FL (nice and cool).  I don't think I've been this excited about an event since I completed my very first triathlon.  Oh yes, it is finally time!