There's so much data from the past four months that the idea of going through it freaks me out. So know that I'm writing this as I'm looking through everything and I expect the post to be way sloppy because it's so unplanned. But honestly, if I had to put more effort into it than this, the reflection would never happen so I'm gonna do this and be satisfied with it.
Here's what the full schedule ended up looking like (if you click on the images, they should get bigger):
And here is the month by month breakdown via Garmin:
- Swimming:
- Jan: 9 swims, 19.13 mi, 11:10 total hrs
- Feb: 9 swims, 18.52 mi, 10:15 total hrs
- Mar: 5 swims, 11.08 mi, 6:15 total hrs
- Apr: 9 swims, 14.82 mi, 8:21 total hrs
- Biking:
- Jan: 9 rides (all trainer), 172.43 mi, 12:21 total hrs
- Feb: 10 rides (4 outdoors, 6 trainer), 250.59 mi, 17:59 total hrs
- Mar: 6 rides (5 trainer, 1 outdoors, 2 bricks - 1 trainer, 1 outdoors), 163.01 mi, 11:17 total hrs
- Apr: 8 rides (2 trainer, rest outdoors including 1 brick, 2 races), 185.08 mi, 10:59 total hrs
- Running:
- Jan: 10 runs (6 treadmill, 4 outdoors), 41.44 mi, 6:37 total hrs
- Feb: 10 runs (1 treadmill, 9 outdoors), 67.68 mi, 10:43 total hrs
- Mar: 15 runs (all outdoors, 2 bricks), 93.47 mi, 16:04 total hrs
- Apr: 11 runs (all outdoors, 1 brick, 2 races), 56.74 mi, 8:40 total hrs
- Other:
- Jan: 11 sessions (6 lifts, others were core/rowing/etc), 8:50 total hrs
- Feb: 6 sessions (5 lifts, 1 other), 7:10 total hrs
- Mar: 6 sessions (5 lifts, 1 other), 6:57 total hrs
- Apr: 3 sessions (2 lifts, 1 other), 3:15 total hrs
- Total time by month:
- Jan: 38:58 hrs
- Feb: 46:07 hrs
- Mar: 40:39 hrs
- Apr: 31:22 hrs
- Totals:
- Swim: 32 swims, 63.54 mi, 36:01 total hrs
- Bike: 33 rides, 771.11 mi, 52:36 total hrs
- Run: 46 runs, 259.33, 42:04 total hrs
- Other: 26 sessions (18 lifts), 26:12 total hrs
- Time: 156:53 hrs
Okay that was actually sort of cool to compile. On one hand, the numbers are too large for me to really comprehend so it's like, oh apparently I worked out a lot. On the other hand, it's cool to see what the swim/bike/run distribution looked like.
Overall thoughts:
- On the goals from back in these days:
- Consistency w/o burnout towards the end of the big training block: Somewhat accomplished? I think I definitely did way better than I did in the fall and managed to keep up what was for me a very high volume of work both in terms of training and school and somehow stay on track for almost four entire months. There were some off days/weeks towards the end both because of inevitable schedule issues relating to travel and just mental things (some weird mix of burnout, anticipation, and anxiety) but it was a margin of error I am more than happy to accept. I feel like if I can hit serious training blocks like this every time I went for it, I would be in a fantastic place. Sure, there's always room to improve when it comes to consistency but given the constraints of reality and the fact that there's much more to my life than just this sport, I am 100% satisfied with what consistency looked like this block.
- Picking up the slack on the biking and swimming: Biking yes! Swimming no...Which I'm sort of okay with honestly. I think there's still room to improve on the biking. That's something that I want to continue working on moving forwards. My swimming hasn't been improving but it also hasn't been getting significantly worse and for now I'm willing to accept that while I focus on upping my game in the disciplines I'm weaker in. I've gotten a lot better as a cyclist these past few months and I really hope to keep that moving in the right direction as time goes on. I will say that the lifting supplement to my swimming did go phenomenally well this block, something else I hope to keep up as time goes on.
- Run mileage: goals were 20-25 miles per week which turned out to be waaaaay ambitious. I had a few kinks in the early parts of the year involving my knee and my IT band that kept that from being a reality, but I was there in that range in March (which was my highest volume month) so I would consider that a success. I'll be running a lot between now and July so we'll see where the weekly mileage lines up in the upcoming weeks/months.
- Core/stability/mobility/stretching/recovery: Um no. Fail. I have always sucked at this and pretty much continued to suck at it this cycle. This is something I'm going to try and work on more in the upcoming months.
- Being more present: I think I'm getting better at this. I think I still have a long ways to go before I am where I want to be. I think what has improved is my acceptance of myself and the things that I feel and the way that I think. I think I'm more okay with being who I am and having the quirks that I have and accepting that one of the consequences of just being me is that I'm maybe not going to be as happy as other people are sometimes and that's okay because it is what I want and what I choose. I think I'm better at being thankful for having the ability to do what I choose to do. That's valuable. Do I still have to work more at being present? Yes, but in terms of my mentality as a whole, I think I'm moving in the right direction. I hope the people who have been reading this madness agree.
- On the future:
- Honestly training is going to be way less serious in the upcoming year because I know I need to focus on other things like school. There are plenty of things that I want to work on because there are always plenty of things that I want to work on, but I think it's important to take it one step at a time and remember that it has to take a back seat compared to some of the bigger things happening in my life right now. So for the next few months, the two main things I'm going to be working on are as follows...
- Running: Most of my races are running races in June/July, so I'm going to focus on running for now. (After that, there'll be a mix of different races from August through October so I'll probably get back to a more balanced tri training schedule. By the time the winter rolls around, I expect to be switching over from endurance work mode to strength work mode because I've always wanted to put some work in at the gym just getting stronger. I've never really had the chance to focus on that specifically because I've always been doing one endurance type race or another. Since there really aren't races on the calendar after October, I expect to have some time to just hit the gym and have fun focusing on something that is normally more of an accessory part of my schedule.)
- Core/maintenance/stretching: I suck at paying attention to this and doing this and I really need to make it a more habitual part of my schedule so it's something I'm going to try and really tackle in the next few months.
There is so much more I could look at and so much more I could talk about and over-analyze when it comes to this stuff but honestly, I want to leave it at this: I did something in the past four months that I didn't think I was capable of doing. I think I've worked harder than I've ever worked in my life (not necessarily just in regards to training, but in regards to literally everything else too) and I've learned a lot about myself and my limits and my strengths and my weaknesses. Most of all I've learned a lot about how to make this life and my passions work within the constraints of reality and I've learned that I have the best support person in the universe who does so much to give me the best chance I have at reaching my goals. I couldn't have imagined any of this would go the way it had when I first laid out all my crazy plans at the beginning of the year. I couldn't have imagined that it would be so hard. I couldn't have imagined that I would realize that it is so hard and keep going. I couldn't have imagined that anyone would support my crazy crazy life and my crazy crazy dreams. I've been so lucky just to experience the things that I've been able to experience and come out the other side. Sure, there are a billion ways in which I've fallen short along the way but I really couldn't be more satisfied with my decision to try. I couldn't be more thankful to have had Henry standing beside me every step of the way. I couldn't be more proud of how far I've come.
The lofty goals are getting laid aside for a little bit. You can bet I'll keep training and keep working and hopefully keep improving, but the priorities are definitely going to shift in the next few months and maybe even years. I'm going to try to be a little less uptight and a little more forgiving and a little more focused on school. I'm sure everything that's gone into these past four months will only help me even as things start to change. It's just another adventure and I'm sure it'll take me to just as unexpected places as this one has, even with all my overbearing planning. I hope you'll stay with me as I take it on. Happy Sunday everyone!
Much love,
Jess
PS - It was a rest day today. I didn't do much of anything, which was fairly glorious. Long run tomorrow! (:
