Today's Workout: Bring an umbrella

My riding partner KR, her friend Dave and I hit the water at 7:30 AM today. While on the beach we ran into Paula Newby-Fraser, 8-time Ironman World Champion. I said hello to her and I was tempted to ask for advice but everyone mocked me for being so brazen as to say hello. Hey, how many people recognize her--I should be thanked.

The water was a chilly 70 degrees and most likely will get colder before race day. Nothing but rain expected until Saturday. The swim course was busy, lots of athletes getting in their practice swims and dare I say there was physical contact. I'm amazed that people can run into you when there are several hundred swimmers stretched the length of a 1.2 mile course. Just rude if you ask me, then again maybe I should have the slow moving triangle on my feet.

I had a little vertigo after the swim. That makes me a little nervous but I think I know the reason. In cold water you can get vertigo from swimming due to water coming in your ears. I hope this and perhaps staring at the line that runs the course were the primary factors. I stopped in Ironman village and bought some ear plugs which I will try in my swim tomorrow. I do not want to get pulled from the race for vertigo--it has happened once before in a 1 mile swim when the water was 64 degrees. It took me 15 minutes to walk properly.

Out on the bike for a short ride, in theory. We rode down to Riverside Dr. and road the run course out to Route 73 then road back into Lake Placid on the bike course after climbing little cherry, big cherry, mama bear and papa bear. That only took 29 minutes so we decided to go back to Riverside Rd and return. KR and Dave have zipp wheels so they lost me fairly quickly. I didn't see them turn around so I repeated what we did the first time. Apparently, I passed them within two minutes of our restart but I never saw them. They had stopped to talk to someone. Oh well, I enjoy the hills so it felt great.

I could not drive the bike course and put my dedications out on the course today because of the rain. Tomorrow does not look any better. This may have to slip until Saturday or I will use my backup plan and carry the names with me. I had a picture of my Dad taped to my bike but it fell off in the rainstorm we went through yesterday during our commute. I have a backup plan for that too--I carried and extra picture just in case.

Tomorrow, a swim (1 loop) and a 30-minute run. I'm hoping to get some last minute tips from my coach tonight at dinner.