Start of training

Training for the 5km swim started today with a 1600m "normal" swim, alternating strokes, doing legs only and arms only to get going with checking the basics.  I've not done a lot of swimming since January and with less than 2 weeks to go to Swimathon, there's certainly some work to do, so I have a plan:-

7th - 1600m normal swim
8th - rest
9th - 1600m normal swim
10th - rest
11th - 3200m distance swim
12th - 850m sprint swim
13th - rest
14th - 1600m normal swim
15th - rest
16th - 850m gentle swim
17th - rest
18th - 5000m challenge!

I'm over half way to my sponsorship target, thanks to some generous people at work and people I work with through work, but there's still more to go.  I'm hoping I will actually make the target, but this close to the event it's not looking so good.

Anyhoo, today went like this...

B - greek yogurt with 1 scoop, blueberries and grape nuts
S - banana
*swim*
S - 1 scoop in skimmed milk
L - salad; a chicken breast, cherry tomatoes, sweet pepper, capers, pomegranate seeds and lettuce with honey and mustard dressing
S - Dorset Cereals bar; 3 fruit, nuts and seeds
S - carrots and houmous
D - salad; a salmon fillet, sweet pepper, toasted pine nuts and lettuce with olive oil dressing and a ciabatta roll

Exercise - 33 minutes swim

Calories (kcal) [kcals to maintain weight (inc. exercise)	2102 2091]
Protein (g)	155.5 (29.9%)
Carbohydrate (g)	194.8 (35.1%)
Fat (g)	81.0 (35%)
Fruit & Veg	10.0

Swimathon 2010

I've signed up with less than 2 weeks to go, to complete the 5km challenge in this year's Swimathon (for Marie Curie Cancer Care).   5km is a heck of a long way to swim... for reference, in the 30m pool I'll be doing it in, it will be 167 lengths; in the pool near where I work, it would be 294 lengths!  I've only ever swum 3.2km in one day before and that was over 10 years ago now.  It's going to be long, it's going to be tiring, but it's something I can actually do right now when the physio won't let me do much else.  We're in the sporting season now, and dammit I want to do sport!  Especially when it's for a good charity.

So, please take a look at my fund-raising page and donate if you can.  It would mean a lot to me, and a lot to the Marie Curie Cancer Care fund too!

First Triathlon of the year

(of course, I wasn't competing due to busted-butt fallout)

We got up at 5am (unholy, especially so soon after the clocks went forward!) and stuffed in some food; I had Cheerios with milk, something I've not had in months, and Mr TOTKat had a proper brekkie as he was competing.   Drove on out to the place, thinking we'd be really early, only to find that they were serious about the parking around there and most people were already there before 6am registration opening.  It was sodding freezing, to say the least.  We got Mr TOTKat registered and sat down for 2nd breakfast (I had 1/2 a 9 bar, Flax and Mr TOTKat had a peanut butter sandwich), then prepared the transition stuff.  Race numbers are handed out based on your 400m swim times and Mr TOTKat had over-estimated his time by about 30s so he was still quite early in the field, but 30s-worth of competitors too far down the field and ended up having to overtake quite a bit in the pool while I shivered by the side of the pool.

Bike transition went OK and Mr TOTKat was off like a rocket, but I didn't really see it as the end of the bike route is quite a long way from the central area (there's a 7 minute transition break between bike and run to allow people time to get back from the end of the bike route to the transition area).

Having overtaken a few more people on the bike route, he was off on the run and lost a few places there, but given he's been recovering from a knee problem since October and not had much running training at all, it was a really good time!

All done and some nice goodies from the race sponsors, including some Thames Turbo beer!  Mr TOTKat finished the last of the tea from the vacuum flask and we headed home to warm up.  Next time, we'll hang around a bit afterwards as there are spot prizes and a bit of social.  It was just too cold for me to wait this time as I'd been standing still a lot in low temperatures (and yes I was wearing a vest, technical mid layer, technical fleece and "fashion" fleece on top and my snow boots and I was -still- cold!).

Good race overall, good finishing time too, so I'm rather proud :o)

My go next time and hopefully it'll be less blimmin' freezing!

Easter dinner

And here's the lamb saddle dinner (with apricots, prunes, potato, sweet potato, carrot, parsnip and broccoli):-

That lamb was extremely succulent and soft.  De-heee-licious!

Right!

This week has been very off target.  The aim was to maintain weight while being on low exercise at the moment (I do 2x physio exercises every day at the moment, but no running or weight training until the physio says I can - however... (see below)).  And then there was accidental dinner out on Monday and yesterday was an utter blowout with Gourmet Burger Kitchen burger and chips for lunch and instead of going out in the late afternoon/evening and only having a nut bar in the evening, we came home and had takeaway pizza and wine because we didn't make the cut in the numbers for the audience for the recording we'd turned up for.  The result being that there's a lot of *ahem* "transit" at the moment, some fluid retention due to the huge amounts of salt plus alcohol and now I'm 2lbs heavier than I was yesterday.  Of course it'll drop off a reasonable amount over the next couple of days but might not be on target for maintenance again.  Only time will tell.

Sometimes you can get away with a big cheat like that, but I think this might have been pushing it a bit ;o)  I did, however, have a naughty little gym today.  No impact: 12 minutes on the Wave, 12 minutes on the cross-trainer, 3x 60s planks, 3x 10 bicep curls with 2x 7kg, 3x 12 tricep dips, 3x 10 pull-ups (27kg assist), 3x 15 double reverse crunches.

So.  I really really hope that the physio says I can get back to weight training when I see her on Tuesday, less fussed about running but it'd be nice.  If see say yes... RIGHT! Back to it with avengeance!

Today is our Easter celebration meal day due to not wanting to eat a big roast the day before the triathlon on Monday.  I got a beautiful saddle of lamb from the Leadenhall Market butcher, which I'm going to roast with apricots and prunes and serve with piles of veg.

B - toasted wholemeal, seeded bagel with Marmite XO
L - roasted chicken breast and lettuce on granary bread
*gym*
S - 1 scoop in semi-skimmed milk
S - 1/2 toasted bagel with ham and lettuce
D - roast saddle of lamb with apricots and prunes, with potato, parsnip, carrot and broccoli

Exercise - 45 minutes of gym, 20 minutes hardcore hoovering

Calories (kcal) [kcals to maintain weight (inc. exercise)	1845 2206]
Protein (g)	142.1 (31.5%)
Carbohydrate (g)	196.5 (40.9%)
Fat (g)	55.2 (27.6%)
Fruit & Veg	5.0