Perspiration, Inspiration, and Focus

While having my weekly call with Coach Lucho this week, I commented on looking forward to having something new to focus on.  Lucho saw what I didn't, that my 20 mile weekend runs had become routine and were no longer something I even concerned myself with!  With Ironman Boulder approaching in less than 7 weeks, I asked what I could focus on to improve my cycling in this period of time.  That's how I got my marching orders for the next 4 weeks.

Lucho shared a workout that he learned from Dave Scott, not bad company, which is to do 20 minute intervals broken up as 7 minutes in Zone 3, followed by 3 minutes in Zone 4, then repeat.  These are tough, as I've already discovered by doing one of them just two days after my last long run.  However, I'm already looking forward to doing a few of these during my long bike this Saturday. In fact, this is what I'm thinking about rather than my 20 mile run.

It's interesting how our goals can evolve and change, as just 17 weeks ago, the idea of running 20 miles every weekend for 20 weeks was somewhat daunting.  While I never doubted that I could do it, there were certainly many things that could go wrong and derail this goal.  Now, as I near the completion of this task, it has already been supplanted by another goal.  That is life, and that is certainly my life.  I always tell people that I always set a bar that I can't reach, because if I happen to reach the bar, I'll automatically set a higher one.  Once again, ironman training imitates life.