The taper and The bet

"the best athletes race from where their fitness level is rather than where they would like it to be" -Gordo Byrn

True dat!!

I wish my fitness level was a little higher for this weekend's 1/2 Ironman at High Cliff. But this is a process and the bigger goal is 11 weeks down the line. And my fitness level is a result of the decisions I have made day in and day out over the last 10 months. That's one of the great things about racing. You can prepare for months but race day (and the few days before) doesn't lie in terms of how well you prepared.

I am just completing a recovery week and mini taper. A taper is something triathletes do 1-3 times per year for big races. By reducing your volume in the days before a race you are able to charge your battery and recover a little so you are ready to charge out of the gate on race morning. A 1/2 Ironman taper is typically 7-10 days and for a full Ironman it's 2-3 weeks before.

Tapering sucks. You get all kinds of little aches and pains that you are convinced are injuries but are really just your body healing and preparing. And you feel tired and lethargic at times and full of pent up energy at other times. And you have all kinds of time to mentally drive yourself crazy about how you prepared and whether you are overtrained or undertrained blah blah blah. For me personally the longer a taper goes on the more confidence I lose.

Added to these feeling for me this week is that everyone around me is sick with some sort of cold/flu virus (both at work and at home) and I can't tell if I have already had it (and gave it to them) or if I have it now (I am waking up feeling tired and with a stuffy head) or if I am just getting and it will get worse in next couple of days. Hard to tell where the sickness stops and the taper begins.

But I will press forward to Sunday.

My goals for Sunday are:
1) to go a little faster at every part of the race than last year (including both transitions). This should be pretty doable as I took it pretty easy last year because of my injured leg. So to swim a little faster, bike a little faster, run a little faster and get through both T's a little faster
2) to work on my aero position while riding; this is a very flat course (after the original big climb) and I need to spend lots of time down in my aero position (which is not one of my strong suits). To work on my nutrition plan (I will eat and drink following my Ironman schedule for September) and to use my power and pacing guidelines and stay within them.
3) to stay healthy
4) to not go too hard and shred myself. I have a lot more work to do this summer and I need to recover from this race and move on next week. 1/2 iron racing, while fun and challenging is really a different animal than the full stuff and I don't want to have too much down time as I can't afford it for Sept.

THE BET:

Big Island Will and I have a smackdown bet. Will kicked my butt at IMWI last year. He was planning to do IMWI again this year but has decided to pass. Our bet was originally intended for IMWI but we will now have it at High Cliff. The bet is as follows:

If he beats me I need to buy him a case of WI's finest cheese bratwurst

If I beat him he needs to buy me some delicacy from Hawaii called Musubi. Will claims this is the big island equivalent of cheese brats. He also uses the term "spam" when describing it though (as I understand it Hawaii is the largest consumer of spam of anywhere in the world).

Now those of you from WI know this is a flawed bet to begin with as nothing compares to cheese brats. But it has been a friendly wager and a good way for us to stay motivated over the winter.

I have every reason to believe I will pay up here. Logic dictates it as
a) Will kicked my butt at IMWI last year and
b) Will has outworked me in the last 10 months. In part because of me and in part because he prepared for and completed an April Ironman.

But I think I can run a little faster than he can on any given day so I will at least be in his mind in terms of me catching up from behind. Hopefully we will push each other to new personal bests at this distance. I look forward to sharing the course with Will again; it may be a while until we share a course again. Then again maybe I can talk Becky into she and I going to Hawaii for the Honu 1/2 Iron race next June!!!!!!!!

I will post a race report with how it went next week.

See ya......