Good Start to week

Got a good start to the week. I quit trying to get up on Monday morning when it's cold and dark, and it's working. I read somewhere to never schedule Monday morning workouts because "you'll figure out why" as the book said. I realized why. It's because it's not fun and kills motivation for the rest of the week. So I don't even try any more.

For lunch I did my drills in the pool. 8x25 (20sec swim, 10sec rest), 4x50 (45sec swim, 15sec rest), and then 2x100 (1:30swim, 30 sec rest). Start w/ 100yd warmup and finish with 100yd cooldown, which really isn't enough but it lets me get in and out in time to do the lift during my one hour lunch.

Then I lifted my basic routine but switched up a bit for time constraints. I did two sets of six and increased the weight a bit.

After work and in the extend daylight (thanks daylight savings!), I did a hard 5.3 mile run in 42:09. Good run. That's just a bit under eight minute miles and is actually kind of slow because I need to run 6:50 miles or so to hit a 40 minute 10k after the bike. But that's where I'm at.

And I figured out a good "intensity factor" as an objective measure of my workout. It involves an excel spreadsheet that has all my data points and a formula that uses average heartrate, distance, and time. I don't know how scientific it is but it looks like the numbers show good relativity when I test it with example numbers of what I know are hard runs and easy runs. I like the fact that it incorporates distance as a feature of intensity. "The Triathlete's Training Bible" defines intensity as a funtion of effort and time, which I think has to include pace and distance to fully define time. Now I can make some cool charts with trending lines! I'm a bit of data geek. Honestly, sometimes the only reason I do a workout is so I can keep a good data set, and I'm not even a statistician.

Tomorrow I hope to do two laps on a course with Paul. Of course, the weather plays a factor. In any case, I expect to do a good bike workout, too, inside or out.