Rumbling and Rolling

The heat (an humidity!) is on and our next race is just about a month away -- Musselman Sprint in Geneva, NY on Saturday, July 16 and a half-Ironman triathlon the next day, July 17 -- so it's time to get back to regular training. Races are a blast but they disrupt our regular schedule because we have to taper our volume the week before, then take a week pretty easy to recover, so all that time in between is a bit anxiety-making. Should I be doing more? Doing less? Should the beatings continue until morale improves?

Alaina has taken control of our training schedule, and she is a cruel coach. Tempo intervals on the bike followed by hill repeats on the run. Long, hard bike rides on Saturday with a short run afterward, then long hard runs the next day. Sheesh, the female competition at Musselman doesn't stand a chance.

I've been doing my rides during the week on my cyclocross bike out on the dirt roads almost exclusively because I'm so sick of cars on the paved roads. The scenery in the country right now is stunning. Deep green forests line every road that isn't rolling farmland, with the cornfields at just over knee high in time for the 4th of July.

Last weekend Alaina joined me for a 2 hour fun ride on the dirt roads to stretch our legs out a couple of hours after a brutal 10 mile hard run. Pictures below.