Tri Training Week Two: Sweaty in Seattle

Weekly Mileage: 29.3 (9.2 Running, 1.5 Swimming, 18.6 biking)

Wow.  I just checked my sweet google doc training tracker (sounds more impressive than it really is at a whopping 4 columns in excel) and I have trained 10 days in a row.  In those 10 days I have worked out 12 times!  But here's the really cool part: the last 4 workouts were while I was ON VACATION.  Yep, I'm that person.  I work out every day of my vacation.  And until yesterday I really didn't even resent it.  In fact, I looked forward to it.

This positive attitude was probably the result of location and company.  From what I could tell over the weekend, there are few places more beautiful and conducive to outdoor exercise than Seattle.  Upon landing I went for a run around Greenlake with Non-red Kate, a former rugby teammate.  The air was crisp, the sky was sunny and blue (I’m beginning to think they lie about Seattle weather just to keep us away), and the three mile loop around the little lake was a perfect welcome to Seattle.

Another thing about summer in Seattle is the sheer amount of daylight.   The sun came up at six and didn’t really set until around 9:30 or 10:00.  As a result, I got in a full day of fun and adventure (sleeping in, shopping with my high school history teacher Henry, pedicures and dinner with my Mississippi roommate Gwyn) and still was able to squeeze my run in at 8:30pm!  It was after a delicate rain shower, and newly wet pavement is one of my favorite smells.  Heaven.

Saturday morning I borrowed Henry's wife Catherine’s pimped out Specialized road bike and took it for a spin along the Burke Gilman trail.  I rode through the University of Washington, along a canal, and through the Fremont neighborhood.  I finished back at the Kamerlings atop a massive hill.  When I got into the house, their six-year-old daughter said, “You’re sweaty.”  Yep.  Sure was.

The final workout of the vacation was a quick run to the beach at Golden Gardens, the site of the wedding that brought me to Seattle in the first place.  The run to and from the beach was  no big deal: 3.5 miles of gentle ups and downs, with a view of the mountains in the distance on the way there.  However, as I approached the park, I reached a set of stairs heading down.  I skipped down the steps knowing that beautiful views awaited me upon my arrival.  But about half way down I realized I’d have to go back up.  The final count was 253 stairs, plus a few straightaways in the middle.  Having just run almost two miles, I was none too pleased to be climbing.  Upon reaching the bottom of the final set of stairs with just 25 more to climb, an 80-year-old man looked at me, smiled and said, “You’re movin’ awfully slow.”  Yep.  Sure was.

So maybe I'm sweaty.  And maybe I'm slow.  But the bottom line is, I'm having fun training for this triathlon!