One Week Out... Inside My Head

I don't even know if I'm going to publish this post but I'm finally feeling the desire to write some stuff down on the blog so I'll type away and then we'll see what comes out... Probably just some random points to start... ;)

~One week til Canada! I must be tapering because yesterday I cleaned my car and today I cleaned my house. No kidding- doing my 5th load of laundry as I type. I also dusted. That happens like twice a year.

~Rode my new bike today for the first time. Really its the same bike- new frame but same make/model white P3 so really nothing should be different about it. I'd be lying if I said I was 100% comfortable on it today but close enough. For whatever reason I'm not a huge fan of the aero bars on that bike and I don't relax as much as I'd like which makes my low back tense up some but it is what it is at this point so I'm going to ignore it next week when I'm racing. :)

~Of course it rained all night so the roads were wet this morning... First pedal stroke on that new bike and she's a mess already. Welcome to your new life, little bike. HTFU. Truth be told if I had my other bike I would have ridden it today instead but my worn out trusty old black P3 has seen her last ride and is going to heaven. I know. So sad! Her replacement is a new P2... stepping down but just b/c I'm poor cheap and in the end she's just going to serve as a training bike so no need to spend any more $$$ than I have to on that one.

~No shocker here- I've been thinking about IM quite a bit and trying to talk myself through how I want to execute each part of the race. I've come to the conclusion that this race is going to be won or lost inside my own head. Physically my fitness is there so that is not a question. But being fit does not make an Ironman easy. So at some point I'm going to have to accept the suffering and push right through/past it. I've never actually been able to pull that off the way I want to pull it off next week so it'll be interesting to see if I can. I'm looking forward to the opportunity to try anyway. :)

~Along with that point above, here is an excerpt from an email exchange I was having with one of my athletes today... This gives a pretty good peak into what's going on in my head right now.

So here's the deal- we are FIT and READY. That does NOT mean it's going to be easy next week. What that means is that how we actually perform is really all in our heads. I don't think you can fake your way through an Ironman if you don't have the baseline fitness... you can't just wing it and rip up the course if you haven't done adequate training (this is not our problem so we don't worry about this). That said, just b/c you're super fit does NOT guarantee you a great race... SO, you go into IM with some humility, knowing that Ironman is fucking HARD- it is a very long day no matter how fit you are... so we respect that and we pace ourselves and fuel ourselves well for the first 7-8 hours. Hold back and stay within yourself having confidence that even your 'within yourself' pace is a strong/solid one... Be patient. Then after ~8 hours, anticipate that it will start to hurt... and HTFU. Grit your teeth and start talking yourself through the suffering. This is where they say IM performance is so mental. Your fitness is there but anticipate that is is still going to be very hard. Expect it. Welcome it. And push through it. THEN you cross the line with your huge PR. :)))))