Shaking off the chains!

I've had a few tougher workouts recently. Not hard, but just mentally tough to get through them. Training is pretty cyclic; sometimes you feel fantastic, and other times, it's an accomplishment to have simply shown up and have gone through the motions. I did a pretty tough ride on Sunday with the guys after riding on Saturday. We've not been riding the 67 mile ride in Ardmore regularly, and the hills simply killed me (and the guys were pushing pretty hard, too). Swimming this week has been breakthrough workout after breakthrough workout for Justin, but I've been pushing hard on the "easier" stuff just to hang with him! Oy! Things are supposed to be pretty aerobic in the offseason...and I think my body has acclimated well to that aerobic zone!

Today I was scheduled to start some intervals on the run. I was a little leery of the number of 400's I was supposed to do (8), as well as the pace (under 6:00 mi pace...shorter distance, of course, so normally this isn't all that crazy). I've been running long and slow for about two weeks now, and the thought of jacking up the pace by over 2 minutes from what my body's gotten used to seemed like it might be tough. Well, it was tough. But...it felt like I shook off a bunch of cobwebs and chains, so I think I'll be coming out of my mini-slump today! I did only 4 of the 8 - they were pretty tough, after all, but definitely not impossible. Maybe all I needed was to shake off those chains!