So it's 11 days to go to Wimbleball....

Well do I feel that my last four weeks have gone well building to my "A" race - UK70.3? in one word "NO!" the last few weeks have been a bit of a step backward (with a few small shuffles forward too).

Why is this? Well last year one of my biggest challenges was reaching the start line for IMCH healthy, something I almost managed except I damaged both of my Achilles tendons just before my warm up 70.3, these than plagued me through the rest of the training season and nto the race itself, ultimately requiring a fair amount of rest, recovery and physio afterwards. Unfortunately I have managed to damage them again :-(

Unfortunately during my disasterous week in London at EULAR I had no gym or pool to go to so I overdid it running - I ran 5 days back to back finishing with a run which I did at my friend's pace not mine and I pushed it a little (5.11km in 25mins). As a result the following day when I tried to do a brick set everything hurt, but mostly my Achilles, small needling pains down the middle of them - a sure sign of acute tendon damage....As a result no running since, nearly two weeks now. I am speaking to my coach later but I think it is going to mean shifting my "A" race priority from Wimbleball to Galway in September....

On the plus side my cycling is improving - I managed a 40km TT effort in training in 1:14:23 - on an undulating route, on my road bike with my training wheels on - a new PB by 4mins pretty happy with it as my previous best was at Dorney Lake on my TT bike with deep aero wheels 8-)

Also I am out getting some OW swim training in - I managed to get to Datchet Lake last week (see my previous post) and I am entered into the Great East Swim (http://www.greatswim.org/Events/British-Gas-Great-East-Swim/) at the weekend - a straight 1mile OW swim - I am in the fast wave (under 30mins) which should make it interesting! My next OW swim race is Henley Challenge (http://www.henleyswim.com/challenge.asp) a 1 mile upstream swim on the Henley Regatta course on the 10th July.

My totals for the last 90 days had me amused...1102km on the bike, 81km running and 52km swimming - I didn't think I had trained that much!

And finally it was announced today that NYC will host the US Championships for IRONMAN next year (http://ironmanuschampionship.com/) - looks like we will have to look at budgets but maybe Roth has some competition as my "A" race next year...

I'll post an update after the swim - wish me luck!

Later
I.