The Glorious Life of a Triathlete

A lot of people* ask me what it's like to be training for a triathlon. I'm only a few weeks into my training, and I'm already surprised by how hard it is. When I was marathon training, I was thinking that once I got to triathlon training, I'd only be doing 1/3rd as much running, and wouldn't it be so much easier then? I've never been good at math. In reality, I'll be doing three times as much training for almost 3 times the distance (26.2 for a marathon, vs. 70.3 for the triathlon).
*nobody, ever.

The workouts themselves are shorter, so far. My weekday runs are only 30-40 minutes, compared to the 3-4 hour runs I did every Saturday from January to March. But mentally, it's exhausting. Getting up and ready for a run still takes the same amount of energy whether that run is 30 minutes or 4 hours and 30 minutes. Ok, maybe I spend a bit more time applying Body Glide for the longer run, but basically everything else is the same. And at least after a 4 hour run, I'd feel like I was making progress. After a 30 minute run, I feel like there's no way that can be beneficial to getting my fat ass across the finish line in the 8.5 hour course time limit. It feels like the equivalent of starting your marathon training by walking to the curb to check the mailbox. But, I guess we all gotta start somewhere, right?

Today I was supposed to swim, but I'm taking a rest day. It's hard for me to do this, because I feel like if I don't bother following the training plan, then I might as well just quit entirely. There's another part of me that thinks that a rest day is ok, and I should stop being so hard on myself. In the end, the decision was made by my good friend Ally McBeal. That's right, the same Ally McBeal from the Boston-based dramedy from the late 90's. I came home from work, debating whether I should get to the pool, or stay in for the evening. I actually said outloud, "If there's an Ally McBeal disc from Netflix in the mailbox, I'm totally staying in!" A totally logical thought, yet when said outloud to yourself, just sounds pathetic. Lucky for me, there WAS an Ally McBeal disc (two of them!) in the mailbox, so it's sofa city for me tonight.

My plans to stay in remind me of a question posed on an online dating site that I love to deactivate myself from on a regular basis. The question asks what a typical Friday night looks like for you. My answer, which thankfully nobody can read because my account is deactivated, says, "My Friday night consists of me singing (to the tune of 'Ladies Night' by Kool & the Gang), 'Oh yes it's Laundry Night, and the feeling's right, oh yes it's Laundry Night, oh what a night!' And seriously, the only thing that is more exciting than two Ally McBeal discs in the mailbox is a box full of quarters and an overflowing laundry pile. Amirite?! Seriously though, there's a lot of laundry involved. Running 3 times per week, biking 3 times per week, swimming 3 times per week. That's 9 workouts per week that all generate laundry.

So far, my experience about being a triathlete in training includes me simultaneously complaining that I'm training too much AND not enough, taking extra rest days, and doing a lot of laundry. One question that everyone wants to know is what I eat.* On my way home from work tonight, I went grocery shopping. The only thing I bought was greek yogurt, which, as it turns out, was also the only thing I already had in my fridge at home. Have I mentioned I'm compulsive?
*nobody cares what I eat.

I'm beginning to think that all of this triathlon training is just a distraction from my otherwise boring life. Hrmm... I may be onto something there...