THE MIGHTY JO CARREL: July 2014

So after our little blip of a holiday followed by getting sick we are now on track with our Samoa training albeit a little bit late and in a bit of a rush...

SWIMMING

I was pretty useless at swimming a couple of week ago (even more useless than usual if that is at all possible) but I seem to have found my groove again. Our squad and lane is getting ridiculously busy which can be a bit frustrating and I got kicked in the head while doing kick yesterday while simultaneously kicking someone else in the head. Good times.
I finally cashed in my wetsuit voucher which I won at Auckland Half Ironman and splashed out with an upgrade to an Orca 3.8 suit from whatever the entry level one was that I won. For the past 6 years I have been getting custom made suits from Blue Seventy but since our contacts don't work there anymore and the new staff obviously don't love us as much, they don't work out as reasonable in price as before so it was looking like time to move on from B70 anyway. I wasn't sure if I would fit into the Orca one since I was a bit off the size chart (in a smaller way not a fatter way) but it fits pretty good apart from a bit of bagginess around the armpits which I can get taken in.
It's a non wetsuit swim at Samoa so I won't get the chance to test out the new suit for a while since the sea is at Arctic temperatures right now but hopefully it makes me swim twice as fast...

CYCLING

With the unexpected and a little bit sneaky entry of our friend Kezzle into the Samoa Half we now have the A Team back for weekend riding - wooo! So we have done two weekends in a row of riding the Waitaks for the first time in a long time. We are pretty slow but hopefully a few more weeks of it will do the trick. The weather has been a bit sub optimal the rest of the time for outdoor riding but we have been very diligent and have ridden our indoor trainers in lieu of the road each time. I somehow managed to get a puncture partway through a session last week which was a new experience especially considering I haven't had a puncture in probably almost a year (barring puncturing with my race tyre in Kona) thanks to the trusty Gatorskins.

RUNNING

Running is building back up to where I was before we went on holiday with 45km last week and hopefully a bit over 50km this week. I try to maximize my time and use running as a form of transport when I can especially at this time of year when it's hard to find motivation to go for a run when I get home at 5.45pm and it is cold and dark. Yesterday my running home plans were foiled when my ferry to work was cancelled due to gale force winds (pfft.....) and Jared kindly lent me his car to get to work which obviously meant I had to return it at the end of the day. Like any ultra organised person with mild obsessive compulsive tendencies I was rather pissed as it ruined all my plans and I don't like having my plans ruined especially when it comes to training.
Anyway today I will be running home from work so nothing had better get in my way...

No triathlon related photos this week so how about some random photo grids which I did on my new app when I was home sick.