Pool running and cycling

This morning pool running was back on the agenda. Now that I know that I can get to the pool from my place in 10 mins, including navigating my bike through the security doors, I didn't leave home until 6:15 am. We were in the water just after 6:30. Today's session was a 5 min warm up, followed by four sets of 5 mins hard with 1 min easy in between them, and a 5 min cool down. Sal and I both thought we'd find it difficult to do the 5 mins hard, but we managed it ok. We took turns leading, which seemed to make it a bit easier.

I had thought about going straight to work from the pool, but I realised that I didn't want to cart my flotation belt with me. I headed home for breakfast and a shower, then got changed again to ride to work. I don't know about the rest of you, but all this changing clothes means that I end up with piles of washing. Mind you, one way to deal with it is to buy more clothes. :-)

It was quite warm this morning, so I removed one of my usual layers. I'd heard that it was going to be a lot colder tomorrow, so I packed my windcheater in case I needed it coming home. That turned out to be a good idea. I was behind the War Memorial, about a quarter of an hour into the ride, when I finally acknowledged to myself that I was going to have to stop to remove my high visibility jacket. I'd also forgotten to turn on my heart rate monitor. Once the HRM was on and the jacket was rolled up in my backpack I realised that I was dressed completely in black, which is not exactly the most visible colour out there. I came to the awful realisation that I was going to have to start wearing yellow lycra. Oh no, my limited fashion sense is giving up the battle.

I managed all the hills on the way to work, so I think that this new route is a little easier than the other one. It also had one huge bonus. I rejoined the main road at the top of the long downhill instead of two thirds of the way down. It was so much fun to coast on down the hill. I was a lot more relaxed on the 600m stretch down to the office.

I made it to work in 30 mins. I think that's because the route is a little shorter. Better yet, I made it home in about 25 mins. I ended up leaving work early because there was a stormfront rolling in. We had a lovely view of it from my building. There was a rainbow in the distance, surrounded by black clouds. Going earlier meant that there was a little less traffic in the city too, which helped. I'm clearly getting more confident as I rode on the road most of the way through town.

After I got home I dumped the bike, changed out of my bike clothes and headed down to the gym to see if my Garmin was there. It had been and it had gone home again with the staff member who has it in safe custody. Hopefully she will remember to leave it behind the desk tomorrow. I called in at the bike shop too, so that I could look at yellow lycra. They didn't have what I wanted. It's hard to imagine that I can be picky about yellow lycra, but the only top I tried on was a bloke's top, and I have way too many curves for that to be acceptable. I guess I could go for a larger size, but I'm seriously trying to avoid wearing baggy clothes. Instead, I think I'll be wearing my bright new running shirts while I'm riding for a while.

I decided not to do a workout at the gym tonight. I figured that half an hour of pool running and an hour of cycling was enough exercise for today. This evening I was reading an article in the Age Life & Style section that said "Dr Garry Egger, the man who wrote Australia's physical activity guidelines in 1999, says if he were asked to revise them, he'd double the daily target from 30 minutes of physical activity to 60 minutes and also recommend some resistance (strength) training every other day."

If I manage the cycle commute a few days a week and keep up the rest of my exercise, I should manage to average 60 mins/day easily.

I'm trying to work out what I'll do tomorrow morning. I have my PT session at 7:30 am and I have to be ready for a meeting at work at 9 am. The bus that I can scramble to catch after PT gets me to work at about the right time, but I had been planning to run or ride. I could run before PT. I could run or ride after PT but showering at work will be a scramble. It looks like I'm scrambling whatever I choose to do.