In a word…hot. Well, another word. Wind.
It is really hot here. Things are made all the more challenging by the fact that we are coming from Seattle. It was low 50s. And raining.
So here I arrive on what looks like the surface of Mars, with a couple of palm trees and some sod thrown in for good measure, and am trying to maintain calm ahead of the race on Saturday.
The lava rock fields are absolutely stunning. I have never seen anything like this in my life, so it makes the pre-race rides and runs all the more interesting because I keep thinking to myself “hey, look at that!” Actually, it was more like “squirrel!”
I did a very very short bike ride to make sure the bike techs didn’t break anything, and to get my legs a little warm before going for a run. The run was supposed to be 10mins at E pace, then 3x5min at what I am targeting for race pace (with my HR under 160), followed by 12mins of E pace. I was surprised that the first two 5 min blocks came in at 7.6mph, or 7:53 pace. However,the last one was 8.1mph, or 7:24 pace. With the 1 minute rest periods and the brackets of E pace running, I totaled out around 8:40 pace. 8:30 for the whole of the run segment would put me at A+ time according to my coach. Let’s hope that I can hold it together, but all in, things feel really good. Though, with the heat, my HR is drifting up, so I am going to have to be really careful there.
On a more fun note, look at the size of that Koi. Are you kidding me? I know that scale is hard to get in this picture, but there are some others in the shot. This is the largest Koi I have ever seen. He was swimming through the pond like he owned the joint, and he did. Out-sized every other Koi in the pond by quite a bit. I was left wondering – is this a genetic abnormality, or do they always get this big? I have always heard that Koi make excellent targets for hawks and falcons, so maybe Darwin keeps the population size under control. Who knows, but this one was pretty impressive.
