1 down 29 to go!

Week one training complete. Just 29 left to go.
 It's not really felt like training though, for one thing I'm on holiday and it's been more like playing out with my mates and having fun, which accounts for why I've done more than I need to. The bible, according to Don Fink, decrees that thou shall complete 6 hours of training in week one, comprising 2 swims, 3 runs and 3 bikes. I've done that, they've just been a bit longer/harder than suggested - surely that's not a sin?
I mean, if Christmas Eve is not a time for enjoying an 8-mile hill run with pals, then when is? Fair enough, the conditions were pretty horrendous and left to my own devices I'm not sure I'd have done it. Which goes to show I hang around with nutters who don't let the small matter of a Met Office weather warning ruin their training opportunities! The wind was howling at gale force as we tracked our way up Ben Bouie to the Christmas tree. A fir tree, which is decorated in tinsel and trimmings all year round. Great views over Loch Lomond and the Clyde from the top. Not that much time was spent admiring the views - we could barely stand upright in the howling wind.
 I have IronPhil to blame for the second of my training excesses. Among my many exciting Christmas gifts ... bike tools, cycle helmet, The Grid (a hardcore foam roller designed to make you howl with pain as you roll around the lounge ironing out all manner of knots in your weary muscles), was a copy of a Sufferfest DVD. For the uninitiated, Sufferfest is exactly what it says on the tin. An American turbo- training cult - you pop in the DVD, get on your turbo trainer, watch a film of pro-cyclists doing what they do best and listen to the commentator yelling instructions at you as you try to keep up with them. Needless to say, this equates to much suffering. So much so, that as I played with my new present on Christmas Day I swear to God my eyeballs were actually sweating - or maybe it was just the blood that was pounding in my ears finding a way out. So while IronPhil sweated over a turkey dinner, I did a tough brick session - one hour of turbo suffering followed by a 15-minute transition run.

Day 3 dawned with some calmer weather, so friends arrived bright and early for a tour of our killer hills by bike. As we all reached the top of the Glen Fruin hairpins IronPhil and I couldn't decide if we still had friends, but they were still smiling and insisting they had enjoyed a good start to their Boxing Day celebrations.
So to spread the icing on the week one cake, I joined pals from Helensburgh Amateur Athletics Club, for the annual Cashel Hill run. I am so lucky to have a great playground on my doorstep and this is no exception. A tough 7k hill run on the banks of Loch Lomond. Yes, it's for charity, festive fun and handicapped start times to make it even more jolly. Trouble is, something happens when I pin a number to my top, and so, with a damning handicap time that saw me start with only 3 mountain goats behind me and IronPhil with 14-year-old son Cameron up ahead - I had my work cut out. Feeling sick from the effort of catching IronPhil and worrying that he was hot on my heels during the descent, I missed the last turn and finished in the wrong place for the second year running. At least I don't have to navigate in Bolton!

I will pace myself better as the weeks tick by, I know I will have to if I'm going to survive what is set to become a gruelling schedule - but right now it's Christmas, it's the holidays and this is what I do for fun - happy days!

And so the journey begins....

This is it, day one is dawning. Sunday marks the start of the Ironjourney. In exactly 30-weeks time I will plunge into the murky waters of Pennington Flash to swim 2.4 miles, cycle 112 miles through the Lancashire countryside, climbing 5249ft and pound the streets of Bolton for 26.2 miles - all to claim the bragging rights to declare myself an Ironman.
Am I ready to start - hell yes! I've been steadily plugging away for months now, building a good fitness base. I've been training my body by strengthening my core with hundreds of squats, planks and more; rolling my sore muscles over a foam cylinder to keep them supple and swimming, biking and running 6 days a week. I've also been training my mind - training it to ignore the 'voices'. No, I'm not mentally deranged (although some would beg to differ!) I just hear the same voices as everybody else. Some days they're screaming: "You're too tired." "Far too busy." "You deserve a glass of wine, it's been a bad day." "You haven't spent enough time with your family recently, you can't go out again." "The house is a bombsite." "Sleep and rest are more beneficial today." "You can't possibly go out in that weather!" Sound familiar? They're like an unwanted mantra, programmed to repeat over and over again. Just because I go out and ignore them, doesn't mean I don't hear them. They are loud, frequent and clear. But I'm getting better at silencing them.
The bottom line is - train today when you really don't want to because you never know what tomorrow will bring. I always work on that philosphy. You never really know what life will throw at you tomorrow - you might feel really unwell, the kids might be sick, you might have even more work to do, the weather might be even worse!
I'm lucky too, because I have the added voice of IronPhil, aka 'reason'. He is very good at cutting through the nonsense. If I'm being lily-livered about cycling in the wind and rain, he provides a good kick up the necessary. If I'm stressing about fitting it all in; he reminds me that I'm not doing this for a living!
It is important to gain perspective - I am prone to being 'a slave to the schedule' which is good because it drives me, but it's also good to remember, as IronPhil says - this is just a hobby - it's something I've chosen to do for pleasure!
As these next 30 weeks tick by, I must keep that perspective. As I plough through the depths of winter I will record a whole set of new voices to talk to me - when I'm soaked to the skin, frozen to the core, weary and challenged. They'll be screaming: "This is just for fun." "Remember, it's your hobby." "You're lucky to be fit enough to do this." "Nobody forced you - it was your choice." "Maria Dye, you are an Ironman!" It's this final voice that rings in my ears and keeps me going when I want to stop,
because I know I will only ever hear these words when I cross the finish line in Bolton on July 21st 2014. Bring it on!

It's all mental

I've had a little medical issue to deal with over the last two weeks, which has distracted me slightly. But I had to laugh when I read my GP's referral note to the hospital. It described me as "an elite athlete"! So I've taken a photo of it and I might just get it framed!

I know it was her way of explaining to medical staff why i have such a low resting pulse rate - but it gave my family something to laugh about. There's nothing "elite' about me, I know that for sure. But as I sat in the hospital waiting room, I was definitely the odd one out - not overweight, not over 60, not about to hang up my running shoes for slippers any time in the foreseeable! So, after that blip I've enjoyed a week of positivity, and as a teacher I know only too well how a small pat on the back goes a long way. Last Monday, the toughest of tough swim coaches said: "Have you been practising? Because you're starting to look like a swimmer." I ignored the cheekiness and took it as a compliment. This is the swim coach who put us through a '6-killer-swims-a-week' schedule to swim the 24-mile length of Loch Lomond, so he knows how I swim and if I've improved.
Next, I had a hilly bike session with IronPhil. Now, descending is not my forte. As a cyclist friend of mine once said: "I brake like a girly." I do, I do and there's no shame in it. If my brain is screaming 'slow down you might crash and die', then my hands obey and squeeze the brake levers ... mind over matter, I can't help it! Well, progress is being made, because as we reached the bottom of one of our regular, smooth and quite fast descents, he didn't have to wait for me to catch up. Despite the wind and rain, I kept him in my sights as I merely 'feathered' my brakes (technical term which roughly translates as light braking for wimps who don't have the balls to build up too much speed!) Even better, I reached the summit of one of our steep, hairpin climbs ahead of him, had time to stop, unclip and have a drink before he appeared. (I have to add that IronPhil claims it was due to dodgy rear derailleur issues) but I'll take a training victory whenever I can.
Also very kind training pal, Laura, nominated me on the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games website as Sports Star of the Week. Embarrassed but proud.

You see, I'm surrounded by an elite bunch of healthy, fit, go-getters - any one of them could do this if they really wanted to. I think once you've signed up for something huge, it ceases to be quite as big and you begin to forget how enormous it looks form the outside. It simply becomes a series of small, steady steps in one direction. Keep following them and you will get there. You just have to really, really want it; and I really, really want it! Some of it is physical, but most of it's mental ... totally, nutcrackingly mental!

It's all about the bike

It's not about the bike, as Lance once said. We now all know there's more truth in that statement than we first thought. However, in my case it is all about the bike.
I've done my research and taken plenty of advice to have reached the conclusion that prowess on the bike will make or break my Iron dream. Consensus states that 60 per cent of my available training time should be spent on two wheels, I know that makes sense. My cycling journey so far has been a very steep ascent with some hair-raising hairpins thrown in for good measure. Christmas day 2011 was a landmark in this journey, marking the day when IronSanta saw fit to deliver The Beast, my first road bike.
Until then I'd happily chugged along on a sturdy mountain bike, completed 3 triathlons on it, albeit wincing with embarrassment as I racked it alongside real bikes. It's the triathlon equivalent of turning up at the Grand Prix in a Skoda! Anyway, IronPhil decided that my swim and run times weren't too bad but my bike was a serious handicap, so he scoured eBay for the perfect starter bike. When I saw it winking at me next to the tree that morning, I tingled with a mixture of fear and excitement - to be honest, it was more fear than excitement! You see, I am the cycling equivalent of an adult who didn't learn to swim as a child, I have outlandish fears, huge incompetencies and a dreadful sense of balance. This dates back to my childhood, as the youngest of six, with a big age gap to my older siblings, I didn't have the benefit of hand-me-down bikes when I was growing up.  So all those skills that kids and adults take for granted, I don't have. The phrase, 'it's just like riding a bike' for me may as well be 'it's just like climbing Everest'!
Needless to say The Beast and I have come a long way together, from my panic-stricken Boxing Day  descent from home to Tesco, to regular 50-60 mile training rides. Together we learned all the skills that real triathletes don't even think about. While they're worrying about getting their nutrition right, I'm worrying about how to take my hands off the handlebars to get my drink bottle out of it's cage or how to take an energy gel out of my back pocket, open it and consume it without crashing! This year, I even managed to reach the pinnacle of cycling success - Tour de France, nah; I earned my yellow jersey on the day I finally 'clipped in' to my pedals. Now you've got the general picture of where I've come from, you might realise what a huge achievement that was. My Pearl Izumi cycling shoes sit proudly on the shelf as a testament to the power positive thought and a patient, encouraging husband! Finally, I look like a cyclist.
As for The Beast, well my first love has become my winter training bike and I'm now the proud owner of a carbon fibre dream machine. With all that gear you'd think I'd be closing the gap (that's the gap between me and IronPhil) It seems not, as my guru whupped my padded posterior over a 55k ride yesterday, acting as my coach, cadence monitor, bike computer all in one. Who needs technology - it's miles that count ... many, many miles, hard miles, cold miles, steep miles, scary, hairy descending miles...just miles!
So when you ask me what I'm on, the answer's simple, as Lance said: "On my bike, busting my ass!" Powered purely by determination.

I've got a date

The date has been set - training officially starts on 22nd December, that marks exactly 30 weeks to Ironman UK!  IronPhil pointed out that most people would enjoy Christmas first, then start, but he knows me better than that...what a great start to the hols, say I! You see, the trouble with that volume of training is not the thought of the physical effort I'm about to put in, I can make my eyeballs bleed without losing too much sleep over it, but what does keep me awake at night is the stress of organising my life around it. Anxiety levels begin to rise when I'm trying to squeeze in two sessions a day as well as cooking dinner; taxiing my teenage sons around; getting my lessons planned; marking jotters; shopping, washing; cleaning....the list is endless and exhausting; so training in the school holidays is a piece of cake. Can't wait to get started.
For now, it's all about enjoying the relative freedom of life without a schedule on the fridge. That doesn't mean I'm slacking, I've been trying to keep up 6 sessions a week - 2 swims, 2 runs & 2 cycles. Although this week it all went to rats when I logged two 13-hour days at school for parent's night. The only way to squeeze in training with that workload is the 6am alarm call, I know there'll be lots more of those to come in the months ahead, but I will declare right now - I hate dragging myself out of bed in the deepest depths of winter to run, swim or turbo. Embrace the freezing, dawn darkness and make it your friend, is about to become my mantra.
I've also been busy trying to sort out old injury niggles too, after the cortisone injection failed to miraculously sort out my ITB. Cue Pamela at Sports Injury Scotland, who I am now trusting to do what no physio, GP or massage therapist has done before. She's given me a programme of exercises to strengthen bits of my body. This usually involves me side-stepping or squatting around the house with a big, green elastic band around my knees. I'm usually a bit lazy with core work, but I know it makes sense and now's the time to do it before my body really does feel like it's been hit with a sledgehammer.
Oh, I've also had a flu jab, stocked up on protein shakes, energy drinks and inner tubes, updated my i-pod playlist and downloaded a year's supply of turbo sessions. As American basketball coach, Bobby Knight, said: "The will to succeed is important, but what's more important is the will to prepare."

Simply outstanding

Had a great night at the Lomond Swimming & Triathlon Club Awards Dinner last night. Not least because it was good to get-together with my swim buddies, The Maids of the Loch and quite an honour for us to be presented with the Outstanding Achievement Award for our Loch Lomond swim relay.
For anyone who doesn't know, we're a group of six women who set a world record as the first relay team to swim the length of the loch without wetsuits. Yep, it was a slightly crazy feat - tough and challenging, a real test of mental and physical endurance. We all left our comfort zones, along with our wetsuits and any trace of sanity, on the shores of that chilly loch many, many times over the long months of training. This experience has had a lasting impact on every one of us and its a true reflection of how incredible challenges change your life.
Taking on the loch swim was not just about swimming, in fact, that was only a small part of it in the end. It was about training your body to acclimatise to the cold water; it was about pushing yourself mentally and physically - not just once, but repeatedly, day after day; it was about juggling your home, your job, your family to fit in hours of training. Ultimately, it was about discovering that two words:  "I can't!" no longer existed in your vocabulary.
So as we partied hard last night, into the small hours, we discussed the big question of how do you top a world record? Well, I've got my Iron dream to keep me busy, but all the Maids are going on to tackle amazing feats of endurance too. Some have already signed up while others are in the process of organising their next challenge. Which just goes to show that once you've put yourself out there, you just can't go back and if you surround yourself with like-minded people, you will achieve so much more.
Some may call it a mid-life crisis, but there is no crisis. A real crisis would be sitting at home, making excuses about why you're too busy to do what you really want to do. If this year has taught me anything, it's made me realise that everything is possible ... if you're willing to make it happen. That's why I now believe I can tackle a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike and a marathon, all in one day! Thanks girls -  the power of determined women. Hmm, could I bottle it and sell if for Xmas..anyone want to buy?!!
https://www.facebook.com/TheMaidsOfTheLoch

I've been 'Finking"

Bit of a frustrating week. I decided to take the plunge and have a cortisone injection in my knee in a desperate bid to finally put an end to years of niggling ITB (Illotibial Band) issues - a long standing running injury dating back to the London Marathon many moons ago. So the doc prescribed 10 days of rest. To stop me climbing the walls, I decided to spend the week "Finking". Yep, that's right & there's no "th" in it!
Finking, is a pretty essential part of my grand plan, I quite enjoyed it and will probably do a bit more of it in the months to come!
In this house, it's what's become known as dipping into the holy book of Ironism, aptly titled, Be Iron Fit, written by training guru Don Fink. I poured over his training advice, scribbled notes, dog-eared pages and quoted snippets out loud to my hubby IronPhil. IronPhil, rolled his eyes on a few occasions and yawned quite a lot. You see, as his name suggests, he's been there, done that and got the tatoo. He worked his butt off to get it & finished with a cracking time, but he ploughed his own furrow, shunning gadgets like Garmins, bike computers and heart rate monitors. He also likes to cringe at some of Fink's inspirational quotes and advice and didn't embrace my frequent shared readings of Fink's path to the Iron dream.
So when I suggested that maybe I should buy a heart rate monitor to accompany my Garmin and bike computer, his eyes rolled again and his advice was to save the cash, spend it on wine and just listen to my body when I'm training!
The trouble is, the Fink-tank has a set of plans based on time spent training and all the sessions are geared around working in specific heart rate zones, I'm not sure if I want to be wired up and crunching numbers. Also, I'm a bit of a mileage junkie, I like to know how many miles I need to complete each day, I'm not sure if working in hours will suit me. In fact, I am the saddo who runs or cycles around the block a couple of times at the end of a session, just to see the Garmin clock the exact mileage.
Anyway, it's the end of my week of Finking, I still have the cardio cash, minus £5.99 on a bottle of Merlot, and the jury's still out. What do you think - heart rate monitor or not?

My name's Maria Dye & I'm a triathlete! There, that's it, I've finally said it.

It's still an admission that feels a bit embarrassing, mainly because I consider myself to be far too much of a novice for such a worthy label.
I'm a mum, I'm a teacher, I'm a runner, I'm 47-years-old ... all those fit the bill nicely, but triathlete is still out there, a title that doesn't sit very comfortably just yet.
However, I have been dabbling for about 2 years now and have the grand total of 8 triathlons under my belt, including the Outlaw Half, a middle distance tri, completed in June 2013, of which I'm quite proud.

However, I have discovered that the three-pronged sport is quite an addictive beast, so much so, that from my humble beginnings in the novice tri category, I've been driven by a curious longing. Each time I've tasted it, I've gone back for more, inevitably looking for a longer, stronger, more powerful hit.
It's been a classic journey - from novice to sprint, sprint to standard, standard to middle and now the big one...Ironman!
I honestly didn't realise that's where I was heading. When I began this journey, those closest to me will testify that although I've been a runner for many years, my cycling and swimming were truly awful - think hopeless, then drop down a few notches!
However, what I lack in skill I've learned to make up for in effort and sheer determination. In two years I have learned to ride a bike and swim front crawl, enough to make me believe that I can take on the ultimate challenge - IMUK 2014. I now believe that you can teach an old dog new tricks!
This blog is not about the science of training, it's not a platform to boast about what I choose to do with my time, it's going to be a down-to earth, realistic account of how a busy, working mum steps well out of her comfort zone and up to the mark, to achieve a huge personal goal.  
I hope you enjoy my journey.