Progress

I'm continuing to make progress with my health and my back. My stomach and inner ear are handling the new dosage of the immunosuppressives well (they initially made me super queasy and my head all foggy). I'm definitely starting to stabilize- a long-sought answer to prayer!

This past week I completed 4 workouts:

Tuesday- run 0.75 miles, walk 2.1 miles, run 0.25 miles
Thursday- walk 1 mile, run 1 mile
Saturday- 800m swim workout
Sunday- 10 mile bike ride

The back handled it all pretty well. I definitely could tell it was getting used to the activity. I woke up this morning with sharper than my new normal pain, which made leaning over to eat my awesome flax cereal a bit of a challenge, but I spent some time stretching it out and over the course of the day, it feels back to "normal". I don't think it liked the "back-to-back" (is that a pun?) workouts, so that was a good thing to learn. I'll be careful to space out my workouts for awhile...gotta give the body time to adjust.

I am planning on signing up for a super sprint tri the first week of May. The distances are 200yd swim, 8 mile bike, and 2 mile run. Before I do that though, I want to do a short brick (bike, then run) workout to see how the back handles the loading. I'm a few weeks away from attempting that though...

In the meantime, I've signed up to volunteer at two upcoming triathlons. I'm doing body-marking (writing folks' race numbers on their arms and legs) at the Kemah tri in April (I raced this last year) and my training buddy, Lisa, and I signed up to help out at one of the bike aid stations at the Texas Ironman in May.

I am really excited about volunteering at the Texas Ironman. I figure watching an Ironman in person will just make me want to do it more. Oh yeah, I have the heart of an Ironman...not sure about the body, yet, but we'll see what it will let me do. It and God of course. Anything that I can accomplish physically is a direct testament of God's grace in my life, because my doctor says "you really shouldn't be able to do that" (when it comes to running and triathlons). So to Him be the glory. And I will be thankful for whatever progress I make, remembering the past 8 months and how walking without grimacing is a victory in itself.