Do 'it' well

So I was out grinding hill repeats today and stopped at 9 reps. Why 9? Why not just do the 10 and be done with it?? I have yet to do 10 this year, my max so far has always been 9. The fact is I'm saving 10, maybe for next week. Actually, I just may blow past it and crank out 11, any dial that goes to 11 is obviously much better than one that goes 10.

It's unfinished business, as long as I don't max out the hill repeats, I'll have to make room for yet another hill session and maybe, just maybe next time I'll hit the double digits. I have a feeling that once I do that my hill training for this season will be 'done', however, as long as I have unfinished business, I'll just keep plugging away.

Did a 22k run on Sunday. As a side note, I'm really enjoying 'the-I-don't-HAVE-to-run-for-2.5hrs-because-I-have-an-Ironman-coming-up-mode' I'm currently in. Not having an Ironman scheduled this year is nice, not feeling compelled to log crazy mileage in Zone 1 is refreshing. I also find intensity training more rewarding. If I choose, I can totally shell myself on the trainer in less than an hour - at times it just seems more productive.

Anyway, during my run, as always I'm trying to run 'well'. Not fast, that wasn't the goal for the workout, just run well, keep HR down and concentrate on form. Soft landing of the feet (can hardly hear them!), high cadence (90 strides/min), relaxed upper body (shoulders, neck, face - yes face, no sense wasting energy grimacing), deep regular breathing... and I noticed that running well is finally becoming a habit. (ha, it only took 4 years to finally get 'it') Now I just have well and fast. (sigh... another 4 years?) The lesson is: whatever you do, do it well. This whole running thing is rather humbling.

Last week's training:
The good news: hammy is 100%.
The bad news: been fighting some sort of bug that seems to want to reside in GI tract. Enough said. (it's not serious)
Despite that challenges did OK training wise:
Swim:6.3k
Bike: 100k
Spin: 3 hrs
Run: 54.5k
The only real highlight was a bike threshold session: 10min @305W, 8 min @310W, 6min @315W, 4min @320W and 2 min @325W. That's 30 minutes of threshold work in a 1 hour trainer session...
talk about bang for the buck!

Cheers!