rockin' the triathlon training

I've gotta say...I'm loving triathlon (-style) training. This week had rocked so far. On Monday I started the day with P90X Chest and Back lifting workout in the morning, followed by Ab Ripper X (and it does truly rip up your abs - often even causing strange digestive phenomena). I then went about my normal day. I cut out of work at 4 and went to a spinning class for an hour before returning refreshed to work for another few hours in the evening. On Tuesday I had my first run without significant pain since the half marathon in the beginning of december. I kept my pace pretty slow and switched over to run/walk combo after mile 3 when my post.tib. started barking a little. I had only planned to do 2 miles so I nixed my tentatively planned Plyo workout and just enjoyed my nice day at work. I almost went to the pool when I finished up with my last patient at 6pm but got sidetracked and didn't leave the department until after 7 and then it was a little late for me. In addition, my upper back, shoulders, and chest were pretty rocked from the combo of heavy lifting and spinning the day before. Yesterday I woke up still significantly sore through the shoulders but diligently dragged myself to the gym at 6am to do P90X Shoulders and Arms workout. I only made it through half of Ab Ripper before calling it quits, vowing to do more core later. Made it back to the gym to spin (solo) around 5pm. Kept the cadence high and resistance low. It was just what my legs needed after that first run back. Today I knew what I had to do. I had to put Dissertation before Training. I have a tendency to do whatever I do between 7am and 12pm really well. And take great pleasure in it. But then the pleasant sense of accomplishment tends to facilitate this weird and frustrating stagnation in the afternoon. Today it was more important that I actually make some headway with my dissertation analyses than getting in a double workout (despite have a run and a swim on the calendar). Miraculously and finally (and I do mean finally - like 6 months finally) I got down to business. After 3 hours of up and downs, fits and starts, frustration and elation I actually got through the step of my data analysis that I have been stuck on (read: avoiding and paralyzed by) since August. And it was only noon. You know what that means? I drove to the commuter lot, parked, and ran over to the Natatorium pool just in time for lap swim. Every lane had someone in it, most were already doubled up. A young man (cute, with a slightly stocky swimmers build) offered to share his lane. As I did my first few hundred meters of warm up, he repeated flew by me. So much for a pleasant and non-competitive swim :-)  I told myself that dealing with his wake would be good practice for open water swim (not the same, i know). Then I realized what was going on. He was doing very short drills. 50m, rest, repeat. Also, he was doing flip-turns. I was not. So I let it go. After about ten minutes we fell into a pattern. I was swimming continuously and he was doing 50m's on the :00's. It actually ended up being great for the next 20 minutes and I swam :57 50's through 1600m. He left the pool around my 1500 mark. Too bad though, as the pool emptied out and after I took a 1 minute breather after 1600m my pace fell markedly. I mean seriously, I don't know what happened. how does :57 turn into 1:03-1:05. I decided not to worry and just plugged along until 2400m. By this point the pool was empty and I was able to even practice my flipturns a bit before toweling off and running back to my car. I probably only ran 1.5miles. Can't decided whether I should make it a true double and get back out there after my afternoon meetings. I guess I'll decided after some lunch. I need some serious fuel right now.