Out of the comfort zone again: training for triathlon

Life begins at the end of your comfort zone...

Yes it is happening again. Trying out new things and stepping outside of my comfort zone... This time the seeds were planted already more than a year ago. After the summer holidays of 2014, I wanted to try a triathlon. I had been both running and swimming the whole summer, and all that remained was just a little practice of biking. Os sprint triathlon in September 2014 seemed to be the perfect choice for a first triathlon. However, as it was very close to Oslo half marathon which I was training hard for, Ketil and I decided that I postpone it. This year, already in March, before my rehabilitation therapy started and running stopped completely, my colleague and good friend Ingunn and I signed up for it. However, as it started to get closer, participation became unclear. After all, I had registered for many races this spring and summer, and in the end I had to cancel them all.

During the summer holidays, when I was swimming almost everyday, and at the same time reading about my friends Janne, Michal, Freddy and Caroline completing Ironman races or other demanding triathlons, I got inspired again for trying a triathlon. Swimming and biking would be fine for my injury, but running was still a big issue. Would Ane let me do it?

When I came back from the holidays I concentrated mainly on uphill training, keeping in mind the coming competitions Skåla Opp, Storehesten Opp, and not the least Stoltzekleiven Opp. My motivation for triathlon started decreasing, especially since all the preparations like buying a wet suit, getting hold of an appropriate bike, and finding time to train for all this, seemed to be impassable obstacles. But I had signed up and I did not want to be a quitter for no reason. If Ane did not allow it, it would be a perfect excuse for letting the whole thing wait until 2016. However, on our first session after the holidays, Ane declared that Os triathlon would simply be the perfect thing for me to try at this point. Well, so there is no escape now, is there?

The first task was to get a wet suit. My friend Janne, who is an experienced triathlete and impressed me immensely by completing an Ironman this summer, had lots of good advice. I read over and over her blog post about open water swimming, and she gave me a lot of private advice in addition. I ended up with a Blueseventy Fusion wet suit in women's size medium. Wet suits for swimming are pretty expensive, but an Internet shop based in Oslo had the 2014 version of this model much cheaper than the normal price. So I ordered online and started waiting, really anxious to see whether it would fit. It arrived on Thursday and I tried it on, and you can see the result on the picture above. A wet suit has to fit very firmly so that the water is locked between the suit and the skin to give warmth, and there should not be any new water flowing through the suit while you are swimming. Janne had told me that it should be very difficult to put on. I found my suit difficult, but not very difficult to put on. Was it too big? On the other hand, it was extremely difficult to take off! So perhaps it was after all the correct size? It felt uncomfortable, but not so uncomfortable that you cannot stand to have it on another minute. This was the description of correct size that I had read on another web page, so I decided that it was most probably the correct size.

By coincidence Ingunn also bought her first wet suit the same day as I received mine, on August 6, exactly one month before Os triathlon on September 6, which we thought was a good sign. And then of course we wanted to test out our suits as soon as possible, and we agreed for a combined biking and swimming practice Friday evening. I was pretty nervous about swimming in a cold lake. Until now I have only swum in pools or in warm seas with white sand bottoms and crystal clear waters where you can see everything. I was afraid that I would panic when I saw all the plants and the rocks at the bottom of a lake. In fact I was so nervous about the whole thing that I did not at all sleep the night between Thursday and Friday... Friday evening, Ingunn and I met in Paradis, close to where we both live, and we biked to the Munkebotn lake.

When we arrived at the lake, I was sweaty due to the uphills at the end, and the suit was even harder to put on then than on a dry body. Laughing a lot at ourselves and our lacking routine, after some stumbling we were ready to hit the water.... My goodness! I had been afraid that I would be panicking about the vegetation??? There was nothing to see! It was completely black. It was like swimming in coffee, or rather Coke (due the bubbles my arms were making), I could see nothing; just absolute, thick, immense black void. Wow, I panicked in a completely different way than I had imagined. The darkness was so massive; I started choking and coughing, and the neck of my suit started feeling very tight. For a moment I was sure I was drowning. It took me a while to regain control, and I had to keep my head above the water all the way to the other side. Fortunately, after a short break on the other side, I quickly got used to the blackness and started enjoying the swim. To my pleasant surprise the suit felt comfortable and warm, very flexible, and even more convenient to swim than without a suit. Eventually I got into good rhythm, and started swimming swiftly, and clearly faster than without a suit! A very unexpected experience.

Both Ingunn and I are extremely relieved to have survived the first swim with our wet suits. It went better and faster then we had expected, and at least we now know how to do this. We do need to practice a few more times, though, in particular putting on and off our suits!

So how will the other disciplines of triathlon go for me? I have not at all been running for the past months, and I have to run 5 km at the end of this race. Will I at all manage? The good thing is that being injured enables me let my shoulders down and have low expectations. In the worst case I can just do a slow jog...  In fact the most challenging part for me is perhaps the biking. Not because I am not in shape for it, but I am a sissy when it comes to speed. In this sense biking is very different from running and swimming. In the latter two, my form and strength limit my speed. But in biking I cannot go as fast as my form and strength would allow; I hit the breaks all the time! This is also why I don't think I can ever become a competitive biker or triathlete, but I can complete a race. In the future, I might have the goal of completing much tougher races, not focusing too much on the biking time. Still I want to do things properly, and as my triathlete friends have kept telling me, my beautiful hybrid bike is not good enough for racing. My good friend Irene, the strongest and fastest pregnant woman ever, is for obvious reasons not going to bike for a while, and she generously lent me her faster bike. It has click-on pedals which I am really afraid to try, and for Friday's practice I used my own bike to be on the safe side.

My homework for today is to do a 3 km run and to test Irene's bike without falling, both by Svartediket.  I might also do an evening go at Stoltzekleiven, since yesterday was a day of complete rest. The first homework is in fact given by Ane! Roles have changed; she is encouraging me to start running while I am reluctant. I am concentrating on my uphill fast walks that are going really well, and running is not yet tempting... On the other hand:

A comfort zone is a beautiful place, but nothing ever grows there.