Body Cues & Mantras

I did the Season Opening Sprint yesterday in Hopkinton. It was a real challenge for me b/c of the cold & wind. Just finishing was my goal given the conditions. Air temp in Hopkinton as I left from home yesterday was about 40. Water: 62. With the wind, even as the morning progressed it didn’t seem to get much warmer. My times aren’t an issue– I am into smile pacing this early in my training. Actually, my run times have gotten slower every measured session from my November Turkey Trot. I take that as a good sign that I am working to encode good body positioning but I do hope that I will be able to get into second gear soon. I won't bore you with all the details, but I was in very cold and usually choppy water for about 10 minutes treading water (over our heads & we were trying to keep warm) until they instructed us out because the rescue boat had capsized. I was barely functioning on the bike and my feet didn’t stop being numb until just over 1/3 of the run and then they hurt for a bit. Anyway, to the point, thank goodness I had other body cues to focus on from Michael & ChiRunning to keep myself moving forward. I kept it in first gear although it felt more like ½ a gear. At the end one of the woman in my rack row was complaining about how her numb toes caused some real strain on my knees. I had no problems other than being cold!