I'm probably going to make it

This week is the first week where I've lasted this long with a formal tri training plan; previous attempts have been derailed by schedules, or cramps, or some such thing. But I got up early enough to swim for an hour before work earlier this week; it was "STT2", 200 meters in Z1 (9:26), 400 in Z3 (15:07), 2 minutes rest, 200 in Z3 (7:21), 2 minutes rest, and 200 in Z1 (12:29). A lot of it was against the current, but the times are still slow. That's okay. I'm improving. I went for a run this evening. 45 minutes, and my watch had 18% battery when I began, and 3% at the end. Good to know.

I made a large batch of sweet tea in my new (to me) 2-gallon glass jar six days ago and added a bottle of kombucha to it. In time, it should become a good continuous-brew arrangement.

I got some "suicide brake" levers for the rammer (the raleigh 20 I'm rebuilding and upgrading). They'll go nicely with the stock brakes, I think. The trick is where to mount the trigger shifter for the 8-speed hub. I need to order a few more parts for it, but it promises to be a fun project. Almost totally insane.

A long, long time off

I'm on my third consecutive day off. It's amazing. Less amazing is that the tri plan that I had chosen did not work out, between my schedule and getting a massive cramp on the first swim that I felt for nearly a week afterwards. I have still managed to get a fair bit done; for example, this was a solid strength training week. I've racked both my mead and my maple mead to secondary jugs over the last few days, and mixed my elderflower vodka half and half with simply syrup to make a decent liqueur. I intend to start in on an olympic-length tri training program tomorrow; the shorter distances should help me avoid injuries effectively. I also got word that my raleigh twenty frame is ready for pickup; I'll be buying a hub and rims for it soon. I hope to get a stem, handlebars, and a few other parts for it at the Somerville bike kitchen.

I made a concentrated soapberry liquid by boiling down several changes of hot water that had had the same batch of soapberries steeped in them. I'm hoping it will prove to be shelf-stable; if so, I'll experiment with using the instant pot to make a larger batch of liquid.

It's the 4th of July. I intend to grill some burgers and brats, cook some corn on the cob in foil, and generally drink beer and invite people to join me.

The crampening

Not Quite

I definitely got up early and went for a swim; it jus wasn't two swims combined. Instead, I swam 200 meters in Z1 (7:38), 400Z3 (11:35), rested 2 minutes, 200Z3 (6:14), rested 2 minutes, and swam a final 400 meters in Z1 (8:59 and 9:54). I saw the time and decided to get out; my left leg developed a massive cramp about 25 meters from shore. I was wearing my thick wetsuit (it wasn't at all hot this morning), and it took me a minute to get walking. On the way home, I stripped several branches bare of ripe mulberries and ate them by the handful; it was extremely satisfying. After work, I went for an extremely easy 40-miute run around Boston and went to volunteer at the Somerville Bike kitchen. Overall, it was a worthwhile day.

Maybe

Maybe tomorrow I'll wake up early enough to do a week's worth of swimming before leaving for work. STT2 and SF3 would have to happen; 200m of Z1, 400Z3 with a 2 minute rest, 200Z3 with a 2 minute rest, 200Z1 (That's all of STT2), then 300Z1,1150Z2, and 300Z1.

So, depending on the tides: swim to a buoy in zone 1, double lap and then a single lap in Z3 with 2 minutes of rest after each, 3 laps in Z1, 6 full laps in zone 2, and a lap and back to shore in Z1. 13 full laps. That's 2.8 km (a little over 1.7 miles), and it could take over an hour (and that's if I got my zones right; I may not have).

Anyway, I could go for my run after work and before volunteering at the Somerville Bike Kitchen. The track at work is pretty good. The only saving grace, if there is one, is that tomorrow isn't a strength training day.

An early start

I woke up very early today. Early enough to get an hour of stationary biking in before work. The training plan said I was supposed to swim today, too, but the weather didn't cooperate. Oh, well; apparently, it's fine to combine the swimming workouts for a given week into one workout. Anyway, tomorrow is a more complex bike workout; 5mZ1, 20mZ2, 3x5mZ3/3mZ1, 5mZ2, 6mZ1.

I mixed and bottled some of my limoncello today. I also bought an asus wifi router and flashed it with dd-wrt. I bought a 2-year NordVPN subscription; hopefully, tomorrow, I can set the whole thing up.If all goes well, I'll have my own private file server soon.

1st day of formal training

And I'd say it went reasonably well. I had to run by pace instead of heart rate to get the zones right for the last part of my running, because going from zone 4 to zone 1 didn't give my heart time to slow down before I needed to go back to zone 4 again. But other than that, both cycling and running went rather well. Despite the 80/20 setting on my watch not working (my fault, I'm quite sure), I managed to stay in my zones nearly the entire time. Tomorrow, is STT2 (200 Z1, 400 Z3, 2 minute rest, 200 Z3, 2 minute rest, 200 Z1)  and CF9 (5 minute Z1, 50 minute Z2, 5 minute Z1).

I got my commuting raleigh 20 more or less set up; pump bracket and pump, spare tire, etc. Hopefully I can manage to leave the PJ express set up in the trainer so I'm not hauling it up and down a ladder and swapping wheels every time I want to work out.

Other than that, I determined that the best sweetener for my orange/elderflower liqueur is 1/2 simple syrup and 1/2 honey syrup, mixed to make the same volume as the flavored vodka. I don't have enough honey syrup to finish (I need another 300mL), nor enough honey to make more. When I get more honey and finish mixing, I intend to gravity (or possibly force) filter it, to get a good, clear liqueur. I gravity filtered the lemon vodka today, so I can mix it with simple syrup and bottle the limoncello whenever I wish.

Not much else got done today. This is the first time in a long time that I've had two days off in a row, excepting my vacation a while ago. I did have good luck with my granola experiment (1 cup of granola and 1/4 cup of milk powder in a jar, add water to top of granola and shake to mix). It's the sort of thing that could make good no-cook food for camping or bikepacking. Anyway, I made up three jars of it to take to work for impromptu meals. I'm thinking of buying a few MRES or backpacking meals for keeping at work, maybe even for the benefit of others. I'm also interested in the Humanitarian Daily Rations I've heard about, not least for use in ant food pods.