First Official Training Run...

It's day three of my journey to race, er, finish the Florida 70.3 Ironman, and today's session was my first run. 

I did a couple of runs in the prior weeks and ran on Monday last week. My calf tightened during that run last week, and I wasn't sure if I could run today. I've had this issue in the past, and I wouldn't be able to run it for four to six weeks. 

That said, I decided to go for the run and see what happened. The good news was that I could run, albeit very slowly, trying not to put too much pressure on my left calf. It was more of a straight-leg run, and as I was running, I thought that people without a lower leg could run, so if I kept my leg straight and shuffled, it may hold up, which it did. It was a mental game I played with myself. 

I also self-talked to my brain and said that it needs to fix this and send the required signals down to the calf, as our lives and Mr. Brain's life depend on helping to fix it. If we can't lose weight and get in shape, it may end in an early death, "and that's not good for you, Mr. Brain."

A strange thing happened after yesterday's bike ride: My gut "popped out," like one thing that goes into a Turkey and pops out when it's ready. The difference is that my gut hasn't gone back to normal. 

It may be because my lungs had started to expand more due to the start of my training and to do so, it pushed my fat out of the way and pushed outward. It's not scientific, but my "bro science". The fact is, whatever it is, my gut is protruding like it has never been. 

I made sure I pushed myself out the door before work and before it got too hot outside, or should I say less hot. It was 22 C, not counting the humidity. 

My run was a shuffle and walk and repeat. I brought a rag with me to wipe my eyes of salt, and the good news is I didn't have to use it as much. I guess the salt in my system has started to normalize since I started training, and no longer eating high-salt foods. 

As I was running, I could tell the tightness was in the fleshy part of my calf, and it might be able to be massaged out. When I got home, I did some stretching and had a muscle vibration machine that I used after I found it and blew the dust off it. 

The challenge I have when I get back from all my training sessions this week is I can't stop sweating or breathing very hard. I don't know the exact time, but it takes at least an hour until the sweat and heavy breathing stops. 

I'm eating well, and following the diet program, I've been on for the past three days. Tomorrow will be a big day. I have a scheduled swim and bike ride. I also had a strength training session today but couldn't bring myself to do it. Partly, I was not motivated, and partly, I didn't want to overdo it too early since I just started training on Monday. 

It's funny looking at my training program; it gives me time intervals where I should be training in specific effort and heart rate zones, with rest in between. I'm not even close to following that. I can't. I'm struggling to put in the allocated overall session time and cut it short. 

For example, yesterday's bike ride was supposed to be one hour, but I only made it to 53 minutes. Today was to be a 45-minute run, and I could only do 35 minutes. The swim was to be an hour, and I could only do 34 minutes.

I think that in a month, I will have enough base and a little weight loss that will allow me to try and follow the program intensity levels and intervals as part of the program. 

Run - 38:09 - 4.71 km / 8:05 per km pace.