Back in Training

Went for my usual Friday 30 minute easy run today and I was 6sec/km slower than usual and my heart rate was 4 beats a minute higher. That is what Bronchitis and two and a half weeks of no training did to my running. With my Friday easy run my heart rate target is 137 Max, so it's a real easy run.

I was actually surprised when I downloaded my exercise file as it felt much worse while I was running, especially when I was doing hills. Yes and Witbank, my hometown only consist of hills, so you either go up or down when you train. Most of the hills I had to walk to keep my heart rate below 137.

After the run I was coughing a bit, but I think that was just my Lungs thanking my body for the run. The coughing didn't last that long and I feel so Good to finally start training again. Will see what happen on Sunday when I am suppose to do my Long run but I will not try and push the body and will probably end up with an intermediate run.

This morning I took Kim and Dejone to the US embassy to get their Visas for our trip to Kona. Luckily everything went well and now we just need to get the UK visa as we will be spending a day or two in London on our way to Kona. That's one of the pleasures of being a South African citizen, for almost all the countries in the world you need a visa.

One can see that the current down turn in the economy is affecting a lot of people. Just by comparing my visa experience beginning of 2008 with the one this week. When I applied for my Visa I could only get an appointment two weeks after my phone call. When I phoned Wednesday to make an appointment for Kim and Dejone they said that they can help us today, only two days later. When we arrived today there was virtually no waiting time and not even a long queue, I think I counted 16 people in the waiting area for the time we spend there
Our appointment was 8:30 am and we were out of there by 9;15am. When I went I also had to be there at 8:30am but only left after 11 and most of it was waiting in a very long queue. Anyway glad it's over.

On our way back home I stopped to pick up my new bike at Cycle Tech. The bike looks real smooth and I can't wait to take it for a ride tomorrow. The only problem is I asked them to fit a Zipp Chrono crank but the crank will only be arriving from Zipp on Wednesday. Marco was nice enough to fit the bike with a Zipp Quad crank for me to use until the right crank arrives.

Tomorrow will also be my first swim in almost three weeks, going to be very interesting!

Today's training:
Run: 30 ;32, 5.6 km, 133 bpm, 5:27 min/km, 85 cadence, 425 kcal.