Kona day 4 (and a half)

its 2:30 am and i'm pretty much wide awake. thought that the jet lag situation was improving when i slept through till nearly 5am yesterday...but the thoughts rattling around on a loop in my head, combined with a sunburnt back, wont let me sleep tonight. so, i might as well fill in some time with my 3rd day in Kona post.

so, my last substantial training day before the race: first, a swim out to the (very) far buoy and back. relaxed out, pushing it on the way back. the return felt easier than the swim out, and i enjoyed the swim more than i'd anticipated. treated myself to breakfast in Tante's diner with the rest of the guys, before heading out for a 3hr session on the queen K. Rachel also had an interval session to do, so we set off and rode our warm -up together, having a nice chat on the road. at 20 min i ramped it up for my first effort - giving rachel an extra 10 to warm up. i knew she'd be steaming by me shortly! she did - at the exact moment that my rear wheel punctured and the heavens opened with a 10 min down-pour. just the same amount of time it took me changing the tube! so i got a little unplanned break in that work interval, but some good roadside repair practice. weird thing - it was such a local rain fall that i literally rode out of the cloud - onto a completely bone dry road. And at the end of my session back into it - Kailua Kona was in rian most of eh day. finished the session with a nasty fall from my bike. stupid really and only because i like to ride right into the hotel lobby..which is tiled...and wet. so i had a good audience as my bike disappeared from under me, planting me square onto my back. Luckily strawberry flavoured Powerbar gel broke my fall, though i still sustained a nice bash to my shin and completely winded myself!

A few moments to compose myself in my room before heading out for a 'race pace' transition run on the queen K. well, i HOPE i can race at that pace - i was feeling good today. Seems that the effects of the long flight are out of my system and i'm feeling the benefit of the rest that the journey enforced - i was even able to aise my HR on the bike, something that's been eluding me the last couple of weeks in training at home. So,I just need to get caught up on sleep from now on, and keep ticking over with shorter sessions each day..