Open Water Attempt

It's finally like a normal Massachusetts summer and I am back in triathlon training mode. I got down the Cape yesterday and found a new way to enjoy PT exercises. Or should I say for the first time I actually didn't mind doing them. Here we go leg lifts on a beach towel!
The strap around my knee is my new best friend the knee strap that holds my pataella in place. I also have my nice five pound weights around my ankle. You can see them even better in this picture:
Haha, it totally looks like I am leading one of those crazy work out videos or something. Oh well it prepared me well for my triathlon training today.

This morning my mom and I went down to look at some bridesmaid dresses and they even forced me to try on a wedding gown. I really do NOT like wedding gowns. #1- I am not a fan of white, but I really don't like when people don't wear white because then I have no idea who the bride is haha. #2- I also am not a huge fan of long dresses, especially not ridiculously heavy ones. #3- I am going to have to pee during my wedding and I really don't know how that is going to work with these massive dresses on. I did enjoy trying on bridesmaid dresses though. Alfred Angelo has this AWESOME fushia color that I love. Of course the sample dress was eggplant, but I could see the fushia and I swear I am going to be wanting to wear my own bridesmaid dress if I end up ordering them. I'll give someone else the bridal gown, any takers?

Anyway, after the "fun" of dress trying I went to the beach to try my first open water swim. I know it looks beautiful but looks can be deceiving.

Well also, this picture was from a few weeks ago when the water was calm and beautiful. Today it was beautiful, but not calm. My mom even commented on how she hasn't seen it this rough in a long time. GREAT day for my first open water swim. I should start by saying I am a little afraid of the ocean. I love it and I've been scuba diving before, but I do have a small fear of it. Not really of big issues like sharks or rip tides, but more like jelly fish and other smaller issues. I rarely swim at the Cape because normally there is a nice breeze and I'm not that hot. But I forced myself to get in (and Eric was a fantastic sport and came in with me). It was a little chilly but I got used to it. I started swimming and the water was going in my goggles and my mouth and I started to panic and tell Eric FORGET IT I CAN'T DO IT! Fortunately, he is a calm (normal) person and talked me down from my minor panic attack. I kept trying to convince myself that next week was not going to be so rough and he was like "WHAT IF IT'S ROUGHER? NOW SWIM!" So I fixed my goggles, stopped trying to swim INTO the waves (which I do realize may not be an option next week) and things got better. I still doubt I came close to swim 1/3 of a mile but I got over the mental obstacle so that is what is important.

The second thing I did today was go for a walk/run. It was 3.32 miles total, and I ran about 1.7 miles of it. My knee seems to be okay with it AND I am happy that I was able to run 1.7 miles without any running for over a month. I know that doesn't sound like much but I could not even run 1.7 miles in February of this year so I thought I'd be back to my pre-running self with all this running rest. Apparently not though. I could've gone farther also but I did not want to push the knee, so I am happy. Hopefully I'll have some more productive triathlon training (with no over doing it!) this week and be ready for next Sunday. I hope everyone is having great weather and enjoying the weekend!