July was a month of recovery, I recovered a bit of form (thanks to a good few weeks swimming), I recovered mentally thanks to the study break at uni.And I recovered a bit of shape thanks to a sugar-free diet that was not quite sugar-free.
I just cut any added sugar, sweet biscuits, scones, cereal bars, sauces, drinks, deserts and any other sugar-ladden food that was not naturally sweet. That meant I kept eating fruits and sweet veggies. And I also treated myself to a sweet treat once a week. The result was nothing extraordinary in weight-loss (I wasn’t looking to lose too much weight, anyway) but it was a good reflection on what habits I needed to shave off to keep to my sugar-free promise. It wasn’t extremely hard, but it was not a walk in the park either. I reckon doing this twice a year is a good way to go about it.
What else happened?
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| keeping to the pack at the Welly XC champs |
We had the final race of the XC season, a 6-lap-12km affair in the northern beaches of Wellington region. Cross Country is good fun, and this race was great fun, firstly because it is hard mentally and secondly because it is good banter with club mates. My performance was nothing to write home about, I got into a group and there was no group ahead to aim for, therefore the interest went from going fast to staying-in. By the end, I had no legs for the sprint, so I trotted to a happy 46min finish 15th or so overall.
In the pool front, we had our second Time Trial, and I was happy to see the time going down closer to 20 than to 25. There still a lot of room for improvement, but the signs are good.
Wellington is much colder than Auckland, and there were a couple of mornings that the cold and the wind made it easier to stay home than to go out training. I don’t regret a good lay-in, especially when the road is wet and windy.
With the XC season all but finished, the focus was to road racing, or doing something else. I went for something else and started a long base-training block, aiming to get miles on the old 890’s and ready myself for the tri season which is just round the corner.
And then there’s August… but that’s another story
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