What lies within?

With 6 days to go I am in the wrong frame of mind. It is due to a combination of poor prep (no shock there), Morphsuit difficulties, poor organisation, a blurred right eye, not enough hours in the day, not enough sleep and those are just the training related issues. There are added stresses such as work, life, work & life!

Since my last post I picked up nicely last week with a half marathon PB and some comfortable pool swims. A gentle tootle on the MTB and I was fast approaching mental readiness. Jollied on by posts and encouragement from other Outlaws and Outlaws to be, the sense of community building nicely and the general huge level of support I get anyway, I was nearly there….over the weekend though I slipped back into doubt and shit! This was despite witnessing 3000 women do the race for life including Mrs B who rocked the 10k distance! This was followed by watching the Paralympic international meet in Birmingham including Gold medallists such as Jonnie Peacock (he can shift), Hannah Cockroft (she can really shift) and Richard Whitehead (he didn’t really shift much as DQ’d with a false start). Watching these international athletes and earlier the non athletes just wanting to make a difference at Race For Life should have set me straight! It didn’t!

Silly little things pissed me off such as the bill for servicing my bike pre Outlaw (including a new rear wheel, bike pump) £138!! What pisses me off most is that I should learn how to do it myself! Not getting out and running Saturday morning! Leaving my helmet at work over the weekend and using that as the excuse to not get out on the bike Sunday morning!! Not being organised yesterday leading to a rushed OW swim. Rushed and poor. I had tested the adapted Morphsuit on Thursday night and it needed further adjustment as the wetsuit over the Morphsuit pulls the Morphsuit down so the mouth hole became a chin hole meaning I couldn’t breathe. So I adapted it and went yesterday pretty much expecting to be able to breathe normally and fly round. Sadly there was no flying in sight. My wetsuit didn’t feel ‘right’, my nuts were uncomfortable, my goggles felt like they were leaking and despite having a big enough mouth hole, even to accommodate my gob, I found breathing difficult. I adapted it again so the mouth hole became a mouth and nose hole which seemed a bit better. Unfortunately it seems that the water the hood of the Morphsuit holds onto is then leaked out as I turn my head to breathe. It’s a bit like breathing through running water from a tap! Then my eye started to blur. I cut the 400m lap to about 300 and probably did about 750m all told. None of it good or fluent. I didn’t seem to be able to sustain front crawl for long. Worrying with 6 days to go!

I am going to sneak 750m in on Thu night with Morphswimsuit MK I and Morphswimsuit MK II (to be adapted slightly differently tonight) and then choose which I am going with for Sunday. This will also provide final T1 practise. Essential because it’s hard enough to get out of a Morphsuit on your own anyway (although I am now quite good at it) but it’s twice as hard when it’s wet! Unfortunately these issues will clutter my mind until Thursday but I can’t get to OW before then!

I did think of not Morphing the swim but then that’s just not cricket is it. It’s the challenge that creates the interest, interest creates awareness, awareness promotes sponsorship and sponsorship helps save kids lives at BCH! Not Morphing the swim is therefore not an option.

So, I wasn’t too happy and when I got out my right eye was blurred – significantly. I washed it, tried some eye drops, washed it some more and after about 4 hours the vision improved. This is either a hay fever reaction coincidental to the swim or it’s the goggle spray I use getting in my eye, or something in the water? Its about 95% improved now so I might just hope it’s gone away!

I started a 7 days countdown yesterday requesting people share my FB status and sponsor me. By this morning I had about 4 shares and to the best of my knowledge no sponsorship (lesson for learning – always check your Justgiving page before moaning and also keep in mind people have lives that are not dictated by my Outlaw efforts!). I did my 6 day countdown this morning and loads of people have shared already. I also arrived at work to a load of Justgiving notifications and nearly £150 has gone on in about 36 hrs (red faced smiley required!).

So to turn this around my plan is to tweak the suit as above, stop being a self centred miserable arse, and gain strength from those closest to me and the wider Poppyfields community. I am going to draw strength from Mrs B and the Rugs. Mrs B’s determination (lich half mara against doc’s orders), Elle-Belle’s strength of character in face of adversity and G Man’s unweilding enthusiasm. I will absorb the encouragement from all of you willing me on (you know I can’t list you because once I start there are just too many and I risk missing someone) and drag out, from somewhere, the strength, determination, the will, the Ironmorph within and the finish on Sunday!