Plan D

After work yesterday I went to the pool for some aqua jogging (or aqua running as Bri prefers to call it).  I will say that it was a bizarre trying to visualize my next race while running in the water.  I will also say that I did not enjoy the stares of others watching me jog up and down the lane in my ‘pool shark’ swimsuit.  Talk about drawing attention to yourself.  It was also my first time in the ‘free swim’ environment of the merged lanes 5 and 6.  Boy, it’s a jungle in there.  I had to dodge the likes of little Jessie and his 3 friends – none of whom have learned many of the social skills you might hope for from a 7 year old.  I was nearly jumped on several times and in their enthusiasm Jessie and the gang kept dog-paddling RIGHT in front of me so that I would have to stop or go around them.  That just shows you how nonthreatening I am with a big, padded blue belt on.  Also there was a big-splasher in the lane so several times I had my contact lenses unexpectedly rinsed with chlorine.  Should there be a next time, I may try for a less popular pool hour.

I was surprised how difficult pool running is (aside from the 7 year-old obstacles) and pleasantly surprised to have some muscular pain in my legs this morning.  Bring it.  Blue belt and all!

In a few weeks I am flying to my first A race of the season.  I am optimistic that my IT band will cooperate by then and am looking forward to trying a little more running tomorrow to see how that goes.  I will never understand what possessed me, but on Thursday I called the airline to confirm the cost of flying my bike.  I don’t want to be hit with any surprise fees when I get to the airport.  Well, wouldn’t you know it, I have managed to book myself on one of the few commercial planes in the country that doesn’t allow bikes.  WTF??  So I went about the business of pricing shipping.  Because I’m flying out of the country (all the way to distant Canada!), the shipping will be in the $300 – $400 each way.  Unless I want to send it yesterday, in which case it MIGHT be there by June and will cost significantly less.  My bike is barely worth $800 so I’m not paying that much money to ship it somewhere.  No way.

Then I moved on to plan C – rent a bike for the race.  Turns out such a thing is possible and there is a high-end bike in my size.  I got excited about this option and decided to go for it.  I figured I could go for a fitting prior to the race since I’ll be there several days beforehand.  Great!  Then when I went to book it “oops, it’s already rented on those dates”.  I begged and pleaded for another option.  Nothing was presented to me.

So now I’m on to plan D – ask fellow bloggers if they have any ideas.

I am SO glad I called ahead.  I would have been very annoyed to have packed up my bike for nothing and I think I would have freaked at the airport.  There might even have been public tears.