half ironman training -- week 9 (down week and crazy news)

here is the breakdown from week 9 of my half ironman training. 

down week
things come up in life and throw plans off. that's a given. week 9 was one of those weeks for me. the other service manager that i split shifts/responsibilities with was on vacation so i opened/closed everyday and had a LOT on my plate. i worked close to 70 hours so it didn't leave a lot of time for training or sleep. i fit in what i could, but my training definitely suffered. week 10 will be a repeat of week 9 due to so many missed workouts. 

crazy news
also...sad news/reality hit for me this week. as you probably know by now, my wife and i are in the adoption process and will be travelling to east africa very soon. we'll end up being there roughly 4-5 weeks and i don't think there will be many opportunities for me to train while we're there. we were planning to be gone and back home by summer so the thought of a july race seemed to be perfect. well, that's the "plan according to Tony," but the "plan according to God" looks quite a bit different. now, as i'm about a month out from the half ironman on july 27th it seems to be just about impossible. the only way it'll work now is if we haven't even left for east africa yet and to be honest with you....i can't even think that way at this point. 

i'm looking ahead at some fall races and have something brewing that could end up being better in the end. it would involve some slight travel and would cost a bit more, but i'm taking one step at a time.

Week 9 // June 17 - 23

17 Swim 1500 yards w/ main set 10x75 sprints, RI=20 Run 1 mile easy, 2.5 @ 5k pace, 1 mile recovery, 1 mile easy

18 Bike 55 minutes w/ 4x4 minutes hard efforts scattered

19 Swim 1500 yards w/ main set 3x300 race pace, RI=30 Run 6 miles moderate w/ 4x10 second hill sprints

20 REST (or) Strength Train

21 Bike 40 minutes moderate w/ 20 minutes comfortably hard

22 Swim 2200 yards moderate Run 14 miles moderate

23 BRICK Bike 60 miles moderate Run  10 minutes @ race pace

monday breakdown: 

tuesday breakdown: 

wednesday breakdown: 4.15 mile run in 33:16 after a 13ish hour work day. it was really tough. enough said.

thursday breakdown: 

friday breakdown: 

saturday breakdown: i was determined to get in some weekend training after my crazy week of work, so i went out for about 22 miles on the bike and pushed it hard and finished in barely over an hour. i ran straight off the bike for just about 2 miles. 

sunday breakdown: sunday i did about 8.3 miles around a 8:20/mile pace so i got in a good workout, but obviously not what was scheduled. 

weekly weigh-in:   176.8   on 6/9/13

previous weekly weigh-in:    175.9  

difference:   + .9   

total weight difference:   - 10.4