nothing beats a break-through workout!

nothing quite compares to the feeling you get after a 'break-through' workout. it's soooo motivating to hit that target and go beyond it...
sometimes, it's a target that you never thought you'd be close to, which is extra satisfying.

i have been fortunate enough to have two of these such experiences in the last two weeks...
last week, i had a break through w/o at the track. at first, i was thinking about cutting the w/o short or slacking off the times a bit. i even had a thought of skipping it all together (injury prone as i am). but late afternoon, i pulled it together, HTFU so to speak and did my double.

i competed the 'big, scary workout' and it went better than i could have expected -- kinda' surprised myself a little.
hoping that i can follow that up with another breakthrough tonight at the track. but the tired, sluggish feeling in my legs may mean something a little less glorious.

the second 'break-through' was yesterday in the pool. i have definately been feeling slow and uncoordinated in most of my swims lately so this was a shocker!
in a nut shell, the workout consisted of a bunch of 50's with fast 400's sandwiched between them. this was the first time i had to do 3, 400's fast (i've had to do one before, but it was followed by a 300m and then a 200m). my fastest to date was around 5:45ish...
i was feeling pretty beat up from a tough weekend, and was just hoping to 'get through it', so when my first 400 was in 5:47, i wasn't too bummed but didn't think i could go any faster.
ended up shocking myself when i went 5:40 for the second one, especially since i was feeling more exhausted by the minute.

the breakthrough came with the last one... i was so tired, legs feeling like bricks and arms barely breaking the surface (or at least that's what it felt like!), i did the last one in 5:34!!!

it's hard, if not impossible to have breakthroughs like that very often, so i try to enjoy them when i do... usually celebrating with ice cream and cookies... maybe a glass of wine.

here's hoping to many more breakthrough workouts...