When in Rome, do what the Roman's do

In sum and substance, this is the e-mail response I received from my coach after his viewing of my running log upon my return trip to Italy.
“Mark, great job on completing your runs while you were away. I see that you enjoyed your eating….Now it’s time to get down to serious work”. Jesse K
I laughed when I read that, and then took a big “gulp”. I actually thought I was working pretty hard prior and during my vacation. Oh no!!!!!
In fact, I got out of bed almost every day after eating and drinking in Italy to me was a mini-version of a finish line!! Truth be told, I did gain 4lbs in ten days after running in excess of 54 miles and walking God knows how many miles after every day!
As to ”when in Rome and do what the Romans do”, actually, I did what they don’t. For some reason people in Rome, Florence and Venice regardless of the time of day are not into running in their very beautiful cities. I can understand why many would be deterred from running in the city. During my ten days in Italy, every time I ventured out to run, the locals stared at me as if I was from another planet! One of my runs was at 6 pm and the sun sunk very rapidly. I found myself running against massive waves of scooters and oncoming buses. I never felt comfortable with the cobble stone footing or assault of cars, scooters and masses of people. You certainly have to be either nut’s or fearless. In my case some would say both!
During the vacation, I did my best to complete the prescribed workouts as early as possible as to not impact our vacation as much as possible. I wanted to make sure Mary did not feel that my Ironman year had made even vacations seem tedious. Whenever possible I try to minimize the impact that 3 or 5-hour workouts can make.
Having completed the week’s workouts early in the morning, the rest of the day was spent walking many hours, as one would expect a typical vacation to encompass. I was really happy about that because it was another test in endurance and another way to recover after hitting it hard in the un-even streets of Italy and then climbing stairs in the Medici Palace, jumping steps in Florence and jumping boats in Venice as a true vacationer.
I’m getting better at fitting this all in and I’m so pleased about not missing any volume in training, and having the time of my life with my best friend Mary. In closing, Jesse my coach said, “I’m so glad a trip like this came so early in the training protocol and not later near Lake Placid. With that, I totally agree! However I will have Italy engrained in my memory for all my days.