Random Thoughts

recap, the bullet version

2012-01-25T22:40:00.000-08:00

I was going to do a recap of my rest week, but as usual, time has run away with me and it may be a bit late.

Just a couple highlights then:

I did get out to run some trails with JoLynn (and the adorable Boomer). I always enjoy my time with her and don't get enough of it. That's one problem with being so scheduled. Not a lot of spontaneity. But she's the first one I ping when I have a workout that lends itself to company.
Bike test...winning! Not to brag....ok, to brag a little....I had a really good bike test. Never as good as I'd like it to be, but pretty darn good. I bumped up 10 watts, and that might not make sense to either of you, dear readers, but let me tell you....any time you get an email from your coach that involves capital letters, it's either really good or really bad. Yes, this was a good one. (And yes, I have, on a rare occasion, been on the receiving end of one of the other kind. That one is now posted on my 'motivational' board.)
Had a good visit with my PT. I can actually extend my left arm over my head now. Which let me tell you, is pretty important for swimming. And even if it did feel like an elephant stepped on my ribs the day after, it was worth it.

In other goings-on, my first race is in a bit over 2 weeks! Woot! And whoa. That sure snuck up on me. I'm looking for some good things on the running legs, and the bike leg....well, here's the profile.

Yeah, that's going to be a challenge. But then again, that's what this year is all about, challenges. The bike course is on a route known around here as the 3 bears. I think those are Mama and Papa. I'm not sure if we also cover Baby, but it's a lot of bears. My legs should be good and smoked by the end of the duathlon. And that, folks, is what it's all about.

ode to rest week

2012-01-17T22:10:00.000-08:00

Oh rest week, how do I (mostly) love thee? Let me count the ways......

Dear rest week, you allow me to meet up with awesome people like JoLynn (as long as the rain holds off tomorrow) for fun stuff like trail running. And she brings The Amazing Boomer for an extra dose of awesome.
Lovely rest week, you give me "naked" workouts so I can practice not obsessing over my pace/distance/HR numbers.
Beautiful rest week, you offer some challenges like bike tests, which I'm looking forward to since my bike legs feel like they've been coming around.
Awesome rest week, you give me reason to tell my trainer, "Soooo sorry, gotta' take it easy, it's rest week." Altho I do not recommend wearing any "Iron" workout gear during this negotiation. That will invariably elicit comments to the effect of "Are you an Ironman or a mouse?!?!" *ahem* Or so I've heard.
Amazing rest week, you free up HOURS and HOURS of my day. Wait a minute. Where are my hours and hours of free time? I guess nature really does abhor a vacuum, as whatever 'free' time I have is automagically filled in with activities.
Dearest rest week, all because of you I'm able to stay awake long enough to watch an *entire* movie. (As long as it's not one of the scary ones the husband prefers.....)
And mostly rest week.....you prepare me to tackle the next weeks of challenges that the ELF has prescribed for me. You make me say.... BRING.IT. (But not loudly enough for the ELF to hear, lest she actually BRINGS.IT.)

thursday thoughts

2012-01-12T07:21:00.000-08:00

A quick jumble of things going on (either in my head or in real life):

Bam and I are having a battle. I think she's winning. She goes out and digs up the dirt onto the pavers, I go out and sweep it back into the dirt area. She goes out the next time and I imagine her thinking, "What the hell?!?! I know I dug that up already!" And digs it up again. Rinse, repeat. Yeah, she's definitely winning.
Training is going...pun intended...swimmingly. I have moments of feeling all glidey-glidey in the pool. And I feel like I may actually have some biking legs this year. Best of all I think my Fizik saddle has finally given in and conformed to my, ahem, parts. Ahhhhhh.
I occasionally have moments where I slap my head and say "WHAT was I thinking signing up for an ironman." Yes, already.
I was told the other day that I may want to consider the idea that while I have A LOT of heart, I will probably never be fast. To that I say, "Thank you. And fast is relative." I just want to be fast compared to the previous versions of me. I'm not so deluded that I think I'll ever be "fast".
I added an early season duathlon to my schedule. To any of you locals who are familiar with the 3 Bears bike ride, that will be the bike section. Yes, I may have lost my mind completely.
Work is stressing me out. I've said it before and I'll say it again....for a tiny (30-ish people) company, there is more disfunction than I thought possible. But as my friend says, "We put the 'fun' in disfunction." Yeah, *something* like that.
I had lunch with my former coworker, and friend, that was diagnosed with lymphoma last year. He is doing FANTASTIC. In remission and planning his comeback to triathlon this summer at the South Maui Olympic. He's doing it with Team in Training and is their Honoree. So, so happy for him.
My appetite has increased a lot lately. So I'm eating more. Which is evidently okay, as coach tells me I should *not* be sitting at race weight right now. Of course in my usual OCD manner, I am taking that very seriously and eating. And eating. And eating. So it will not be long before I am very far from race weight.
And lastly, I *may* have indulged once too often in a peppermint mocha this holiday season. I got this in the mail:

Yes, I am a gold card holder for Starbucks.

Oy.

what a concept

2012-01-09T21:11:00.000-08:00

I'm not getting any younger. I know, I know, this may be a surprise to some of you out there. (If you could see my roots in the week before I'm due for hair color however, you would definitely believe me.)

In the past, I've worked on my body parts on more of a crisis management mode. Have the PT fix/work on something. Get assigned some homework. Don't do it. Then have him fix it again. Or fix the next issue. Rinse, repeat. And while I keep saying I need to do something to fix that, so far it hasn't stuck. Oh, I have all the tools of the trade to help keep my body from breaking. Foam roller, 2 varieties in fact; the stick; tennis balls and golf balls (for the feet), blah, blah, etc, etc. The problem hasn't been in the acquisition of the tools, but in their application.

With my next IM attempt on the schedule this year, and the whole aging thing, I've decided that I need to take this a bit more seriously. And how about not only using the tools that I have, but maybe throwing some yoga on top of there too? Okay, that may be getting carried away.

But I'm going to give it a shot. Do the work the PT sets up for me. Stretch. Recover, recover, recover. And who knows, maybe this year my entire FSA budget won't go to paying for my PT appointments. *snort*....not likely, but stranger things have happened.

inside voice

2012-01-05T21:32:00.000-08:00

I'm sure any of you who have been around kids at all have heard the 'inside voice' phrase. I'm talking about the *other* inside voice. Or voices. The ones inside that talk to you. And yes, sometimes tell lies.

Since I started back with tri training, I've been doing all my training sans music. Instead I'm trying to listen to my inside voice. I had a "no brainer" kind of thought as the year was starting. You know those workouts that are supposed to be at 'easy' pace, just cruising? Yeah, I never really thought about it before, but those workouts are *ideal* for working on form. Not just swimming/biking/running easy and mindless and chilling out to music. Those workouts are the best time to really think about how the workout feels, how the body is doing, work on form.

So I'm trying to stay in the moment. Checking in on myself. Dialing in nutrition on a schedule. Working on recognizing the negative voices for what they are....simply thoughts. They too shall pass.

Of course, I reserve the right to plug my headphones back in when the swim/bike/run gets up to epic IM proportions.

new year

2012-01-02T13:55:00.000-08:00

New year.....new opportunities.

2012 is going to be a good year. Yep, I've just declared it so.

Before the calendar year was over I put together, at least in my head, some resolutions for my "tri-life". I won't bore you with the details here, but the summary is......do the work without over analyzing every little thing. That's the ELF's job. My job is to give it my best effort and let the results fall where they may.

I have some ideas for what I'd like to do with the other parts of my life for 2012, we'll see how much comes to fruition. Some changes I've been contemplating may happen eventually, but a wrench was tossed my way today, so we'll see.

One thing I know for sure....no one can make the changes for me. That's up to me. For this change averse girl, that can be tough. It may be finally sinking in though that life is just too short to be worried about all the 'what-if's'. Sometimes you have to jump and trust that wherever you land will be okay. It may not be the spot you thought you'd land, but if you don't even jump you'll never know.

So welcome 2012. I'm looking forward to getting to know you better. We've got some great adventures ahead of us.

last tri of the year

2011-09-11T20:38:00.000-07:00

Over Labor Day weekend, I traveled to Illinois, where my family is, to do my last tri of the year, the Great Illini Half Iron distance race.

Actually, I flew to St. Louis on Thursday. It was the closest airport to the race that I could fly into on a direct flight. With my previous bad experience traveling with my bike, I wanted as little plane time for it as possible. I had borrowed a hard sided case this time, from my local bike shop, and they packed up the bike and gave me instructions on how to get it back together and how to pack it back up. The packing up instructions mostly consisted of "When you open it, before you move anything, take lots of pictures. Put it back EXACTLY the way you find it."

Travel in and of itself was uneventful. For once my flight was right on time, even a smidge early. My luggage and bike arrived perfectly safe. Whew. I picked up my rental car and started the 2 hour drive to Mattoon. It was late evening by the time I arrived and I debated putting my bike together or if I should wait until the morning, but wanted to get it done so I could do my pre-race brick Friday morning. I got mostly everything together easily enough. The rear derailleur was tricky, mostly because I'd never disconnected/reconnected the one this bike. And then I went to put the handlebars back on. Which went just fine, except for the missing piece. The top cap was nowhere to be found. Fabulous. No top cap, no steering. I did some quick internet searches for local bike shops and found a couple that would open in the morning.

So I did my best to put it out of my mind and get a good night's sleep.

By the time my grandparents and my mom arrived at the hotel, I had spoken with the bike shop and was very relieved that they said they'd have no problem getting me fixed up. We grabbed some lunch, and by then the mechanic was at the shop and in no time had me race ready. They put a new top cap on and even adjusted my derailleur to make sure everything was working properly. Not only did they save my day, but they were super nice too. Took the bike back to the hotel and then we did a tour of the course and picked up my packet. Which was really just a t-shirt and some gels. Timing chips would wait until race morning. Ah well, at least I got a look at the course.

The forecast for race day had gotten a little better, with the temps only expected to be 95 instead of 99. Oh, such relief!

Early to bed, but there was little sleep to be had. Tossed and turned, and kept waking up to look at the clock. 3 more hours. Only 2 more hours. 1 more hour, oh hell, just get up already. So I was up plenty early for my pre-race breakfast. We packed everything into the cars and drove 15-20 min over to the race site in the dark. Only one missed turn on the way, but we made it with plenty of darkness still covering transition. There were no flood lights, but they did pull a couple of cars over to shine their headlights on the transition area. And attract every mosquito within 20 miles. There were swarms of 'em! And evidently they really like California blood.

Before I knew it they were having the pre-race instructions and I grabbed a quick warm up before the 'gun' went off. Or at least before the guy yelled "go!" The swim seemed to go fairly well. I didn't feel like I was pushing super hard, just getting warmed up and settling into a nice steady pace. The race was tiny enough that after the super crowding around the first buoy, where I got scratched, kicked, and elbowed at least once, it spread out nicely. The two loops went by and then I was running up the beach towards transition. Saw my family, including my brother, sister-in-law, and 2 nieces that had arrived while I was swimming. So fun to have family at the race! My time was just about the same as my last HIM swim. But this one was without wetsuits, so although it was slower than I'd have liked, I'll take it.

T1 was super fast! Yeah, I won my T1 AG...again. ;)

Before I even started racing I had decided that I was going to go hard on the bike. Like maybe harder than strictly prudent for a half iron distance race. I was tired of having mediocre bike splits (even if some of them this year were due to mechanical issues or flats). I just wanted to turn off my brain and RIDE already. I knew the heat would most likely blow my run up anyway, so I pedaled. And pedaled a little harder than I thought might be a good idea. With lap one coming in just under 1:30, I visions of blowing my projected 3:15 bike split out of the water. The second lap, however, was a little tougher with the wind picking up, and hey, who turned on the heat anyway? I did a much better job than usual of sticking with my hydration plan, but fell a little behind on my nutrition when my stomach started to feel a little sloshy. If I had been paying just a little more attention, I would have pushed the finishing stretch a bit more. I just missed a sub 3-hour bike split. But I *did* smoke my projected bike time, with a 18.5 mph bike split. So, so happy with that. So, so happy I had a good bike, finally!

Into T2, again speedy, but got beat out of a a T2 AG win by a measly .3 of a second. So close!

The run, well, I knew it would be ugly. Temp did in fact exceed 95. Humidity, well, I was told that the humidity was 'better' than the week prior. Not much consolation really. As soon as I started down the run course, my quads started cramping. I took a minute to stretch and tried running again. It was just so oppressively hot. The first loop was more run/walk than running. Or maybe jog/walk would be more appropriate. Oy. All thoughts of a PR were gone, it was a sufferfest on the run course. At every aid station I took a cup of water. I downed two salt sticks every mile, and carried ice with me as long as it would last. Dumped ice down my top and held ice in my hands. I started drinking two cups of water at each aid station and putting one over my head. I started thinking that I was going to have a personal worst half marathon on my hands, something around the 3 hour mark. But by the turnaround for the second loop, I was actually feeling a little better. I didn't feel like I was going to pass out when I tried running. I started setting longer and longer goals for myself. Run to that aid station. Run to that mile marker. Run until you can't run. Amazingly enough I was actually bringing something resembling a race back to myself. I started calculating. My times were a little off, but I *thought* I could still PR by about 5 minutes if I could just keep myself moving. As it turns out, I ended up with a 13 min PR. While it's a little depressing thinking how much better I might have done if only the cooler weather had arrived one day sooner (yeah, after the race it was in the 70s all week), at the very least I ended up with a huge bike split PR, and an overall PR. Oh, yeah, and 3rd in my AG.

1.2 mile Swim ~ 38:18

T1 ~ : 55

56 mile Bike ~ 3:01:21

T2 ~ :42

13.1 run ~ 2:41:09 (ouch, holy hot!)

70.3 miles ~ 6:22:26

3/6 in AG (including one DNF)

I spent the next week at my brother's, working from there, and visiting the family. It was a great trip, with some serious entertainment value provided by my sharp-as-a-whip nieces. Oh, and the proximity to Black and Whites Confections wasn't bad either!

Now it's time for a few weeks of run focus. Half marathon on October 2nd!

is it friday yet?

2011-08-11T22:10:00.000-07:00

It's been another one of those weeks kids! Shouldn't it be someone else's turn for a crappy week by now?

Workouts have not been stellar, I feel kind of like I'm getting my legs back under me after being sick. And there's no time for this....my half iron race is just 3 weeks from Saturday. Freak out much? Yeah, just a *little*.
Serious drama at work. And despite that fact that I could see it coming, I just could not keep from landing right in the freaking middle of it. On my run today, all I could think of was 'how am I going to get myself out of this center of this mess?' Oy. For a tiny (30 some people) company, there is some serious dysfunction.
The most craptastic news of the week though, was a call from the vet after Bam's annual appointment. She has some elevated liver function tests which are, at the moment, unexplainable. So after getting stuck at work late yesterday talking to the vet, then scurrying to the vet's office to pick up some medication, we're at a 'wait and see' point. For now, the assumption is that she has a bacterial infection. She's getting antibiotics and some supplements that will help support liver function. And all I can do now is wait 2 weeks until we get her blood drawn again. Hopefully everything drops back to normal. If not, well, we'll go from there, but the first thing may be an ultrasound to get a look at her liver. For now, I keep my fingers crossed that the next lab test will be normal. I know she's not a spring chicken anymore, but she's a very young 12+. Be sure to hug your pups today!

"I don't feel sick. I'm sure I'm fine. Give me cookies."

Bugged

2011-08-07T23:32:00.000-07:00

I may have mentioned that I'm in the thick of my half iron training. I had some *big* workouts planned for this week. You know that saying about the best laid plans??

Tuesday night, I started to get a scratchy throat. Damn allergies, thought I. Popped a Zyrtec and continued on my merry way. Went to bed early. Woke up through out the night with scratchy-ness in my throat.

I went to work on Wednesday, still willing the symptoms to be allergies. And started feeling flushed and fatigued thru out the day. You know that crappy feeling, where it just seems like your body is not quite all there? Still, I brushed it off and went home a bit early and did my big workout. I took some aspirin to drown out the sore throat, and so I could sleep. Thursday I headed out for my long run. A big one. And made it through about 2/3 before I hit the wall. Nothing left in the legs. Chest tight. Light headed. I turned off my Garmin and jogged it home. Damn those out and back routes anyway. I *had* to get back.

I let Coach know what was going on and she benched me for Friday. I also stayed home from work and slept about half the day away. Started feeling a little bit better, but still really tired. So, my 'big, BIG' workout week prior to my taper was down the tubes. Including my planned long ride (which was going to be with super-woman). Bummed. But I know it's for the best. No sense in digging myself into a bigger hole. Best to get well and move on from there.

The two good pieces of news....

I'm finally feeling back to myself, mostly. Just, ah, well, clearing out my sinuses a bit. TMI, I know, sorry.

I get to do a big week this week, and it looks like delay my taper until week after next, and JL is not working this Sunday, so we can just postpone our date by a week! Wheee! The route's all planned. Now I just focus on good nutrition, good rest, good recovery. If only my appetite would come back. Hm, did I really just say that. I should probably revise that. If only my appetite for healthy stuff would come back. With the bugs come the craving for comfort foods. Not wholly nutritious, if you get my drift.

No more bugs! Don't they know I don't have time for this?!?

california sprint tri race report

2011-07-31T21:44:00.000-07:00

USA Productions was the group running the tri, and they had scheduled a sprint and an oly for today. There was about an hour between the start of the oly and the sprint, with the oly heading out first. But I arrived at the race site about an hour before *either* of them started in order to get a parking spot, and a decent transition spot. The good thing was they segregated the transition into oly and sprint, and because I was so early, there was still a ton of room on the sprint distance side. I grabbed an end spot on one end of the transition. This made my transition from swim to bike a bit long, but my transition from bike to run SUPER speedy.

I did all my pre-race prep, squeezed into my wetsuit, and headed down to warm up for the swim. The water was warmer than the air and was amazingly clear. There were two women's waves for the sprint, 34 and under and 35+. Yes, I was in the next to last wave yet again, with the relay/Athena/Clydesdale division going off last.

I planted myself close to the front of the swim pack. My goal was to get out in front and find some feet to sit on. The gun went off and immediately my heart was in my throat. I wondered to myself if that gasping, breathless feeling at the start ever gets easier. I didn't find any feet to sit on, but was setting a good pace and before I knew it I was heading around the buoy and in towards the finish. Once my hands were brushing the sand, I popped up and hustled in to transition.

Wetsuit....off. Bike gear...on. Out onto the course. I tried to settle into a hard push on the bike from the get go, but it was pretty crowded out there. There were a few places where I had to pull up and wait to make a pass, but for the most part I was able to keep moving at a good clip and even passed quite a few people. I just wanted to keep pushing on the bike, even if it meant my run would suffer a bit. A good bike split, that's what I wanted. The biggest problem I had on the bike was launching my bottle of sports drink before I was even 1/3 of the way thru the course. Uh oh. That was not going to help my run either. There was no aid station on the bike course for the sprint, so there was no way to replace the lost fluids/calories. Ah well, nothing to be done but keep on moving. Feet out of the shoes before coming in to transition, jump off the bike at the dismount line. Throw the bike on the rack, stuff my feet into my shoes, grab the hat and the race belt and go!

Uh oh. Legs don't want to go. Yeah, I'm pretty sure the lack of fluids on the bike caught up with me. I grabbed two cups of water at the 1 mile aid station and took a gel and not long after that I started to feel a little better. Except for those hills they put on the trail. Ooof. Ran and ran, and ran some more. And started to worry that I was on the oly course somehow. I asked a couple people who were running near me, and they were thinking it was the sprint course too, so I wasn't the only one. When my Garmin said we were at roughly 2.25 miles, I finally hit the turnaround. Oh man, this was supposed to be a 5k run. Turned around and thought to myself....there must be a short cut back through the park. I kept running, and running. I passed an aid station table that hadn't been set up at all, and laying on the ground beside it was a sign that said 2 miles. I kept running.....and running. Finally, after another couple small hills, and a little down and back section, I was told the finish line was 'just down the path around the corner.' Having run a different race at this location, I knew it was true and the finish line wasn't far away. My Garmin put the run at just about 5 miles. Hmm....maybe they meant to say 5 miles instead of 5k.

But no. Turns out we should have been turned around at that aid station that never got set up, where the 2 mile marker was. And it further turns out that not only did some people run that extra section, but that they also got sent down part of the oly course, so they ran more than 5 miles. And additionally, when the organizers realized the mistake, they started turning people around earlier on the course. So there were at least 3 different distances run, all for the sprint race.

In the end they dropped the run times from the award determinations, since they couldn't really say who ran what distances. They were very apologetic about it, with the race director giving a little speech, and he obviously felt very bad. The good news is that they have already decided not to have the oly and the sprint on the same day next year. Just logistically too problematic.

Anyway, when all was said and done, I was 3rd in my age group with the run times. But after they dropped the run times, I moved up to 2nd in my age group, just sneaking past the woman who had been in 2nd.

The highlights of the race:

2nd in my age group on the swim, at 10:25. Altho I'm pretty sure it was short of the 1/2 mile advertised. I'm certain that I've never swum (swam?) a 21 minute mile in my life.

A good strong bike, finally! The bike felt good, I passed a bunch of people. And while I would have loved to have averaged 20mph for the 14 miles, I came in around 19.8. But after the less than stellar rides I've had lately, I'll take it for sure.

At 31 seconds, the fastest T2 time in my age group! Hey, those seconds add up!

A good solid race to help get me ready for the half iron coming up in just about a month! Just over a month....how did that sneak up on me so fast?!?

This week is a big week of workouts, with my longest ride to date on Sunday. Lucky for me, I'm going to have some excellent company.

Mental

2011-07-18T22:33:00.000-07:00

This week I had another lesson in mental toughness.

Friday had a 3 hour ride on the books. With work and non-tri life responsibilities, this was going to have to be on the trainer. And truthfully, I usually find it easier to hit certain intervals/watts on the trainer anyway. But 3 hours is a long time to pedal to nowhere. Even with a veritable smorgasbord of TV shows at my fingertips. I will admit that I was not mentally prepared for this ride. It had been a long week and I was just having trouble with my focus. The TV was not keeping me distracted. I kept fidgeting in the saddle, rearranging my butt. It was a real battle to keep pedaling, and eventually, for the cool down I just turned off the TV, let my head hang and got it done. Oof. Oh, and now go run for a bit. Double oof. My legs were aching to be sure.

Saturday was a blur of eat, errands, sleep, eat, sleep.

Sunday we were up bright and early to head to a local little 5k. When I guaranteed my hubby that it was flat, not "flat" like the last 5k I got him to sign up for, he had signed up too. We arrived to overcast skies, cool temps, flat course. Perfect running conditions. The only drawback was the lack of a true start line, or any kind of instruction on lining up according to pace. So the start was a bit of bob/weave. And it never feels good to have the woman pushing the stroller blow by, never to be seen again. I had the thought, "Yeah, that's just what it would be like if Coach was pushing Max."

The first oh, mile to mile and half, went by pretty quickly. Just got my legs up to speed and tried to keep them steady. Just after I hit the mile 2 marker, it seemed like I was getting winded. My legs felt okay, but my head was telling me otherwise. Amazingly, just before the 3 mile marker, I had thoughts of slowing up. What?!?! The end is *right there*. I was on pace to hit my goal, and yet my head was trying to talk me out of it. Keep moving feet. Just keep moving. A little faster. The faster you run, the sooner you'll be finished. I made the final turn, with just .1 of a mile left, and.......ran up the hill to the finish. I made my time goal, going sub 8 min/miles for the first time in a run race. And that was after a 10 hour workout week. And the tough trainer ride just two days prior. All which make me wonder how much my legs are being limited by my head when I run. I have a suspicion that the legs have more in them than I think. And that is what's holding them back. It's a mental game. But I'm getting a little bit better at the game all the time.

After I finished, I jogged back to find out where hubby was on the course. He was just a few tenths from the finish and I ran along with him, encouraging him to push to the finish. And on virtually no training at all, he made it easily under 30:00. Woot! Now, let's go find some breakfast!

To top it off....when they posted results today, I got 3rd in my age group. My first running "award".
3/33 in my AG (missed 2nd by 6 measly seconds!)
12/116 women over all

Gotta love small races!

We now return to our regularly scheduled half IM training. Biggest training week yet. Giddy up!

baby steps

2011-07-08T06:49:00.000-07:00

I think I have, roughly, 5 partial posts hanging out in blogger. I start to write, then get distracted, then start over. Repeat.

Truth be known, there isn't a whole heck of a lot going on. The usual, swimbikerun workeatsleep.

I did do something for the first time, at least I think its a first. I dropped two running events off my schedule. Okay, yes, I added a 5k next weekend, but I dropped a 5k and a 10k. The half marathon on October 2 will be my last race of the season. We leave for our Kona/Maui trip on October 3. Coincidence? I think not. Last year when we took our Kona trip, I was in the midst of training for a half marathon. And while it was kind of fun to run along the course on Alii drive, and use the aid stations they had set up, it was also tricky to schedule things around the fun. The year before that our Kona trip was because I got my lottery spot and that wasn't exactly relaxing. This year I'm going to be on island time completely. Snorkel, stand up paddle board, maybe some diving. Mostly a whole lotta' nothing. Oh, except a whole lotta' cheering for all those Iron people. Coach especially.

This week has been a step back week. Next week jumps into the thick of HIM training. Less than 2 months from my "A" race for the year. Wow, how did that happen? This has been a bit of a strange year. I haven't made the big leaps forward that I think I made last year. It's a little frustrating, but at the same time, even a little progress is progress. With the new bike, struggling with the fit a bit, some mechanical issues, and more flat tires than it seems fair of fate to throw at me, yeah, a bit frustrating. The last piece of the fit will happen next week, then hopefully I can make my final 'adjustment' and get settled in.

For now, I'm doing the work. Taking baby steps forward. Day by day.

But, I do get to race next week! And a run race, where there is *so* much less equipment to pack up. Woot! Even if, as Coach so eloquently phrased it, "THIS WILL HURT". Giddy up!

Hump Day Miscellany

2011-06-15T07:02:00.000-07:00

More bullets for your reading pleasure. Maybe it's the zombie books I've been reading. Bullets are appealing.

Two blog posts in one week. I hope you haven't fainted from shock.
I need to start using sunscreen more regularly. Okay, I need to start using sunscreen.
Verdict is still out on my new boss, but as I told a coworker, I'm *less* pessimistic.
I either need to chop my hair off or let it grow out. This in-between length is just not a good look for working out. Not that I care that much about how I look while working out. But I could fly away on the wings of hair sticking out from under my hat/visor.
I told my PT/bike fitter at my appointment yesterday that I haven't had a good race on my new bike yet. "That's because you haven't had a race yet, without a flat, on the bike since I started working on it." Gotta love his chutzpah.
He also gave me a gold star. After only 2, or maybe it's 3, years of occasional visits, I've actually gotten my left rotator cuff into some semblance of normalcy. Huh. Guess those exercises really do work. You know...if you do them.
Turns out that when one is training for an endurance event, cutting carbs from your diet is a bad idea. I thought that as long as I was getting enough throughout the day I'd be ok not including carbs at dinner. Evidently not. Spacing them out is important for energy stores.
Training for the half IM will commence this week. After a coach imposed reduced load period due to my brilliant "diet" and my crappy sleep pattern lately. Yes, these things are related.
Only 80 days until the half IM. Only 2 more tri's in the year. Wow. This year has gone by so fast.
We are taking a trip back to Kona in October to volunteer at the IM. Bonus that just last weekend my coach qualified for Kona. So again this year I'll have someone to cheer for. Excellent.
I am so glad that I planned an earlier half marathon this year. I plan to spend my time in Kona putting on my "post-season" weight. Of course being the fattest person there might put a damper on that. I swear it could give one a complex. Or already did. My workouts will be: snorkeling, paddle boarding, sitting on my butt on a boat, maybe diving, maybe driving Jeff around a golf course. Pau Hana time indeed.

SV International Tri

2011-06-12T21:02:00.000-07:00

A report of my participation in the Silicon Valley International Triathlon, in bullets (because I haven't posted in so long, I'm not sure I can string sentences together):

Sleeveless wetsuit was a good choice. Not cold at all and my crappy, impinged, left shoulder much appreciated it.
Swim was changed to 2 loops from a 1 loop, confusing course. More "contact" (polite way of saying got run over, kicked in the head, scratched) in this swim than in any other race I've ever done. Including a mass start IM.
Felt flat for the first loop, but found a bit of a groove on the second. Meh swim time, maybe the course was a bit long, as rumored.
First 10 minutes of the bike were really good.
Next 6+ minutes were spent on on the side of the road with a clusterfluff (no, I only *wish* it was the Ben and Jerry's variety) of a tire changing effort. Ending with an under-inflated front tire.
Mentally blew it after the tire change. Checked out for a bit. Including another stop when I swore the tire was leaking again.
Finally got pissed off at myself and my pity party and started to get my butt in gear. Too little too late, I fear. But I did manage to pass quite a few of the people who flew by while I was taking my unplanned rest break on the side of the road.
Did not eat or drink enough on the bike. Too much time spent talking to myself I guess.
Am still waiting for a *good* race on the new bike. Adjustment period has been much too long for my liking. Between fittings and mechanicals, I am less than pleased. Husband has already warned that I can not just replace it. (hee hee)
The fit now feels pretty dang good at least.
Coming off a bike under-fueled and with overly toasted legs does not lead to a good run.
The last 1 - 1-1/2 miles were spent trying not to throw up. and trying to ignore my lightheadedness.
The good news is that I did not pass out nor throw up. Nor pass out in my throw up.....oh, wrong story. Sorry.
No PR, no course PR, nothing today. But if I subtract my rest period on the bike from my time, I would have had a course PR. So that's *something* I guess.
On the run several people said something to me about my biking. I think maybe a woman standing on the side of the road (who was swearing, but only silently) makes an impression? Not sure. Impressed that I could actually change a tire? Who knows. Just kind of weird.
One part of me is incredibly frustrated at my year so far. As I told my coach, even before this race, I feel like I've been "playing" with this new bike all year.
Another part of me has moved on to the next race already. This one is done. And in the grand scheme, pfft.
Onward and upward. Only one more sprint, then the big one, the half iron in September.
Perhaps the new bike fit/mechanics will all come together for the half. Wouldn't that be nice.

Balance

2011-05-02T19:57:00.001-07:00

Balance. It's something I've been struggling and fighting with myself over lately.

In some respects, I'm very lucky. I have a job that allows me flexible hours, including working at home two days a week. I have a hubby who has a variety of interests so that he's not waiting around, nor complaining, while I'm out doing my training. I don't have kids. I don't do yard work, and truthfully I'm a bare minimum housework kind of gal. (I'm working on that one.)

The scales I'm having trouble with lately are more philosophical. It's an issue of seriousness. No, I don't mean it's a serious issue. I mean it's an issue of how serious do I take myself. Am I not taking myself seriously enough? Too serious?

I know that my coworkers occasionally (okay....routinely) think that I'm overboard already. Training 6 days a week? Sometimes twice a day? Crazy talk.

I also know that I'm not doing as much as a lot of triathletes out there. And I'm not talking about professionals. Recreational triathletes like me. Workouts, equipment, dietary supplements, dietary restrictions, recovery garments/concoctions. The options are mind boggling. And overwhelming.

And I have to admit, often I read or hear something that is written for athletes, and my first thought is..."They're talking to pros, not me. I'm not an athlete. I'm a SAS programmer." When I hear athlete, I think professional. I'd say I'm a weekend warrior, but I'm warrior-ing all week long, so I'm not sure that's appropriate either.

I didn't buy a tri bike for the longest time mostly because I felt like tri bikes were for real athletes. I didn't want to be riding a tri bike, with aero wheels, and getting passed by everyone on the course. I'm not competitive enough to ride "that" bike. And I'm still not. I finally just decided that it would be a fun toy, and life is too short to put off buying fun toys if you can afford it. So when I got my bonus this year, I got myself a toy.

But I still struggle with seriousness. If I turn something down because I have an event the next day, or that weekend, I wonder if I'm taking myself too seriously. But then I think that if I'm investing so much of my time, why am I not taking myself more seriously?

I want to lose those last 3-5 pounds that are just clinging to me, but I also want to eat that little piece of chocolate. Or that piece of bacon. Mmm....bacon. Balance.

I want to go on vacation without worrying about workouts. But I want to do well in my events too. Balance.

I want to workout hard, but don't want to get injured. I want to get my work projects done, but not be a slave to my job. I want to...... The list could go on and on, but you get the picture. It's all about balance.

It's a fine line. One that I'm still working on walking.

Reservoir Tri Race Report

2011-04-17T21:23:00.000-07:00

First tri of the year. A smaller race, capped at 400 entries.

We arrived plenty early and I was lolly gagging a bit getting everything set up. Maybe compounded by the fact that they didn't use the traditional, hang your bike by it's seat, taking up as much space as you want, bike racks. They had racks that you propped your wheel into, which ended up making your neighbors much closer to you. Nice in that it limits people from really spreading out, but also makes it tight to squeeze in between bikes to get your stuff set up. Once I had everything set up and was squeezing into my wet suit, they were announcing that everyone would have to be out of the water in 10 minutes. Yikes!

Had to hustle down, with a very quick hello to Molly who was spectating (and whose pics I have blatantly stolen), to jump into the murky water. And as soon as I started my "warm" up swim, I thought to myself "WHAT were you thinking?!?!" My face, hands and feet were really feeling the chill of the 58 degree water. At least the race company was reporting that it was 58. I think they may have exaggerated upwards.

Jeff all toasty warm in his beanie and jacket. Me...not so much.

The word of the day for the swim....chop. The breeze that we saw and felt floating around evidently kicked up the chop on the reservoir. Especially around the back side of the little peninsula that the course goes around. Right sided breathing resulted in a face full of water. I like to alternate, but found myself breathing mostly left sided in an effort to take in air. The plus side is that I stayed plenty hydrated on the swim portion of the race.

Into T-1 where I got caught up in my timing chip a bit, and off with my trusty Trinity for a little ride around some rolling hills.

Yes, my feet are bare. I had my shoes hooked up to my bike and put them on while moving to save time in T1. Today though, I'm not sure it was much of an advantage. My feet were so numb that I was having a hard time feeling whether they were actually stuffing into the shoes. In this picture I think Molly captured the moment when I looked down to see my gels sliding off the side of my bike frame. I had taped them down, but evidently not well enough. Luckily there isn't video, as the sound bite wouldn't be PG rated. I managed to grab the second gel before it could escape and stuffed it into my shirt pocket. Lesson learned...always carry spare nutrition. The bike was breezy. And rolling hills. With a couple of climbs. Followed by a couple of descents. Which I am evidently more tentative on with the new bike. Room for improvement for sure. As I realized I wasn't going to make my goal bike time, I kept my legs spinning as hard as I could. I just kept thinking that I could still shoot for my run time. The day wasn't lost.

Feet out of the shoes, hop off the bike, and into T2. It was like running on blocks of wood. I couldn't feel my feet at all (and didn't until about 3 miles into the run).

The run was rolling as well. More uphill on the way out and down on the way back, but still a few hills on the way back to keep your legs honest. Ouch. Lovely that they put the turn around at the top of that little hill too. *Thanks* for that! I had been grabbing a cup at each water stop and slowing enough to make sure I got it all down, but at the last stop I grabbed a cup for the mouth, one for the head, and another for the mouth. At this point it was feeling a bit toasty and I was feeling a bit dehydrated. My head was trying to tell me that I should just take a little walk break, after all we weren't going to PR today anyway. I countered back with "How bad do you want to hit that run number?!?" So I kept moving. Once I could hear the finish line I was even able to pick it up a bit. And once I crossed over a ramp into the finish chute, I picked it up even more and had a nice kick into the finish line. Chicking a guy in the process. Sorry dude, but seriously...it's the finish line...pick it up a little, eh?


You can see the guy I chicked by the green flag on the left of the finisher's chute	.

And just like that the day was done. Not an overall PR, but an oly run PR by more than 3 minutes. Nice. One of my goals for this year was to drop my times in running off the bike, so this is a good start. Amazingly enough, I'll be back at this same spot for my sprint race next month. Yep, racing again in only 4 short weeks!

I hope the water warms up a bit by then.

Here we go

2011-04-10T21:48:00.000-07:00

And so we come to it. Race week! The first tri of the year.

I'm feeling mostly good. The leg is still a little achy, but it doesn't flare up during any of the swim/bike/run, so I think it will be fine. Most likely an adductor strain, it makes itself heard at unusual times. Getting up off the floor. If I twist my leg certain ways. (I know, don't twist those ways!) Mostly I'm feeling ready to get going. This seems to be my race week M.O. I just want it to be race day already!

I haven't really done ~~much~~ any open water swimming yet this year, so jumping into an international distance tri should be interesting. I feel like I'm swimming better than I ever have tho. And extra buoyancy from my full wet suit won't hurt either. The estimated water temperature sounds a bit chilly, but I know that once I get moving I'll warm up quickly.

I've gotten a few more outdoor rides in with Trinity and altho the shifting is more temperamental than Ruby's, I feel like I'm getting it down. She's at the Bicycle Garage now getting her race shoes put on. The weather should be good this week, so I'll be able to get out for a few more short rides before this weekend.

And the run....well....I feel like I've made some nice progress already this year in running off the bike, so I'm looking for good things there too. And with my new kicks, my feet feel super light.

So, for now, it's just do a bit more work. Rest a lot. Eat good stuff. Review the race plan. Think good, strong thoughts all week long and get ready to GO!

Wordless Wednesday

2011-03-30T01:23:00.000-07:00

Pics and sunshine

2011-03-17T21:52:00.000-07:00

No profile shots of Trinity and me,

but I *think* I see some muscle definition in those arms!

Two feet off the ground...that's running, right? :)

(BTW....I *hate* spandex.)

Now I have to finish packing up. We're off to the sunshine for the weekend. Dinner with friends tomorrow in Chandler then the hubby's nephew is getting married on Saturday in Tucson. It's supposed to rain for about the next week here, so I'll be glad to leave it behind for a few days.

And in May we've got a little vaycay on the books. I'm hoping to see one of these up close.....REAL close. (fingers crossed)

Doing a Du

2011-03-14T15:45:00.000-07:00

First race of the year....done! Woot!

I knew this one was going to be tough. If I had to pick my strength in triathlon, I'd pick swimming. Sad...since that's the portion that lasts the least amount of time. Not that I'm a fast swimmer, maybe just a bit less slow than my bike and run. So with a run-bike-run format, I've eliminated my strength. But that's what this is all about. Testing myself. Getting outside the comfort zone. Seeing what I can do.

The biggest lesson of the day may just be.....don't schedule a race on the day that we set the clocks ahead. *YAWN* I had actually forgotten about the time change and remembered right before I headed to bed. Not that I had to worry about the clocks. They change themselves. But I quickly realized that what I thought was a reasonable hour of 9:30 bedtime was actually 10:30. And 5:30 came around very early.

I had plenty of time to check in, visit the loo, get my transition set up, do my warm up, visit the loo, and get to the start line by 9:00. It was about 50 degrees and I worried about being under dressed in just my shorts and tri top. But then with my aversion to being even a tiny bit cold, I typically tend to overdress. I quickly thought that I should have at least put on my arm warmers, but...too late now! Time to line up and get going. It all worked out in the end though, as I quickly warmed up once we got moving. Only my hands got a little chilled on the bike.

The field was small enough that they decided race morning to send all the women off in one wave. Just looking at some of the ladies there, I knew they'd be speeeeeedy. Everyone, all roughly 40 of us, just sort of gathered by the start line and soon enough we were off. And just like that (*snap*) everyone was gone! Gone I tell you!

The instinct to chase after them was strong, but I tried to follow *my* plan. Ease into the first mile, then go for broke the second mile. The first 2.2 mile run zipped by and then I was running into transition to grab Trinity and head out.

I was a *little* apprehensive and maybe a bit cautious on the bike. Not during the straights/flats, but a little tentative on the turns, a little unsure of which gears I'd need at what times. Being only about my third real outdoor ride on the new bike, I think I did okay. There was some head wind, there was a roller that was a little steeper than I anticipated (hit once on each of the two loops). Mostly there was a lot of empty road due to the small field. Except it seemed almost every time I came to a turn there was traffic. And I'm never sure of the etiquette in passing during a turn. Do I make the pass anyway? Is that considered rude? I don't know. So typically I end up slowing down to stay behind the person during the turn and waiting to pass until the turn is completed. I think I need to learn to plan further ahead and make sure I complete passes before the turn.

All in all, I'm quite pleased with the ride. The bike feels good, pretty comfortable. I think things can only get better as I get more comfortable with gearing, braking, and just the feel of the new bike.

As I approached transition again, I reached down to pull my right foot out of my shoe. A nasty cramp lodged itself in my calf and I quickly let my foot sink back down. The left one came out okay, so I tried the right again and managed to get both feet out and on top of my pedals in time to hop off and complete my 'flying' dismount. It's kind of fun, spectators seem to like to see the flying dismount, and I almost always get some version of "woo hooo.....gooooo!" Ran into transition, chucked (okay, gently put) the bike back on the rack and shoved my feet into my running shoes. Oooof. Legs felt like wood.

Okay, just 2 (.2) more miles! Hang in there! I felt like I was barely moving. Cramp in my side for the first mile, I just kept talking myself into keeping moving. Left heel complaining a little bit. (Note to self...MORE calf stretching!) Ticking off the the steps. Around this turn. Just down that block. And before long I could see the finish line entrance. I heard some cheering for someone who must have been *really* close behind me and tried to get to the finish line as quickly as I could. Somehow I held on and made it. And just like that the first race of the year was already finished.

I missed my "A" goal, but overall I'm quite happy with my performance, finishing in 1:12. I tried something new, I got my first race done on Trinity, and I learned some things! That's a good day racing, kids!

And evidently good enough for 4/8 in my age group and 19/44 for women. I'll take that. Especially since the initial results had me in a funk...listing me as second from the last out of all the women. What the?!?

Next up....international tri in about a month....gulp!

And she shall be known as

2011-03-08T22:17:00.000-08:00

Trinity

Why Trinity?

swim/bike/run....trinity.....no brainer there.
Trinity from the Matrix (which I was re-watching the other day on the trainer). She is one *tough* cookie. Tough enough that I can forgive her for falling for the moron Neo. After all, it's not really her fault....the Oracle predicted it, so it had to come true, right? YES, I know I am a total sci fi geek.
and there is some element of faith to the name Trinity (father, son, holy spirit). And while I'm not inclined to the religious kind of faith, it's a good reminder to have faith in myself and my abilities.

So Trinity and I hit the pavement today for the first time. Well...luckily we didn't actually *hit* the pavement...we kept the rubber side down. Just a little 'easy' spinning. And I have to say, she and I will need to work out our quirks. Like, I *really* have to work on relaxing my shoulders down and letting my weight settle on the aero bar pads. If I don't the front end feels a bit less stable to me. I was told that tri bikes are built to expect a larger portion of the weight distribution to fall on the front, so maybe that's why.

I was watching (okay, slightly admiring) my shadow as I rode along the path. Nice flat back, nice bike profile. I know, not just a sci-fi geek, but a tri geek too. I contemplated pulling my iPhone out of my jersey pocket and snapping a picture, but as I'm still working on being able to eat/drink while riding the new bike, I didn't think that would be too good an idea. Falling or dropping the phone....neither would be good outcomes.

It was nice to get at least one little ride in outside before the race this weekend tho.

Wait! What!?!? Yes! It's race week! My duathlon is coming up on Sunday. According to instructions received from coach, it's going to be painful. Well, at least if I do it right.

Let's get the season started!

Ain't she a beaut?

2011-03-05T21:35:00.000-08:00

Just a brief foreword before the gratuitous bike porn photo.....

Once I had measurements and knew which bikes would fit, I wasn't too set on a particular brand of bike. The shop would have/could have ordered what ever bike I may have wanted....Look, Cannondale, Specialized, Felt, etc. After a brief discussion (in my head) that went something like..."Chrissie rides a Cannondale, I should get that. *snort* Yeah, I'm sure it's entirely about the bike." Okay. So, remember how I said patience was not my strong suit? Well, when it came down to it, I picked up the bike that the shop fit me on. I liked it. It fit. It was the same brand as my Ruby, which I've had and liked since 2007. It was available pretty much *now* (after some set-up/prep). Cha.Ching.

So.......I give you my new Specialized Transition.

Nope, no name just yet. And nope...Bam is not impressed.

If the rain isn't *too* bad tomorrow, and just light showers as predicted, then we may make our maiden voyage. Otherwise I guess I'll see how it feels to ride on the trainer. Exciting times kids!

Is it Saturday yet?

2011-03-02T14:07:00.000-08:00

How about now?

Now?

Now?

Can you tell that I'm just a wee bit excited for Saturday? Can you guess why? Okay, okay, I'll just tell you. I'm heading down to pick up my new ride on Saturday. Wheeeeeee! I have a noon o'clock appointment to get the fit all fine tuned and then I can bring 'er home! Now the hardest part....she'll need a name. Ruby was obviously a Ruby. Her name was written right on her for pete's sake. This one has not yet revealed her name to me. Maybe once I get some seat time.

So I'll pick her up on Saturday (or maybe she's a he....I don't know....) and I have a race one week from Sunday. Now the dilemma....do I ride Ruby or the new ride for the race?!? I guess I'll see how the new ride feels and go from there. The bike portion is only 10 miles, so it's not like I'd be on it too long. So long as I'm comfortable with the different position and handling of this one, I think we'll let her run. Stay tuned........

So.Freakin.Excited.

A new kind of challenge

2011-02-28T07:00:00.000-08:00

The last several days have been challenging for me in a new way. I've had to work my training around my life.

I know that may be an every day occurrence for most people. But as I noted in my previous post, I consider myself lucky for many reasons. One of those is that I usually have the ability to work my life around my training. After the last few days I have even greater respect for those that manage to train *and* have families/heavy job requirements/both/etc.

There was nothing earth shattering that happened in the last few days to throw chaos into my orderly little universe. It was more a bunch of things taking much longer than expected, with a pinch of extra obligations that came up last minute and were out of my control. You know those compromises you have to make to continue along your merry way in wedded bliss? Yes, throw in some of those as well.

I have to say that it would have been all too easy to skimp on, or dare I say, even skip my last few workouts. In fact I did miss a swim on Thursday, what with my lovely bike fit/shopping spree taking much longer than expected. I don't feel great about that, but I'm not going to lash myself for it either. It has and will happen. But when Saturday rolled around, and all the commitments for the day were fulfilled, I found myself climbing onto my bike trainer at 7:15 pm for a 1:55 ride. Followed by a 10 min run on the 'mill. I would be lying if I said I didn't contemplate skipping that little 10 minute run. I mean....really....it's only 10 minutes. Probably not that important. Oh? Really? 'Cuz coach just throws stuff on there for no reason, right?!? And so I did the 10 minutes on the 'mill. Which made for a very late night. Which threw my sleep off. Which felt *fabulous* when I had to get up at 6:00 to get to the gym to meet my trainer by 7:00. Which was rearranged from Saturday to meet said obligations. Etc....etc.....etc.

So, it was a whacked weekend full of squeezing in what I could when I could. And while I'm proud of myself for hanging in there and getting it all done, there is *no* way this is sustainable. Saturday's food intake was breakfast at 8:00, and dinner at 6:30. With snacking on what I could scrounge up in between. *Not* good. (Note to self, restock purse with emergency food) Time to get my time and life back into routine. Nutritional routine.....training routine.....and particularly sleep routine. Luckily the chaos of this weekend did resolve some things with long term solutions, so those can be crossed off the to do list. Whew.

Here's to a new week and a fresh start.

"What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow: Our life is the creation of our mind."
Buddha

If it doesn't fit....

2011-02-25T07:22:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I took a half a day off of work to head down to Santa Cruz. Nope I wasn't heading to the beach. But that's okay, because the weather wasn't conducive to beach going anyway.

I was heading down to Spokesman Bicycles. While I love Curtis, my bike fitter/PT, he is a bike fitter and a bicycle coach and a physical therapist, but he doesn't actually sell bikes. And while I love the guys at the Bicycle Garage, they are really more roadies and don't carry TT bikes. I needed a one stop shop, so to speak. Someone who carries TT bikes and is a great fitter. So when Curtis told me that it would be worth the drive to head to Spokesman to see Wade, I made an appointment.

Like Curtis, Wade is pretty easy going. We had a quick, introductory chat and then my bike went up onto the trainer. I won't go into the gory details, but he did some testing of flexibility in my knees, hips, legs in general, then had a look at my current fit on my Ruby. I hadn't started complaining about it yet, but he noticed right away that I wasn't sitting in the right spot on my saddle. Too much wear in the wrong places (damn you chubby thighs anyway), while the place I should be resting my weight (entirely on the sit bones) showed almost no wear. After a bunch of try this adjustment, try that, we ended up with a different fit. All of which was really just to give him an idea of what TT bike might work. Wade had taken some 'before' video of me on the bike and some video 'after' the readjusted fit. Then he did a comparative still shot, outlining my back/arms/head, which allowed me to really see the difference.

The red line is my before and shows me higher on the bike, my back with more of an arch. The orange line shows the new fit with a nice flat back and not quite so "squished". I had been feeling like my hips were kind of squished closed when I was in my aero position, but didn't really think too much about it. Once we changed the fit though, and my hips were allowed to open up, I really noticed the difference. I also noticed that my weight was more balanced, with a more natural shoulder rather than having my shoulders hunched working to support my weight. The next step was to put a TT bike up on the trainer, get the measurements set to match Ruby, and see how it felt. Then a quick ride outside (carefully, as it had started raining) and some more adjustments and a lecture. Okay, not really a lecture so to speak. But he did say that I still seem to sit high on the bike, especially for a TT bike, and that while I am pretty flexible, I have lots of room to improve that flexibility. By stretching. And yoga. Like I haven't heard *that* before. Hmm...maybe it's time to start paying attention. Anyway, I can get a good, comfortable, aero fit on a TT bike and still have lots of room to move things around as I get stronger and more flexible. Awesome.

(Not so) short story....*well* worth the trip. All in all Wade spent 2-1/2 hours working with me and my bike. Oh and the bonus....since I bought a bike, no charge for the fit. Oh, I didn't mention that I bought a bike?!?!

Yep, I bought one. Nope, I'm not telling just yet. They're working on it over the next week, putting bar tape on, a 3rd brake lever, fitting my race wheels properly, cutting my seat post and cables to fit, installing the pedals, etc, etc. Hopefully it will be ready next weekend. And then we shall have the grand unveiling.

I'm stupid excited. Like a little kid at Christmas excited. Like wake up early and can't go back to sleep for thinking about the fun stuff ahead excited. And yes, I realize I am seriously fortunate: 1) to have the money to indulge myself in my little hobby; 2) to have a husband who is of a similar philosopy; and 3) to be able to physically (still working on my mental game) participate in my chosen activities.

Happy, happy, happy Friday!

Race season approacheth

2011-02-17T21:59:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe....but there it is in black and white.....my first race of the season is now on my training schedule. Three weeks from Sunday, a duathlon, the sprint version. And from there it's one race per month, except for July. And that's only because one of the race companies had the audacity to change a race from July to May and mess up my schedule in the process. Really, they should have checked with me first. I don't know what they were thinking.

Am I ready? Yes, I think I am. I did have a short pity party back in December when I did my bike test and had lost some bike fitness. (We'll just skip right over the bike "test" last week, shall we? Been there, done that, hashed it out.) But as coach reminded me, I had just come off a break, *and* had trained for a half marathon prior to that. So, I shouldn't have expected to not lose any of my mad bike speed. *cough, cough* So if I look at things as objectively as I can, I am actually in a better place on the bike than where I started last year. And my run is *quite* a bit better than where I started last year. So, I'm expecting good things.

Of course there was the flutter of little wings in my stomach when I looked at my schedule and saw the race on there already. Partly because I haven't ever done a duathlon. And partly because it's a sprint....ow...ow...ow! Once again it is time to test myself against....well.....my past self.

But there are still a few weeks of work between now and then. Plenty of time to build up some bike fitness, pep up my legs a bit, get my head in a good place. Ready?!?

Bring it.

Head games

2011-02-13T17:59:00.000-08:00

Today I had a bike test. I failed it miserably. I own that. And you know what? It wasn't even my body that failed me. I didn't get that far. My head got in my way before I even finished the test. Probably before I even started.

I mentioned that I like to read a lot of blogs. Seems I'm not the only one thinking about the mental aspect of the game. And while it makes me feel good that I'm not alone in this, I'm the only one that can 'fix' it. I know that I need to work on my mental game, it's just a matter of getting in there and doing it. Some days it's not as hard as others. Today it was very hard.

So now what? Now I own it. I look it in the face. And I put it behind me. No sense in dwelling on it. Learn the lesson and move on to what's next. It didn't kill me, so I can either let it crush my confidence or take it in and let it make me stronger. I choose stronger.

And to be perfectly honest, after about a half an hour...okay, maybe an hour....of wallowing in my failure, I thought about my friend who is going through chemo for his Lymphoma. Seriously. How much would he give to be back on his bike, even having a crappy day on it, rather than where he is? And so, I got over taking myself quite so seriously. Yes, I care about the test and doing well and pushing myself. But is my failure the end of the world? Not even close.

Another blogger posted a link to this article. Quite interesting. Perhaps I need to study with the monks.

Lucky

2011-02-12T17:56:00.000-08:00

Today Bam and I went for a hike at Garin park. But this time I was smart enough to wear shorts. I know, I know....the weather we've been having is outrageous. But rain and cooler temps are coming back and sticking around all next week. So we had to get out and enjoy it while we could.

Boo.T.Full. No?

A lone tree in full blossom

Hello allergies..err...lovely blossoms.

Happy, happy girl.

Any fish in here? Tadpoles? Salamanders?

Bark softly.....

and shred a biiig stick.

Keeping Up

2011-02-07T22:22:00.000-08:00

I surf a lot. The internet, that is. I like to read. Not just books, although I like those too. I like to read people's race reports, their training stories, stories of weight loss. Articles about training, nutrition, whatever. But lately...well, maybe not just lately....but lately more than usual, I have been comparing. I think about keeping up with Jane, and Sue, and Mary (names have been changed to protect the innocent). If Jane is doing intervals at XXX, shouldn't *I* be able to do those intervals?!? If Sue is putting out XXX watts, shouldn't *I* be able to hit those numbers?!? If Mary is training XXX hours/week at this point in the season, shouldn't *I* be doing that?!?! I find myself thinking that what I'm doing isn't good enough. Isn't fast enough. Isn't enough period.

Now some of this makes perfect sense when I think about it. I wasn't an athletic kid, so I don't have years of muscle memory to work from. Actually, until a handful of years ago, I wasn't even an athletic adult. Which is my long way of saying, I'm slow. So, yes, it takes me longer to do most of the activities I participate in than it takes most people. And I'm not as strong as a lot of the youngsters out there. Oh, yeah, did I also mention that I'm not getting any younger? And I'm not exactly built like an athlete. I am not lean, and my center of gravity...well...let's just say that it is rather low. I'd have no problem hiking a toddler onto my hip. If I had a toddler that is. But I digress.

I'm not making excuses. Really. I know that if I do the work, put in the time, PRs will come. I mean just look at last year. I did the work Coach put out there for me, consistently, and it paid off with PRs at every distance I raced. Sometimes I just want the work to magically transform me into an athlete. I want the magic workout that will have me super speedy, super strong, super flexible, super thin. All while being superly *not* injured, of course. (Yes, I know superly is not a word. I made it up. Sue me.)

Sometimes I just wonder....will I ever be satisfied? I know I should be looking at all that I've accomplished, and being proud of that. And I do. Some days, I just want....more. Or less. Depending on where I'm looking.

I guess, in a round about way, this post is all about me working on my mental game. Not letting what other people are doing stress me. I can only control myself. Appreciating myself as I am, flaws and all. Taking more of the positive and leaving the negative by the side of the road.

Friday Fun

2011-02-04T09:12:00.000-08:00

I have had a post swirling around my head for a while, but it doesn't seem to want to write itself just yet. So, we'll go with some Friday Fun instead.

Bike Porn!!! These are the ones I'm currently looking at. Colors will vary due to model year I end up looking at. Cost will certainly end up being a factor, as I haven't won the lottery just yet. (Note to self, buy lottery ticket.) And I'd *like* to be able to get it from my local bike shop. Hey, can't beat free tune ups for life! Then I'll just have to get with my fitter and get my rocket, errrrr, bike matched to my body.

Specialized Transition

Kestrel Talon

Kuota KFactor

Blue Triad

Reminder

2011-02-02T12:26:00.000-08:00

I just received a harsh reminder to cherish each and every day. Be thankful for what you have and the people in your life. Make the most out of the time you're given.

A friend of mine is in the hospital with a tumor on his lung. My concern is, if possible, increased because I know how long we've been talking about him having trouble breathing during workouts. With no real explanation for why it was occurring.

I am....shocked.....saddened.....and can only wonder why. If prayer is your thing, please think of adding him to your prayers. If positive energy is your thing, please send some his way. Any kind of good, healing energy can not hurt, right?

Theft

2011-01-27T22:03:00.000-08:00

As promised, if a bit delayed, here are the pics of the trail run last weekend. And yes, as promised, they are blatantly stolen from Jo Lynn.

Theresa, Jo Lynn, Moi

Gorgeous, no? And the trail was pretty nice too. Ba dum bah! Be here all week folks!

In other news, I am beginning to do some bike shopping. While I have not met my internally set goal for when I would be *allowed* to purchase a tri bike, I have grown impatient. I'm sure no one here needs reminding that patience is not my strong suit. But, well, I guess that *was* a reminder. Anywhoo....my bike guy (Curtis at Revolutions In Fitness) whipped up some measurements for me so I can begin to look for the appropriate tri bike for me. Sadly, I am "torso challenged". What I mean to say is that what little height I have is evidently all in my legs. That may be a good thing... well, not the height.....the choices. Too many choices can be overwhelming, and this way I can just pick the one that has the colors I like. (She says *semi* jokingly.) Now, if you will excuse me, I am off to do some research!

Happy Weekend!

Glorious

2011-01-23T23:13:00.000-08:00

With apologies to those in colder locales (hey.....you guys/gals can laugh all the way to the bank when it comes mortgage payment time), it was ridiculously nice here this weekend! Highs in the low-mid 70s both days. And as it was a rest week, I took full advantage in just sucking it up. Took my girl for long hikes out at Garin Park. In case you've forgotten, Garin looks something like this:

Which results in faces that look like this:

Oh, and did I mention that Garin is just a 5 minute drive from my house. Yes, *very* fortunate indeed. These pics were actually taken last weekend. We've truly struck the jackpot lately in the January weather lottery.

This morning, I met Jo Lynn at her house and we picked up a friend of hers and all set out for the Pacific Coast Trail Run 9k in Pacifica. Hello, again, gorgeous weather. JL is coming back from having had foot surgery late last year, and did fan-freaking-tastic.

It was so much fun hiking our butts up (and up....and up....)the hills, running down the hills, and pretty much non-stop, easy going chatter. Fulfilled my training instructions to a T: "Relax, social, enjoyable run". Relax....check. Social....double check. Fun.....yes ma'am! I'll have pics for the run later (after JL posts hers and I steal them....it's okay....she knows....I told her she was the official photographer). Until then...Happy Trails!

Thank you ma'am, may I have another

2011-01-11T23:23:00.000-08:00

Yes, ladies and gents, I have been getting my arse handed to me in my workouts this year.

I made the observation to Coach that "we" seem to be starting off with harder workouts than we did last year. Less easing into it, shall we say. Her response....basically ...."Duh." Okay, she wasn't quite so blunt, but I got the point. Of course we're starting out with harder stuff. I now have a couple of years with her under my belt so I get to start at square two instead of square one. I shudder to think what square three might look like.

I'm trying to not get discouraged, especially with the bike workouts which have always been my nemesis. I know, in my head, that the workouts are supposed to be difficult and I'm not meant to nail all of them. But once in a while would be nice. Of course there was the Saturday ride to which I commented, "Hmm, that seemed too easy." Just a little piece of advice from me to you.....NEVER say that to your coach. If you do...be prepared for some suffering. You've just thrown down the gauntlet.

On the other hand, I'm not paying a coach to hand me workouts I can sleep swim/bike/run through. I am paying someone to kick me in the butt and challenge me. So what am I saying? I guess I'm telling myself to quit whining, HTFU, and learn to love the burn. Okay, maybe love is too strong. Appreciate may be more appropriate.

A few more tough ones this week and next week is a step back week. With a trail run on the schedule. So I pinged my trail run buddy, JoLynn to see if she'd be available to run with me. With "Fun, Social, Enjoyable" on the schedule, it was a no brainer. Unfortunately she is signed up for a 9k trail run that day with another friend of hers. Fortunately for me, the friend doesn't mind if I make myself the third wheel, and coach said okey-dokey. 9k worth of fun....yes, please, sign me up. Hopefully we'll get some nice weather for a run in the hills!

Who Am I?

2011-01-04T23:57:00.000-08:00

(And Dear Readers...both of you....don't get your hopes up...this blogging thing may fade away again quickly.)

There have been several 'things' going on lately that have me thinking about that question. "Who Am I?" If I was stripped of all the things that I've used to define myself, what would be left? Am I more than a sum of the parts? Would I still be me without my job? Without triathlon/training? Without my family, my hubby, my dog? What makes me..me?

Sorry....if you were waiting for an answer to any of those questions, you're not going to find it here. Just food for contemplation.

On a more mundane level, I'm back at work and things are as, let's just say, interesting as they've been the last year or so. As you may or may not know, I had a job offer towards the end of last year. Pretty much the same line of work, just a different take on it, with another small company. It sounded interesting, at least more interesting than what I'm currently engaged in. But I decided to stay put for the time being. When everything was laid on a scale, the negatives where I'm at didn't outweigh the benefits. And the benefits at the new place didn't weigh heavily enough to sway me. On some level now though, I think I've traded away my brain for comfort. I get to work at home two days a week where I'm at. I have a *very* flexible schedule. I'm coming up on five years at this place, which means I will start getting an extra week of vacation a year. An extra WEEK! And really....my work is just a means of getting from vacation to vacation. Oh, and to pay for new toys. Well, yes, and the bills too. No, wait...that's what Jeff's job is for.

But back to the job thing. I really feel like I'm stagnating. And although the company is at an exciting time, entering our Phase III trial (last step prior to an attempt at FDA approval), I don't have a lot of mentoring here. Scratch that, there's *no* mentoring. Because we're so small that I'm basically a department of one. I think I've finally, FINALLY, realized that now that I've made the commitment to stay until 'something happens' (whether that be a buy out, FDA approval, whatever), I'm going to have to engage my brain on my own. Develop some new skills, get back in the practice of attending conferences. Because it would be all too easy to sit back, futz around, and wait. I know it would, I've been doing it for the last several months. I'm not saying I don't do my job. Of course I do. But I do it in a detached manner. There's not a lot of investment there. Which, for me, leads to some serious discontent. You may not have noticed, but I tend to throw myself into things wholeheartedly. So for the new year, I'm making a commitment to my brain. Not a resolution so much as a gift to myself. Here's hoping it's the gift that keeps on giving.

Happy New Year.

Blogless in Northern Cali

2010-10-19T15:53:00.000-07:00

There's been stuff going on.....work, spectathlete-ing at Kona, training for a half marathon, hiking some dogs through the beautiful fall hills.

Follow the leader (Bam and guest, Boomer)

You sniff, I sniff.

But I haven't really felt like writing lately. So maybe some if it will make an appearance at a later date.

I do have a 10k coming up this weekend, which feels so insignificant after watching seriously amazing IM athletes all day on October 9th. But maybe racing again, even if it's just a 10k will inspire me to write.

Then again.

Maybe not.

We'll see.

Planning and training

2010-09-22T18:30:00.000-07:00

As the tri season has come to a close, and I have only a lowly little 10k and a half marathon on my schedule for the rest of the year, my thoughts have turned to goals for next year.

I know, I know........I should probably just enjoy my last couple of events, and then *really* enjoy a couple of weeks of down time before I start jumping into next year's goals. It would seem though that I'm just not wired that way. Maybe it's partly due to heading out to Kona to perform the role of Spectathlete Extraordinaire in a couple of weeks, but my thoughts have been turning towards Ironman.

I have thought, to myself as well as out loud, that I'd someday like to do another IM. The difficult part is deciding when someday has arrived and secondarily, where that IM should take place. Further complicating the decision is that if I want to do one of the 'branded' IM races, I'd need to sign up a year in advance. Truth be known, I'd really like a rematch with Kona. But I am realistic enough to know that I am never going to qualify for a slot to Kona, and so would need some extraordinary luck to be drawn in the lottery again. So the "where" and "when" are questions still to be answered.

The more important word that follows closely on the heels of any IM thoughts is "if". Or maybe more appropriately, "want". If I could commit to training for another IM. Do I want to? To be sure the time commitment is substantial, but that's not the bigger issue for me. When I was training for Vineman last year, I had a great training partner right along with me. There was someone to bitch to, commiserate and celebrate with. As will happen, things shifted in schedules, work commitments, life in general, and this year I trained almost exclusively on my own.

In some ways, training alone is easier. You're always racing alone, so training alone prepares you for the day ahead. In working with a coach, I'm almost never just going out to run or bike without some specific goals. I have specific workouts on specific days, all set up with the big picture in mind. I am looking to hit certain paces or HR (for running), or certain wattage or sometimes HR (for cycling). Swimming I'm mostly just looking not to drown. Okay, okay, there are specific intervals to hit occasionally even in the pool. The point is that there are goals to be met. Which doesn't always align with another person's goals. Now not everyone I know works with a coach, but even the athletes I know that don't, still have jobs, families etc. Meshing schedules alone is enough of a challenge. Add in trying to mesh goals, race schedules, and everything else and it really does become much simpler to train on my own.

The problem is in learning to be comfortable with that. Or perhaps the bigger problem is learning to be UNcomfortable. Pushing myself to get in the hard workouts, the hard paces, on my own. I think I handled things fairly well this year. I pushed myself in training and in racing. Not as much as I'd have liked, but I'm still learning. But.....towards the end of the year....and my longest event, the HIM......I was getting discouraged. Losing focus. Becoming unmotivated. Not as much on runs, where I feel okay with music in my ears. But I found it's not easy to go for 3, 3-1/2, 4 hour rides alone. It's a long time to be alone with just your own thoughts to keep you company. Well, your own thoughts, and at times the cars rushing by at arms length.

So as thoughts turn to training for an IM, thoughts naturally turn to the 7, 7-1/2, 8 hour rides that are necessary for that kind of training. Could I, do I want to, ride for that long on my own. I just don't know. Last year, even with my trusty training partner along for the rides, I would find myself in some pretty dark places on those long rides. Alone....on my bike....for 8 hours, could I find it within myself to tackle that? Could I suppress the urge to chuck my bike off the side of the road? Because I certainly wanted to do that at some point this year training for the HIM, let alone last year while training for the full IM.

For now, I *think* I'm pretty much set on a plan for next year that will be very similar to this year. Shorter races throughout the year working on my version of 'speed'. Maybe a half iron towards the end of the season. Maybe the same half iron so that I can compare. Maybe something entirely new. Hard to say. Luckily....I don't need to decide right now. Good thing, cuz it's time to run.

Race reviews....or not

2010-09-17T15:40:00.000-07:00

No, this isn't my race report from last weekend's half iron race. And to be honest, I'm not sure that will be in the coming attractions. It wasn't a great race, nor a crappy one. It was a good solid effort, with some learning experiences, and I ended up with a 33 minute PR, altho it was a bit slower than I would have liked. Heh....I can't imagine the day when I'll say something like "I'm completely happy with how that race went."

A couple of quick points about the HIM

the swim was....a swim. Yes they could've used a few more buoys, but the water was warm and saltless, there was next to no chop, and the only fish I saw were bluegills....which I can't imagine bite very hard at all.
the bike course had some pretty crappy surface, but I expected that from having ridden the course a couple of times in training.
the run course was on fire roads and single track...again, expected.
it was hot, and yes, that too was expected.

Would I do it again? If they resurfaced the roads it would be a definite yes. As it stands, I'd most likely do it again. I really liked how small the race was, only 168 finishers. Transition had plenty of space. The volunteers were amazing. For me, the things I liked about this race probably outweigh the things I didn't like.

About race reviews....I had a whole write up in my head, a rant mostly, about race reviews and the things people complain about in them. I mean...this *is* my blog, right? I can rant about what ever I want. But I realized I'm entitled to my opinion and so are those other people. So, I'm censoring myself with the ranting. Yes, I know....a sign of maturity or something.....who'd have thought.

Next week we start a more 'run focused' training in prep for the Big Sur half marathon in November. And I now see a long run on my schedule for the weekend we're on the big island. I hope I don't have traumatic flashbacks. Then again, I should be fine as long as I'm not running in the dark.

Showtime

2010-09-10T09:54:00.000-07:00

Posted on FB from the race director for tomorrow's tri:

Nothing enhances performance as much as self-belief, and nothing limits performance as much as self doubt.

And that's all I've got to say today.

Ready......set........

2010-09-08T22:52:00.000-07:00

We're not quite to "go" just yet.

Saturday will be my last tri of the season. For my last big event of the year, I've been surprisingly blase about it. I think I've finally realized what the issue is though. I've had a good year of racing and I've set some very ambitious goals for myself for this race. Most likely unattainable goals, but I could surprise even myself. And I think the biggest problem is that I'm already trying to analyze how I'll feel *after* the race if I don't hit those goals. I'm thinking way too far ahead. I need to bring things back to the present. One day.....and then one mile at a time. No need to jump to the finish line of a race I haven't even started yet. My body is as ready as it's going to be and I really just needed to get my head aligned. I think I'm finally ready to go.

And after much whining (on my part) and some negotiating with both Jeff's and my workplaces, we will be heading to Kona in October! After participating in the IM last year, I thought it would be great fun to go back and volunteer for the race this year. On again, off again, on again plans....but we are going! I'm so looking forward to hanging out in Kona, swimming in the bay, cheering for all the amazing athletes. We'll be 'catching' finishers from 8pm to midnight and it should be a blast. Maybe I'll even get to have a picture taken with Chrissie since I was too out of it last year when I finished to have Jeff take one. And maybe I'll go for a run in my underpants. Or maybe not.

Lackadaisical

2010-08-29T21:40:00.000-07:00

Lackadaisical: Lacking enthusiasm and determination.

Yes, I do believe I have been feeling lackadaisical for a couple of weeks now.

Could it be turning the big 4-0? Don't think so. I don't feel 40. I'm told I don't look 40 (but then, really, who tells you that you *do* look your age?). It's just another number. I know I certainly don't *act* 40.

Could it be the rocky sleep lately? Possibly. Bam has been restless, and itchy...literally itchy. And since I'm such a light sleeper, I wake up when she scratches, bites, licks, etc. Oh, and when she goes out the dog door. And comes back in the dog door. And back out. And back in. And back out....

Could it be the work stress? Maybe. There's just a lot of upheaval at work, nothing new really. Just more of the same. A lot more. With very slight variations. And while I've been assured by my boss, and her boss, of my value as a member of the team, sometimes things just look different than they sound. If that makes any sense.

Could it be that we usually have a vacation on the books to look forward to by now? And that we'd usually be *on* vacation in the next month or two? Likely. There's just something about having a trip booked. The excitement of something different. Some time away. This year, it's not going to happen until spring most likely. Jeff's has some projects going on at work that will keep us from taking time off this fall.

Could it be the fantastically crappy long ride workouts I've had lately? Likely. My big "A" race is in less than two weeks. I have set a very ambitious goal for myself. A couple of them really. Okay, maybe three. *sigh* Perhaps I'm putting just a bit too much pressure on myself. This isn't my job after all. It's supposed to be fun....remember? Part of it is that I feel like I've worked pretty hard this year at getting stronger and I'd like for that to show in my time on race day. But I feel like I've been stuck in a loop....crappy workout leads to negative thoughts....leads to crappy workout....etc. I need to break my head out of the cycle. But all my 'big' workouts are done. Race day is in 11 days. Yikes.

Anyway...I have some more ideas, thoughts, ponderings about this lackadaisical-ness. But I've bitched and moaned enough. It's time to let it go. What's done...is done. The bad, but the good too.

I've had some long run sessions lately that have gone very well. One of them, had I run another half of a mile, would have been a half marathon PR. My races this year have gone pretty well too with quite a few PRs. There's a lot to be proud of. A lot of work that I can cash in on in 11 days.

Time to work on seeing the race I want to have. Let the mind lead the body. And really......just get out there and play!

Friday the 13th is a great day

2010-08-13T09:08:00.000-07:00

Today is my grandparents 60th anniversary. 60!! years!!

This year was Jeff's and my 15th, so they've been married 4 times as long as we have. Yeah, yeah, I know, they're a little older, and a lot wiser, than we are. I'm just saying...it's a long time!

They live in a 100+ year old farm house in Illinois. My grandpa has been a farmer his whole life. He's still farming at 84, although slowing down a bit now. At 84, I think he's entitled to. When I was little and loved Winnie the Pooh, he would call me Christopher Robin. He can make his ears wiggle, which as a kid would send me into fits of giggles. He reads a lot (guess that really does run in the family), is quiet (until Jeff and he get to talking), and is a lot stronger than your average 84 year old.

My grandma is the heart and hub of our family. She's the one that keeps in touch with us all, even if we don't always keep in contact with each other. She sends surprise packages in the mail when she finds something that she knows one of us will like. For my 16th birthday, she took me to get my first pair of contact lenses. She's always been the "coolest" grandma, driving a bright red mustang convertible for many, many years, until my uncle bought her a Solara convertible....but of course, still bright red. She has always been there for us, offering anything she can to help when we needed it.

They've helped me, and a lot of my family, through some tough times. And of course, they've had some very tough times themselves, and I hope that we've been able to help them through those times at least a tiny bit. Believe me, I know how lucky I am to have them. And to still have them both. I hope that my luck will hold for many, many more years.

For their 40th anniversary....hard to believe that was 20 years ago....a big group of us took a trip to Hawaii to celebrate. For their 50th....back to Hawaii. For my Grandpa's 80th birthday it was Aruba. So, Gram and Gramps, when does the trip begin?!?! All my love to you both and Happy 60th Anniversary!

Tri for Real

2010-08-08T21:03:00.000-07:00

The main reason I signed up for this race was to get a preview of the course for the half iron I'm doing next month. But having just missed my time goal at my last olympic tri, I really wanted to hit that goal this time around.

After deciding not to find a hotel close to the race site and instead drive out the morning of, the alarm went off at what should have been the shockingly early time of 3:50 am. But which wasn't actually a huge deal since I had been woken up by Bam at 3:45 am. Yes, she is just *that* helpful of a pooch. I had most of my stuff packed up, so that all we needed to do was put the bike rack on and load up the truck. Jeff was going, along with a friend of his from work, to play golf while I was out there putting in some miles. Got all loaded up and we hit the road....about 15 minutes later than I wanted, but the GPS said we'd still arrive pretty close to 6:30, which was when transition opened. And that's even after I made a quick stop at Mickey D's so the guys could grab some fast food breakfast. I had my almond butter and honey toast which I ate on the way. Breakfast of choice on race day.

The guys dropped me off and I headed over to check in/transition. A few things struck me right away.

Very low key. This is a small (just over 200 entries, I think) local race. And it's paired with a kids tri, which was just awesome. Those little kids were rockin' it. A little scary was the kid with the aero wheels on his bike. Super serious.
Transition was *huge* for the number of athletes. There was probably 4 feet between me and the guy who set up next to me. And no, someone didn't squeeze in between us. No need. Space aplenty.
I received my race numbers at check in, but no timing chip. Ummmm. Yep, this was the first tri I've ever done that didn't use a timing chip. I was pretty interested to see how this was going to work.

I got all set up in transition, running through the race in my head to make sure I hadn't forgotten anything. Got body marked, and then suited up. I wandered down to the water just before the first wave was scheduled to go off. I checked out the course and then got in the water for my warm up. And the water was just about perfect. Not so cold that I felt shivery in my sleeveless wetsuit and not warm enough that I thought I'd overheat on the swim. Soon enough my wave was lining up at the start.....all, maybe 30 of us. 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-Go and we were off. There was a bit of a chop on the lake which I wasn't really used to, but nothing too bad. It did make me think that there might be a bit more wind on the bike than I expected. There was one swimmer who I was keeping pretty close to, drafting when I could, but I was zig zagging a bit more than usual today and her bubbles weren't always where I expected them to be. She would get a ways ahead and then I'd find her feet again, especially on the turns, which she seemed to take slowly. While the buoys looked far away from shore, it always surprises me how quickly the swim passes and soon enough we were approaching the final buoy and the exit. That same girl's feet were still in sight and I thought I really should try to pass her. She didn't seem to be making a surge for the finish, so I went for it and pulled ahead with just a 100 or so yards to go. Hey, I have to take small victories where I can.

Into T1, yank off the wet suit, stuff my sunglasses and helmet on my head and take off. My shoes were attached to my bike, and I'd put them on while on the move. In and out in no time.

Off on the bike, which to be honest, had more rolling hills than I remembered. And since I was mostly cruising along close to the 20 mph range, a *lot* more tailwind than I had hoped for. Not that I don't love a good tailwind. It's the head wind I have a problem with. The one that smacked me in the face just after the turnaround. The turnaround where I followed a couple of folks pretty closely thru the u-turn and the police officer yelled out to me "Don't let them get away! Go get those guys!" That gave me a good laugh. About the only laugh on the way back. The headwind and rollers started wearing on my legs and my attitude. The last straw with the attitude was when a woman passed me (no not that), immediately followed by another woman. Okay, not a big deal, she's probably trying to pass that first woman. Um, yeah. No. She was drafting. As she continued to draft for a bit, I yelled out "How long are you going to draft off her?!?!?" But she didn't respond. Now, I know a lot of first time triathletes do this race, but she was wearing an aero helmet, which leads me to believe this isn't her first time around the block. I let myself steam about it for a few minutes but was able to talk myself out of wasting the energy any longer than that. The other issue of concern on the bike was my front tire. It had this weird sort of bulge happening. I had asked the guys at the shop about it and they convinced me it wasn't a big deal, and while I was still a little freaked out about it, I made it through the entire bike without mechanical incident. Always a win in my book. Back into the park and out of the wind (finally!) for the last stretch of riding. Out of my shoes and into T2.

Throw the bicycle up onto the rack, swap helmet for hat, stuff on my socks and run shoes, grab my race belt and gel and head out.

I had read a couple of reviews about the run course, and mapped it out on mapmyrun.com so I thought I had some idea of what was ahead. But the course ended up being a bit hillier than I expected. Mapmyrun had the total elevation change at under 50 feet. Flat. But the actual route has about 400 feet. Not a huge amount, but enough to feel those last couple of rollers in the legs for sure. There is next to no shade, and even at the early hour it was a bit toasty out there. There are also a couple of miles that are run on single track (or is it double track if it's wide enough for 2 people?!?!). I love running on single track. But as a bit of a klutz, the uneven terrain does require me to pay attention and place my feet rather than just running along. At a couple of points along the course I started getting a little lightheaded and a little chilly. Dehydration. So even though I had been practicing drinking only water on my long runs, I added in some sports drink at the last two aid stations. It seemed to help a bit, but in the last two miles, my legs were *done*, and my pace slowed. I was so glad to see the finish line.

And even better was that I beat my time goal by just a hair under five minutes, which also gave me over a six minute PR for an olympic distance race. Sweet.

After I downed a few glasses of water and electrolyte I went and floated around in the lake for a bit. It felt so good on my tired legs. I could feel my right hamstring wanting to act up so I made sure to do a fair amount of stretching too before the guys made it back to pick me up.

Oh! Timing! So here's how it seemed to work. There was a number (like a tiny bib number) that I had to safety pin to my wetsuit pull string. As I exited the water, a volunteer grabbed the number. So that's the swim timing. There were also volunteers at each entrance/exit in transition that would yell out bib numbers to another volunteer who would record them. Then the run, of course, was timed from exit of T2 to the finish.

A few lessons learned from this race:

I need to either make sure to bring my aero drink bottle on the bike, or learn to drink from my bottles in the cages *while* aero. I didn't want to get up out of my aero bars in the headwind on the way back and so came in off the bike under hydrated.
The aid stations on the run may be a bit far apart for me to be able to rely solely on them during the half iron. Then again, maybe if I come in off the bike better hydrated it will work. My last long run was fueled on 'schedule' with the posted aid stations for the half iron and seemed to work out ok.
If something seems "off" about your bike....get it checked or change it prior to the race. That tire was on my mind more than I needed it to be on the bike. And guess what...in a case of honestly *awesome* timing, it was flat when I rolled it back to the car after the race. I'll take the tire in and have it checked, but will most likely just replace it before the half iron.
Don't stress over the stuff you can't control. Yes, I let myself get worked up briefly over the cheater, but I actually kept it together pretty well battling the wind. I just need to remember this for the half iron, when the last long section (15-ish miles maybe?) will be on that same road back towards the park and into the wind.
"Hand" tallied race results take *forever*. I made the guys wait around until I could get my official finishing time but I almost gave up.

Overall it was a good race. And with just one more tri this year, I'd venture to say it's been quite a good season of racing!

Coming up this week.....a swim clinic on Friday! Based on this quote from the registration: "Are you tired of working so hard to swim so slow? How would you like to swim FASTER with less effort? This clinic is just what you need!" I'm expecting big things!

Cheers.

Free stuff

2010-08-05T12:34:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let you know, there's a great give away for a Garmin 310xt going on now thru 12Aug.

Yep, a 310xt! Nice!

Big week

2010-08-01T20:44:00.001-07:00

Today finished out my 2nd biggest week of training prior to the 1/2 IM in September. Whew.

Yesterday I drove out to the site of the race to check out the bike course. Jeff was worried about me heading out there by myself, so he decided to tag along.....no, not to bike with me, although I tried to get him to ride along. First he was going to fish in the lake while I made the rounds. He ran out of time to pull his gear together, so as an alternative I found a golf course he could play that was right on the bike course. It meant I'd be starting at about mile 46 of the 56 mile course, but no problem. It's the same loop. I ended up with about 53 miles, so the only part I missed was the section out of and back into the park. On the drive back home, we went into the park to take a look around.

Nuclear power plant (decommissioned) that the lake was created for.

View for the majority of the ride. Scorched earth. Guess the 95 degree temp at the end of my ride shouldn't have been a surprise, eh?

View of the lake from the road around the park.

Traditional post long ride reward.

The quick and dirty of the ride:

*narrow* roads....while this hopefully won't be a problem on race day, the 6" of shoulder left me feeling a little vulnerable out there. Luckily there wasn't *too* much traffic and the parts where there was more traffic had a nice wide shoulder.
*crappy* roads....the nicely paved sections were few and far between, but don't get me wrong my arse was more than happy for those sections. Vast portions of the ride were just terribly bumpy, or rocky with gravel, or both.
both the above had me riding in my aero bars a lot less than I would have liked.
hills....while I seem to remember this course being billed as mostly flat, there were quite a few hills on the ride. Almost entirely towards the end. But at least now I know a bit about what to expect come race day. (mile 10-ish below is the actual 'start' point for the half iron race)

wind....the first and last sections of the ride are on a road that heads into the wind. One of the highlights of the park is supposed to be wind surfing, so again...shouldn't be a surprise. Hopefully the wind won't really kick up until later in the day.
heat....it wasn't too terrible on the bike, but I really noticed it on the uphills, when my speed dropped off and I was working harder. The run is definitely going to be a challenge.

I head back out there this weekend for an olympic distance race. The bike course is an out and back on the flatter section of the half iron route. The run is the same course, one loop instead of the two that I'll be doing next month. So, a small preview of what I can expect for the half iron. Only two tris left in the year! Definitely time to go for broke. :)

Brain dump

2010-07-28T09:58:00.001-07:00

A collection of completely unrelated thoughts

I drive by a chocolate factory on my way into work. The delicious smell is bad enough most days, but pure torture when I've been to swim before work and am starving.
Speaking of starving...I've been trying to clean up my diet in order to get to 'racing weight' before the half iron in September. But with the increase in training comes an increase in hunger and I haven't been very successful. I mostly want to eat whatever I can see.
The entire month of July has been unseasonably cool here. One of the news stations said it's been the coolest July on record. Fabulous for doing workouts, but not so great for getting ready to race in the heat.
This week the personal trainer had us workout on a gravity system . A whole new method of torture. Ouch.
My hip seems to be mostly healed up (knock on wood) with just some residual tightness in the hamstring. No pain after long runs, up to 9 miles so far, so that's a good thing.
I'm considering an investment in race wheels. Okay, not so much an investment as a 'just for fun because I want them' kind of purchase. Stimulating the economy and all. They'll be my birthday present this year for the "big" day.
I've been craving diet Pepsi lately. Not so many years ago I was a "one a day" drinker. I've virtually eliminated it now, but as my friend Jolynn tells me: "Your addiction was just in remission." Hmm, seems sad but true. So far I've only caved once. I think my body is needing the caffeine right now. Okay, maybe not needing, but wanting. Need....want....same thing, no?
Jeff and I are starting to feel the need (again, need/want) for a vacation. We usually plan something for the fall, but it looks like we're both going to be super busy at work this fall, so will probably put it off until spring. Maybe Belize.....ooooooh, whale shark diving. Yes please! Research is needed.
A few times on our evening dog walk we've seen the most adorable Doberman puppy at the park. Which prompted me to check out the NorCal Doberman rescue group. You know...just to look. And although they have some great looking/sounding dogs and I'm tempted....I don't think it's fair to bring a new dog into the house right now. Bam is pretty satisfied with not sharing it seems to me.
I'm planning to drive out to the race site of both my next races this weekend for my long ride/short run. It seems like a bit of a waste to drive more than I'll be riding (2 hour drive each way, 3:30 workout), but I think the experience of having seen the race course is worth it.
A week from Sunday is my second to last tri of the season. It's been a great year so far, so I'm hoping to finish up the year in the style to which I've become accustomed.
I plopped another 10k into my schedule in October. Why not?
The offices on either side of mine are empty. People like to go into them to have 'private' conversations. I should probably tell them that when they face my office and talk I can hear everything they're saying. Yeah, I probably *should*.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to find some Diet Pepsi and a snack before I wither away. *snort*

Five years

2010-07-20T06:00:00.000-07:00

Five years ago, in February, my uncle was diagnosed with leukemia.

One day, more out of a sense of helplessness than anything, I signed up with Team in Training to run the Nike Women's Marathon.

In something of a miracle (or so I understand), my aunt was about as close to a perfect match as you can get for a transplant. I had a vision in my head, naive to be sure, of my uncle recovering from the transplant and being at the finish line when I crossed it in San Francisco in October.

Five years ago today I received a call from my grandmother telling me that my uncle had passed away. Admittedly I'm fuzzy on the details. Once I heard the first part, everything else was just.......noise. I think that there were complications from his treatment, either radiation or chemo, that damaged his bone marrow in such a way that the transplant couldn't take. And he just couldn't recover.

To this day, I think I can very safely say, we all miss him. We're a small family and he was a very large personality in that family....extremely intelligent with a fabulous sense of humor and wit.

Everything I've accomplished in the last five years, athletically at a minimum, can be pinpointed back to that day five years ago. A couch potato signing up for that first marathon with TNT, determined to finish. And now I've done everything from 5ks to marathons. Sprint tris to Ironman, including Kona.

And while I've been known to say that I wouldn't trade my Kona experience for anything....well......let's just say I wish he was still here.

I'll have to make do with my hope that he would have been proud of what we've accomplished. Because it's not just me. Many of my family, my brother, my aunt, my cousins, and friends of ours.......we've all pushed ourselves to feats that we might not have were it not for the inspiration of my uncle's memory. So today I look back with sadness, but also with gratitude, for I can truly say that my uncle helped make me the person I am today.

Chivalry

2010-07-05T23:14:00.000-07:00

This was the week where my workouts started to get a bit longer. Over an hour of running at a stretch, a bit longer swims, and on Independence Day I celebrated with a 3 hour brick (2.5 hours riding, .5 running).

Seeing that 3 hour brick on my schedule, I pulled out my long ride/run nutrition plan that Heather had put together for me last year for Kona. I had forgotten just how much planning there was involved in this. And totally forgot how I was able to carry enough water/sports drink on my bike to meet my 'sweat challenging' needs. I decided that I may be able to tone down the fluids a little since I planned to hit the road before it warmed up too much. Yeah, global fail there. I seemed to also have forgotten just how long it takes to get all the various bottles, computers, etc loaded on the bike and get ready to roll. In retrospect it's probably a good thing that I couldn't work out plans with any of my go-to riding partners since I was so late getting moving. It was about 9:30 before I actually pushed 'start' on my Garmin and hit the road.

It was a beautiful day out there and I felt great just pedaling along. I headed out Niles Canyon, which didn't have too much traffic, probably due to the holiday. Or maybe people were at church. Either way, I was glad. That curvy, sometimes too narrow, road tends to make me a bit nervous when there are a lot of cars. Most people are pretty aware and courteous, but several times I feel like I've been 'buzzed'. Kept going out towards Calaveras, planning to turn around before I hit the real hills. I had just turned around to head back for a loop through Pleasanton when I felt something a little off with my bike. Sure enough, a not quite flat, but seriously deflated rear tire. Pull out the spare tube, CO2, and pull off the rear wheel.

The Calaveras Reservoir area is a hot spot for cyclists here. So while I was riding on my own, there were lots of other cyclists out there on pretty much all the roads I was traveling. I'm not sure how long it took me to change that tire, probably longer than it should have, but I wasn't really hurrying either. So it was no surprise that probably 6 groups of cyclists passed by while I was standing there changing my tire. What *did* surprise me was that the majority of them made sure I had everything I needed and that I was okay. Some of them yelling as they went by, some actually stopping to make sure. It was nice. My first thought was, "Wow, chivalry isn't dead after all." It didn't occur to me until much later on the ride that perhaps it was because I looked like I had *no* idea what I was doing and really needed help. Either way I managed to change that tire all on my own and got back on the road to finish up my brick. The next hour and a half passed by uneventfully for the most part. I took in all my fluids, nutrition, and even remembered my salt sticks this time.

Pulled into my driveway, hopped off the bike.....and realized my T2 was going to be a bit long. I forgot to put all my running stuff out. So I scurried around gathering stuff while Bam looked at me like I was crazy. And I finally headed out for a short half hour run....and wow, it was toasty. Even though weather.com said it was only 78 when I finished up, it sure seemed warmer. If my half iron is 10 degrees (or more!) warmer than that, I think I'm in trouble.

I finished up and grabbed my recovery drink (chocolate milk mixed with almond milk) and sat down to figure out my fluid balance. I had remembered to weigh myself pre-brick, weighed myself post-brick, and the difference was......down 1.5 pounds. Yikes. I guess I shouldn't have tried to dial down my fluid intake from my IM plan after all. *sigh* I plugged the numbers into the sweat rate calculator Coach Liz sent me and sure enough......if I had taken the amount called for in the plan, I should have been right on the numbers. Something to work on for sure. It does get challenging trying to figure out how to carry that much water around on the bike tho. But it's good to find out now what I'll need on race day and get my body used to taking it in.

Just over 8 weeks until my big race of the season! And coming up this weekend....10k time. And I signed Jeff up for the 5k. Hopefully he won't have to wait around too long for me to finish. Especially since I'm hoping for a new PR.....even with the hills. Fast feet, fast feet, fast feet!

Trek Women's Tri

2010-06-27T20:46:00.000-07:00

Is it just me or does she look less than thrilled?

I decided, kind of last minute....altho not last minute enough (more on this in a bit), to sign up for the Trek Women's Tri.

A while back an email came through for a $20 discount for a new tri in the area, the Trek Women's Tri. It was only a couple weeks after one of my "A" races for the year, so I wasn't sure I was up for it. But there were some perks: Tina was doing the race, the discount, and a tech t for starters. I got the 'ok' from coach to race it altho was informed that it would be one of those races I'd train thru....so no taper going into it. Okay, no problem, I'll just race it to race it and see what happens. Yeah, cuz we all know that I'm not competitive *at all* and could do a race just to have fun. Uh huh, yep, that sure *sounds* like me. (exaggerated eye roll inserted here)

Time goes by, I'm all signed up, looking forward to a short sprint, when some troubling information starts to circulate. First is the news that Trek was offering $1 registration for this race. Uhhhh, okay. So instead of being rewarded for signing up early, I just got penalized to the tune of $64. Niiiiiiice. Second was the lack of course information...or any race information at all. Until about a week before the race when I started getting something practically every day from them. Third was the 'approximate' distances shown for the course, as well as changing distances. I'm pretty sure the race was set up as a 400 yd swim, 12 mile bike, 3.1 mile run. But it somehow, for *some* reason, turned into an 'all distances approximate' 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike, 3 mile run. Huh. That's a new one.....'all distances approximate.' Okay, whatever, it has to be close to those distances right? Yeah, you'd think.

Just a few more pet peeves about this race. And no, I don't think I'll be doing it again, but you never know.

Lack of buoys on the swim course. For what was supposed to be a half mile swim (okay, okay, approximately), there were 2 buoys. Yes, 2. One at each turn of the rectangular shaped swim course. Oh, and the swim start was directly into the sun. So for about 1/4 of the swim it was the blind leading the blind. Straight into the sun, straining for any kind of buoy sighting.
Poor transition set up. The racks were set up by wave and there was a distinct advantage to being in an early wave. The swim in was thru the back of transition, but the bike out, bike in, and run out were all at the front. I was somewhere midway thru, but those poor ladies at the back had to run the entire length of transition 3 times. Not exactly fair.
I get the 'girl power' thing. Seriously, I do. I'm the one who used to be all pinked out on the bike, remember?!?! But enough already. I don't need a cheerleader at the start of the swim telling me how I'm an 'awesome' swimmer, and when I get to the bike that I'll be an 'awesome' cyclist, 'awesome' runner, 'awesome' triathlete. Awesome, awesome, awesome. And then instruct me to hug, double high five, whatever, the people around me while announcing "You go girlfriend!". Please. A touch more testosterone at races may not be a bad thing.

And yes, I get that I am most likely not Trek's target audience with this race. Altho...wait a minute...it's the Trek WOMEN's triathlon, so yes, yes, I guess I *would* be the target for this race. But you know what I mean. I think they're trying to make the race as woman-beginner-triathlete friendly as possible but it was a bit overdone.

Actual performance on the race? A decent, not stellar effort. 4th/50 in my age group. 24/268 overall. Yes, I will take that. I had some struggles on the run, definitely not putting out the best effort there. Each race though, I learn how to push myself a little more. Push in different ways. Gain experience, knowledge, and confidence.

You may remember the goal was to 'blow up' on the bike. And according to the race results, I hit 23+ mph on the bike split. So you'd think I'd have accomplished that goal, no? Sadly, no. I knew something was off. There's no *way* I rode that fast for 12 miles. And as it turns out, I didn't. I rode for just under 10 miles. Uh huh, that 'approximate' bike distance was more than 2 miles short. Which still makes for my fastest bike split yet, but there's obviously work left to do. And if there wasn't work left to do why would I still be doing this? It's the challenge of pushing myself that makes it hard, makes it fun, makes it worth investing the time and effort. You go out there, you try your best, and once in a while.....it all comes together for a great race. That's the frosting.

From here we move on to some longer stuff. Half Iron race is on the horizon, so start going long. Gradually adding time and distance to the swimming and biking and running. Start it off with an Independence Day brick. What better way to celebrate than a 2.5 hour bike ride followed by a 30 minute run?!? Hmmm....I need to start planning some long ride routes......

But next up....10k in two weeks. My last 10k was in September of 2008, so here's hoping for a new PR! May be tough, as its not a flat course, but I'll give it my all. And maybe I'll get some frosting. :)

Back to work

2010-06-20T21:33:00.000-07:00

It seems like it's been a long time since I've had a big workout week.

I had a fairly light week going into camp, then a rest week after camp. Then I got sick and had pretty much a no workout week, although it was followed by a "race". And this week was a transition week, so a bit easier too. I feel like I've lost a lot of ground, and need to get myself back in shape. And yes, I know that it's necessary to take some down time once in a while. It just seems like I've piled up a lot of down time all at once, not all intentionally, but still. Things are about to change.

I was looking through my workouts in Training Peaks the other day and saw this "....with the Half Iron on the horizon.....". Yikes. I guess it really *is* on the horizon, about 2-1/2 months out. And so my long rides and long runs will start to ramp up. I'm hoping to be able to make the long drive out to the race site and do at least a couple of long rides on the course. If not though, I'll at least get a course preview at the Olympic race I'm doing there in August. My biggest worry about the event will be the heat. I'll start trying to get my body used to it, doing my easier workouts during the middle of the day when I can. Of course, we'd actually have to get some summer weather for that to work. So far, altho granted tomorrow is just the first day of summer, we've had a few warm days here and there, but not a whole lot of them.

On the injury front....the hip is about.....98%. It talks to me a little bit after running, but I see the PT/bike guy on Thursday, so hopefully he can check my bike fit and take a quick check of the hip to make sure everything is still where it should be. The number one goal tho, is to make sure the bike is fit properly.

A sprint race on tap for this weekend. Goal....really push the bike. Show myself that I can. And that *no* my head won't actually explode......I hope.

In non-sports news.....we celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary this week. Unlike our 10th, where we took a month's vacation to some exotic locales, we didn't do much of anything for this one. Dinner out, flowers, the standard. I guess I could say I got myself the new bike frame for "our" anniversary present. :)

Also this week....5 years since my father was killed in an accident with a drunk driver, on Father's Day. It's weird. I can't say that I "miss" him, because we hadn't really been a part of each others lives for many years. But especially today, I miss the opportunities we might have had to get acquainted again. He wasn't the best father, but he was my father, flaws and all. It's quite possible that even if we had managed to reconnect that it wouldn't have worked out, but the regret is in not being able to find out. PSA for the day.....don't wait until it's too late. Give it a try, and then even if it doesn't work, at least you'll know.

And to leave things on a lighter note.....Happy first day of summer....here's to warmer weather!

SV Olympic Tri

2010-06-13T21:19:00.000-07:00

The short story: While it was over a 9 minute PR from my last run of this course, it really wasn't my best effort. And as such is a bit of a hollow 'victory'.

The very long version.

Let's start with my bike. My frame was damaged on the way to tri camp last month and I was in Illinois for a week after that. As soon as the shop opened the day after I got home, I was at my local bike shop (*BEST* guys *ever*!). Alan confirmed that altho I probably *could* ride it (and had for the last week), the inherent strength of carbon is dependent upon the fibers being intact. The damage was on the down tube and if I hit a bump hard there was a possibility of it failing. Since I was racing the next weekend, Alan said he'd work on getting me a new frame from Specialized as soon as possible. Unfortunately the new frame didn't come in until Thursday. But Alan really came through and at 9:00 Friday night I went to pick up my "new" ride. Some slight changes in the geometry of the frame, but he did his best to put everything back with the right overall dimensions (seat the same height from the crank, etc). I took the new Ruby out for a spin on Saturday as part of my pre-race brick and felt pretty comfortable.

Really bad, blurry pic of frame damage

"New" Ruby ready to roll

Oh, and amongst my stressing about the bike, I was also sick last week. Yes, again. No, the doctor has *no* idea why. All my blood tests came back normal. Evidently I'm just a weakling in the immunity department.

Saturday night, in some spectacularly bad planning on my part, we headed out to see Sting in concert. When I bought the tickets I completely spaced the dates and didn't realize it was the night before my race. I considered bailing, but decided that wouldn't really be fair to my other half. And to be honest, having already spent the money, I would balk at just letting the tickets go to waste. I tried not to complain too much about being out late or hint too much about leaving early. I'm pretty sure I failed miserably at both. We did leave the concert before the end, but being an hour drive from home, I still only got about 4-1/2 hours of sleep Saturday night.

I was already a bit concerned about my preparedness going into this race. Having been sick, I was instructed to rest all week, so didn't have any workouts to see how things were feeling. Add to that the hip problem and I really hadn't done much running in about 3 weeks. And I definitely knew I was off kilter when I was all suited up for the race and didn't have a shred of nervousness. It was more a sense of "let's just get on with it". Not to say I wasn't excited. I felt ready to go and just wanted to get moving. But the lack of nerves was unnerving.

I felt good during the swim, but probably lolly gagged a bit. In retrospect I think I felt too comfortable in the water, which tells me I wasn't pushing hard enough. I did come out of the water 10/54, but probably could have pushed a bit more.

The new bike felt good, but after looking at the power data, it's obvious I wasn't pushing as hard as I should have been. The mental block with my bike seems to continue. What am I afraid of? I just don't know. I can push myself on the bike tests, but when I get out on the course, I pull back. I told coach that I think I'm afraid to blow up. Her response (priceless, I think) "What happens if you blow up. Do you lose a wheel? Does your head explode? FIND OUT." Given the data from my testing, and the data from racing, it's pretty obvious I'm not giving it my all out there. And I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who can figure out why and do something about it. So although my Olympic in August is supposed to be a "B" race, it may turn into an "A" race. Or at least the bike portion. I need a break thru moment on the bike and only I can take myself there.

The run was a struggle. This was the first hot weather weekend we've had all year, and it got hot with a vengeance and there was very little shade to be had on course. I started off too hard and wilted as the run went on. I would have sworn the last mile was the longest of my life. It was one of those days when I thought to myself, "This is supposed to be fun, right? I am not having fun." And of course as soon as I finished and downed some cold water and had a fabulous on-site, post race massage, I started thinking out to my next race. Funny how quickly the brain packs up the bad stuff into a little box.

Another line of thought post race was how stupid it was to sign up for a half iron race in hot country in September. Maybe that was a *serious* mistake. I looked up the historical temps. 88 on the day of the race is the historical average high. Ouch. But then again, so what. Everyone will be facing the same conditions, and at least I can work towards prepping my body for the heat. Let's just look at it as another challenge shall we? The things I liked about the race when I signed up still hold. It's a small, "local" race. Lake swim, with a fairly flat bike course. Run on packed dirt fire roads instead of pavement. I need to just quit making excuses before I've even started and get to training.

Okay, enough rambling of jumbled thoughts from my tired brain. Bottom line(s): I continue to learn thru my experiences on the course. And my number one goal is to blow up on the bike. Trek sprint tri is next up....let's see if I can get my head to explode.

Happy Camper

2010-06-09T22:10:00.000-07:00

Finally...my *seriously* overdue tri camp report!

(all pics courtesy of Molly, who was the camp photographer....since no one else had a camera. :)

For us west-coasters, camp started early Friday morning. I met Molly at the airport, where we were on the same early morning flight to Chicago. The flight went well, and went by quickly enough. The drive out of Chicago to the hotel....not so much. Lots of traffic, but probably to be expected for a holiday weekend Friday afternoon. We just had time to check in, dump our luggage, and head over to Jen's house for dinner. Jen and Liz were the co-coaches for the camp and hosted all of the campers for dinner at Jen's to get acquainted and go over the weekend schedule. The weekend would be packed for sure. Soon enough we headed back to the hotel, where we still had to gather stuff for the next day and put our bikes back together from travel. My only downer for the weekend was when I found that my bike had been dinged during the trip. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to ride, as I'd heard that carbon can be quite fragile once damaged. I figured I could have Liz and/or Jen take a look in the morning and we were off to bed. At about 8:00 "my" time. Not too much sleep going on there. Especially until the party in the pool (which was directly below our room) ended.

Saturday morning came *way* too soon, but I was excited to get moving. First on tap was an open water swim and clinic. Jen lead half the group on a swim around a lovely lake, which was almost too warm for my full wet suit. I started wishing I'd brought my sleeveless one instead.

Lake in the Hills

Liz explaining open waters starts, techniques, strategies

Jen explaining the swim plan

Me and Molly

The swim was great, and it was good to practice some beach starts, deep water starts and drafting. Soon enough it was time for breakfast and then a long ride. In fact, it was going to be my longest ride since Iron training last year.

Breakfast...much needed fuel for the upcoming ride

After breakfast, everyone got their bikes and themselves ready to head out. I had Jen take a look at my bike, and although she confessed it wasn't her area of expertise, "we" determined that I'd probably be okay to ride, but could call Liz to SAG me if anything felt off. Yeah, being 8 months pregnant, Liz was on SAG duty.

Liz at 8 months...still weighs less than me *sigh* :)

It was warming up nicely by the time we were ready to roll. We broke up into three groups, and I was in the middle group. It was a great ride heading out, with farm land making up the scenery. Not too many cars, and just a few rollers on a mostly flat route.

Evidently feeling good on the ride

It was great to just ride along, drafting some, being drafted off some, and chatting away with the other ladies. And before I knew it we hit the water stop where Liz had parked with snacks, water, gatorade, etc. Some of the group didn't want to cover quite as much ground as others, and so Liz sent Molly and I off to get "at least 60 miles in". Yikes....definitely my longest ride to date. We hit 30 miles and I was still feeling good....until we flipped around. Funny...I didn't notice that we had *that* much of a tailwind heading out. Yep, back home all the way into the wind. I'm not gonna' lie...it was a slog and I wasn't smiling as much nor was I nearly so chatty. And I *may* have been swearing under my breath. Especially when we got to the point where we were about 10 miles out, I was feeling lightheaded, dehydrated, and in general just fried. And it wasn't a whole lot of fun realizing that we were the last ones out there either. I definitely wasn't feeling up to a 30 minute run off the bike. Which is what I told Liz once we finally rolled in. To which she promptly responded, "Just run 10 minutes, 5 out, 5 back." Grrrr...fine. Oh, and I was to stay on the flat road since I'd been having hip issues. I have to say, that 10 minutes seemed so long. And it was more of a shuffle than a run. I was covered with salt, dehydrated, and tired. When it was done I dunked myself back into the water to cool off. Ahhhhhh. And believe it or not, we weren't done yet. There was a yoga session yet to go.

Post yoga and looking forward to dinner

After the yoga, scurry back to the hotel, shower up and head to dinner. Food. Yes, I needed food. I think the waiters were astonished at how quickly the food disappeared in front of a group of lovely ladies. More fun times chatting with the other ladies and devouring salads, bruschetta, salmon, chicken, pasta, and dessert. Mmmmm.

Refueled

Sunday didn't require *quite* as early a start, which was good news to me. I didn't sleep as well as I thought I might, given the plethora of activities covered over the day, so the alarm still came a little too early. Up and at it again tho. We were heading to the pool for a swim workout and stroke analysis. This would be followed by run hills and drills. Followed by strength work, followed by an optional ride. Want to guess how many people opted in to the ride? :)

Liz giving stroke analysis and instruction

Me and Kristin in the toasty pool

I volunteered to be first for stroke analysis and Liz had me do some warm up laps, then started the camera rolling. In a sad, but reassuring way, the same issues she pointed out were what the instructor from my swim lesson a few weeks ago had identified. Sad, because I obviously haven't fixed anything, but reassuring in the fact that I don't have any additional problems to work on just yet. :) After the analysis it was time to jump into the workout that Jen was leading. It didn't take too long before I realized my biggest mistake. By volunteering to be first, I only missed the warm up, while other ladies were pulled out of the workout for their analysis. So I had the pleasure of doing Jen's *entire* workout. Ouch. And the pool was toasty....indoors, of course.....but I don't think they cooled the room either. It was stifling. I think we were all glad to head out and breathe some non-chlorinated air. I wasn't glad for long though as I quickly realized there was only a smidge of shade, the day was going to be seriously warm, and we were heading out to run in it.

Waiting to head out on the run

Group pre-run sweatfest

We warmed up on a path and then hit an overpass for hill repeats. The funniest part was that Jen kept saying how the hill wouldn't really be a hill to "the California girls". It may not have been much of a hill, but the heat and humidity had me (and not just me) hiding in the shade whenever possible.

Running hills...which I surprised myself by being decent at :)

Sharing the only speck of shade around

After Jen gave us some instruction on how to attack the hills, both up and down, we did repeats and then headed back along the trail to do drills. Again, I surprised myself by tackling the drills quite well. Probably because Liz has made me do them before, so I knew what to expect. Finally it was time for lunch. Yes, the theme was workout, workout, workout, eat, eat, eat, workout some more. After lunch we drove to a park for strength workouts. Split into two groups, one group worked with Kate on TRX and one group worked with Liz on bosu/stability ball/medicine ball strength work. A lot of core here!

Showing off my one legged squats on the bosu....hats of to Elena, my strength trainer

TRX workout with Kate, getting the scoop before the torture

And finally it was time to wrap up the day. The offer was made for a nice, easy recovery ride, but I think most people were pretty wiped by this point. Liz offered to have her athletes come over for dinner and an easy ride. Sounded good to us, so we headed back to the hotel (getting waylaid by a parade on the way), packed up some clean clothes for after the ride and headed to Liz's. She lives very close to a beautiful arboretum, almost 2000 acres I think she said, with a nice paved path that winds through. It was a very easy, very pretty ride with coach! Probably the only time I could hang with Liz on a ride, I took advantage to chat with her a bit. After the ride, back to Liz's house for showers and a fabulous dinner that her husband, Chris, had whipped up. Steak (yum, oh yum!), veggies, bread and cheese, and of course dessert...cupcakes, cookies, and brownies, oh my!

All cleaned up and ready to eat....again

The last day of camp, Monday, was the running of the Elgin Fox Trot 5k (although some brave campers did the 10 miler). I started off thinking I might 'race' this, but within the first half mile or so, my legs basically just said "no thanks." So it was a nice moderately paced recovery run. Molly and I raced back to the hotel to get cleaned up and made it back to the race site just in time for camp wrap up. Which wrapped up just in time, as a thunderstorm rolled in. We *just* made it to the car when the rain started coming down.

So all in all, camp was a blast. It was great getting some feedback, having some hard workouts, and basically just hanging out with a great group of ladies. I'd definitely do it again! (But let's leave out the bike damage next time, shall we?!? More on this in another post....this one is long enough already!)

Hi ho, Hi ho

2010-05-26T22:10:00.000-07:00

it's off to camp I go....

I leave for tri-camp Friday morning. Have I packed? Um, that would be a resounding "no". I do have a list and I did start a pile for things I need to pack. But as yet it's a *very* small pile....and no, that doesn't mean I don't need to take a lot of stuff. In all I'm staying in Illinois for a week so I need quite a bit of stuff. I'm trying to learn from past trips though and take only the bare essentials. Somehow that just never seems to work out. I typically end up with an over-packed suitcase and then come home with a bunch of clothes that were never worn. But I have quite a few workouts to get thru, and it's going to be toasty, and I'm....well.....okay, a sweater. Yes, it's true. When I did weights one day after running, my trainer wondered if I had just gotten out of the shower. Yeah, I sweat like *that*. So lots of workout clothes will be required.

The other days that I'm there, I'll be working from my brother's house and I'm just tossing in shorts and t-shirts. We don't do video conferencing at work, so technically I could stay in my PJs all day. But that would probably not set a good example for my nieces.

On the 'injury' front, I had another PT session this morning. It wasn't with my usual guy, as he is *impossible* to get an appointment with on short notice, but one of his partners. She's pretty good, but a little less...aggressive. The look on her face was priceless when she asked when my next event was and I told her I was leaving for a 3 day camp on Friday. At this point, I'd say it's somewhere between 85 and 90%. Not 'normal', but not seriously sore like it was. I have an easy run on my schedule for tomorrow, the first run I'll have done in more than a week. I'm a little anxious about that. I did some treadmill hill walking on Monday, and it was a bit tight afterward. And with camp, topped off by a 5k on Monday, and my first "A" tri of the season a mere two weeks away....yeah, anxious is a good word. One day at a time. That's a good motto, eh?

And so, I'm off.....to finish up at work tomorrow (early I hope).....get packed up....and to board an early, early flight on Friday to Chi-town! Hmm...seems like I was just there. Oh, that's right, I *was*. The wedding two weeks ago where I managed to damage myself....guess I'm coming full circle. Wish me luck. I hope I survive the weekend. If I can do this much damage at a wedding, it's hard to say how much I can do at a tri camp. Happy long weekend!

Pity party

2010-05-20T10:25:00.000-07:00

For one? Right over here.

I haven't had any more bouts of flu/cold-like symptoms since I last posted (ages ago, it seems). So that's good news. And I was really starting to feel better. Not just physically, but I seemed to be getting my positive energy back, despite work being crazy busy. And when I say crazy busy I don't mean *extremely* busy, I mean busy in a crazy, "are you kidding me", do everything three times just for kicks and giggles kind of way. "Oh, one more data point came in, can we (read: you) rerun all the programs?" Yeah, super fun. But I digress.

So, workouts felt like they were starting to come back around and build some momentum. I even had a swim lesson with (another) new instructor. I really liked the last one, but evidently she's not teaching at "my" pool anymore. So I had a 1/2 hour lesson with the new instructor just to see if I was making any progress towards my stroke changes. Turns out the she has had shoulder problems like mine. And after watching me swim a bit said she was not surprised that I had problems, but was more surprised that I didn't have problems with *both* shoulders. A few tweaks to my hand entry and my pull would be required. Not an easy task when the muscles have been memorizing the current pattern for quite a while. But I'm working on it. Slowly but surely I'll get it there.

Although I had been frustrated of late with my biking progress (or perceived lack thereof), I think it may have more to do with my mentality than physicality. Just like building up the biking muscles, I need to work my biking brain too. When it starts to get *really* tough on the bike my legs say STOP and my brain hasn't figured out how to override them. I feel like I'm making a little progress here, but it's slow going.

The run. This is where I feel like I've made some significant progress so far this year. I had another 5k a little over a week ago. And despite coming at the end of a 3 week build in training, I *just* missed a PR. Which gives me the thought that my goal is within reach if I had rested legs and a good day......a flat course couldn't hurt either.

Just prior to that 5k I started to feel some small twinges in my right hip. Nothing major, just something a little off. It didn't bother me during the 5k though, and seemed to be loosening up, so I thought no more of it. Until a little too much dancing, or maybe too much time in heels, or both, at a wedding last weekend had me waking up Sunday with seriously tight, sore calves and a right hip that smacked me every time I moved. Or touched it. Or tried to lay on the right side. On Monday it was feeling a bit better. I decided to run and although it felt a little achy, it wasn't too bad. After the run I spun my legs out on my bike and then plopped myself in a tub full of cold water. And then dumped in ice. And sat there until my toes were about frozen. On Tuesday I woke up and thought, "Wow, I probably shouldn't have run on that hip."

Luckily I had an appointment already scheduled for today with my PT. Again with the "ugh" and "eww" as he watched my gait and poked and prodded my sore hip. An uncomfortable hour later I had some relief, although not total, some homework and 2 instructions. 1) Come back early next week and 2) no running. I had gone to the appointment dressed in my running gear and had planned to hit a nice trail by work after my appointment. Sooo, I guess *not* then. I clarified...."No running today, or ????" Then I get "the look". No running until at least after my next appointment. A small bit of good news is that he thinks he can get me back to 'normal' after the next visit. But I really need to work on changing my posture and gait. Again...easier said than done. Especially when the body alignment he is looking for feels totally unnatural to me. My head says "that can't possibly be right". More hard work to change years of ingrained muscle memory.

On the one hand...it could be worse, right? And if I can get things fixed now, I could hopefully prevent more problems in the future. On the other hand, my first "A" race of the year is in just over 3 weeks. And I have camp a week from Saturday. This is *no* time to be injured. I will try to maintain some positivity. There are much worse things that not being able to run for a few days. *Much* worse. It's just that as soon as I hear 'You can't' or 'You shouldn't' then I want to do that thing even more. I even started thinking...I could just go for a short run after work. I'm feeling a bit better now. Yeah, I'm just that way. But I will do my best to be a good patient. And hope that I can be right as rain before next weekend. Keep your fingers crossed for me, would ya?

Sick and tired

2010-05-02T22:14:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted in a while, because, well, there hasn't been any real news to post about. I've been a in a bit of a blue zone actually.

I'll try some bullet points on for size this go round.

I have been sick once a week for the last 4 weeks. The latest has been the 'worst', lasting the longest, although at least I didn't have a fever this time. Symptoms: fever, body ache/fatigue, sniffles, stuffy nose, sore throat. Now mix and match for anywhere from 36-72 hours a week for four weeks. Yeah, super fun. Yes, I *have* been to the doctor. No, *of course*, he didn't have a solution. I did have blood work drawn, but my follow up appointment is not for a couple weeks. Spec.tac.ular.
Due to above, most likely, I feel like training has been...well....less than stellar. There have been some good moments, but there have been more than my fair share of crappy moments.
And as training has felt less than stellar, and energy levels have been somewhat lower than usual, and mood has been somewhat blue, I've had some long thoughts along the lines of "what's the point of all this training anyway?!?!". Wherein I was reminded by dear husband that our lives are about experiences and for me the training and participating in events make up a large part of my experiences right now. Something along the lines of going to the grave completely out of gas, but having had a spectacular joy ride.
The bike clinic last week was fun, but could have been condensed down into about 2 hours instead of 4. The two best things I learned.....emergency stops and riding with no hands. I'm still not about to try and drink or eat while riding with no hands, but I can at least go in a straight line for quite a while. Or a mostly straight line. It's a start, but damn, it was about 1000 times easier when I was a kid.
5k this weekend, but coming at the end of a 3 week training build, not to mention (again) the cluster of illnesses, I'm not sure what to expect from my legs. Run like hell and hope for the best is my plan.
Last, but certainly not least, a huge congrats to my family who finished the Illinois 1/2 marathon this weekend! My aunt ran (her first half!), my sister-in-law walked (first half too!), my brother and cousin both ran, and even my nieces ran the kids race. Nicely done to one and all.

Quick pics

2010-04-21T16:06:00.000-07:00

A few shots from Vineman Showdown last weekend.

The always oh-so-flattering wetsuit shot.

Yes, I do amuse myself....even when my cold, numb foot doesn't want to get into it's shoe.

This must've been on an uphill....otherwise I have *no* explanation for that forward lean.

Happy to be finished! And fun that they held up the banner for little 'ol me.

Showdown

2010-04-18T20:54:00.001-07:00

The first tri of the year is now in the books. There was some good. Some bad. And some ugly.

T and I drove up mid-day and we made it there *plenty* early. Probably too early, as we had a ton of time to sit around, wander about, check things out, and generally get bored.   But it was nice to be able to get set up, check out the transition ins/outs, eat some lunch, and especially people watch. It just amazes me how super fit the majority of triathletes are, even at a small, local race. And it still intimidates me. I guess I just don't consider myself an athlete, even after all these years of participating in running events and tris. Oh, and we had to go thru body marking, of course. Where I was disappointed that they weren't marking ages on the calves. Partly because it's both humorous and inspiring when the 60+ folks fly by me, but this would have been my first "40". Ah well, maybe the next one.

Some ugly: we knew that there was a 'hill' out of transition that in previous years you had to ride up. This year you were going to have to run up, either with bike shoes on, or with bare feet, pushing your bike. We made sure to walk the hill just to see what it was like. Uh, yeah. About 1/4 mile long, a steeper almost 'hairpin' at the bottom and then gradually up, up, up to the mount/dismount line. And literally about 8 feet wide. For traffic going two ways. Now I see why there were some issues with people riding up/down. The up would be slow enough you could literally fall over, especially if some people were walking their bikes, and the down would be a screamer. And not a nicely paved path either. Yes, it was paved. About a 100 years ago. Very rough, some tree roots pushing parts up, some pot holes. Awesome. Oh, and how about a few flights of stairs out of T2? Not a fan.

Eventually the time crept closer and we listened to the instructions at the athlete's meeting, suited up, and headed to the beach for our warm up swim.

Some good: It was announced that the water was 68 degrees! Fabulous. I had been so worried about the cold, cold water. My plan had been to wear my full wetsuit, get in a good warm up, and hope for the best. Of course, I'm almost positive that they were lying about the 68. I did a quick practice swim at the small lake by my house the previous day and the underwater thermometer there had read about 63. And it felt a lot warmer than the water at the event. But at least it wasn't 55 like they had projected.

We did a nice warm up swim, where I was reminded again that salt water swimming is not my favorite thing. And before we knew it, we were heading back up the beach to line up. Yep, a beach start. It seemed like no one wanted to be at the front. We thought we were front-middle, but very few people were in front of us. I will admit there was a little fear of getting plowed under. And then.....with a countdown from 10, we were off. Run, run, dive, swim. The swim went by both much faster than I expected and at the same time seemed to take forever. I tend to have a very hard time catching my breath during a sprint swim. So I was breathing every stroke for quite a while, not finding any rhythm. And there was more contact at this race than any other race I've done, including Ironman. I had someone bumping me on both sides for almost the entire swim. And often someone grabbing at my feet with feet right in front of me. But the buoys were going by quite quickly and before I knew it I was heading for shore. I swam until my hands brushed the bottom and then popped up and started running to T1. I finished up the swim in a little over 6 minutes, which is much faster than I had anticipated. I'm thinking the course may have been short, because I am just *not* that fast.

Up into transition, strip off the wet suit, sunglasses and helmet mashed onto my head. I had decided to leave my shoes on my bike and I grabbed Ruby and took off running up the hill. And then I was jogging up the hill. And then I was trotting. And I finally made it to the top. I think it's a good thing my feet were still numbed up from the cold water. Or the adrenaline. Or both. I didn't feel the awful surface of the path too much. I did have a bit of a hard time shoving my wet, numb feet into the shoes once on the bike. But I eventually got them in there.

The one thing T and I realized (after the fact) was that we should have taken some of that spare time to drive the bike course. Then we would have had some idea what to expect. It wasn't bad really, just constantly rolling. And a bit windy. And as usual, I got passed by everyone and their great grandmother on the bike (only a *very* slight exaggeration). I have come to the conclusion that I may be the anti-bicyclist. Maybe I just don't have cycling muscles. Maybe I just need to pipe down and work a little harder. Probably the latter.

Some bad: I'm unsure how hard is HARD when it comes to the bike. I see women up out of the saddle for some hills, and wonder how they do it. I try, then plop back down into the saddle. I still have a long way to go with the bike. Participate, learn, train some more.

The bike was over, not quite as quickly as I'd have liked. I didn't make my internal goal. With about a half mile left to go, I was trying to figure out when to slide out of my shoes so I could run down the hill, leaving my shoes on the bike. Unfortunately, here again is where it would have been good to have scoped out the course. Down a hill, into a sweeping left hand turn, and then....uphill to the dismount line. Damnit. There is no sliding out of shoes on an uphill, at least for me. So I had to go into the dismount line with my shoes still on my feet. I started to run down the hill with my shoes still on and decided...it sucked. So I pulled to the side and pulled of my shoes as quickly as I could and started running down that damn hill again. I could feel my feet a little more this time and it wasn't so nice. But I could see people struggling to keep from slipping and sliding in their cycling shoes, so I'm not sure what the better choice really was.

I made it into transition and despite heading down the wrong aisle, I was able to get in and out pretty quickly. Sat down to slide on my socks and running shoes, plop down my helmet and put a hat on my head. I grabbed my race belt and took off running, fastening it as I went. And then...the stairs. &*$&*#* stairs! I have to admit, midway up I slowed to a trot. Maybe even a walk. Okay, yes a walk. But as soon as I got up to the top, I pushed off and started working on getting my legs back. I had a side stitch for about half the run, but getting to the turn around was a turning point. Figuratively and literally. I knew I only had a mile and a half to go and I tried to pick up the pace. It wasn't what I had hoped for, but was probably my best run in a sprint to date. I won't complain too much. Oh, except about that hill...again....coming in to the the final 3/4 mile. Uphill....but then a nice downhill to a flat finish line.

I realized (again) after the race that sprints are hard. I feel like I can't catch my breath for the entire race. It starts on the swim, with me gasping on every stroke. Then just when I feel like I can find a small groove, it's time to pop up and run into transition. Just when I feel my bike legs coming around...off the bike and run again. Then just warm up the run legs, and it's time to stop. Everything is HARD effort, which I guess is the definition of "sprint".   But then afterward, the high kicks in and I'm ready so sign up for another one. Go figure.

Now it's time to get back at the training. And Coach Liz says we have plenty of time to find the bike HURT before the next race. Joy.

Stats:
Swim: 6:06
T1:     1:14
Bike: 36:55 (yes, this includes running both up/down that blasted hill)
T2:      1:25
Run: 27:28
      1:13:11

More good: 4th in my AG (and not out of 4 like I suspected, but out of 20! woot!) and some of the fastest transitions out there (*the* fastest T1 thankyouverymuch). Too bad they don't give awards for transitions...I'd be golden.

Lastly....more bad: The bottoms of my feet are totally bruised from that stupid path. Ouch.

Uncertainty and clarification

2010-04-15T20:39:00.000-07:00

This weekend is my first tri of the year. .25 mile swim, 9 mile bike, 3 mile run. My first sprint in almost a year.

I have my game plan from coach, which is basically something like....1/2 a swim test followed immediately by a bike test followed immediately by a run test. Ouch. There may or may not have been a mention of 'red line' effort.

I have learned in the last few months that I can push myself on the run more than I ever thought possible. I'm *this* close to dropping my 5k time under 8 min/mile. I know, not fast for a lot of folks, but pretty damn zippy for me. My swim is middle of the pack, I'd say. And I've realized that it will take time and technique refinement to push me further up the line. Luckily the swim, as you may have noticed, is short. A mere 440. I *should* be able to hang with the pack for that long. And I'm ever *so* excited about that 55 degree water. Yikes.

The biggest uncertainty is the bike. I have been working hard to increase bike fitness so far this year. My bike tests have shown that I'm making progress, with an increase in speed and watts. But I'm not sure I've had a 'break through' yet on the bike. I'm not sure I've learned how to really push myself on the bike. I head out on a ride and think "wow, this hill/this speed/this effort level feels easier than it used to" but then some jack rabbit on a bike will still blow by me like I'm standing still. And not even be breathing hard. I know, I know, I shouldn't even be comparing myself to anyone else. But still.

I have been visualizing my race for the last few nights as I've been drifting off to sleep. I am setting a positive mental picture. Hokey? Maybe. But this weekend, I am going to do my very best to channel my inner Lance and hammer out an impressive (for me) bike split.

Now for a brief clarification. I may have misled my (two or three) readers into thinking that my body fat percentage is exceptionally low. Not so. It's just that from where I started, it's a vast improvement. And I'm now in the 'athletic' range, instead of the normal range, for a *ahem* practically 40 yr woman. I still have spots (hello rear end) that I obsessively believe could stand further reduction, but other spots (goodbye bust) that are already smaller than I'd like. So I'm at a healthy weight, a healthy body fat percentage, and I'm just going to have to figure out how to accept the bits the way they are.

And my last topic to wrap up the week....what is UP with these coldlettes I've been having?!?! Now, I'm not complaining too much. If I have to be sick, than a teeny, tiny, 48-ish hour cold is not too terrible. However this is the second week....in a row....and I'm hoping that three is *not* a charm.

Here's to a fabulous weekend and some fleet feet. Cheers.

Blame it on the rain

2010-04-11T22:28:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I saw a trail run posted on my schedule and I pinged Jo Lynn about taking me out to a new trail. I had to twist her arm pretty hard, but she penciled me in.

Well, yesterday was the day! I woke up, pulled the blinds open expecting to see some sunshine, and saw the trees waving back and forth. And a gray sky. Hm, not exactly what I had in mind, but maybe it would clear up by the time Jo Lynn got off work. No such luck. In fact there were even sprinkles coming down. Never fear! We didn't let a little thing like rain and wind stop *us*. No sir. But it didn't hurt that she sent me a message that we'd be protected pretty well the whole time.

We drove up to Oakland and the five of us (me and Jo, plus her friend Lori, plus two dogs, Boomer and Mikey) hit the trails. Bam would have loved it, and if we were hiking she would have come along for sure. Poor old girl just can't run much any more. And if I try to run her, she ends up limping and stiffened up for the rest of the day. So she stayed home and would get her exercise as soon as I got back from mine.

Protected trails. Yep, they sure were. By the likes of this! (Photos blatantly stolen from JoLynn's blog. And you'll notice I did *not* steal the one taken from behind of me running up the hill. No one needs to see that.)

There were a *few* muddy spots, but for the most part the trail was in great shape. Very beautiful run and so peaceful. Well, except for the three of us yakking away. :) I rolled my ankle once, but it seemed to bounce right back and just reminded me to watch where I was going. I do tend to be slightly less than graceful. I can tell I'm in no kind of trail running shape though, as my ankles feel like they've been stretched in ways they aren't used to. The uneven terrain just takes some getting used to. The legs feel decent tho, despite the sometimes steep hills.

On Sunday, I was *supposed* to have had my cupcake decorating class. But earlier in the week we received an invitation from a friend to head up to Infineon Raceway, and of course couldn't pass that up. So I called and postponed my cupcake class while it was still early enough to not forfeit my entry fee. Then on Sunday, in typical Murphy's Law fashion, just as we were driving off to head up there I got a message from my friend that the event was being canceled due to the rain storm. So, no track time and no cupcakes. Damn rain.

Since I still needed to find a dress for my cousins wedding next month, we hit the mall to grab some lunch and shop. First stop, Cheesecake Factory. Where there was an *amazing* looking limited edition cake staring at me from the case. A red velvet cheesecake. Layers of red velvet, layers of cheesecake, cream cheese frosting. Oh.Man. I do love me some red velvet. Luckily, or sadly, depending on how you look at it, they now post the calorie content of pretty much everything. And while I knew it had to be bad, I was shocked to see that the cake had 1500+ calories. No. Not the *whole* cake. A slice of the cake. I had to pass it up. After all, I have a sprint race coming up and I can't be weighed down by that cake! After the race is another story.

Next stop....Apple store to ogle and paw the iPad. The worst part is that I think we're going to have to buy two. Jeff says he wants to have one for books and I know us well enough to realize that sharing won't really be an option. No iPad yet though, as the store was sold out. We did eventually make it to buy my dress. It needs some slight alteration, but should work out just fine. Maybe I should wait for the tailoring until after the next trip to The Cheesecake Factory. You know. Just in case.

Bike and bug

2010-04-05T20:39:00.000-07:00

As I wrapped up last week I was feeling pretty fatigued. A run after work on Friday in the wind and rain probably didn't help. And wouldn't you know that if I had started just a half hour later I could've avoided the rain. The sun came out about half way thru my run and a nice rainbow was my scenery as I headed back towards the car.

After roughly 11 hours of sleep Friday night, I felt better and like I'd be okay for my 2 hour ride with hill repeats. I was tempted to hop on the trainer, but as the afternoon wore on and the sun came out, I hauled Ruby outside and we took off for the hill nearest the house, Palomares. The road getting there, Niles Canyon, is a popular bike route, but also a little dicey. There's a lot of traffic, especially later in the day, and at points the bike lane is non-existant. But if you have to do hill repeats, why not enjoy this while you're doing them:

Up and down the hill I went three times. Sweating it out on the way up, and taking my time heading down as to not get too chilled. I let off the brakes a bit on the last time down and headed home. A good ride with some great scenery. I'm glad I hit the road instead of staring at the TV!

After the ride was some recovery, a bath for the filthy dog (much to her disgust), and some good Mexican food. I felt pretty good and went to bed early again. And then.....I woke up about 5:30 Sunday morning with a stuffy, stuffy nose, a scratchy throat, a headache, and very thirsty. Oh no. No. No, I will *not* be sick. I got up and downed some juice and headed back to bed. Eventually got up and headed to breakfast, but was just feeling really fatigued. Vitamins, infusions of tangerine juice, orange juice, anything to try and drown the bug into submission. I had wanted to head to the mall to try and find a dress for my cousin's wedding, but was amazed to find that the mall was closed. Seriously?!?! Since when does the mall *close* on Easter?!? Maybe I just haven't been paying attention. It's probably a good thing anyway, as we just headed home and I crashed and did nothing for the rest of the day.

Oh! At breakfast there were two people in the waiting area with iPads. I definitely *need* one. Okay, maybe not need...want. iLike. iWant. "Hi, my name is Kris and I'm an Apple addict." Well, it kind of comes with the territory when the husband works there and brings toys home. I'm waiting to see if an iPad shows up, but have been told not to hold my breath. Guess this is one toy I may have to buy. Eh....it's worth it. It can take the place of the Kindle I'd been eyeing.

So, it comes to Monday evening and I'm feeling mostly back to normal. Some strange little bug that luckily departed almost as quickly as it showed up. I'll take that bit of luck, thankyouverymuch.

Out like a lamb

2010-04-01T22:11:00.000-07:00

March is all wrapped up. Seriously?!?! Already?!?! I guess time really does go by faster the older you get. Truthfully there are days where I have *no* idea where the hours went.

Let's see...what do we have coming up......oh, definitely some fun stuff in April.

On the 11th, I'm taking a cupcake decorating class with the authors of:

I have the first book, Hello Cupcake, and am looking forward to getting some pointers on decorating. No baking required for this class, so we can get right to the eating......err, decorating. That's my kind of class.

Of course, on the 17th is Vineman Showdown sprint tri. With water temps projected to be.....55. Brrrrr. Would it be wrong to wear *both* of my wetsuits? Hmm, I wonder if that's even legal. Sadly, I doubt they'd fit over the top of each other anyway. Guess I'll just have to suck it up for the time it will take to traverse the .25 mile swim course.

And so far the last biggie on my calendar for April is on the 24th. Bike handling skills 101. The description is:

This 4-hour clinic is the foundation of everything else you'll learn on the bike. This is the clinic where we teach the old dogs new tricks and the newbies the fundamentals. You'll learn about balance and weight distribution and how that affects your ability to ride your bike safely and confidently. We'll learn skills like riding with no hands, emergency stops, and how to look behind you while holding your line, how to steer, and counter-steer. After just four hours, we guarantee you'll be a better bike handler and have much more fun on the bike.

The "riding with no hands" has me worried. I seriously hope they don't expect me to be clipped in while learning that. It could get *very* ugly *very* fast. Coordination is not my strong suit (but slightly higher on the scale than patience).

And that will take me to the end of the month. But that's getting *way* ahead of myself.

March hours all tallied up:

swim: 11.08

bike: 9.68

run: 8.29

strength: 8

brick: 3

grand total: 40.05

Three weeks

2010-03-27T21:11:00.000-07:00

Another week of training is in the books. And things continue to go pretty well. I've added another 5k to my schedule, just for fun. I'm liking these shorter races! And at the same time, I'm looking forward to my half iron at the end of the year. Just to see what I can do over a bit longer distance. But let's not get ahead of ourselves eh?

Amazingly enough, I'm down to 3 weeks until my first tri of the year. A sprint, of course. I just made the connection the other day that the swim is: 1) in the bay, so will be 2) cold and 3) my first open water swim of the year. Not just in an event, but at all. Which makes me a bit anxious. But it's short, only .25 of a mile. So it won't last too long. This race will be a bit different too, as it starts at 4 pm. Yep, no getting up at the crack of dawn. But I'm used to and have practiced eating breakfast before races, and know how that sits with my stomach. I'm not exactly sure what to eat pre-race for 'lunch'. Maybe make it a second breakfast instead. I'll have to ponder this a bit more. Another first.....this will my first race where I'm branded with my new age group. Yep, I'll be racing in the 40-44 group. *sob* Ah, what the heck....age is only a number.....written in large script on my calf for all the world to see.

And that's about all the excitement from my neck of the woods.

Except that I've discovered a new treat....

Man this is good stuff. Danger! DANGER!

Nothing much

2010-03-21T23:22:00.000-07:00

Nothing spectacular to report these days.

Well, one thing, and maybe not quite 'spectacular' but......I had a bike test this weekend. For some reason these tests still get me a wee bit anxious. Too much type-A, I guess. Or maybe I just feel like I'm really working towards getting stronger and faster and I'm afraid I won't see that registered in the tests. I try not to get too stressed out about them, but I only get so far with that. Anyway, after pushing myself to light-headedness with a pinch of nausea thrown in for good measure (both of which made the 'hard' intervals on the run off the bike *so* much fun), I sent off my data for analysis by super-coach Liz. When you get an email back from your coach with lots of capital letters and exclamation points, it's a good thing. I like to read these aloud to Jeff, just to reinforce how tough I truly am in case he forgets. At which point he usually asks if my head fits through the door anymore. Hey, it's nice for hard work to be recognized and appreciated. So, yes, my bike test went very well thankyouverymuch and I continue to make progress getting stronger and faster. Which is good, as my first tri of the year has quickly snuck up on me and is a few short weeks away.

I had a consult with the nutritionist this week too and we came to a mutual conclusion that I probably shouldn't drop my weight much more. Or more to the point, she doesn't think I should go much lower with my body fat. A little would probably be okay, but she says I'm at the point where if I go too much lower it could start affecting my recovery/performance. And since I've been feeling good and doing well with training and racing, I'm probably at a good point for my body. Now I just have to convince myself that this is *not* a license to binge and I should be fine. Remember...it's not a diet, it's a lifestyle change. Just channeling the Biggest Loser there for a moment.

That's all the excitement I have for now. Unless you count hitting up the Gap for some new jeans. And at 30% off too. With 5% donated back to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Now that's a deal.

Happy Spring! Hope everyone had a fabulous weekend!

Another one in the books

2010-03-14T22:25:00.000-07:00

Saturday was a laid back kind of day. I hit masters swim in the morning and then took my girl for a long walk at Garin. Well, long time-wise. Not so long distance-wise. The routine now is that she hightails it to the nearest creek access point and proceeds to spend 10-15 minutes searching around in the water. Then she comes up, hightails it to the next access point, another 10-15 minutes searching. Repeat, repeat, repeat. So for me it ends up as a series of 5-10 minute strolls followed by 15 minutes of standing around waiting for her. Which is okay, it's her time after all, and it's pretty entertaining to watch her slosh through the water. I had planned to wash the car after that, since we're expecting a pretty good spell of nice weather. But I decided to nap instead. Race prep let's call it. Gotta' rest up the legs. Yeah, that's it. After that, just some puttering around the house picking up and then some reading before bed.

After much contemplation about whether our automatic clock would set itself forward for DST, I set the alarm to get my butt out of bed at 6:30 this morning (which is *really* 5:30, I hate DST, but whatever). I proceeded to wake up throughout the night to, I don't know what exactly, check on the clock?!? There must've been some subconscious reason niggling at me though, because I eventually woke up at 6:37. Yeah, no alarm. Ah well, at least I was up in plenty of time to eat, pack up and head to the race. We arrived with what seemed like plenty of time to get my t-shirt, do my warm up and head to the start line. Except that the t-shirt line was ridiculously long. So my warm up was a little shorter than prescribed, but I felt ok. A little tired, not great, but ok. I wasn't sure what to expect of myself today since I didn't feel 100% great, but was ready to find out.

Jeff had headed toward the start line while I did my warm up and I found him hanging out on the sidewalk by the 8:00/mile pace sign. I thought that might be a bit ambitious, but what the heck, might as well go for it. I still had about 5 minutes until the start and I realized that there was a small cluster of people by each pace sign with huge empty spaces in between. What's the point of that?!? So I scooted myself right up behind the first batch of people. And it's a good thing too. There was no big announcement. Just someone yelling, without a bullhorn even, "1 minute"....."30 sec".....and then BLAAAAAHHHH, the sound of a horn and we were off. I can't imagine that anyone even 50 feet back would have heard that. And with a clock start, but chip finish, that hardly seemed fair. Maybe they figured anyone serious enough to be worried about their time would have scooted up to the front. I dunno, but I'm glad I did.

The bad part about starting out there was, of course, that there actually were people who could keep a sub 6 min/mile pace. And silly me, I felt myself trying to keep up. And while I felt like I was heading out too fast, I didn't feel too bad. I tried to pull myself back a little, but still hit the first mile under what I should have. The timer yelled out 8:01 and I realized I might be in trouble. But then again, as coach said, from here it's *only* two miles. Two little miles.

The second mile felt a little harder, and I was struggling a bit, especially up the small hill that lasted a few blocks. I was pretty sure I remembered the last mile being downhill into the finish though, so I just tried to push up the hill and through as much as I could. When I hit the mile 2 marker, it was confirmed by the timekeeper that I was definitely a bit off pace, as I heard something in the 16:30's. Just after that I hit the start of the downhill. I worked on moving my feet faster, pushing my legs a little more. Just one more mile to hang on. My super-"A" goal was to finish with a sub 8:00/mile average. I was pretty sure I wasn't going to hit that today, but just kept pushing toward the finish line. I saw Jeff on the bridge over the path just as a woman I'd been 'targeting' and passed earlier in the race re-passed me. Are you kidding me?!?! I tried to get a quick feel for how hard she was pushing and told myself to not go for it too far from the finish line. Down the tiny little underpass and back up. I could see the finish line. Now, go for it. I pushed a little more, and a little more, and managed to pass her again about 100 yards before the finish line. "Good job" she said as I went by. "You too" I huffed.

The sun seemed to be shining right on the finish clock, so I couldn't see my time, but looked down at my Garmin to see 25:11. Yes! So even though I didn't quite hit my "A" goal, I was really happy with the run and how I felt doing it. It's really nice, and exciting, to see the hard work paying off. I never would have imagined that I'd be targeting a sub 8:00/mile pace for a 5k. And now......I have a pretty good feeling that I could hit that sometime soon. Hmmm...any good 5ks coming up?!? :)

Edit:

Official results are up:

25:10 which is more than a 2 min PR! Wheeeee!

Frustration

2010-03-12T06:53:00.000-08:00

After last week's blah-ness, I am happy to report that this week the workouts have come a little easier. There hasn't been nearly as much, if any, coercion required to get my butt moving. And the bike and run seem to be coming along nicely. Both will be 'tested' in the next week. A 5k run on Sunday to see how fleet my feet may be. And a bike test next week to see how fast my wheels can spin.

The swim.....ah, the swim. While I haven't had a problem getting to the swim workouts, or keeping myself there, I am still quite frustrated. There's an additional component to the frustration however. All these shoulder problems I've been having, I *think*, are affecting my swim. Or my swim is having an effect on my shoulder. I'm not sure which....it seems to be a chicken and egg kind of thing. Is my swim form "bad" and therefore causing shoulder issues? Or do my shoulder issues cause a hitch in my swim? Most likely it's a feedback loop. There are issues with the shoulder joint, which in turn affect my swim stroke, which in turn affects the shoulder. *sigh* Google has only served to confirm what the PT is already working on....shoulder impingement. Slouched posture when sitting + hyper-mobile shoulder joint + underdeveloped lat strength compared to pec strength = bad news for shoulder socket. So I continue to work on strengthening the rotator cuff, sitting up straight, etc. The tingling down the arm is much improved, but obviously still a ways to go. So, yeah, frustrating.

But it's FRIDAY, and so we shall eat, drink, and be merry...oh, well, maybe I'll save the drinking for after the 5k. That would be a fitting finish to a St. Patty's race, no? Happy weekend!

At least it ended well

2010-03-08T09:30:00.000-08:00

Last week was an off week. No, not a rest week. It was week where pretty much everything seemed 'off.' A bad case of the blahs.

Run....blah. Bike....blah. Swim.....triple blah. At least once I got moving the run and the bike were ok. But I had serious bad swim attitude last week. It was a struggle to get my arse into the pool and a struggle to keep it there for an entire work out. Yes, I managed, but it was not pretty.

Somehow I made it to the weekend and the last workout of the week. I had asked Coach for a trainer workout because the (lame, stupid, incompetent) weatherman had been predicting rain for the weekend. Saturday dawned, while maybe not sunny, at least it wasn't raining. So instead of hopping on the trainer, T and I packed up our bikes and headed to Sunnyvale to ride. We started out at Sports Basement, where they were having tri-fest later in the day, and where I was due to be dunked at 2:00. We left ourselves plenty of time to get our ride in and get back for some shopping. Or so we thought. Stupid mapmyride anyway. We were following the route sheet pretty well when we pulled up behind a couple of guys on bikes at a stop light. T and I were talking about the route and one of the guys starts asking us where we're riding, are we with a group, yada yada. Before we know it he says something like, "We can show you that route", and basically escorted us through the first half of the ride. Of course, these guys looked like they were barely pedaling while I'm back there pushing my legs to spin, spin, spin. At one point, T tells the guy that we don't want to hold them up, or mess up their ride. His response.....he's recovering from the flu so no worries. Great, I can't even keep up with a guy with the flu! Oy. Anyway, we get to the point where we should have been heading back towards the car, but *somehow* we were quite far from the car. We decide we need to take the most direct route back, and between the guy's directions and my iPhone we do eventually make it back. But not before spending a considerable amount of time riding on a 3 lane (in each direction) road with no bike lane. Exciting, no? Nothing like a few near death experiences to get the pulse racing. Okay, so there wasn't anything *that* dramatic, but I definitely wanted off that road. We eventually made it back with about 20 minutes to spare. Did a little tri-festing and made sure to enter the raffle. I hope we win something good.

I presto-chango'd into my swim suit at the dunk van and hopped into the tub. For those not familiar with this form of fat test, you're basically laying in a tub of warm water. The tub has a scale suspended over it, with a rack you rest your feet and hands on. As you blow out *all* the air in your lungs, and you have to get it *all* out for an accurate test, you sink into the water held up only by the scale. The more fat, the more you float. So sinking is good.....at least in this case. My last test was in May 2009, and after all the measurements were complete my stats were: down 8.6 pounds (6.3# of fat, 2.3# of lean mass), and body fat is down 3.6%. While I'm not thrilled with losing that much lean mass, I was told it's pretty difficult to lose that amount of weight without losing at least some lean. At least it was mostly fat loss, so all in all *great* results. Or "excellent" according to the range of body fat for my age. Why, yes, I am quite pleased with myself, thankyouverymuch.

After the dunk test (and a bit of shopping), it was home to shower up, get my 'volunteer hat' on and head into the city. Jeff and I were volunteering at Camp Okizu's Art Inspires Hope again this year. While it seemed like turnout was a bit lower this year, and there wasn't a big name entertainer, it was still a great night for a great cause. It always amazes me how generous some of the attendees are. Yes, I'm sure they can afford it, but it's still heart warming.

Sunday was rest day (thankyouthankyou) and I decided to try out a new cupcake recipe. Dark chocolate cupcake with Irish cream filling and a vanilla buttercream frosting. Due to an impatient chef, the frosting didn't set up properly and I ended up turning it into a glaze. And I overfilled the cupcakes and the tops were too heavy. So, it needs a little refinement before it makes a general public debut, but I've promised some work folks that I'll have a rematch and make some that are suitable for viewing.

I did pawn a couple off on T, and one on our trainer, since even if not pretty they still taste good. Yes, I brought cupcakes to the gym this morning. What? Is there something wrong with that? What's even funnier is that T brought the trainer a cookie today too. Funnier still is the threat the trainer hurled at us as we were walking out today, "You better bring me another cupcake and another cookie next week or else you're doing more push ups." We've decided we should oblige her and fatten her up. The plot is hatched.

Closing it out

2010-02-28T14:52:00.000-08:00

And another month comes to an end.

In a shameless bit of self promotion......

February 2010 featured athlete

But then, this is my blog, I guess it's all shameless self promotion, eh? I mean it *is* all about me after all.

Still feeling tired. Seemingly more tired than I should be. I've realized it's partly due to work. Not just the regular crazy work stuff that everyone deals with, but the constant uncertainty. I know that most everyone has some degree of uncertainty in their job, but when it gets to the point of wondering how many more months worth of money the company has, it's a little over the top. I'm not even really worried about whether I'd be able to find another job. I just want a little better idea of if I'll have to. I can't imagine jumping ship at this point. We're too close to something happening. Either we get money, get bought, or fizzle out. But something has to happen soon. Of course, I thought that about this time last year too. I guess it's the nature of small biotech, but I may be getting too old for this kind of 'excitement'.

I may be stuck in my weight loss journey. Which actually would be okay. If this is where my body wants to be, then I'll live with it. I'm about 10 pounds lighter than I was when I competed at Kona, most likely at least some of it muscle. I'll find out a little more next weekend when I get dunked. Sports Basement (a local sporting goods store) is having a tri-expo and they are offering body fat testing for $20, so I jumped on an appointment. That's a deal. Although, I'll probably make up the difference in purchases. But, hey, it's stuff I would have 'needed' anyway!

Another small race in two weeks! 5k...less than half an hour....excellent. :)

February hours:

swim: 8.33

bike: 11.7

run: 7.64

strength: 8

grand total: 35.67

Racin' and Relaxin'

2010-02-21T20:18:00.000-08:00

Saturday morning I headed over to Palo Alto for the Juana Run 8k. I was really looking forward to pushing myself to see if these old legs of mine could learn some new tricks. I arrived about an hour early in order to get my t-shirt, take it to the car, and do my warm up run. Coach and I had emailed back and forth earlier in the week and I had my plan in place. Take it easy starting off, especially for the first mile, was going to be the hardest part. I've historically started off fast and died off towards the end. Yeah, I'm still learning this little thing called 'pacing.'

Soon enough they were announcing that we needed to head over to the start line, which was a couple blocks away. I followed the crowd over to the chalk line on the ground marked 'start' and tried to keep my legs loose and nerves in check. A few minutes went by and someone at the front of the pack started talking, very quietly, and all I heard was 'GO!' And off we all went. Or should I say, off *they* all went. Zoom. And I was following right along. Damn, they grow them fast over on this side of the bay! I made myself pull back and keep my race in my head rather than trying to keep up. I got to the first mile marker and there was a volunteer reading off times.

I hit my first mile about where I thought I would for my "A" goal, and worried it might be a little too fast, but felt good. I hit the second mile and again was right where I was hoping to be. At the third mile, there was no announcer, but I was still feeling good. Good sign. Right after the three mile marker I passed a woman and felt her fall in pace behind me. Occasionally I would hear her say something to a spectator, so I knew she was hanging right there. I was trying to pick up the pace a little with each passing mile, but during the fourth mile my head started sending some negative thoughts down the pipe. I tried to shut them out and keep pushing, but felt myself fade a little. I think at some point I was hoping that woman behind me would pass so I could rabbit her instead of being the rabbit. But she didn't. And when we hit the 4 mile marker, I told myself that there was no way I was letting her pass me now. I started to pick up the pace a little. And when the volunteers said, "Last turn, the finish is right down there" I pushed it a little more. In retrospect maybe I should have waited until I could actually *see* the finish line. It seemed to take forever to get there.

Crossing the finish line, I glanced up at the clock to see that I had beat my revised goal of going under 45 minutes. In fact, when I checked my Garmin I had come seriously close to hitting my "A" goal of going 8:30 pace. Of course Garmin says I ran 5.04 miles, when the course was supposed to be 8k, so my official pace was 8:42. Either way.....I beat my 5k PR pace on an 8k course! Woot! I guess this old dog may be capable of learning new tricks after all. Thanks coach!

My workout week done, it was time for some relaxation. I took Bam out for a hike at Garin and realized that my dog has become obsessed with the creek. She used to just pop down the bank to get a drink when she was thirsty. Now she'll hang out in the creek until I *make* her come back up. Then she'll trot off to the next accessible bank and head down to the creek some more. Why the change? She discovered tadpoles last spring and has been looking for them to come back ever since. And while we haven't seen any yet, she's started chasing after water striders. She will romp through the stream chasing them down, biting at the water, generally being a total goofball.

At one point I was watching her and saw her grab a leaf, shake it, and drop it. And then watched it swim away. Uh...wha!?!? I went over to take a closer look and saw that it wasn't a leaf (of course), but was.....

a salamander! I watched it for a while and it was swimming/crawling/moving around okay, so I don't *think* she smooshed it. She saw me watching and started to stomp after it again, but I was able to get her to leave it alone. We went back to Garin today and walked the other direction on the trail. She still checked out every stream access point she could and I wandered down with her. I was able to see 2 or 3 of these little guys at each point we stopped at. Pretty cool. Oh! I also saw a fox out there today. And some wild turkey. And of course....cows. But they left us alone, and we returned the favor.

All in all, a good weekend. And I'm really looking forward to the upcoming races to see just how far, or should I say how 'fast', I can push myself. I'm doing the work, seeing results, and actually believing that I can make some progress. Look out....fun times ahead!

This one's for coach......

2010-02-20T17:28:00.000-08:00

T minus 3

2010-02-17T21:30:00.000-08:00

Three days until my first event of 2010! Wheeeeeee. Yes, there is excitement in the air. And there is also a twinge of nervousness. Maybe more than a twinge. I have an ambitious goal in mind for myself for the 8k on Saturday. I need to remember that it's a goal....if I don't make it this time, there will be another chance. In that light, perhaps I need an "A" goal and a "B" goal. A=ambitious, B=backup? Okay, I now have two goals in mind. There, wasn't that easy? Hopefully they aren't both too ambitious.

Workouts have been going well. I feel like I'm getting stronger and maybe, just maybe getting a little speedier (hence the overly ambitious goal). I've had a few bricks in the last couple of weeks and the running off the bike is....well...running. My version of running anyway. Altho the default settings in my Garmin seem to think it's a 'fast jog' or 'slow run'. Whatever. Yes, I know it's shorter stuff. Nothing like IM training. (And right now I say "Woo Hoo for that!") But it's nice to feel like I come off the bike now with my legs somewhat intact even if it's only for 20-30 minutes at a pop. I'll take it. Progress is progress. Gotta' start somewhere.

Weight is hovering on a precipice. I am a hair away from my goal. Now I want to lower my goal. Of course. Classic "me." I just don't know how low I should go. I have a body fat dunk test all scheduled up for 2 weeks from Saturday. That will give me more info and then maybe it's time to talk to the nutritionist again. I've been pretty happy with the results she's helped me get so far. Amazingly I'm not starving, altho I do get hungry quite often. Or "HUNGRY!" as I text'd to dear hubby just last night. But I mostly eat sensibly, indulge occasionally, and try to balance it all out. Not rocket science by any means.

On the entertainment front, I've been indulging my inner couch potato and soaking up Olympic coverage. Altho, it's at times like these that I would kill for either cable TV, Tivo, or both. Can not *believe* the amount of commercials they show on NBC. I have to admit that I fell asleep during the opening ceremonies. Sorry, just not as exciting as Beijing.

We skipped last night's coverage to catch Billy Joel and Elton John in concert at the HP Pavilion. This is the second time we've seen them together and they do put on a fantastic show. Both were musically entertaining, but Billy Joel was also just plain entertaining. Quite a few jokes about his age, including some seemingly unintentional 'senior moments' when he couldn't remember the name of one of his albums. They started out playing piano facing each other, alternating who's song they were singing, and alternating stanzas of the songs for 4-5 songs. Then John played for about an hour, then Joel for about an hour, then back together again for 4-5 songs. And even tho I joked about skipping out after Elton John was finished, I ended up enjoying the whole thing quite a bit. A fun night out, but as I said to Jeff, "I'm getting too old for these late nights." His response? "Maybe you're just getting old." Smart ass. I did have to laugh tho.

But man, am I tired now. Maybe tonight we skip some of the Olympics and hit the hay a little early. After all, I need to rest up for my big Saturday!

*** Breaking news.....questions to coach, and answers back, have me revising my goal a bit. I was definitely overly ambitious. With this new goal in mind, I'll just leave it all out there and do my best! C'mon Saturday! :)

Over thinking it

2010-02-08T22:01:00.000-08:00

I emailed coach last week, whining *again*, about my swimming. I was really feeling like I'm stuck in a rut, even after the lesson. And the more I thought about my swim stroke, the more confused I got. Am I supposed to do the stuff I learned at the lesson (more of a lengthening out my stroke) to get faster? Am I supposed to increase my arm turnover to get faster? Kick more? Kick less? Turn more on my side? Or less? So, yes, completely reasonable *now* to see that I was way over thinking it. She sent me some comments, and no it wasn't "quit yer whining!", and so I'm back to working on things without thinking about it quite so much. If that makes sense. So tonight I was swimming on my own, since I couldn't make masters swim. I really focused on the drills. Work on one thing at a time. And when the time comes to swim....just swim. And maybe I saw a little progress. Which completely fell apart as I got tired. But still...I have to start somewhere.

I had a nice moment of progress last Saturday on my brick workout too. Legs felt the best they've felt off the bike in I can't remember how long. I was actually running....off the bike....unheard of. And I was instructed to end in HR zone 3, so I saw some paces I haven't seen....well....I think ever. So I'm feeling good about getting a tiny bit of speed in my aging body. It's nice to see the results of the work.

Sunday was a rest day. What better day for a hike, eh? Okay, that might not be rest, but it was a nice easy-paced hike with Jo Lynn and dogs. The three B dogs: Bam, Boomer, and Bella. Lots of babbling brooks and streams. Lots of cows. Interesting too that Bam is perfectly content to *chase* the cows when she's in a pack. Probably doesn't hurt that Boomer and Bella can run circles around her and the cows are mostly scattered by the time Bam gets there, but still. The dogs had a blast, I had fun chatting it up with Jo Lynn, and Bam and I both had a nice nap when we got home.

My weight had a nice little blip downward this week. Seems to be a pattern, lose one week, hold steady for one week. Whatever. I'll take it. I'm about 1.5 pounds from my original arbitrary goal weight. I'm going to go for a dunk test sometime in the next few weeks so I'll have a better idea what my body fat is and can set a goal body fat and weight from there. Hopefully my lean mass hasn't dropped much, if at all, and I've mostly lost fat. I have to guess there's at least some muscle loss however. Those 3, 4, 5...8! hour rides from last year *had* to have put some muscle on my legs. And now that I'm doing shorter durations, I'm pretty sure some of that has melted away. Be interesting to see anyway.

In other news, I hear from my big brother that he's back in training. He and my Aunt are going to run the Illinois marathon (the half). It's on May 1, so there's plenty of training time yet. Very cool. If I wasn't already going to be back in Illinois two weekends in May, I *might* be tempted to join them. Then again...this is the year of shorter stuff....so maybe not tempted *too* much. Happy training family, you'll do awesome!

Hocus pocus and other magic

2010-02-04T21:59:00.000-08:00

Through the magic of the internet, Bam and I met up with Jo Lynn and her super cute dog, Boomer, for a hike on Tuesday. When we met at Garin we realized we had seen each other 'around' before, which makes sense as we live a stones throw from each other. Well, not quite that close, but pretty close. Bam had a great time romping with Boomer, and following his lead, she even worked up the courage to walk right towards the cows standing on the trail and make them trot away. I think she slept the entire day away once we got home. Okay, it's true, that isn't *that* unusual for her....but she was definitely worn out! A good start to the day for sure.

This morning I finally got in to see my PT about my shoulder problem. After talking about what's been going on with it, he did some tests. This involves him pushing and/or pulling on my arm in various ways as I try to resist. It starts as a pretty pathetic effort, I have to say, since he's not using much force at all. Then he does some hocus pocus where he has me reposition my posture/head/some part of my body and we do the test again. And it's just amazing what a difference it makes. Biomechanics...simply amazing. My problem wasn't the shoulder at all. Well, maybe a tiny bit, but it was really in my neck. See, I sit all day long behind a computer. And I have bad posture. And I slouch...which I guess is the same as bad posture. Anyway, what's apparently been going on is that I've been slouching and my head is kind of slouching forward, not up nice and straight and tall, and it's affecting the nerve coming out of my C6 (cervical vertebrae #6). Which, not so coincidentally, runs down the clavicle, through the pecs, down the arm, and innervates the last two fingers on the hand. The ones that have been tingling. There was some fairly painful deep tissue/ART work on my neck and some work around my clavicle. My *favorite* is when he hits a particularly nasty tight spot, evidenced not only by the pain that I experience, but also by the "Ewwww" or "Ick" he utters as he digs in. The sound effects are awesome. And of course, there was homework issued. Which I fully intend to work on this time. I do *not* want to get back to the place I was a few weeks ago. After all, it's not something that requires weights or equipment. I just have to 'reset' my head position and work on getting my muscles to learn their new job. Or the job that they should have been doing to begin with. All this just reinforces the fact that maintenance really is the best policy.

Anywhoo....the week is wrapping up and I can almost feel that Sunday rest day! Happy weekend all and best of luck to everyone racing this weekend! Wishing you fast feet!

Downs and ups

2010-01-31T21:30:00.001-08:00

Rest week has come to an end. And what an end.....but that's the end of this story.

Work was a bit crazy, and of course everything wanted at the last minute, as we're having some big guests coming in this week. Hopefully they don't expect me to dress up. Jeans are my standard work attire. And hopefully they don't expect me to actually come in on my work at home days. I will if I *have* to, but it really messes with my...*ahem*....other activities (workouts).

Workouts were light. I think I was on my bike all of once. Two masters swims and a swim lesson. A few easy runs. Oh, the swim lesson went well! She gave me a few key things to work on. As expected, it's proving difficult to change my heavily ingrained habits. Especially at masters when I'm trying to keep up with my lane mates. But I'm working on it. I've been instructed to drop down a lane once a week at masters and do some serious work on ingraining the new, good habits. We even worked on some breast stroke and some butterfly at the lesson. Butterfly with fins=pretty fun. Don't get me wrong, it was still freakin' hard. But kinda fun too. Overall I really liked the instructor. She has a way of putting things that keeps it simple and just makes sense. So I'll probably work on things for a while and go back for a tune-up eventually. Plenty to work on for the time being tho.

I had one easy brick (my one bike ride). Just a little 20 minute easy run after the ride. My day got away from me and I ended up running close to dark. I had my headlamp tho, so no sweat right? Evidently not so much. I was a couple of blocks from home, running along, then looked away from the side walk for a second to check out some traffic. Next thing I know I'm laying on the ground. Whaaaa? How did *that* happen? Evidently I caught my foot just right on a raised part of the sidewalk. And down I went. I caught most of my weight on my left knee/hip. I hobbled home and put ice on it right away, but a nice little egg swelled up on my knee anyway. At this point, a few days later, I've got a nice bruise and it tightens up when I sit still too long. But I think I'll survive.

My last workout of the week was my run test, which I'm not terribly good at. I have pacing issues, in that I have no idea where to start so that I don't die towards the end of the 20 min test. Last time I tested, back in November, I went out waaaaay too hard for the fitness level I was at then. And got slower and slower. Not good. This time I swung in the opposite direction. I went out a bit too conservatively and kicked it up in the second half. Kicked it up quite a bit....for me anyway. So while I'm pretty happy with the improvement I've made since November, I think it could have been an even bigger improvement if I hadn't taken it quite so easy to begin with. Maybe, just *maybe* I'll get to test once more before the tri season gets going. In the meantime I can work some more on my run form, and get my legs ready for my 8k in about 3 weeks.

Sunday morning I took Bam out for a hike at Garin. It was a bit muddy, and bound to get worse since we're expecting more rain again this week. I know we need it, but the sunshine over the weekend sure was nice. We took a little side trail I hadn't been on before and Bam took of a bit ahead of me. She usually goes a bit ahead, then comes back to check on me, or waits for me to catch up. At one point I came around a corner and she's standing in the trail, hackles up, issuing a low growl. It really startled me....there *are* mountain lions around. I stopped and tried to look all around. And then I saw it.....cows. Four small cows. At least I hope that's what she was growling at. There is certainly no love lost between my girl and the cows out there. She's never forgotten being chased by one and holds them all responsible. Just to be safe, in case it *wasn't* cows she saw, I decided it was time to head back towards the main trail. Where there were more people. And fewer mountain lions.

Digging for....I dunno...truffles?

Wrapped up the weekend with a movie (Invictus), some house cleaning, some resting, some baking (Oreo cupcake anyone?), and a peek at the Grammy Awards. Now, back to work!

January summary:
swim: 10.83 hours
bike: 11.61 hours
run: 9.13 hours
strength: 9.0 hours
grand total: 40.34 hours

Slowly....slowly....

2010-01-24T22:56:00.000-08:00

Why is it that the weight comes off soooooo much slower than it goes on? How is that fair? I know, I know, no one ever said life is fair.

I did lose another 1.5 pounds, according to my weigh in. That was on my old crappy scale that only measured to the nearest .5 of a pound, not my new *fancy* scale that measures to .1 of a pound. AND measures BF (just as inaccurately as my old scale) AND tells me my BMI (in case I didn't have access to the bunches of BMI calculators to be found on the internet) AND tells me my "max calories" that I can eat to maintain my currently body weight. And I have to say....that was the most entertaining of all. Apparently I can consume about 2300 calories to maintain my weight. Yeah, right. I think that's how I got into this mess to begin with. "I'm working out a lot, I can eat whatever I want."

I'm about 5 pounds from what I *think* my goal weight is. I have yet to figure out what my racing weight is, according to Racing Weight, because I have to determine my actual body fat percentage. I still haven't been able to fit in an appointment to get dunked and I don't trust either my trainer who pinches me with the calipers (which shows a much higher than realistic BF percentage) nor my new scale (which shows a much lower than realistic BF percentage). Maybe I could split the difference?

But I am on the right track....slowly.....slowly....getting there. And when I get there I'm eating a big 'ol pizza to celebrate!

Just kidding........sort of.

Fun stuff coming up

2010-01-22T16:45:00.000-08:00

It's the last couple days of my 3 week build....which means:

I'm wiped out....as evidenced by my craptastic swim this morning. Did not make a single interval except the warm up, and I don't think those really count.
I get a rest week next week! Woot! Although this comes with a run test. I'm looking at that as a good thing tho. I expect to see some progress from my sad run test of a couple months ago. Reminder to self: PACE IT! Yeah, last time I did not do so well with the pacing and died off at the end. I'm sure I can do a better job of that this time 'round.
Only one more workout this week! A brrrrrrick. I am somewhat reluctant to ride outside for it tho, even if the weather is clear, as I am lazy and don't want to have to clean all the grime off my bike that I'm sure to pick up from the still wet roads.

I signed up for one more "race". It's an 8k on 20Feb. Sounded like fun and coach said "sure", so I signed up. *And* a guaranteed PR since I've never 'officially' run an 8k before. Bonus!

I've been frustrated with my lack of progress in the pool. I feel like I'm just as slow as ever. I'm not saying Masters isn't cutting it for me, because I've really only been going for a couple of weeks. I just want to get someone to really look at my stroke and see if there are some obvious places that I need to concentrate on. Am I still swimming "flat" or am I actually rotating a bit more now? Am I being lazy in my pull? What's going on with my kick? Why do fast swimmers seem to swim so effortlessly and I feel like I'm killing myself to go nowhere? You know, maybe get the answers to some of these great mysteries. So I scheduled a swim lesson for next week. It'll be interesting at the least, and at best I'll learn some key points to work on. Can't hurt anyway, eh?

And while I think these are kinda fun and definitely make a point, I'm not sure I'd want to antagonize someone in a 3k pound weapon. That could get seriously ugly seriously fast. I definitely like the "Don't Run Me Over" one tho. I have, morbidly I'm sure, been reading a lot lately about bike accidents and I have to admit that I would choose to ride on the one (boring) bike path near by rather than head out onto the roads.

And now....I'm off to my next massage appointment. Knock wood, but the shoulder is hanging in there. I've been working a little on the biggest knots and it *may* just be doing some good. Imagine that.

Happy Weekend All....and here's to some sunshine!

I've got some nerve

2010-01-18T14:08:00.000-08:00

And not in a good way.

The massage on my shoulder lasted until this morning. Or should I say until some time in the middle of the night. I woke up to a tingling down my left arm. Most likely I was sleeping on it....again. I have had a tendency to sleep on my left side with my left arm curled up under my pillow. And I've woken up with my arm asleep before. But now the tingling hangs around a while. Joy. It's been suggested that I don't sleep on my side, but do you know how hard it is to change your sleeping habits? I really concentrated on it for a while, to the point that I was constantly waking myself up to turn onto my back. That does *not* make for a restful night's sleep. Of course, waking up with a sleeping arm hasn't been so hot either.

I'm pretty sure at least some of the nerve issue is related to this amazing (again, not in a good way) knot that I carry around on the top part of my left trapezius muscle. I can press on the knot and send a nice pain right up the left side of my neck/head. And I'm sure the nerve that's traveling through there goes both back up to the neck and down to the arm. From what the good doctor (hello WebMD) has to say, it would seem to be the ulnar nerve that is giving me fits.

Luckily (so far, knock wood) it hasn't been much of an issue while I'm working out. I was really surprised last Friday at masters swim when it didn't give me any grief at all, not even doing butterfly. Or at least my sad, pathetic version of butterfly anyway. Hopefully some more massage and some heat applied to that knot will get me through a couple of weeks until I can get to the PT. And then....I promise myself.....that I will perform some maintenance. There. I said it. Wrote it. Whatever.

A week in bullets, random of course

2010-01-16T21:28:00.000-08:00

I've survived another week of "short" workouts. I swear, this short stuff is more painful than IM training. I know it's good for me and will be beneficial in the long run.....but ouch. On a positive note, I may be getting at least a little bit of my run legs back. Then again, I'm not at all sure that I'll be "ready" for a 5k in a couple months. Or at least not a 5k that I want to push for a PR at. We shall see. I've still got 3 months until my first tri, a sprint, so plenty of time for more bike torture, ahem, I mean work.
The last time I saw my PT we worked on some tightness in my right leg. It was a toss up between the right leg and the left shoulder. Um, yeah....wrong choice. All week I had some tingly/asleep/nerve pinching kinda thing going on down my left arm. I saw a massage therapist last night and she worked on it, but it needs quite a bit more work. Sadly my PT is out of town until early February. More massage may be in order to try and keep the pins and needles to a minimum until he gets back. *sigh* This is what my 'no-maintenace' policy has got me...well, the policy and old age.
Weight is stuck this week. My system may be in shock after two weeks of healthier eating that followed the holiday binge. Not sure. But I definitely can't be trimming my diet much more...I'm hungry most of the time. I eat enough to fill up, not stuffed, but then I'm usually hungry only about an hour later. Maybe I need even *more* protein. I'm logging my food and will probably follow up with the nutritionist in a couple more weeks. I got a bit crabby and down this morning when the scale didn't move from where it was last week. Then I realized that all I can do is eat well, train well, and let my body take care of the rest. The weight will be what it will be. And I'll keep telling myself that until it sticks.
Work was blissfully quiet last week. The big bosses all come back Monday, so who knows what next week will bring. But a week of quiet was certainly nice.
I had my first masters swim workout where I was forced to try butterfly. Well, ok, not *forced*, but it was a 'non-free' workout where the lane leader got to choose the strokes and well, when they threw butterfly in there, I tried it. Luckily it was only a 25 or a 50. No one was brave enough to make the 75 butterfly. There was a lot of non-free work and it was exhausting but fun too. While I'm not getting a lot of stroke help at masters, and I may not be getting any faster, I'm having fun so that's gotta be a good thing, right?
Still a bit tired most days. Sleep has been a little off, but seems to be getting back on track. Life of the party that I am I was in bed before 10 last night. A Friday night. Damn, it sucks getting old. ;)
Speaking of which....it's almost my bed time.....but it's a rest day tomorrow and I think I'll be sleeping in. Woo hoo!

Be careful what you ask for

2010-01-10T18:53:00.000-08:00

I wrapped up the workout week with a rest day today. Funny...I didn't accomplish nearly as much as I thought I might. Ah well....the dust bunnies will wait. At least I got the small dog that was scattered around my house vacuumed up.

Work was a wee bit crazy this week as a lot of meeting prep was going on. Next week it could go either way. If all goes well at the meeting, it will be *very* quiet all week. If not, all hell could break loose. Let's hope for 'well', shall we? :)

Weight is back to where I was pre-holiday binge. From where I'm sitting now, I'd like to drop another 5-7, I think. It may be time for another dunk test to see where I am body fat percentage-wise. It's really more about getting leaner than getting my weight down.

Workout-wise, it seems I'm getting into the thick of things to get my sorry self back on track. About 9-1/4 hours all together, pretty evenly distributed between swim/bike/run/strength. This week also marked my first week as an "official" master's swimmer. I finally signed up and, wow...even went twice! In one week! I don't know why I was so reluctant. Yes, I have been one of the slowest in my lane....and I'm in one of the slower lanes.....but no one has laughed at me...yet. The people have been really nice, including the coach. I almost revised this on Thursday when he bumped me down a lane, but it turned out okay. He said that all 4 of us were swimming about the same pace, and we might as well have 2 per lane rather than be all bunched up. Yeah, the other girl in my lane and I then proceeded to dust the lane with 2 guys for the main set. Not that it was a competition or anything. No, of course not.

So remember how I've been saying, for a while, that I want to work on my biking in particular this year?? While it hasn't been bad so far....next week seems to have a bike focus. And some of it looks, shall we say, painful. But from what I hear, that is what it will take to build some biking legs. In return, those biking legs will allow me to have some running legs too. That's the plan anyway. So right now I say...bring on the pain.....but check back in a few days. I may be crying like a little girl.

Giving Thanks

2010-01-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

I know...I know...it seems like my holidays are mixed up. But they really aren't. What better time than the start of a new year, a new decade (to some...to others you'll have to come back in another year) to think about what you're thankful for. Here are a few things I'm very appreciative for these days (in random order):

My health, which allows my body to do some pretty amazing things, even if I do them more slowly than the majority of the other participants. And even if, as I told my PT, I don't believe in maintenance (stretching, the exercises he assigns me, etc.).
My husband. Even if his super-power is finding/having the most expensive stuff/habits. Yes, even more expensive than triathlon. Hard to believe, I know, but true. There's a money pit in the garage to prove it. But the only kids we have are one furry, four-legged girl, so why not throw some money away on toys. And besides that, it keeps him busy while I'm out swimming, biking, running, etc.
My family. No matter how different our political, religious, or any other ideological views may differ. There's no one who will support you like family and keep you grounded at the same time. After all, most of them knew you when you were in diapers. And after a couple of co-workers each lost a parent just before the holidays, I'm even more thankful to have my family for as long as I can.
My job. I work in an industry that I like, at a job I like. And I'm thankful it pays me (over-pays some, *cough* Jeff *cough*, may say) enough to do what I want, when I want. (Although I do tend to be surprisingly frugal about most things....I prefer that to 'tight' or 'cheap', thankyouverymuch.) I may bitch about my work but really am extremely lucky. I get paid vacations, paid holiday shutdown, health insurance, and sick time. I work at home a couple days a week, have decent hours and work with decent folk who appreciate me. Yes, extremely lucky indeed.
For my friends. I am not a social butterfly by nature, and as such, don't have a *lot* of friends. But I'm thankful for the ones I have. Add in a special thanks for Facebook, which hooked me back up with my high school best friend. Tip o' the hat to technology.
The weather. Yes, after a week in Illinois in winter, I am reminded yet again to be thankful for the weather we have here in the bay area. Bicycling outside in short sleeves just today was yet another reminder.
My coach. Yep, I'm working with her again in 2010. She got me through 2 iron distances races last year and as I age up this year, we'll see if it's possible to get a bit of speed in these old legs of mine.

Just a few things I've been contemplating lately and working on reminding myself to appreciate each and every day. I'm excited about what this year may bring. I'm sure some of the 'same-old same-old', but I know there will be a lot of new challenges too. So, here's to a 2010 that is everything you want it to be!

Starting Over

2010-01-01T21:12:00.000-08:00

Random wrap up stuff......

2009 was a big year. Almost 200 hours of biking. About 120 hours of running. Almost 100 hours of swimming. About 40 hours of strength. Two Ironman races. Now it's time to start over. Get some speed in my legs and see what I can do in some sprints, some 5ks and 10ks, some olympic distance races. Yes, I will mostly likely do another Ironman someday. But now is not the time. A half iron toward the 'end' of the year, in which I've set an ambitious goal (not to be named at this time) with a big reward. If I make it....fabulous. If I don't....I keep trying at it until I get there. I'll get there eventually. Oh, and I'm really looking forward to a 3 day Tri camp in Chicago with my coach. All women, 3 days of swim bike run, etc. Fun!

Jeff and I spent the holidays with my family in Illinois. We were, once again, very lucky with our travel days. No flight delays heading there or heading home. And the roads weren't too bad on the days we needed to drive either. I couldn't really say that for the days in between. It was a good visit, mostly. We were supposed to spend a few days at my brother's house, visiting his family. But my youngest niece got sick and actually ended up spending several days in the hospital with pneumonia. She was finally released today and they got to go home. Happy New Year to them! I did go down to their place and picked up my older niece and got to visit with her for a couple of days. Wow, that girl just goes and goes. Oh, to have the energy of a 6 year old!

We got to see my cousin's chocolate shop (very nice!), Black and Whites Confections, and sample some experiments (fabulous!), as well as some 'discards' that weren't cosmetically suitable for sale, but tasted great to me. Truly the best chocolate around. She even made us some custom candy bars for our flight home. Deeeelicious.

I was the life of our private New Year's celebration....as I fell asleep on the couch around 9:00 in the middle of a movie. I'd have to say, I didn't miss much and evidently needed the sleep. Lately I've been, what seems to me, excessively tired. Not that I'm falling asleep at the drop of a hat, but I just feel tired. More than usual. Probably time for a visit to the doc and have some labs checked.

Diet-wise, I've probably set myself back a few weeks with holiday eating. But the chocolate alone may just be worth it. I'll get back on the wagon and hopefully be down where I want to be in a couple of months. At least by my first event of the year (hopefully) in March.

Today we received the sad news that my cousin had to have Louis put to sleep. He was a fabulously big, gentle guy. An American bulldog. A real sweetie and it's a sad start to the new year for sure. RIP Lou. You'll be missed.

I have some, not resolutions, but goals for changing some things in my life this year. It's a big b'day year, so what better time to shake things up. After all, no time like the present, right? Here's to a happy, healthy 2010. Be thankful for your family, your health, all the little things we take for granted each and every day. *ching ching*....cheers.

It gets me every time

2009-12-19T19:20:00.000-08:00

The IronMan World Championship broadcast was on TV today. I didn't make the coverage, which may be a very good thing considering how fabulous (heavy sarcasm intended) I probably looked.

It was fun watching and telling Jeff, I remember "xxx" happened there. I remember that guy. Remember that woman? Oh, there's the bike turn-around. Yeah, I wasn't feeling so hot at that point. The woman who had severe back spasms...I remember seeing her on the way back into Kona on the final part of the run. And hoping that she would somehow be able to make it. I remember seeing Matt, the Biggest Loser guy, on his way into the Energy Lab when I was on my way out. I remember thinking he'd have to hustle.

And I seem to have forgotten how difficult and exhausting and hot and humid it was. And, and....exciting and motivating and yes, even in some ways, fun. I told Jeff, "I want to do that again." And meant it. That damn broadcast is why I threw my hat into the lottery ring last year, and it got me again. It gets me every time. The inspirational stories, the sights, the sounds. It all gets me. And so, yes, I want to do that again. And if I can get lottery luck again some day.....I will.

Blah humbug

2009-12-13T14:42:00.000-08:00

I've noticed, and not just in my own house mind you, a lack of ho ho holiday spirit this year. So many people I talk to either haven't bought a single gift, or put up a single decoration, or like me....both.

I'm not exactly sure what the story is this year. Maybe it was just an epic kind of year and I'm wiped out emotionally. Maybe it's that work is draining the life out of me with two big deadlines in as many weeks. Maybe it's that I've been bombarded with Holiday "cheer" (read: marketing opportunities) for more than a month and a half already. Maybe the holidays have finally lost their novelty.

I think it's easier to get into the spirit when you have little ones around. But Bam doesn't seem that excited about the holidays this year either.

Any way you slice it, our house is feeling pretty Blah Humbug.

photo courtesy of T, from when Bam was much younger...

and without so much white in her face.....

but with the same grinchy attitude

Lessons in nutrition

2009-12-06T22:54:00.000-08:00

I had an appointment last week with another one of my goal achieving army. I did a nutritional analysis and spoke with the nutritionist to see what changes I could make to lose weight, but keep or increase muscle mass. Big surprise....I'm not getting enough protein. Overall she was quite happy with most of my eating habits and where my nutrient levels were at. All except the protein. And of course if you up one thing, you have to reduce another to keep the calorie count the same, right? So, a little less carbs and a little more protein. Like I said....big surprise. Pleasantly surprised tho that she doesn't have anything against a little treat....a couple of cookies, a piece of candy....as long as it's not all day, every day. I *can* have something every day. Just can't have dessert at lunch AND dinner. *sigh*

I like her approach in general, that we're not really restricting anything. It's small changes. And her goal is that I'll say "piece of cake (not literally), I can do this forever" and not feel like I'm starving.

We discussed weight and weight loss history and how every body is different. And how bodies tend to have a set point where they're happy, and it can get to be too much of a hassle or get too frustrating to try to kick them out of their happy place. And from my history, it's quite possible that my body is at it's happy place. And it will be tough to evict it.

We talked about likes (quite a few), dislikes (also, quite a few), and various ways to get more protein into my diet. My biggest goals are to increase variety and make sure I get at least 2, preferably 3, food groups per meal. So instead of snacks that are carb/fruit or veggies I need snacks that are protein/fruit or veggies/small carbs.

This week begins my diet modification. And yes, I realize I picked the *perfect* time of year to give this a whirl. But if it doesn't work out.........next year is right around the corner.

Setting goals

2009-12-02T12:24:00.000-08:00

I find as the holidays approach (or pass...uh, hello and goodbye Turkey Day), that I have little to no motivation for the things I *should* be doing. And lots of motivation to ignore those things and do other things instead.

Unfortunately there are 2 (or were 2....1 is now wrapped up....knock wood) big deadlines at work in between T-Day and X-Mas. One of the big hematologic oncology meetings happens the first weekend of December, and we had an oral presentation as well as a poster presentation to prep. Hopefully those are now in the bag, especially since the attendees are leaving...um, yeah, tomorrow. Whew, one down.... UPDATE: Boss just walked out the door, without asking for any additional info or changes! Woot!

But I digress! Goals...yes, that's where I was headed.

I've set some goals for next year. I figured I can start working on them now and get a head start. In no particular order......

1: Clean house. And I'm not talking about that superficial cleaning that has been my go-to for the last too-many-to-count months. I know, I was a little busy doing other things. Fun things. But the house seriously needs cleaning. The simplest thing may be to bring in a fire hose and blast it all outside, but there are a few things I'd like to keep. One being my dog....and my bike on the trainer.....oh, and my husband......ahem, in no particular order of course. I did get started on this, but the two toughest rooms are still waiting. Both the spare bedrooms, which have boxes and boxes, and drawers and drawers, of "stuff" in them. I'm feeling a need to simplify. Get rid of a ton of "stuff." If it's in a box that has dust on the top....out with it! Don't even open it. Yeah, okay, I can't do that either. Open it, but throw away without a backward glance. And keep the husband away while doing it. Historically I throw, he comes by usually when I'm not looking, and starts pulling stuff back out. *sigh*

2: Drop some weight, or at least some fat. Neither of which will be easy considering this is the season of eating. Altho......the boxes of candies, cookies, cakes, and various treats that we get from vendors hasn't started arriving. Perhaps the state of the economy will put a damper on those this year. That would help my cause for sure. Evidently I'm a see food person. If the food is in sight, I *must* eat it. At least it seems true for the foods that I *shouldn't* be eating. Maybe that's a simplification. I think it's more that I tend to let myself get too hungry between feedings, so then I grab the first thing available. And that tends to be the crap....the delicious, decadent crap that hangs around this time of year. I did start working out again with my weight trainer, Elena (another evil, evil woman who enjoys making me suffer), this morning. And thought I might die. Yeah, I can pedal my bike for hours on end, but one hour with her and I want to pass out...what gives? Evil, I tell you. But in the pursuit of the lower fat me, she'll be a good ally. Remind me of that when I can barely move tomorrow.

3: Get faster. I feel the need...the need for speed....on the bike. And the run. And why not..the swim too. And the best thing is....if I get faster/better/smarter at the bike, it helps my run. Bonus! I've set a somewhat ambitious goal for my biking, with an appropriate reward if said goal is met. It may take more than just next year. But I'm patient (HAHAHAHA....who am I kidding?!?!). Okay, I will try to be patient with this. As I've been told....it takes time. And the reward, plus evil workouts from Coach Liz, will push me to harden up. Included in this is the need to find a 'good' Masters swim group. I've been less than impressed with the couple I've tried so far. Two more on tap to test out but I'm running out of places within a reasonable driving distance.

4: Get my resume in order. I don't have an immediate need, but big things should be happening either for better or for worse at work early next year. Best to be prepared. And as much as I bitch about my current job, there really are quite a few advantages, so replacing those will be tough. I may try to flip to doing consulting/temp work if things fall apart here. I'll have to see. At least there still seems to be *some* market for my skill set.

Let's start with those, shall we? And let's raise a glass to progress toward goals! Cheers!

More pondering going on

2009-11-22T21:16:00.000-08:00

Less hours of training time=more time spent thinking about training...seriously?

For the last several weeks, well ever since I got back from Hawaii really, I've been thinking about this whole tri thing. And what I've accomplished. And what I've learned.

I was *not* an active kid. I had (had?!?! ok, ok, have) issues and was, while maybe not 'fat', definitely not average. Let's say I was above average, shall we? In 2005 my uncle was diagnosed with Leukemia and I decided to train for a marathon with Team in Training. I did my first few sprint triathlons in 2007. I did a half iron in 2008 and then this year I went slightly nuts and did a marathon and 2 IMs.

Which leads me to my introspection about this year.

First off...HELLO....I did 2 IM distance races this year. And not just this year, but in a span of just over 2 months. And while neither one of them was the race day I would have liked to have, yeah, it's still pretty freakin' awesome. Couch potato to double IronMan inside 4 years. Seriously, who does that? Me, that's who. Awesome.

Ok, but seriously.....my points of pondering....

I am slow. I am likely not ever going to be fast. But I can be less slow. And I seriously need to be less slow on the bike before I do another IM. Yes, I know, I just said 'before' and not 'if'. I'm about 99% certain it's just a matter of time. I need time to develop my bike skills/technique/speed/nutrition so that my legs aren't fried and I can actually run at least some of the marathon instead of death marching it. But there's something about IM, granted it may be the finish line, that is addicting....and of course there's the thought that "I could do that better....I just need to xxxx/yyyy/zzzz". There is a nagging itch in my head that says the *next* one might just be the one you're waiting for. You know more about your nutrition, more about what to expect, more about IM in general. So far, I've shut that voice right up. But really, it's only a matter of time. Of course the counter argument (all inside my head of course) says something about...maybe IM is just not a distance that's for me. Maybe I just sweat too much or will always have some kind of digestive issues. Hard to say with a sample size of two, don't you think?

I started thinking about how cool it would be to do Kona about the time I did my first sprint tris. And now, I've done it. Not well, but I've finished it. And that's left a kind of hole in my motivation. Seriously, I've already completed the holy grail of iron distance triathlon. I've completed one of my 'bucket list' items. The magnitude of it has me spinning a bit. I certainly never imagined that I'd get in on my first entry into the lottery. Well, ok, I admit, there must have been *some* idea that I'd get in, or why bother entering. There's a part of me tho, that wishes I had waited until I was more prepared. More ready. Stronger. But then another part that says there are no guarantees. It's a little morbid, but really none of us knows how long we'll be around. Why wait for the big ticket items. Go for it and enjoy it! And I feel like I did....as hard as it was....the hardest day of my life....and I still enjoyed it.

Jeff and I went hiking with some friends recently. Just a short, easy hike. Lots of chatting going on. We were talking about my recent accomplishments and what's the next step and Nora asked me, "Do you think you'll ever, I don't know, stop?" An interesting question. Jeff and I have typically latched onto an activity, thrown ourselves body and soul into it, and then....moved on to the next thing. Right now, tri is my 'next' thing. And the thing is....I feel like it's something that could stick for quite a while. Let's face it...I'm not very good at it. It's a challenge. There's so much to learn and do. So much fun to be had.

Speaking of which. This is all supposed to be about fun right? I mean, I don't make my living at triathlon. It's not my job. It's my fun. And I need to find a way to make it fun more of the time. Even though I'm not fast, I tend to be driven by a goal. And if I'm not living up to the goal, the fun goes away. I need to make it fun more of the time. Stop taking myself so seriously. It doesn't mean that I can't be competitive with myself and push myself. But let's have fun! Enjoy the journey and the destination. Be thankful I am out there swimming....biking....running. Don't take it for granted.

Well, enough with my rambling for the day. Happy short work week!

Feeling off

2009-11-12T21:58:00.000-08:00

It's been just over a month since my last event of the year. I spent three weeks of that month doing a whole lotta nothing much. Weird then, that when I get out to do some exercise, I still feel 'off'. One would think that things should be getting back to normal. My normal anyway.

But evidently not. I've still got some lingering aches/pains/un-normalness going on. I can motivate myself to get to the pool most times, and to run, the bike....not so much. Maybe if it was *my* bike it'd be a different story, maybe not.

Coach, evil woman that she is, has basically given me permission to slack off for another 4 weeks. I'm sure there's a method to her madness, something about deep recovery after a mary and 2 IMs this year. But I have already warned her that me+lazy/slacker+holiday food is going to = ugly. :) Yeah, she replied with the 'smiley devil' emoticon. I told you...evil.

Anyway, I'm still not doing a whole lot of anything. A few runs here and there. A few swims here and there. Bikes on the trainer on Jeff's bicycle, or on the bike at the gym. Oh! And a few strength workouts at the gym with weights. I've actually missed weights. I like that shaky arm feeling that lets me know I've used some neglected muscles. I like that "good" kind of sore. The kind where you know you're getting stronger, building muscle. And my trainer almost fell over when she saw me, I think. And wants to know when I'm coming back for some punishment. Soon, Elena, soon.

Hopefully before too much holiday food has had a chance to settle around my arse.

We now interrupt this program......

2009-11-10T21:32:00.000-08:00

In lieu of any kind of update........I *seriously* need this shirt. Especially lately.

Back to the beginning

2009-11-01T22:57:00.000-08:00

I've had three weeks completely off of training. The most strenuous thing I did at any point was walk my dog. And it went by so fast! I guess nature really does abhor a vacuum because I sure filled up my time with....I don't even know....stuff.

There was work, of course, and lots of reading. Ah....reading. I do love to read. Unfortunately I tend to want to get thru the pages as fast as possible so I can move on to the next book. Jeff always accuses me of not reading all the words. Silly...of course I don't....I only read the important ones. As a result of all that reading my house didn't get nearly as clean as it should have in this down time. Ah well....there are worse things than a cluttered house I guess.

Now I start over with training. Short stuff. Easing back into it. I went for a nice lake swim and a 4 mile trail run with some folks yesterday. The trail was a bit hillier than I had expected and my legs are evidently still a bit miffed at me even after three weeks of slacking off. My quads were quite tight and sore today. Which made getting going with my short run interesting for sure. And it feels like I've forgotten how to run. "Run." Time to work on form. Luckily coach has me covered there for the next couple of weeks. A quick 40 minutes today and then some good stretching. Yep, just easing my way back into movement.

Now, excuse me, but I have a book to finish.......

Not just another day in paradise ~ the finish

2009-10-29T20:31:00.000-07:00

A little run.....26.2 miles.

If I could make.....when I would make it....I would be an Ironman again......

Things started off ok, altho my legs were feeling pretty shaky. I was also completely sunburned, which I didn't find out until later. I had put sunscreen on for the bike ride, but it was 1) apparently not rated for 8+ hours and 2) not water proof enough for 8+ hours of dumping water all over yourself. Huh....who knew!

You can hear how awesome the crowd is...even at this late point in the day. And I don't mean just my family, who are *the best*, but also complete strangers. You can hear my aunt letting me know that the Butterfinger I'd been eyeing all week was waiting on the bed. Like a pillow mint but so much better. I only had 26.2 miles to go to get it. This is a nice little clip. It's almost the entire amount of running I was able to do. Maybe not quite. But close. I mostly looked like this:

I dug myself quite a hole on the bike. And I felt it when I tried to get moving on the run. My stomach would start turning, but mostly it was my head. It would start to spin. And I'd be slowed to a walk. I was getting little bits of water and Gatorade in, but was reluctant to try any gel or food just yet. I'd hit an aid station and grab ice, dump it in my top, both front and back, then grab water and Gatorade and drink as much as I could get down. Before I had gone too long I started to think that time-wise it was going to be *close*. I kept telling myself that I would make it...just keep moving forward. I remembered what Liz had said, "If you have to walk, walk like you have somewhere to be." I didn't let myself lolly gag around. At least I didn't *think* I did. I kept telling myself...at the next mile marker hit the stopwatch. Start checking your times on the miles. Make sure that you will make that finish line. And a mile marker would come up...and I'd....completely space. It was like I couldn't even remember what I had just told myself.

The spectators...again...awesome. Many had the list of participants and would look up my bib number as I came by and would call me by name and give encouragement. I passed my family at one point, and was slowly running. I don't even remember what they said to me or what I said to them. But I kept moving forward. Looking for the turnaround. Before too long, a truck went by and a volunteer jumped out and hooked a glow stick around my fuel belt. "For your safety," he said. No problem. It was getting *very* dark. Eventually I made it to the turnaround. Only somewhere around 21 miles to go. But I wasn't moving fast enough. It was going to be *very* close.

Just before I got back to where my family was sitting, I saw Jeff heading towards me with a little flashlight. "Do you know where you're at? Do you know what time it is?" he asked me. I remember that I said, "I know it's going to be close. I'm doing the best I can." He asked if I wanted the flashlight, but I just didn't want even one more thing. I just wanted to keep moving forward and cross that finish line before midnight. I *had* to cross that finish line before midnight. Not long after this, I heard a familiar voice ask, "Is that Kris?" It was Liz on a bike riding along with Chris, her husband. I told her it was me and that I was getting sick and dizzy when I tried to run. I know she told me something like, it's ok...just keep walking...lots of folks are doing it...you've got plenty of time. I'm pretty sure she was trying to reassure me, because I'm not so sure I had plenty of time. I think it was the mile marker after this where I finally remembered to start timing my miles. I made myself power walk, pumping my arms and moving my feet as fast as I could. I was hitting 13/14 min miles walking. I could live with that. That would get me there.

There's not a whole lot more to say about the 'run'. It was a very long walk. It was very dark. The aid station volunteers were amazing. I tried to encourage other people as much as I could. I was finally able to get some fluids and calories in me and even pick up the pace slightly. I was still toasty warm and dumping ice and water on myself quite often.

And...I'm about to blatantly confess a breaking of the rules here, so tune out if this will offend your triathlete sensibilities....but Jeff was so worried about me, I think both my physical as well as mental state, that he walked along with me. Not always right beside me. Sometimes off to the side, sometimes a bit behind, sometimes a bit ahead. But definitely *with* me. Almost the entire way. And he wasn't alone. Quite a few of us out there in the late night, in the dark, had company. Some on bicycles. Some walking. Just moving along with us. Our guardian angels, if you will.

It was along walk out the Queen K and back.

We passed one guy who said he knew he'd make it if he kept up 16 min miles and that he was on track. I hoped he would make it.

We had one guy from Costa Rica walk with us for a while, but lost him at an aid station when he had to stop. Jeff said he could see him sit down and take his shoes off. Guillermo. I hoped he would make it.

We passed Matt from the biggest loser when he was heading out to the energy lab and we were heading back to town. I hoped he would make it too.

At this point, I *knew* I was going to make it. I knew. We were getting closer and closer. I thought I could make it by 11:40. 20 minutes to spare.

Somewhere around mile 24.5 or 25 we were back into town enough that we could see the finish line lights. We could hear the crowd and Mike Reilly announcing the finishers. I'd make it. I tell Jeff that once we make the turn onto Palani back into town, he could go straight down and wait for me at the finish line. I had to make a loop through town and then down Alii Drive. As we hit Palani, a nice downhill, I started to run...very slowly...down the hill. There were still quite a few spectators. And all were yelling encouragement. I made one turn after another, and then....and then....I was on Alii Drive. And everyone was clapping. And telling me...only a few hundred yards. You're going to do it! Keep going! And then I could see the lights. And the crowd. A crowd like nothing I imagined. Wall to wall people lining the finish line. Everyone wants to high-five. I feel like a rock star. I jump up and down "YES! YES!" People are cheering. I see my family. I'm smiling a huge smile. And then....the finish line. I'm here. I'm finally here.

And as I cross the line. There's Tina with a huge hug. And there's Jeff waiting for me. And there's Chrissie! Chrissie Wellington! Who gives me a lei, a hug, and congratulates me. And in my fuzzy headedness, I don't make sure to get a picture of it. Oh well, I don't think I was *all* there.

And so ends a very special day in paradise.

Thanks to my Mom, my Grandma, my Aunt Pat, my friends Tina and Matt, for journeying to Hawaii to support and cheer for me.

Thanks to my coach, Liz, for her support and encouragement all season long. She knew before I did that I'd make it.

And huge thanks to Jeff, who went for the longest walk of his life to help make my dream come true. I always tell everyone that he supports my crazy endeavours, but never dreamed how true that would be.

Aloha and mahalo.

Not just another day in paradise ~ part 3

2009-10-27T19:15:00.000-07:00

When I last left you, I was....prepping for a little ride around Kona, no?

I exited the changing tent at a slow trot. In retrospect it might have been a better idea to carry my bike shoes and put them on at my bike....but whatever. I was here to enjoy the day and see that finish line, not set any records. I made it to my bike, after overshooting my rack by a row or two and slapped on my helmet. And I have to say....those bike racks were pretty empty by the time I ran up to Ruby. More evidence that this was not just another event. Not that I'm ever in the front half of the pack, but I'm usually somewhere in the middle....at least after the swim, I am. :) Grabbed Ruby out of her parking slot and headed to the mount line. I hadn't seen my family yet, but figured they'd find me somewhere out there.

I started spinning, trying to find my bike legs. I went by a big tower where Mike Reilly, at least I think it was Mike, was calling out numbers. I must have had a huge grin on my face because I heard "And there's a BIG smile, number 1387, Kristi Mahadocon from Fremont, California." That was fun! And not too far up the road I saw Jeff and gave him a big smile. I'm in Kona! I'm doing it!

And just as Liz predicted it wasn't too long before everyone and their mother was passing me. These folks were going ALL out. That's ok, let them go. I had my plan and I'm sure they had theirs. Heading back down the route, getting ready to hit the hill on Palani and then out for the long ride on the Queen K. And I saw Tina! She had an awesome sign and was cheering and that was fun too! I tried to soak it up as much as I could because I knew I was going to be out there, pretty much alone, for a long time.

As soon as I got into a rhythm I tried to keep my hydration and nutrition on pace. So far, so good. Soon enough I passed my favorite sign on the Queen K. All along the road they had posted signs "Caution Athletes in Training." But my favorite had been converted to:

Again awesome! Although I knew that by the time I hit this sign again, on the run route, I might not find it quite so amusing. For now tho, I was feeling good.

I was following my plan and feeling good. Even though I was constantly getting passed like I was standing still. Drink, drink, drink, a LOT and eat at little. I have to say, it was HOT out there. From the second bike aid station it went something like this....chuck a water bottle, grab a bottle, fill aero, chuck bottle, grab another bottle, finish filling aero, dump rest on head....pedal on. Eat a little, salt tabs, sweat, pedal, repeat. I was doing fairly well and feeling pretty good....until the climb to Hawi. I knew it would be long and take a while to get there. I also knew that the turnaround was a little *more* than half way. I just needed to get there. I did start to get worried because I hadn't needed to make a pit stop. In more than 3-1/2 hours. Not good. I was supposed to be hydrated enough that I would need to stop at the most every 3 hours. I was putting in what my plan called for, but in retrospect it was very hot, and started to get very windy. Both dehydrating factors. I finally made the turn around, a bit behind schedule, but I kept up the positive thoughts.

At the turnaround, I made myself climb off my bike and hit the bathroom. The bad news was that I didn't even really *have* to go. I really just wanted a brief stretch of the legs. Just past the turnaround I grabbed my special foods bag and pulled my extra salt tablets out. Then I was off again. The downhill out of Hawi was fun. Luckily there wasn't much of a cross wind on this stretch and I was able to just cruise down the hill. It was lonely out there, not may of us left on the course. The wind picked up and at some points I was heading down hill, not coasting mind you, but pedaling downhill at about 10 mph. I shook my head and turned around, sure that I would see I had been on an incline. But no. I was *actually* going downhill. I still had about 40 miles to go and I was already getting discouraged/frustrated/worried. I remembered one thing I had heard several times throughout the week. "The only thing you have control over is your attitude/response to the situation." I tried to stay positive and just kept reminding myself that I was lucky to be here. At some point this reminded me of Willie Wonka. The one with Johnny Depp. And he's meeting the kids and tells Charlie.."and you, well you're just lucky to be here!" That was me....just lucky to be here.

I was trying to keep up with my fluids/food. But things started to go south. I started burping and throwing up a tiny bit. I tried to remember what I was supposed to do if this happened. I stopped putting food in and tried to get my stomach settled. I kept sipping water, and tried to keep sipping Gatorade. The aid stations were shrinking too. Although the folks that were manning them were still so supportive and encouraging, it was depressing just to see them breaking stuff down. I was in a pretty dark place at times. More than once I thought about climbing off and walking. Seriously, couldn't I walk faster than I was moving in this stupid wind?!?! And then I'd talk myself out of it. Look at the ocean. Happy day, remember?? Lucky day, remember??? Just keep moving forward. As Liz said, "Don't stop until you hit that finish line!" At this point, I knew I was way behind my prediction of when I'd finish the bike. I hoped my family wasn't too worried, and that the athlete tracker was being updated so they'd know where I was. I was not doing well. I kept looking for the airport, as I knew I'd be home free once I could see it. It refused to show itself. Refused, I tell you. I was moving at a snails pace and I started to worry about something I had not even imagined I'd worry about. Missing the bike cutoff. How did this happen? I know how it happened. I completely underestimated how hot and windy it would be. I completely underestimated how prepared I was to handle the heat and wind. Now, you may or may not know, but I sweat. I mean I SWEAT on a cool day. And it was at least 90 degrees out there, not including the heat baking up from the asphalt and lava rock. I think Chrissie Wellington said it best "It was like riding in an oven." And I was spending more time in that oven than most.

I have to say that as much as I might have wanted to quit and call it a day, I just couldn't. I most likely would not have another chance at *this*. Kona. And everyone who was here to support me. I couldn't let them down. But mostly I couldn't let myself down. And so I kept pedaling. And trying to drink something. Everything on my bike was lukewarm. I'd grab something from the aid station, whatever they had left, and before too long it would be lukewarm too. Not enticing in the least, I have to tell you.

Finally! Finally! The airport came into sight and I was never more relieved to see something in my life. I was almost there. And I was going to make the cutoff. And I was already calculating what I'd have to do to make the finish. Because I was not feeling very perky and I knew it was going to be ugly. But...I was one step closer.

Rolling in close to the finish, I saw my aunt. And then I saw Jeff. And I'm not sure, but I think they were almost as relieved as I was. Jeff later told me that they started to worry when it took me so long to reach the last check point on the bike. Yeah, you and me both!

I finally made it to the dismount line. I had pulled my feet out of my shoes in an effort to dry them out a bit. All that water dumped on head, basically all day long, had left them feeling like prunes. That would make 26.2 miles extra fun, I'm sure.

Tina was actually there to catch me at the line. And I think she was just as relieved/excited as everyone else that I had *finally* made it in. She grabbed my bike and I took off for the long, slow trot around transition to find my run bag and head back into the changing tent. Where another volunteer was waiting to help me and she was just as awesome as the first. She grabbed me a cup of Gatorade and a cold towel. I sat down and must have been in a daze. I didn't think I was in there *that* long, but Jeff would tell me later that I had spent almost 10 minutes in T2. What was I doing all that time? Trying to find my legs. Trying to find my mind. I changed clothes. I wiped my face and shoulders and legs with that cool, cool towel. I smeared my feet with aquaphor to try and limit blisters. I skipped the sunscreen, I remember that. What was the point, it would be dark shortly. The volunteer asked me if I needed my Garmin. I looked at it for a moment. No. No, I don't think so. I have my watch and I just don't want to get worked up about how slowly I'm moving. In what seemed like moments, but was of course, actually about 10 minutes, I got myself moving. I was slowly jogging out of transition, where Tina was still cheering me on. "Just a little run," she said.

And so....I had just a little run left.....and as Liz had told me on Friday.....more than enough time to walk it if I had to.

Not just another day in paradise ~ part 2

2009-10-26T20:05:00.000-07:00

Pre-Swim
I'd have to say I slept "okay" for the night before. I was up before the alarm went off at 4 tho. My family wanted to have a good view for the start, so we planned to leave the condo around 4:45. I got dressed, ate my oatmeal and toast, grabbed my pre-swim bag and we were off. There was some traffic, but not bad. I got booted out of the car as my relatives jumped out to find a spot along the sea wall to watch the swim start. I made my way to the special needs bag drops, through body marking...no sharpies here! No sir. They use ink pads and number stamps....very neatly stamping me with 1387 down each arm. I wandered out of body marking towards transition and stopped to check my weight on the scale. Coach Liz had said I shouldn't be surprised if I saw I had gained *another* 5 pounds since registration. A little niggle of worry entered my mind when I saw that I had actually *lost* 4 pounds since then, but was too caught up in the events of the day to really think about it.

Off to find Ruby,

pump up the tires, and stock the bento box with my picnic lunch. Again, a little intimidating to see so little food on the ladies' bikes next to me. Obviously they weren't planning on spending quite as much time out there as I was. "Lucky to be here, lucky to be here, just enjoy it as much as you can!" I putted around for a while with my bike. Got her all ready to go, put on my PZ3 speed suit, liberally applied the Body Glide to my neck and arms, packed up my pre-swim bag and dropped it off at the bag drop. Then I headed over to the water entry just to see if I could see my peeps. I saw a group of pink that *had* to have been the awesome t-shirts my mom had printed up for my support crew.

My Gram and my mom (pink hat) awaiting the start of the day

I saw Jeff's signature hat and waved and waved. I willed him to look over at me....but he didn't get my vibes. I put my head down for a minute, got a little choked up, and thought to myself, "You're really here! Enjoy it as much as you can. Take it all in. You *will* cross the finish line eventually. Soak it up." It was a feeling unlike any other, I have to say. A day unlike any other.

Swim
It was getting close to 6:30, the time Liz had said I should work my way into the water. The sun was up.....the Navy Seals had parachuted into the water.....and the pros were soon off on their journey. I took off swimming along the sea wall to warm up and yell up at my family. I was so glad to have people there looking out for me. I smiled up and told Jeff "I'll see you in about 16 hours!" A guy sitting next to him yelled back at me something like "Race hard! Go hard! Go for it!" The water didn't seem bad to me, although I've read other people say there was moderate chop. It felt just like the practice swims I had done...except for that I was out there with 1800 or so other folks, there was excitement buzzing in the air, and there were spectators as far as the eye could see.

I headed out towards the swim start, sticking to the left as planned. I was here....in Kona....ready to start the biggest event of my life. I chatted with some other participants and realized I had somehow gotten a bit too close to the start line. I definitely didn't want to be in front! I overheard someone say they were hoping for a 1:30 swim and felt like I was in a good position sticking in that general area. Before I knew it, the countdown was on and the cannon went off. I put my head down and started swimming. I was pretty calm. I felt good.

At some point I had drifted close to the buoy line and it was pretty crowded, but people were surprisingly polite. My only 'major' contact was an elbow to the head, and the guy that delivered it immediately said "Oh! I'm sorry!" "No worries," I said and put my head back down to start swimming again. Sighting wasn't too much of a problem, as there were always quite a few people around and the buoys were easy enough to spot. I was able to latch on to some feet for at least part of the swim and before I knew it the turnaround was there. A right turn, swim a little, and another right turn and I was headed back to shore. Just after the turn around, I felt something under my arms, and realized that I was starting to chafe. Lovely salt water. I wished I had grabbed some of the Vaseline for my arms, instead of just using Body Glide. It felt like the swim back was shorter than the swim out, but that may have just been anticipation. I found some feet that were slightly faster than me and hitched a ride. I stayed with those feet almost the whole way back. I swam until I could touch sand, then popped up and pulled off my goggles. The spectators were still everywhere and it was amazing. Out of the water, up the stairs, under the freshwater showers to rinse off and then into the changing tent.

Just like everything I've heard...the changing room volunteers were awesome. Pulling everything out of my bag, helping me with my clothes, my shoes, my sunscreen. Taking my sunglasses out of the case and handing them to me. Then when I was ready to head out, packing up my stuff into the bag for me to pick up at the end of the day. And so encouraging. And cheering. And it was just....awesome.

Time for.......a wee bike ride!

Not just another day in paradise ~ part 1

2009-10-25T20:00:00.000-07:00

Pre-race

We arrived in Kona about a week prior to the big day. My Mom, my Grandma, and my Aunt all arrived from Illinois a couple of hours before we did. The week is kind of a blur of activity, non-activity, and an active attempt to stay out of the hub of energy as much as possible. I did some short swims, some short rides, some short runs. I picked up my race wheels and arranged to have my bike shipped home. We did a bit of sight seeing. I ate, drank water and Gatorade (in retrospect, probably not enough of either), experienced the heat of Kona, previewed the course.

The sight of so many super-fit, super-serious athletes was pretty intimidating. I started to have the sense that I didn't belong, I was some kind of impostor. I tried to tell myself that while I may not have qualified, I got an invitation to participate, I paid my money and I had just as much right to be here. Not everyone can be front of the pack. It did make me realize tho just how different this event would be from Vineman. It was going to be very lonely out there. These were the best of the best, and there would be precious few folks back where I'd be spending my day.

On Wednesday I hit the expo, registration and the 'official' merchandise shop. I warned Jeff that I was going to buy everything the shop had and while I didn't quite do that.....yeaaaaah.....this was going to be an expensive trip. Registration was the first time I experienced the amazing volunteers this race has. Already everyone was so nice and extremely helpful. Instead of treating me like a 'lowly lottery winner' they seemed even more excited for me when they found out I was one of the lucky 150. Registration was quick and before I knew it I'd been weighed in (coach Liz was right....I was about 5 pounds heavier than I thought I'd be), filled out a medical and emergency contact form, received my race packet, and had my chip activated. Now I just needed to sort out my gear and food into the appropriate bags and check everything in.

On Thursday Jeff, Aunt Pat and I checked out the underpants run. No I wasn't wearing underpants...well, I mean I WAS wearing under pants, but they were under my pants.....err shorts....you know what I mean. We donated some cash for a good cause and got souvenir t-shirts, a visor, some compression socks and watched the run get under way. Later in the day I made sure to get my bags ready for check-in on Friday. Special needs bike and run, bike gear bag and run gear bag. I included anything and everything I thought I might want, even extras of shorts and tops just in case. Better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it, I figured.

Friday was a swim with Liz and Tina. Liz watched us swim a bit and after a couple quick suggestions for me, I proceeded to draft her for the rest of the swim. Well....I had to rest up for the next day....that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Then I met Liz at Lava Java for a discussion about what to expect during the event. Based on my times from Vineman, when things did not go as well as planned, we figured I could walk the marathon and still make it (cue foreshadowing music). She reassured me that I would make it across the finish line. Around 4:30 (after 'dinner') I went to drop my bike, bike gear and run gear off at transition. All the athletes are funneled through a chute where first your helmet is checked, then a line of folks tally up equipment. They count bikes, components, saddles, aero bars, wheels, etc and publish a tally of how many of what brand were represented. I'm sure I looked (and definitely felt) like the 'poor country cousin' with my road bike/clip on aeros next to all the tri-bike eye candy. But I tried to maintain my attitude of 'I'm just lucky to be here'. Evidently there were a lot of freebies handed out earlier in the day, but everyone was pretty much gone by the time I got there. So it was fairly quiet, which was okay by me. The butterflies didn't need the extra excitement. I got a sticker for my bike that says it was "checked in" or something like that and rolled up to the next stop, my escort around transition. I hear someone say 'I got the girl in pink' and look up to see Matt, T's husband, heading towards me. Nice to see a friendly face. He took me to my transition spot where we parked my bike, reminded me to let some air out of my tires (I already had) so the tubes didn't blow from the afternoon heat, explained the flow of things thru transition and took me to where my bags would be stored. And with that I was officially 'checked in'. Ruby would spend the night surrounded by greatness. I hoped some would rub off on her. Home to finish packing up and early to bed.

Next up......the big day.

Idiocy

2009-10-18T22:33:00.000-07:00

I'm home now and it's back to work tomorrow.

And I've finally realized that I truly am an idiot. Or there's something seriously wrong with me. Yep, it's pretty much confirmed. In the last week, the glow of finishing Kona has started to dim and I've been feeling like I should have done better. See, told you I'm an idiot. I don't know why it is that I have trouble being satisfied with my results. Just a few short years ago I hadn't even done a single triathlon. Forget the idea of doing an IronMan.....let alone Kona! And now, I successfully finished a marathon, and 2 Iron races in one year....one of them the world championship. That sure seems like a big accomplishment. So what is wrong with me that I can't just enjoy the success of that? *sigh*.....I guess that's something to work towards.

I'll put together a race summary soon........maybe even with pics. :)

Almost here

2009-09-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

Things are falling into place.

Bib number....check (1387).

Dog nanny set up.......check.

Packing list......check....even some stuff packed.

Bike box borrowing......check. Bike and box will be dropped off at the shop on Thursday for packing up and then bike goes on the plane.

Race wheels...almost check....should hear back tonight about the details, but am told that the wheels are on their way to Kona as we speak....er write.....er whatever.

Panic...check....excitement....check.

Of course, there are still a million things to do, but there always are just before vacation it seems.

Once everything arrives safely in Kona, I'll feel much better. Well, better at least. I'm sure the butterflies will get worse, but the excitement will build too. I think my coach really helped get it through my head. This is going to be harder than anything I've ever done. Kona is an animal unto itself. Finish and have fun are my only goals. I'm almost laughing now as I think about it....I'm going to KONA for goodness sake. Freakin' Kona. Hot daaaaamn.

Expectations

2009-09-23T22:41:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking lately about how to manage expectations. This is a difficult thing for me, I'll admit. Oh, I don't mean other people's expectations of me, but my expectations of myself.

I have a *bit* of a competitive streak. And it runs even more deeply when the competition is with myself. Although on one level I know it's just not possible, there's a niggle in my head that every event could be a PR.

So I come down to my last event of the year. *The* IM. Kona. Now I obviously won't be competitive with anyone else there, but the competitive fire with myself has been seriously fueled by my disappointing performance at Vineman. Okay, okay, I *know* it's not really a disappointment. There were folks that didn't finish. That's a disappointment. But still....I guess I only know it on a superficial level. It hasn't sunk down deep just yet.

With that said, I've been contemplating how my day will go at Kona. I've read a lot of race reports, the athlete guide, etc. And I've come to the conclusion that no matter how much I might like to smash my Vineman time to bits....I'm going to have to be satisfied with just enjoying the day. Now don't get me wrong...I'm still planning to do the very best that I can do. I'm not going to just coast through the day! But the conditions....the ocean swells, currents, the heat, the wind, the hills combined with wind.....I just don't know how my body will respond or how truly difficult it will be.

And so I have to get it through my stubborn head, that I'm just so lucky to be there....ENJOY IT. Soak up every minute and store it away. It's not likely that I'll be heading back, so make the most of it. Repeat this 100 x to self. Eventually it *might* sink in.