Thin line

Sometimes I feel like that of ALL people, I should be able to figure MYSELF out. Nope. I am beginning to believe that OTHER people are way easier to figure out. Overall I tend to run a thin line between being SUPER busy and LOVING it...and being SUPER busy and it stressing me out so bad that fall off the side of an emotional cliff. Granted one thing I have learned over the past 6 years or so is the signs of being close to that edge...and I now have learned at least a little better how to pull myself back from the edge, even if it means that I only fall half way down the ledge. Half way is better than all the way into the abyss I think.

Unfortunately in the midst of all of this...i am attempting to add just one more very stressful thing into the mix...buying a condo. Yep...i saw one... and i'm putting a bid in on it this week. Scares me out of my mind, but i'm also super excited about it too. It's in my current neighborhood where I caught myself last week just walking around saying: I love my neighborhood. Dorky...i know...but I love where I live. I'm sure there are other great places here...but my slightly quirky neighborhood is great in my opinion.

Training is going pretty well overall. Not a whole lot to talk about of interest at the moment aside from that midweek velodrome track riding (twice a week!) is going to become a regularly scheduled plan...which I am SOOOOOOOO excited about. This winter has been predominately 'Track Sundays'...which have been lots O FUN, but real trackies are getting ready for race season so more organized stuff in the evenings is opening up. I'm pretty sure I'm going to make a mockery of myself and it will be hilarious. And a rodie friend of mine is trying (as well as my coach) to get me to ride in a 'road' race. I ALREADY eat a lot of humble pie on the bike ...but looks like it will be the main course being surved this spring.

And of course...Saturday is the LA Velodrome/ADT center. EXCITING! I'm trying not to think about it...otherwise I fear it will just freak me out all week.

HOME!!

Ahhh...i'm home...and soooooooooooo happy to be home.

First...clarification from my last post...i'm not going to be riding up at the LA Velodrome for another 2 weeks...so I have two weeks to freak myself out. Good times. And two weeks for anticipation of what it might be like.

I had to fly to TX for work on Sunday for the week...it was not a fun trip on many fronts

Flying out...

...things didn't start so well when I got to the airport and I asked the guy:

Um...i don't have a seat assignment.

He looked at me, looked at the flight and said: Yea, we are in an oversold status...oversold by ONE...and that is you. Best to check in at the gate and see if you can get on.

Here's the part that was lame about that...I had tried to get a seat assigment when I bought the ticket. I put in a request...there were seats...I BOUGHT THE SEAT 3 WEEKS AGO AND NOW YOU ARE TELLING ME I AM NOT ON THE FLIGHT?? Ok that is what I wanted to say to the guy...instead..i just sorta glared at him. I got on the flight in the end...of course a middle seat...but I got there.

The rental car...

I pick up my rental car and the radio isn't working and the radio says: Enter code....hmmm interesting. I mention this to the lady checking my car out and she offers to let me switch cars. I'm tired, cranky and want to get to my hotel so I decline. I also figure I can probably figure out how to punch in the code. So when I get to my hotel...i open the glove compartment, and lo and behold there is written: Radio Code 45934234 (whatever it was). I punch it in. The radio comes on. All is well.

I get out of my car, and double check there are no lights on (because i'm slightly paraonid with rentals) and go to bed. Come out the next morning...car won't start. Brilliant. I am supposed to be at where i'm doing my work stuff and i have a car that won't start. Call Hertz...they refer me to AAA...AAA comes out, jumps the car and then tells me that if the radio says: enter code...that's a BAD BAD THING...and CHANGE THE CAR. I tell Hertz...they then tell me to drive to the airport OR go and get it checked out. WHAT? I convince them that their job is to exchange the car...they eventually comply...but only with some minorly pointed arguments. NOT IMPRESSED.

Get to where I am going...and as time goes on we discover that what I am trying to do (i'm running experiments)...isn't really working very well. We are jerry-rigging the whole deal and I am not thrilled with the way it is turning out. I email my manager and tell him about the woes of the trip and say: the trip is going marginally.

He replies: Sounds like the trip from hell. I hope the rest of the week shapes up.

Experiments go south...
Um...unfortunately, things didn't shape up. Experimental points that were to take two days, were a bust in half a day so on Wed I end up having to re-design the stupid set of experiments...on the fly. I wasn't thrilled with it...I didn't feel like it was a great idea to just throw in the towel half way through Wed when I could at least attempt to do more experiments through Friday. Hopefully something unique and interesting will come from it.

Treadmill??
I got back to my hotel on Wed and was supposed to do some intervals on the treadmill...i really didn't want to so I sat in front of the TV for a bit and then headed down to the treadmill to do some attempt at this. Pushing buttons...treadmill won't work. Manager comes over to try to help me:

Oh yea, they were trying to fix this today. I thought it was fixed.

Me:( I just look at him...not sure what to say.)

Him: Well I can comp you a movie if you'd like?

Me:(Apparently i don't have any sort of a poker face. I must have given him some sad look of: But...I don't WANT a movie. Granted I really didn't even want to do this workout so I was secretly starting to be relieved.) Uh...that's ok.

Him: Well...i can comp you to go over to the gym across the street.

Me: (thinking: Crap now I have to do this workout)...uh sure.

Workout was done, and done quite well I might add. I was pretty pleased with it considering how tired I was and not really in the mood to be on a treadmill at that time.

The rest of the week...
The final bits of the week were pretty uneventful...THANK GOODNESS...It's really a bad thing when you want to go home on Monday and can't until Friday...but I got through it...and attempted to have as good an attitude about it as I could...but there always seemed to be just something round the corner waiting for me. But happy...HAPPY...HAPPY...to be home!

ADT center and lots of other things

Next Challenge:
My next challenge....is to stop freaking myself out about going up to the ADT center in LA to ride the track. So... it is decided...I have to stop freaking myself out because some friends and I are going up for a women's only session in a few weeks (any takers? Only 10 dollars to learn to ride the track AND ride at the ADT center... More info here.) But after reading this page...I will be honest I sorta wanted to throw up at the thought of it. Why? Here are a few comments from the page that make me go...huh?

The blue band:
Because the ADT track is so steep in the corners, riders on the blue band can be a serious hazard to riders who are going fast in the sprinters lane. Fast moving riders in the sprinters lane are tilted over so that their heads and bodies are out over the blue band, so it's possible for them to collide with a rider on the blue band, even while their wheels are a meter apart.

Balustrade:(This is at the top of the track)

The final riding position is the balustrade. Like the blue line, the balustrade has a limited formal role in racing, but is commonly used as a training zone. Generally more experienced riders will do part of their training effort at the balustrade. Be aware that the balustrade takes more effort and skill to ride safely than the lower parts of the track. Although the banking is the same, the radius in the turns is larger so the centripetal force as you go through the corner will be lower for the same speed-- you need to ride faster to avoid slipping.

And in general:
If you slide down the track your session is over for the day. Keep your speed high enough to avoid slipping off.

Slipping...sliding...it is a mind bend to get my head around it. The track I ride is something like 27 degrees...this one is 46 degrees and two stories tall! BUT I'm going to do it AND in just a few weeks. And I'm pretty stinkin excited too! (even if it kinda still makes me want to throw up...just a little bit.)

other stuff...

Lots of stuff going on with training and regular chaos of life. Went for a bike ride this weekend with a friend of mine and here is a little reminder for everyone...eat your wheaties (or really anything). Um...yea, my friend didn't eat breakfast and bonked so bad she passed out after we had stopped and were looking at our map. Not a fun way to end one's ride for the day. So I will forever ask people I ride with: Did you eat breakfast?

Should I apologize?
Ever feel like non-endurance athletes or just people who maybe just 'workout some' put you in a spot that makes you feel like you should apologize for your endurance?? (and i'm not even in the prime of my season right now!)I went skiing this week and basically skied a couple of the guys I was with into the ground...and could have gone for at least another 5 or so runs if I had wanted to. One of them said to me: just tell me your legs are a least a little tired...please? um...ok...my legs are tired?? Granted I did sorta pay for it in my own way as the next day I was swimming like a rock...but I wasn't sore...just feeling low on energy and tired.

Trying to catch up with everything hard to juggle it all at times...but doing my darndest.

Pretty close to perfect

Today was just an awesome day. Even before I got to the pool this evening, it was an awesome day. Internally I've just been hung up on a few things, struggling with others and then mix in some other stuff and I didn't really realize how much internal termoil I had induced upon myself, but I had. And today...i just somehow let it go. Someone made an offhand remark to me, I finally just relaxed a little and things in a lot of areas of my life just...clicked. It felt good. It's been the kind of day where people stopped me and asked me why I was smiling so much and I didn't have an answer for them aside from: It's Friday? When inside I was thinking...i don't know...i just can't stop smiling. But that was even before i got to the pool

Back in December I did a time trial in the pool to get an idea of what my threshold pace was...that time trial in the dark with the leaking roof? (it did make me laugh at the time). But the end result of that was that my average pace per 100y was around 1:50/100y. Nothing steller, but that was the end result. Although what I found in my swim workouts when I had workouts that said: do X amount of yardage at T-pace...i couldn't hold 1:50/100y for longer than 100y and generally not for very many 100s...like one or two in a set...so it was decided that if something said "T-pace" that I'd go off at 2:00/100y. Ok...cool...whatever...It didn't fuss me either way so that's what I did. So I get to today's workout and see 4x50's descending and then 4x300 at T-pace and then later 3x150 T-Pace...with more swimming stuck in between all of it...but that is the general gist of the workout. So I start and I come up with:
4x50s

1. 0:52
2. 0:50
3. 0:48
4. 0:46

hmmm...interesting. I'm pretty happy with those times and get into the main set of 300s. The first 300 I hold what I think should be my t-pace @ 2:00/100y. But I realize...i'm just feeling good. And I sorta think...hmmm...i wonder what might happen if I just push it? Just see what happens. Just go as fast as I can at what feels like threshold pace?

Then that little voice in my head crept in and said: but what if you blow up by the last 300? What if you get REALLY slow by the 150s...what if you really just muck up this workout because you go too HARD at the beginning??

I briefly considered the point. And hesitated for a second and then I thought: Well if I can't screw up a workout then what good IS a workout? SO WHAT if I start going slow. SO WHAT if I find myself at 2:05/100 for my last set. WHO CARES ANYWAY? Sure I wanted it to go well...but if I couldn't 'color outside the lines' a little bit i'd never find out where those lines were anyway. So I figured...just go for it. If i slow down over the course of the workout...at least i KNOW where I am...right? So I got to it...what MIGHT happen if I just WENT at what felt like threshold pace ...what might happen?

Basically...i threw down the workout.

After that first 300 where I was conservative at 2:00/100y the next 300s looked like this:
5:41(1:53/100)
5:36 (1:52/100)
5:33 (1:51/100)

Then I was into my 150s. That stupid voice came back in my head: well...ok...so you swam faster than what you thought you could hold...really...but i'm sure you might get tired on these 150s...you have to be tired by now? Right? I bet your time per 100y will slow down.

I think at this point I pretty much then said to that little voice: screw you

For the 3x150 they looked like this;
2:38 (1:45/100)
2:42 (1:48/100)
2:35(1:43/100)

I don't know what to say aside from: it was awesome. It felt awesome...it just felt so easy...It was an awesome way to end a pretty awesome day. Total breakthrough workout for me. I think i'm going to be smiling for days. :-)

Mental Game

Just don't think about your hip hurting...imagine it doesn't. It hurts partly because you think it will. ---advice from coach.

I've been told by people...more than once...i'm somewhat of a complex person. I usually think: who isn't? But I guess not everyone is complex or 'multifaceted'. I can't figure myself out most days so I don't expect other people to figure me out either. But sometimes I feel very duel in nature...and here is one area that I feel somewhat duel because while I love science and experimental evidence ect... that isn't the whole picture either. I've just run into a lot of people who expect that if one thinks that way a lot of the time that many times...they also expect them to behave that way and are a little taken aback by how emotional/spiritual/intuitive I can be also. It doesn't always make sense to some people. (It doesn't always make sense to me either) I'm ok with that.

So the mental game that is also important in sports...like dealing with a nagging injury that just won't go away...maybe just telling my body I am healthy will heal it...right? Coach told me to try it. And here is where my duel brain has a big old thrown down going on inside one side thinking:

What are you talking about...just WILL it better? Are you crazy you aren't doing anything to it! How can it get better?

And the other part thinks:of course you can will it better. Mind-body connection is more mysterious than any science project can figure out.

It can be interesting the weird fights my little brain can come up with but this happened to be the one for today. Not much else is working at this point with this injury so I might as well try this technique. So whenever my mind wandered to my hip on my run today I thought:

my psoas is getting longer, running makes my psoas happy.

Basically any positive thought about my hip...i thought. And well...it really wasn't irritated when I finished. Minor trigger point I've been releasing all day...but not too bad.

I've actually done this sort of mental gymnastics before. I was about 15 when I was on a ski trip where I was cold and had no opportunity to warm myself up and we weren't leaving anytime soon...so I just told myself: I'm warm. Think of a hot tub...YOUR FEET ARE HOT....warm, warm, warm. And I remember warming up. Some people are better trained in mental gymnastics like these Tibetan monks who can dry wet blankets with just their body heat or there are some yoga techniques where yogi's can slow their breathing down to ridiculously slow rates and low heart rates. It all seems crazy at first glance but really...how much do we really understand about how the body works or even how the mind controls the body?

In my opinion, I don't think we understand much at all. Knowing what I know about science, we know so little about much of anything in the physical world it really is amazing how much there is to KNOW and how little we really understand. Much of what we understand we only sorta understand and much of what we think we understand we are really taking a stab at. Much of the time it is only possible to disprove something, not actually prove it. I am more mystified by how much we don't know...and the fact that many people seem to think that science is one step away from unraveling the all the mysteries of the universe. It isn't.

The mind-body connection is quite mysterious and I know I over look it. And positive thinking, while sometimes seems cheezy to me, can actually do something...even though it doesn't feel like it should (at least to me).But I know the power of positive thought has gotten me through many situations that have been particularly difficult. And even through descending down a hill that has freaked me out where i've just told myself: I AM a good descender...and while it hasn't made me ease up as much on my brakes as I would really like, it has helped me relax a lot.

I have some challenges I am thinking about with the whole mental game...i'll post on those in a few. Till then...my psoas is not spasming...it is getting longer...it loves to run...running helps.

Riding 'round

Now that I think about it, I spent a fair amount of time in the saddle this weekend.

Bike Clinic
Saturday I decided to check out a bike clinic and see if I could gain some insight into developing more bike handling skills and fun stuff like that. I think SO much about bike handling is...well..not thinking about it. There are some things to think about, but if a person thinks too much about it...more likely than not one will fail while attempting to do it. We practiced picking up water bottles off of the ground and playing tag...on our bikes and other fun things...but many times I realized if I could just shut my mind off about the thought of: how does one do this? How do I do this? Will i tip over when I do it?...and just DO it...it is so much easier. Analytical skills do not come in handy here. I did pick up a handy tip on cornering though...LOOK where you want to go eventually. Look through the corner and your bike will go where you intend it to. I thought I was doing it, but at one point one instructor sorta yelled 'Look ahead' while it was my turn and I realized I wasn't doing it and once I did look ahead the cornering got SO much easier.

Women only ride
Sunday My LBS was sponsoring a women only ride and I thought I'd check it out since my friends were going to be there. I don't normally skip church to go on a bike ride, but these things can happen in the middle of January when its 80 degrees outside. Always fun to meet more women who enjoy riding so i thought it would be good time, and it was a lot of fun. It was a pretty chill ride which was great and I got to meet some fun women, but one of the thoughts that I kept realizing as we were climbing up hills and such...was around how fit I was for January. My HIM training started on Monday and the reality that I am as fit as I am right now as I start my base building is really amazing. I think my main two things this season I only worry about are: burnout and aggravating my psoas injury. If I can avoid both...this could be a really great racing year for me.

Track Sunday
And what would a weekend be without...the track? Sigh. It might become apparent that I could write a post every week about the track that basically just says: I love the track. And not much else. I basically would write: I love the track and post the same picture every time and well...it would pretty much get my point across...which is I love my bike AND the track. sigh. Ok...i incorporated a new picture...this one has PONY on my bike. She deserves her own post in all rightfulness...but PONY rocks pretty much. She came to Europe on my last trip with me (really she did!). Side note: she used to be a purse PONY but I swear she chewed through my purse strap on the trip and protested being in the purse. So now she just sits on my dresser...but I may have to find a new purse and see if she will tolerate a new purse or not. (If you haven't figured out by now, I have a penchant for silliness on a regular occasion).

Anyway, back to the track...sorry I get distracted easily. By the time I got there I was actually pretty tired. Between getting a 'baby cold', not sleeping well and then riding on Sunday morning I was pretty tired...but I still managed to get in about 15 miles on the track in total. Some nice paceline work, got dusted in a sprint and generally just enjoyed being out there...like I normally do.

Overall a great weekend, but I fear my baby cold is turning into a monster malaise. While the level of horrible coldness isn't that bad, I feel terrible. No energy at all. I would have left work at 1 today except I had an important meeting and now I am counting down the minutes til I can go to bed as I don't want to go to bed too early for fear then I'd just wake up at 2am and not sleep anymore. Oh YEA...i can go to bed now!! Excited.

Lots...

There has been lots going on in my little world this week. First week back after two weeks off and I discovered...my job must really stress me out. I don't know why. In all truth I don't have crazy deadlines right now and the topic of my job in general is not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of life...but well...the insomnia has crept back in. This is the type I hate (although there isn't one kind of insomnia I actually *like* though is there?). I can get to sleep fine, but my busy, busy mind wakes me up and no more sleeping from that point on. I picked up some homeopathic remedies, but also gave myself the rest of the week to see how I did. Only one episode. But still...i get the feeling there will be a repeat showing of this particular movie in the future. I'm not impressed.

Unfortunately I worry I have taken on too much in my life already and I am not even knee deep in every aspect of my life yet. I don't know what to dump or pull back on either...no do I want to...i just know it will all exhaust me especially with trying to balance it all with HIM training.

My HIM training started this week and I discovered: I need to plan time better. Everything was (so far) executed alright, but I always felt rushed. I had great plans of trying not to have too many evening workouts so that I can have some evenings free...alas...that works if I actually get to bed early enough (oh and no insomnia). Again a planning issue. I hope to get the hang of it with time.

Then...some stuff has recently turned into a situation where I have come to the realization that not everyone in life will get a gold star and a comment of: plays well with others. I'm particularly not fond of pedantic and patronizing attitudes. sigh...must.not.scream.

Lots of other insanity going on too...life can be just too bizarre at times.

One more thing...

UGH...triathlon sometimes just seems like: Just one more thing...one more gadget...one more piece of equipment...no wait ....time to replace the shoes/swimsuit/bike/whatever. Since I found myself with a coach a few weeks ago I have been introduced to the joys of Training Peaks. I cannot express how much i LOVE this beautiful piece of software. It is truly amazing. I am having a lot of fun with it. I can graph stuff...ohhhh...i'm in heaven. I am a data geek at heart. Probably why science has suited me so well for so long of my life. Granted it has lead to my current conundrum...How to analyze my current loads of data?

I bought a Garmin Forerunner 305 this summer and have enjoyed it. And while I do hoard data, love data...no, no...NO...wait...i need to emphasis this...I.LOVE.DATA...I like making graphs and all of that. What is sorta funny about me though is that I actually try to keep some (ok...granted it doesn't work too well..) of my WAY too analytical mind out of my training or should I say the analysis of my training. I had a love hate relationship with my experimental data in graduate school and since I took up endurance sports while in grad school...I actually tried to only observe my training data to a very small degree and not delve too deep into it. Basically hold it at arms reach. I always knew I could take another look at it. I knew I could analyze it to death and probably enjoy analyzing it...to a degree.. but I also knew that it could taint my training since I was having such a difficult time in grad school and much had to do with my experimental data in the lab. So in some ways since my early days of training I haven't really picked my data apart as much as I have the capacity to do.

Here is a bit of a confession of mine. Since buying my Garmin 305...i hadn't installed any software about my Garmin til...uh...uh...i got a coach a few weeks ago. I know, I know...here I have this very powerful training tool and really all I was using it for was distance and speed and HR. That's all I really wanted it for so it was doing its job...and my training had its own set of hurdles last year between injury and the reality that I came (very) close to breaking up with triathlon... so I really wasn't that fussed about the tool in itself.

Now here is my conundrum...the Garmin came with one piece of software and then there is another piece of software that Training Peaks also lets people use for free. From my scientific perspective...they both suck. BIG.TIME. I can't chop off parts of what is recorded unless I had hit the lap button...and well...i'm a smartie in general or a better word really would be...space cadet...and like today I forgot to turn off the stupid thing from my cool down and into my car and my drive home. So now during my run it show that I hit 65mph...yes...if that were the case it would would be a justifiable reason have the moniker 'rocketpants' :-P

Ugh...so it comes back to the whole "just one more thing"...I realized on the Training Peaks website there IS a software package that would allow me to analyze my data to DEATH. WKO+
a quick little tour of the software made me salivate. (Anyone out there use it? Thoughts?) BUT...here is the thing...it's just one more thing. This desire to acquire this software also competed with me thinking back to the day when I spent my first two racing seasons on an early '80s


(a picture of the beloved bike before I sold him)
racing bike with down tube friction shifters (that frequently stopped working...especially during a race and then i'd have only my front two chain rings)that I had found at a pawn shop for 75 bucks when I was an undergrad. I'm kinda sad that I parted with him before I left MA...even though he actually was too big for me.

Sometimes I look back on those first two seasons of training and have a few reactions. One is pure laughter at myself and the stupid things I did unwittingly or even just how 'green' I was when it came to endurance sports and no concept of really any part of it. (Coming into my first sprint race I wasn't sure if I was I going to survive exercising for1.5 to 2 straight hours without falling over and bonking or something if my heart rate went too high for too long. And I had followed a 10 week training plan for beginners...to the T. My UTTER concern makes me laugh now...but I was very concerned about this when I was doing my first race.) But in some ways those first few years were pretty simple. I was a poor...poor grad student and I couldn't race too much because I couldn't afford to...I didn't have much gear unless I had been given it for my birthday or Christmas (aside from shoes)...so for quite a few seasons it was all pretty simple gear wise. I didn't even own a wetsuit until my fifth season...and that was this last summer when I bought one, since I now am not a dirt poor grad student.

Triathlon can just get so complicated some times. I think that is why I fundamentally love riding the velodrome so much. While I'm not terribly fast, or strong, and I really don't have any aspirations to ever race ...riding a track bike on a track is just SO simple and to be honest...quite beautiful because it is so simple. One gear. Want to go faster? Pedal faster or apply more pressure to those pedals. (or get a different gear ratio)...but at the heart of it...it is just so simple. Somehow that speaks to me.

It doesn't mean that I won't salivate over the potential to get some new fangled software or contemplate a new piece of equipment, or drool over every bike when I go to a bike shop... but it is also good to remind myself regularly that sometimes keeping it simple IS equally important.


I think Thoreau was on to something: Simplify, Simplify, Simplify.

Staycation

I wasn't supposed to take a staycation but I'm going to now. The plan was to get back from visiting the family...YESTERDAY...and THEN head up to the Palm Springs area for a few days of fun. BUT...well...of ALL places...yes ALL places what city had a weather advisory yesterday when I was traveling??? Yep...San Diego. So when I hopped on an earlier flight in Reno and they were actually taking off...i thought "YES...i'm going to get to go home tonight". Unfortunately the fog never lifted last night and my plane got diverted to Vegas en route. Nice. I did manage to get the first flight in and who knows how...i actually managed to get my luggage too. There were 10+ flights that were cancelled into San Diego last night and the baggage area had hundreds of bags.

Sure I could leave town and all that good fun, but I've decided to take a step back...relax for a few days, enjoy some stuff in San Diego...I mean...it is San Diego and just enter 2009 in an organized and focused manner. I'm pretty tired at the moment and I think a few days of calmness around here will be great. The weather looks pretty good...60s for the next few days...so i'm pretty excited to be out of the snow.

Here are a few tips from my fiasco that I amazingly didn't have to learn on this trip:

• Always carry on necessary toiltries for an overnight stay.
• Have something you don't mind sleeping in your carry on.
• Don't forget any medication that is necessary in a 24+ hour period.
• Have your cell phone charger in your carry on. I can't tell you the number of people who's batteries were running low.
• Be flexible.
• Be nice to those that are changing your flight. It's not their fault and they are completely stressed out too.
• Be creative.
• Laugh...you can't do much more and complaining will just make it worse.

I'm glad to be home. I'm starting to think and plan for this next year and getting pretty excited. It's going to be good.

Happy New Year!

Home for the Holidays

I somehow managed to actually make it out of San Diego on Saturday. *That* in itself was a miracle. Due to all the chaos with all the snow all over the country on Saturday the line for the Southwest Airlines ticket check in was over 2 hours long! I somehow had the wits to just do curb side check in with SW and only had to wait for 30 minutes...but it was only slightly less insane. I was delayed before I got even to the airport but really in the end it was only an hour.

Visiting the fam has been great. Between two sisters, I have 5 nieces and nephews all under the age of 5. Chaos is reigning but it is a lot of fun. Things that are great about kids?

• Asking for a hug from the 2.5 year old, and realizing that she's really not going to stop hugging you any time soon. To which when she finally does stop hugging you she says: I wuv you.
• Funny hats that look like bears that they get to wear when we all go out to play in the snow.
• The fact that any picture I try to take the kids will try to make silly faces. I cannot for the life of me get the kids with grandpa without them making silly faces.
  
• Having my 4 year old nephew request ME to read him stories for bed.
  
• Having my two 5 year old nieces want to know where I am since they haven't seen much of me yet this visit.
  

Its been fun so far visiting fam. The normal chaos and insanity, but also good. The snow is coming down and it looks like that the skiing might be good which I think I will venture up the hill with my dad sometime this week.

Merry Christmas!

Nightswimming or dark swimming...take your pick

Here is a little REM "Nightswimming" for some background music if needed.

Granted OK...i haven't really gotten into much detail about a few things about this next season and well, I really don't know too much about next season except a few things. I have a coach, and a team and well a goal. There are some other races in between that will be worked on and worked towards but July is the main one.

Katie b. has been coached by 'coach Brian'...or CB as she refers to him, since this summer so i've heard stories of CB for awhile but not until IMAZ did I actually get to meet him. I guess I can't say anything mean and nasty about him cuz...uh...he reads my blog. (Hi coach!) In all honesty he's a great guy and nothing mean and nasty could be said about him.

But this whole 'coaching' this is pretty new to me in someways. Joe did coach me to an under two hour half marathon back in 2006. But that was for 2 months of coaching...for one sport. This is for months and for the whole triathlon deal. I played soccer in high school...but not very well and I did play competitive ultimate frisbee (i know...many people look at me strange when I say I played in a league. There are competitive leagues out there and university teams) in college and for awhile after but again nothing like this. So all a little new.

But back to the point of this morning. Swim Time Trial. It looked like this: warm up...then do 3x100 at threshold pace with 10 second breaks between the 100s. Then 30 second break then do it 2 more times.

Not that I have internalized what my 'threshold pace' is for swimming, but I get this whole TT thing. OK. I get it. I can do this. Maybe really slowly. But I can definitely do it. I get to the gym and walk onto the pool deck only to discover that there are.no.lights.! Actually there is no power in the pool area, just the emergency lights. Hmmmm....ooooookay. At least I wasn't being reliant on the split timer for my splits or I would have had to do this another day. I now have a handy dandy new little watch specifically for swimming I picked up so I was golden for the AM.

Here are a few tidbits and funny bits from the TT this morning that should be pointed out:

• There was minimal light in the pool area.
• I have darkly tinted goggles so I can barely see to begin with inside, much less without any lights on.
• I know I'm supposed to rest 10 seconds between 100s, but i have no split timer, and I can't read my watch...so i'm stuck hitting the split/lap on my watch and just counting to 10. Don't ask me why I found this endlessly funny, but I did.
  
• It was dark.
• Did I mention it was dark? It was dark.
• Good thing about it being dark and not being able to see much of anything is I had no idea how fast or slow I was swimming because I couldn't read my watch because...oh did you catch what I said before? It was dark and my goggles are darkly tinted. Basically blind swimming.
• Even though this was an indoor pool the roof was leaking...so it was raining inside too which actually was kinda 'cold' (for San Diego at least) and a little disorienting to be hit by really cold water halfway through every length.I know I know...whine...no...not asking for sympathy.
  

Overall the TT went fine. According to coach, apparently because I 'timed' my rests I was being anal. Anal or notsosmart? I vote for the latter. In MY defense...I was afraid to hit 'stop' in between laps because i might never get my watch to start properly again...cuz , you, know...IT WAS DARK. I knew if I just hit the 'lap' for everything I would be fine in the end and I would just record the rests. Maybe coach didn't actually need me to GIVE him the times of my rests. But i was just being thorough in my data collection. Sheesh...OK...maybe anal...just a wee little bit. :-) OR just funny?

I hope they get the lights working soon. I do like being able to sorta see, just a wee little bit.

Sailing, riding for charity and chaos

The title of my post has basically been my weekend...lots of things muddled together but been a great weekend. Friday some friends invited me out to go sailing...which, quite frankly, is weird in December to me. It has been turning less warmish in these parts, but Friday wasn't too bad actually. Got out early enough to see the sun set and the full moon rise. It was a pretty fun time...we did have to bundle up quite a bit as it does get cold on the water, but still very weird to me to go sailing in December. But after reading a dozen posts on real WINTER in the rest of the country...i'll take weird.

Saturday I joined a few friends to do a charity toy bike ride. The part I loved about this ride was that I rolled out of my house and then met up with my friends and we rode up to the start of this bike ride...which was about 12 miles away. I so rarely ride from my house that i love it when I get to. I live in urban-ville in San Diego and i'm trying to find more ways to do this, slowly I am mastering the riding in urban-ville with traffic and all that fun and navigating my way around. With more confidence riding in traffic i'll get there...but I just loved that I could ride to the start of this bike ride.

The point of this bike ride was raising toys for kids in need. It was a couple of the local bike clubs that got together to do this ride and you had to bring an unwrapped toy and carry it on you to the Salvation Army we were riding to...which was about 20 miles from the start of the ride. There was a contest for decorated bikes and dressing up...there were some great costumes on the ride. I wasn't festive, maybe next year. Someone had even made her bike look like it was a raindeer. It was pretty funny.

There were about 200+ bikers who showed up to this...and the point was not to be an insane bike ride...but then it ended up being a pretty slow bike ride as we accordion-like snaked our way to the salvation army. That shear volume of bikers was pretty crazy. What was unexpected though was by the time we hit one of the major roads that we had to head down to get to the Salvation Army, we picked up a 3 car police escort! It is still unclear if the police escort had been planned ahead of time or if they just decided to do it for us. But they leap frogged the traffic lights and stopped traffic for us. (not like we weren't already doing that on our own...but now it was 'offical')

We got there and dropped our toys off. They had some food for us and warm drinks. Me and two of my friends I had gone with started to get cold by the end of all of this and as it got to be time to leave we just decided we didn't really want to wait everyone else and for the slow...cold...ride back. No...it's not real 'winter' in San Diego, but Saturday was about 50...pretending to rain and not exceedingly toasty...especially when I really should have been wearing long pants for the ride and more layers than just arm warmers. But the slow speed we had taken with the group was fast enough to slightly warm me up...and equally slow enough to cool me down at the same time. Basically we were getting cold and wanted to warm up and go faster. So we took off...with about 7 others with the same idea of just needing to warm up.

Granted I quickly realized I was in a little over my head speed wise and was secretly grateful for the traffic lights that allowed me not to be completely dropped from the small group. But we hammered the rest of the last 10 miles home and it was great to just hop off my bike and head up my own stairs, not having driven my car anywhere for the ride.

Sunday has just been a bunchachaos...as i needed to be at church early for band practice...race to Temecula for a christmas gig to play my violin and then cram in a run on the dreaded dreadmill (as it was dark) before my gym closed. Sadly due to the gig on Sunday...no time at the track...and won't be til next year...sigh...But all in all a good weekend.

Only one week of work til i'm off for a bit for the holidays. Can't believe christmas is almost here.

I want some CHALK!!

So...what to do with crossfit? What to do with lifting? What to do, what to do? I know a few things, crossfit and the extra lifting this last year helped (i believe) my psoas injury, and prevented other nasty things like my ability to get ITBS. GRANTED recently the psoas injury has started to whine in new and curious ways like: knee pain. Bizarrely when I release the trigger point associated with the psoas injury the knee pain will go away. At least I know this is not a new injury, but i'm a little frustrated with the stupid injury. It has been over a year by now. Not a fan. Fortunately it isn't as terrible as it was a year ago, its just become this nagging injury. Sigh.

I'm flirting with the idea of a strength program that most crossfit affiliates (mine included) subscribes to...Starting Strength. I haven't bought the book or really read much about it, just generally looked up the affiliated wikki on it and have gone with that. In someways I'm pretty familiar with the concepts and the lifts as my crossfit affiliate mixes a lot of this general idea of lifting with our workouts anyway. If we have a general met-con day where we have a prescribed workout for time, we will generally lift heavy for one specific lift before the met-con. And on days where we just lift...well...we just lift.

I like it because it is simple. Not too many lifts. Just mainly linear progression in strength in a specific manner with some simple lifts. I won't have to spend a zillion years on five hundred weird machines that I can't remember how they work anyway most of the time and constantly thinking: was this the position I had it in last time?? Generally there are just three lifts for a particular day and really only 5 I have to keep track of: back squat, deadlift, push press, bench press and power clean. I'm starting with a modified program that isn't specific to the book, mainly because I didn't want to bench press and/or do power cleans today, maybe in the future. I wasn't going to my crossfit affiliate so I didn't want to scare people with the power cleans. Granted I also confused power cleans and squat cleans where you end up in a squat position below parallel...I *really* think that would have scared a few people with a squat clean, but maybe next time I will mix in power cleans...although all the jumping does draw more attention to oneself. I'm such a dork. :-)

But back to my gym...I haven't really ventured into the weight room at this gym all that much. I swim there and last year would go to the spin classes and maybe an occasional yoga class so I don't really know my way around when it comes to weights. Few observations:

Only TWO barbells...three if you count the one attached to the smith machine (that's what they call that weird contraption where the barbell is attached to it? right?)

Why is every guy obsessed with doing curls? OK maybe not every guy, but 9 out of 10 were. I am still not certain when a person actually uses that muscle in that capacity...much less loaded with a lot of weight. Also many people seem to think that range of motion is over-rated. Again, something I don't understand. I really just wanted to tell one guy, go lighter and use your full range of motion. It might save you from a trip to your PT in the future.

I pretty much felt like a big dork with my weight lifting shoes, but I still went ahead and wore them. They are waaaaaaay easier to lift in than running shoes. So I just sucked it up that I felt like a dork because I knew I would be wearing dorky lifting shoes and not moving much weight...so i'd look dorky for no good reason. Oh well.

So I did my standard crossfit warmup:
Run 0.5 mile on the tread mill and then 2x of the following:

Stretch the hip out
10 squats
10 push ups
10 sit ups
10 back extensions ( I couldn't find this machine, next time I may just have to do 'supermans' on the ground...so I skipped it)
10 assisted pull ups ( I HATE this contraption at the gym. Give me a rubber band, a straight bar and let me do kipping pull ups any day of the week. This crazy thing you have to kneel on and you don't even get a straight bar. I didn't like it. )
10 assisted dips
repeat

Then
3x5 back squats
5x1 dead lifts
3x5 push press

The way they talk in the wikki site about how to find this initial weight to start off with was to start with an empty bar and do the lift and then add weight and do the lift again, basically until you slow down with the weight and then that is your starting 'round' of the set. So it is better to start a little light so that your future progress can be linear and you don't stall early on. Granted i'm a weakling so I ended up with these weights:

Back Squat: 65 lbs
Dead lift: 135lbs
push press: 40 lbs

The thing that sucks about this gym...NO CHALK. I didn't realize how helpful chalk was until I couldn't have any. boo

Funny thing happened while I was trying to find my deadlift weight. The bars at this gym are sorta rough, and weird to get the plates on and off. I'm used to smooth bars, these have all sorts of ridges on them and they made me struggle to get them on and off. I was trying to get the 25lb plates off and put the 35lb plate on and I couldn't. Now I'm feeling like a bigger dork with the dorky lifting shoes. I'm sure someone was thinking: Look at that girl who is wearing lame lifting shoes and can't even get the stupid plate off the bar.

So...of course i can see out of the corner of my eye a guy has come over to help me and then asks me if he can help me. I let him. I do appreciate when people help me when i'm struggling, but I just felt so lame that I kinda wanted to hide when he came over. He is in the middle of helping me get the plate off and I see he sorta takes a double take at the weight i'm racking on the bar: 45lbs on each side...so total weight with the bar of 135lbs. I kinda giggled to myself. I am kinda a weakling so I have never really thought about it. It was kinda funny though seeing that I couldn't even get the big plates on the stupid bar. Nice one.

I'm still in the process of working out the details of my base building phase with my coach and what that entails, but I think i will be able to shove 2-3 days of this program with 1 crossfit day and then a whole lotta base building stuff that he has planned in the mix too. Should be fun.

was it really 10 years ago?

I sorta can't believe how quickly time can pass. This spring it will have been 10 years since I went backpacking around Europe. It doesn't seem *that* long ago...where does the time go? Anyway I got the chance last week to visit one of my favorite cities from that trip...Prague. I was over in Europe for work, but snunk in an extra day or so and got to see Prague. Here are a few pics:















The Christmas market was in full swing in the main square...here is part of it.






The famous clock in the main square











These things were pretty yummy...sorta a sugary/almond coating














Prague Castle...and the cathedral inside the castle.






















A nativity in the courtyard of the castle.




These guards are great and sorta reminded me of the beefeaters in London, but here you can get up close to them...I actually wanted to take a replicate picture from the time I was there last...but I got too embarrassed to ask a stranger to take a picture of me pretending to push the guard's box over. :-) That is what my picture from 10 years ago is of...me pretending to push the guard box over and the guard just standing there. If I had a friend take a picture of me, i would have done it. It would have been awesome to have two similar photos that were ten years apart, but it took a lot for me to ask a stranger to take my picture in the end and actually that particular picture didn't come out very well anyways.





This strange fried dough with cheese, garlic and ketchup is called a Langose. It was interesting. I made quite the mess of it.
















And one of my favorite places in Prague:
















Charles Bridge, Unfortunately it is undergoing some repairs at the moment.



The rest of my time was spent in Germany for work...The trip to Germany went ok, parts of why I was there went well and parts did not. I now have a bunch of work on my plate because of the parts that didn't go as well as I had hoped. But such is life sometimes.

It was a little odd though because on the plane ride home I had way too much time to sit an think...espeically since I didn't sleep at all from Europe to the states and a lot of the past ten years really hit me in many ways I wasn't expecting. I sorta hate that when I get blindsided by my emotions, but sometimes that is how it goes.

Overall a good trip. I'm a bit jet lagged but seeing that it is 930pm and I didn't not take a nap today even though around 4pm I didn't know if I would make it to 8pm, i think i'm doing OK. Got some good yoga in this morning with my favorite instructor (who I think I overheard that he is leaving...SAD) and even a very short bike ride. A good day.

more fun

After returning from my little excursion to IMAZ this weekend to be an iron spectator, I needed to get in a workout and decided to venture back to crossfit. I'm having a little internal connundrum about whether or not to break up forever with crossfit, maybe I will talk about that later...or not. Anyway on my way to crossfit AGAIN the secret hope was: puuuleeze no pull-ups.I still had some soreness in funny spots from last week's debacle AND my hands are sorta a mess still. They hurt a bit from the rip I have on my left hand and the nice rip on my right thumb. Yes, i'm weak when it comes to pull-ups...and yes these are assisted...still a weakling and can only do 5-8 at one go. We do kipping pullups so there ends up being a lot of friction on the hands, hence a lot of ripped hands. Here is an example of kipping pullups.



So I was none too pleased when I showed up to see "Helen".

3 rounds for time:
400m run
21 kettlebell swings (men 1.5 pood, women 1 pood. pood ~36 pounds)
12 pullups

When I first grabbed a kettle bell and started swinging it I accidentally grabbed the 3/4 pood size which is only 12kg not 16kg (~36lbs). My instructor was quick to point out the difference and 4kg is 8.8lbs and it made a world of difference when I went to swing it. UG. Really had to focus on core and using the hips to get that stupid thing above my head.

The workout chugged along. The pull-ups continued to hate me and me them. I was slow. That's what being away for 2+ months will do to me. Makes me think a bit. But it got done.

I'm having a connundrum around goals and such and crossfit and triathlon and really a lot of things, but it is too muddled to attempt to flush out here. All in good time...all in good time.

Iron Spectating

When katie brought up the idea of going to IM AZ to spectate awhile ago it sounded like it might be a fun filled weekend. Our friend Chris was doing his first IM and Katie's coach (and soon to be mine) CB were competing. Here are a few tips I picked up from the weekend of being an iron spectator.

1. Leave early on friday...getting in at 3am just sets you up for not a lot of sleep for the weekend and going out on Sat night makes Sunday even longer on less sleep. Sleeping is key even for a spectator...its a long day.
   
2. Bringing a bike along can be handy and fun if you have space to pack it. Granted we rode a loop of the course on Saturday and can i say = boring. I can't imagine 3 loops of that endless boring-ness. To all who have done IMAZ...hats off to not falling asleep on the bike.
   
3. If bringing a bike the best kind of get-up would be a ghetto commuter type you don't worry about the bike and get it set it up with toe clips. This way you can just have a simple bike lock if you need to lock it up anywhere and you won't worry about it. We didn't have this set up and then needed to babysit our bikes a lot.
   
4. Talk with the athlete (s) you are tracking and have a general idea when they might show up for different loops and parts of the course. Then have a stop watch to click by when they pass so they are easier to keep track of than this constant conversation: Now what time were they coming by again? It's been X amount of time and they should be where now if they are going X speed? Numbers can get fuzzy after awhile.
5. Don't forget to hydrate, especially in AZ. % humidity = 9%
   
6. Carry snacks.
   
7. Making t-shirts is fun.
   
8. Screaming at the athletes you are following like they are rockstars is equally fun.
   
9. Yelling random people's name on the run is fun, especially if they say thank you or even give you a thumbs up...so don't put your last name on your bib. (you have to start making up games when cheering. It can be tiring... cheering deserves it's own t-shirt: Iron-Cheerleader)
10. Being an iron-cheerleader is hard work but totally worth it when you see the spirit of the athlete you are tracking get lifted just a little bit as they round a corner and head off again.

It was a good, fun, weekend all around.

Exciting things ahead!

No... I am not planning on signing up for 2009...but I will be spectating this weekend for IMAZ! I'm excited. Katie and I are headed out tomorrow after work to make the venture. There are about a zillion and two people from the tri club doing this race...granted I think I know maybe two out of that zillion...but that's ok. (I admit it...I have anti-social tendencies...it takes me awhile to get over my introverted nature...unless you pair me with an extrovert and then they do all the work...um...Katie? :-) ) We are going to cheer on our friend Chris...and I will get to meet my soon to be coach (hmmm...I haven't talked about that yet on my blog have i?) who has coached Katie for the past few months and I have heard a million tales about...it'll be great...and it will be a great weekend...I am sure of it.

Then I will get back to work for just a few short days...eat some yummy turkey and then I'm headed to Europe for work for a week. Germany...brrrrrr...i will have to break out the winter coat but I will get to tour a little of where I am headed off to. I enjoyed Germany back in '99 when I was backpacking around Europe...although i'm not sure if I will hit any of the cities I saw back in '99. Although...I might actually be able to make it to my most favoritest city that I saw while backpacking...Prague...i'm curious how much it has changed in 10 years. We shall see.

So adventures abound! All very exciting.

I'd like the use of my arms now...please??

It really has been too long since i'd been to crossfit. Between being out of town and races on the calendar, I have not made it to crossfit in a very long time. Sadly...very sadly. But now that it is the off season...back AT IT!! I had plans to go today and was inspired to go after Steve's post just the day before about doing a crossfit workout. I do heart crossfit, even if there are times when it makes me want to walk backwards down the stairs because i have such bad DOMS. Somehow I convince myself there will become a 'point' when this will stop happening, but even the 'seasoned' crossfitters in the gym are tired and sore all the time, so that is just a crazy dream.

In my head today: I really hope there are no pull-ups in the workout of the day (WOD)

As I was getting out of the car I looked in the window of the gym and saw lots of people doing pull-ups....i truly almost just turned around and got back in the car. It's not doing the pull-ups that made me want to turn around, its that doing a lot of pull-ups in a WOD tend to tear my hands and considering how long it had been since I had been to crossfit, i didn't have any callouses, so i knew it could get ugly.

The WOD had two parts, the first part was just a lift
5-5-5 SOTTs press
Here is an example of a SOTTs press...its from the crossfit website, but he isn't below parallel on that squat so I would hazard to argue he needs to squat a little bit more. (At least I was told to squat lower than that.) Let's just say...I found some new muscles on my back today. All the way down to my lower back. That is what stopped me from progressing much with the weight as my lower back started to have a panic attack about what I was doing. That kinda wigged me out. It's not like i would have put much more weight on it. I think in the end I was near 30 lbs...i know...i'm a weakling. This move is much harder than it looks though.

Then it was on to the rest of the WOD. Stupidly I waited for the two other guys who had shown up near the time I had...I should have started with out them. They both ended up with the top times for the day...and my time...well...I was battling it out for the slowest position. Anyway the WOD:
3 rounds of the following
25 burpees
25 chest high pull ups (with an assistance band...i'm not that cool yet not to use one)

Hours later... my arms still don't fully work. I hope I can pick up a pen tomorrow. Oh and I did rip my left hand...in an impressive manner too...ick.

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger... I only take solace in the thought that maybe by the time a workout actually kills me I will have built up some cool deltoids. In the meantime, trying to get stronger. Some guy 'complimented' me on finishing the WOD...'way to finish it'...all I could think was: is there another option? I figure if there isn't something physically wrong with me during a WOD, then being slow isn't a reason not to finish. How else will I get stronger?

Just because you *think* you can

Ugh...ever have those moments when you think: Sure I can do *that*...my body feels fine...i'm fine...and then you go to do them and your body says: what are you thinking my friend? That was today for me.

I got down to the velodrome and was very excited to get back on my track bike. Last week my neck was bothering me but I got another spacer put on the stem and it seems to have helped a bit. So as I am headed down to the track initially i don't see anyone on it...which made me concerned that I'll just be by my lonesome and that wouldn't be as much fun. You never know how many people might actually show. Last week the weather was terrible, cold, blustery, looking like rain but something like 8 people showed up. This week was hot and beautiful and as I walked over I didn't know if anyone was actually going to show up. Fortunately there were two other guys from my class and a third who wanted to join in our fun.

We warmed up, my legs felt pretty stiff...very quickly I realized that a lot of times on my road bike I stretch my legs while I coast...but...uh...no.can.do...on a track bike...one must keep pedaling or get catapulted off the bike...so I had to pull off and stretch the legs out. My legs were making some noises about being tired or something. I stretched them and promptly ignored them. Then me and the two guys from my class started doing flying 200 sprints. You have to understand...these are the two fastest guys in the class and i was...uh...one of the slowest in the class. Besides my legs were quickly telling me that just because I think I can go and do some sprints...they were telling me another story. My legs kept whining about the fact I had done a tri the previous day...and I should be doing something less intense (ok i know this...but I so wanted to be on the track...so I just said 'deal with it!'). So I did a few sprints and then headed in for a bit.

I got back on and rode around for a bit...and in the end we did a lot of pace line practice at a good clip so that I could still have fun on the track with all of them and not die...or have my legs fall off in bits and pieces. All in all...good fun. I heart my shiny new track bike.

Do a what?

First off...odd things happen to me sometimes...I know San Diego can be the magnet for lots of people to flock to, but to be having lunch outside at a cafe and see one of my roommates from my Sophomore year in college walking down the street? When I didn't know she lived here? When we went to school near Seattle, WA?? And I haven't seen her since 2001? I went to a small school, but this is the second time in San Diego that I have run into someone from my 3000 people undergrad that I knew. Very weird.

And again...what month is it here? I get confused most days. The past few days have been a little on the toasty side so when my friends brought up doing the tri club's monthly club race this week it was something I considered...but only if they were coming. It was a sprint distance ~800m swim, 12 mile bike and 4 mile run.

This morning when I woke up I was worried I wasn't going to make it. Yesterday my stomach had been bothering me and today didn't seem any better. I'd feel ok one minute and the next I wasn't so sure about it. I'd texted my friend and told him that I didn't know if I would actually race, i'd show up...but i was feeling pretty icky this morning.

I finally talked myself into at least swimming and see how I felt (granted that could turn your stomach on its own...the water in Mission Bay is disgusting). I felt decent through the swim and hopped on my bike and just decided to make a go of the day. I'm glad I did. I had a good day. The bike proved yet again that my bike split from Oct wasn't a fluke and it was actually probably true. Riding the track has dramatically improved my bike speed...as in a 3mph improvement in speed since May. (And I have not been doing much of much on my bike all summer either. ) This is why I am hooked on the track. (that and it is fun)

The run was pretty uneventful. In sprint races I don't give much thought to 'pacing'...just go hard. The first 2 mile loop was ok for most of it, but then my sour stomach decided to remind me that maybe i should take it a little easier. I came close to meeting my breakfast at one point. One the last lap I thought I was closer to the finish and made a push to pass a woman who was in front of me only to realize I had a lot further to go...and then I didn't have much to push with. Sadly she picked me off as I lost some steam. Maybe if I had played that a little better I would have done better, but no matter. Live and learn. That's part of it.

Overall I was happy with the race. I'm glad my stomach behaved and I had a great morning.

Not feelin it

I don't want to. I'm hungry. It's the off season. What's one more day? Bla. I don't wanna. Who cares?

And a myriad of other excuses floated through my head today as I drove towards the pool. I have done not much of anything this week and while the weekend was full of fun and bikes, and birthday fun...i just have been bla about much of anything off season related. I know I need to get back into a pattern of doing something but today I really just didn't want to. No good excuse. (when is there a good excuse?) So I bargained...do 500m of the 1500m swim planned and if after 500 you want out...then get out.

100 meters into the swim I was chastising myself for the stumbling block I had created for myself with not wanting to go to the pool. I was happy. Sooooo happy I even made myself do two sets of 5 x 50s on a minute, where I go all out for a 50 and then have whatever is left of a minute to rest until the next 50. I typically sprint a 50 around 45s to 50s so it's not much rest and by the last 50 i have to focus pretty hard on keeping any semblance of form.

But right before my second set of 5 x 50s I had an out. I was being booted out of my lane by the swimming teacher who needed my lane. So I hopped out of the pool and blankly contemplated ditching the last 5 x 50s and my cool down. I mean I had an excuse at that point. AND I was going to have to make some people circle swim which I wasn't sure they would be that excited about. And then...the most unlikely candidate (in my book) to volunteer to make their lane circle swim starting making his lap lane partner circle swim. Yes the 17 year old teenager made his friend start circle swimming so I could join in. I hadn't even asked. When a 17 year old boy sees that this woman has been forced out of her lane and is standing trying to figure out what to do...and takes the initiative to volunteer his lane...that kid has some great manners. And really at that point I had no excuse not to finish. So finish I did and I was so happy I had done it.

I should actually write a post

I should actually write a post or something...but that funny thing called life keeps screwing up everything and then I don't have any time. Here is a brief synopsis of the past week:

• Work = good...went to a good conference this week
• Weekend = awesome...birthday bike ride on Sat (birthday tomorrow)...awesome.
• Breakfast/lunch after bike ride = awesome.
• Dim sum with friends today = yummy
• Maiden voyage of track bike ride on SHINY NEW BIKE = awesome but very windy(...no..san diego's velodrome is sadly NOT inside...who's bright idea was that?)and dim sum is a little heavy on the tummy to then go ride the track.
  
• Hanging out with friends tonight = good but their new dog-o tried to eat me. I wasn't a fan. (even though i've met the dog before...very weird).
  

Been an AWESOME weekend aside from the fact it still sorta appears that my apartment threw up on itself. The past two weeks of traveling have left things in a bit of a disarray, but i think i have it under control now. I need those little mice from Cinderella to come and tidy my apartment. That would make things so much easier.

What is life without a little chaos mixed in?

My life lately = chaos...but then again if you know me then rocketpants = chaos. Or at least that is how I feel most of the time. I run around like a crazy person, trying to keep a zillion plates spinning at any given time and then thrown in a good dose of quirky personality and well...you get = me...my life and a good does of hilarity mixed in with a good does of chaos.

I've been in Houston, TX all week for an experimental trial. After the first day of feeling like an utter failure because I couldn't get my control to work...finally sorted that out and life did look up a bit after that. Good stuff came to fruition and well...i made probably more samples than I know what to do with. It's going to be an interesting time trying to analyze everything.

While in Houston...i discovered that I would be going to Chicago this week for some training. I was surprised I would get to go...so double props to things that help us with our jobs...but...NO TRACK BIKE RIDING!! For a SECOND WEEK!!! ARRRRRRRRGGGGGG. And it is the LAST week of class. I.AM.SO.BUMMED. I missed it last week and now I will miss it this week...and well....i HEART my bike!! I haven't gotten to try now the new steed in all of his glory yet on the track...but plans are in the works for next weekend. sigh

So I got back from Houston on Friday and on my way from the airport I see this guy on a bike...dressed as a...COW. It took me a minute to remember it was Halloween...it would have been way funnier if it hadn't been. After I get home and am trying to sort myself out because I had planned on doing Tour de Julian with a couple of friends of mine the next day. Julian is known for its apple pie (and hills)...so I just saw this as a great excuse to eat apple pie. A nice bike ride and mix it up with some pie after...right? 55 miles of Tour de Apple Pie. YEA! That is how I had it marked out in my head.

Now all is seemingly fine but I have to make a simple thing like doing a bike ride complicated. It wouldn't be me if I didn't...so I had to have the added: Sure i'll do the ride but I need my friend Kim to pick me up...totally out of her way...because I had dropped my car off during the week at the shop so they could fix the dumb check engine light. Now I was going to grab the car on the way back from the bike ride...but the car is 20minutes away from my house. I flew in late on Friday and am trying to sort my life out when at 11:50PM i discover...i have no shoes or helmet and my arm warmers and cycling jacket are: in.my.car! ARGGGGGGGGG!

Desperate text messages, phone messages and emails get thrown at Kim as I am just hoping that somehow my telepathic skills are working and she will get my messages and call me. We somehow manage to get every thing together at a very early time saturday morning...pick up the car (as the shop said I could just grab it when I got back), get the stuff and meet up with our other friend Laura and head out. WHEW.

Now chaos is pretty much the theme of the morning by this point and the beautiful thing about going on a bike ride is you don't have to start with the group...uh...or even close to when they start...yea...we took our time and finally got on the road some 30 minutes after the group left. No matter. We had a group of 5 and enjoyed the day. It was a beautiful ride and all was pretty spectacular weather wise granted the last 20 miles or so the WIND had picked up and was quite the tyrant.

Most of the second half of the ride is downhill...and me...i don't mind going UP the hills...but coming back down them can be another story. If it is a technically curvy decent...me.no.happy...but just generally a downhill...i'm ok...but i sorta wish I had a little dish of fearless in me a little more coming down a hill. But this time...the wind is hitting us from the front and the side and I am torn between not wanting to go as fast down the hills and the reality that if i don't keep pedaling and in the drops that the wind is going to quite literally throw me off the bike. So I tuck in and keep reminding myself about the physics of the bike when the wind picks up: a faster spinning object is more stable...so...spin!

Overall, the ride was fantastic. Great friends to ride with AND...even with our 30 minute later start and the reality we were one of the last groups coming off of the road, THERE WAS SOME APPLE PIE LEFT!! Actually they still had 3 apple pies! Props to the organizers for enough apple pie for everyone. When we rolled in...i just bee lined it for the apple pie...didn't even put my bike away...still had my helmet on..chowing down on the apple pie. It was awesome. YUM...Tour de Apple Pie...gotta love it.

Today I even threw down an 8 mile run and would have done 10 if the dark hadn't closed in and every car on the street suddenly decided they wanted to run over me. After 6 near misses in 5 blocks I called it good and headed in.

A great weekend!

Shiny.New.BIKE!!!

But in blue...

Life is more fun without brakes...

At it again

My track bike class when I first started off in the class I was actually not too thrilled with it. No brakes, can't stop pedaling, sorta freaky....but i now LOVE it to the point that I am looking at buying a track bike. But the point is...i LOVE the track. Tonight i had SO MUCH FUN!! We were doing this race where you have 6 laps...and the group was broken into two groups. The slower group got a head start (me...and 3 other people) and the goals were A)Don't get cought by the faster group and B) try to win the race. Whoever got across the line first in 6 laps wins!

By lap 3 it was me and two other people in the slower group that got the head start. By lap two it was just me and one other guy and by the last lap it was me and the other guy just going all out trying to beat each other and not get caught by the faster group behind us. I was half way around the track on the last lap and I realized....I WAS LEADING THE RACE!!!!!!! All i could think was: i'm not being lapped, and no one is ahead of me...and I AM LEADING...what is going on?

IT.WAS.SO.CLOSE. The guy I had been working with up until the last lap from the slower group beat me by inches. I was gutted. But it was awesome because we never got caught! YEA!!! Who cares if I was in the group that got the head start? :-) I had a fun night.

I went from being wary of the track and really wondering if I would enjoy all 6 sessions to wanting to buy a track bike and hang out at the velodrome all the time.I don't know what has gotten into me lately!